Republican presidential candidate Paul Rand is taking a swing through Minnesota Monday, delivering what his campaign calls a “unique” message to college students.

All three of Paul’s stops are geared to students. The first two are on campus at the University of Minnesota and University of Minnesota-Duluth. The third is in Rochester.

In a phone interview during a campaign swing through South Carolina, Paul explained his appeal to students in a single phrase: “phone warrants.” 

“Students believe that the government shouldn’t collect your records,” he said. “They believe that the government went too far in collecting all of our phone records.” 

The U.S. senator from Kentucky is largely credited with temporarily stopping the renewal of the Patriot Act, the set of laws enacted after the 9/11 terrorist attacks that gave the U.S. government virtually unlimited access to American phone records. After its forced expiration, President Obama signed the renewal in early June.

Paul is milking that victory and his libertarian credentials in speeches and rallies at college campuses nationwide. In Minnesota, Rand’s father, Ron Paul, had a similar approach during his presidential campaign in 2012. It resonated so well that the delegates who went to the Republican National Convention that year cast their votes for Paul over Mitt Romney.

“Frankly [today], Minnesota needs Republican like me,” Rand Paul said.  “I think Minnesotans want to be left alone.”

In national polls, Paul continues to hover around 4 percent, allowing him to make the cut for the fourth Republican debate Tuesday. Paul’s appearance in Minnesota comes on the eve of the Fox Business Network debate, where he will be one of eight candidates on stage in a newly winnowed field. 

I asked him what he hoped to communicate in this smaller group. “I’m really the only fiscal conservative on the stage because I’m willing to hold the line on military and domestic spending,” he replied.

He elaborated that his tax plan demonstrated that commitment by leveraging a 14.5 percent flat tax to cover all domestic spending, including Social Security and Medicare.

Under the Paul tax proposals, those programs would get priority funding but enrollment would be raised from 65 to age 70 over the course of a generation. “If you want to save Medicare and you want to save Social Security you have to raise the age,” he said. “You don’t have a choice, because we are living longer and our families are getting smaller, so you have to raise the age.”   

At a Students for Rand rally at the University of Minnesota, Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul led with the one-two punch of his appeal for younger voters.

The U.S. senator from Kentucky began his speech to about 200 people, mostly students, by stoking concerns about privacy. “I don’t want a government that’s looking at all my phone records. I don’t want a government that has the ability to collect them all and send them to some billion-dollar underground facility in Utah,” he said.  

“They’re also collecting your credit card confirmation,” he said.  “The government —it’s none of their damn business what you do with your credit card."

Next up was reducing criminal penalties for marijuana. “I’m not here to advocate for marijuana, I’m here to advocate for freedom,” he said. 

Paul made sure to differentiate himself from that other candidate reaching out to young voters. “If you think, wow, Bernie’s great, Bernie [Sanders] wants to give me free stuff … there is no free lunch. Bernie can only pay for your college by taking it from somebody else,” he said.

Paul’s remarks appeared to resonate with the crowd that responded with subdued applause but stayed in their chairs for the duration of his 30-minute speech.

U of M student Spencer Gressen, of White Bear Lake, typified the audience. “I’m interested in anything political,” Gressen said. “He’s a libertarian and I myself am a libertarian.”

Paul is only the second presidential candidate to visit the state. The other was Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who ended his candidacy last month. Like Walker, Paul has an affinity for Minnesota. The state’s delegates to the Republican National Convention in 2012 backed his father, Ron Paul. 

For Rand Paul to get to that point, he needs to persuade the elusive young voter and other supporters to go to precinct caucuses on March 1. He says he’s relying on the intangible – “We have more committed voters” – and the concrete – “We put people in place on the ground.”

Paul hovers around 4 percent support in most national polls, well behind Ben Carson and Donald Trump. But he said he believes neither Carson nor Trump will be the nominee, citing the same polls that show a majority of Republican voters are uncommitted as the Republican field heads to debate No. 4 tonight in Milwaukee.

MinnPost photo by Brian Halliday

Andy Aplikowski

The endorsing convention Saturday to replace retired GOP state senator Branden Petersen took a familiar turn. 

District 35 delegates, from Anoka, Andover and Ramsey, endorsed Andy Aplikowski, a well-known Republican Party activist. But to win the seat in a special election February 9, Aplikowski will have to defeat a respected Republican, former state Rep. Jim Abeler, in a January 12 primary. 

Abeler tried for the endorsement, even though he said from the start he would not abide by it.  That appeared to make the difference for the 138 delegates who gave Aplikowski the endorsement on the fourth ballot, after two other candidates — Brad Sunderland and Don Huizenga — dropped out.

Republicans have represented the district so long that no one can name that last Democrat who got elected. But the politics of Senate District 35 are more intriguing than the general election results might indicate. 

There’s a libertarian vein that helped propel Branden Petersen to office and that was likely to re-elect him, despite his controversial vote in favor of same-sex marriage in 2013. 

Aplikowski, who criticized Petersen’s vote, indirectly addressed the issue in his remarks.  “We deserve a senator who respects all of our principles,” he told the group assembled at Oak View Middle School in Andover.

Abeler was a member of the Minnesota House when the gay marriage vote was taken. He voted against it. But before that, he was one of a small group of Republicans that voted to override then Gov. Pawlenty’s veto of a transportation bill in 2008. He has a reputation as an independent thinker who put his stamp on major health care and education bills.

He said he worked to be part of the endorsement process, but there’s more involved. “While the party endorsement is useful there are 85,000 people out there, many of whom know me and are cheering me on to run,” he said. “Many people, even delegates and officials in the party, have encouraged me to run in the primary. This is the first step of many.”

MinnPost photo by Brian Halliday

Former state Rep. Jim Abeler

Aplikowski said this campaign will be different for Abeler. “Jim Abeler has represented the district a long time but he’s never had to run against an endorsed candidate,” he said. “That’s a huge advantage to me, where I’m actually going to be able to go into this with the party working to support me. “

Abeler and Aplikowski are both expected to have relatively solid groups of core supporters, but they have some challenges before either takes on presumed DFL-endorsed candidate Roger Johnson in a special election February 9. The January primary date will require campaigning over the holidays and during less than ideal weather conditions. 

The GOP primary will also test just how much the Republican Party's endorsement makes a difference in the outcome of a contest involving two capable candidates. 

At the first formal debate of Republicans trying to capture the seat that GOP Rep. John Kline is vacating in the Second Congressional District, there was minimal difference in the five candidates’ approach to federal policy.

There was, however, a difference in style. Former radio host Jason Lewis, state Rep. Pam Myrha, former state Sen. John Howe, businessman David Gerson and newcomer David Benson-Staebler staked out territory that could be described, respectively, as voluble, nice, workmanlike, passionate and tentative.

At a well-attended forum in Inver Grove Heights, each candidate came out strongly in favor of education vouchers, the elimination or drastic reduction in the scope of the Department of Energy, and stronger borders to control immigration. 

Questions on Social Security and taxes produced the most difference of opinions, as well as  an opportunity for Lewis to display the skills he accumulated as a talk show host.

Gerson and Howe advocated means testing to determine future Social Security benefits. Lewis responded with a history lesson and policy detail. “If you means test, and even FDR understood this when it was created, you turn Social Security into a welfare program… You won’t have any support,” he said. “Means testing or lifting the cap on taxes is not the answer. The answer is turning COLA benefits into a chained CPI and raising the retirement age for younger workers.”

On reforming the tax code, Howe called for a consumption tax, a policy he said was revenue neutral when promoted it to balance the state budget. That response led to one-on-one charges and counters between Howe and Lewis.

“Especially for you seniors out there, after a lifetime of paying income taxes, now you’re going to get hit with a 23 percent consumption tax at the federal level,” Lewis said.  “And second of all John, I would say in your sales tax hike of $800 million that you were negotiating with Gov. Dayton, the Senate majority leader said there were no offsets in the bill, it was just a pure tax increase…. And my old buddy John Howe was the swing vote in the Senate taxes committee to get the Vikings stadium on the floor. He then voted against it, so I guess he was for it before he was against it.”

Howe seemed startled at the comments. “I’m glad that Mr. Lewis sees me as the candidate to beat,” he said, defending his vote for the new Vikings stadium. “I was voting for that stadium when it was user fees, user fees only.”

Then it was Howe’s turn to pounce.  “Now Mr. Jason’s walked off his radio show and started this gold coin thing,” he said. (Lewis started a website, Galt.io, that uses a virtual currency to invest in libertarian causes.) “That’s more like a Ponzi scheme than anything else. And now he’s here looking for a job.”

Gerson and Myhra were muted compared to Lewis and Howe, but each had a cluster of supporters who clapped and cheered at their responses. Benson-Staebler, a St. Olaf graduate with a background in political consulting, sparked some curiosity in the crowd but seemed unclear in his answers. 

The debate concluded with acknowledgement that the GOP candidate will have a tough race against the eventual Democratic nominee in a district that, once safely Republican, is seen as a toss-up next November.

The Republican Second Congressional District debate, courtesy of the UpTake.

David Benson-Staebler

David Benson-Staebler, Republican candidate for John Kline’s seat in the Second Congressional District, has already made quite an impression among the activists and obsessives paying attention to the race at this early stage — largely due to the candidate's comments in an introductory news release and on social media.   

Among other things, in a news release distributed at the first Republican candidate debate, Benson-Staebler called Black Lives Matter “a ruinous movement which… has done tremendous damage to African-American and its own communities.”

Then there was this: “For the good many, I would seriously consider punitive punishments against anyone violating the law out of a bigotry against my being Caucasian, male, and heterosexual as prejudice.”

In an email follow up to my questions, he wrote: “BLM has been based on lies and bigotry from the beginning and was fostered as a prep-for-get-out-the-vote for Democrats from the beginning … As reflects the style of President Obama-era DNC tactics, the movement does not seek racial equality and perverts the teaching of Martin Luther King Jr.” 

Benson-Staebler has echoed those remarks with similar posts on Twitter. Such extreme comments — coupled with Benson-Staebler’s previous work as an operative for Democratic candidates in Virginia and New York — have actually prompted suspicions that he is not a Republican candidate at all, but a mischief-maker solely in the race to offer inflammatory rhetoric that will taint the entire Republican field.

At least two other candidates’ campaigns have referenced the issue, albeit indirectly. Andy Parrish, a consultant for state representative Pam Myhra, one of the other four GOP candidates competing to replace Kline, said: “While some people might seem to polarize and divide the party, Pam Myhra has a record of uniting people from all across the spectrum and all walks of life.”

Noah Rouen, a spokesman for the race’s most high-profile candidate, former radio host Jason Lewis, offered: "Jason's campaign is focused on bringing people together. With a $20 trillion national debt and growing crisis abroad, Minnesota's second congressional district needs someone who understands the issues and has real solutions to the serious problems facing our district and nation." 

Benson-Staebler, 29, said division is not the purpose of his condemnation of Black Lives Matter, even as he proceded to go further with an explanation of his views.

“The biggest hate problem of today is African-Americans against Caucasians,” he said. “Just look at when someone said they were going to shoot white kids on the University of Chicago campus.”

If his Republican competitors question Staebler-Benson’s positions, he is not surprised. “I understand if different generations don’t see it the way I do,” he said.

Benson-Staebler’s positions on the economy, Social Security, and terrorism — as he expressed them at the debate two weeks ago  — are similar to those of GOP competitors Lewis, Myhra, John Howe and David Gerson.

But his views shift toward the libertarian on social issues. “I know people in Minneapolis who are same sex and married and they’ve been together for decades.  The idea of them not having the access and the treatment that’s necessary for their union would be wrong,” he said.  He added he does not endorse the U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the issue.  “It seemed to be that the court was making a law, which is not the court’s job,” he said.

On abortion he says, “With the degree that I am pro-life, I begin with fewer abortions, fewer later abortions and more support for motherhood and parenthood.”

Benson-Staebler said his political change of heart evolved over time, starting from his days as a philosophy major at St. Olaf College. He currently lives in Morris, about 200 miles away from the Second Congressional District, adding another question mark about his candidacy. He says he is planning to move into the district shortly. 

Still, he insists that his candidacy is no prank. “Doing this is not necessarily a fun job, it’s not necessarily about being liked,” he said.

As for his view on race, equality, and Black Lives matter, he says, “I am ready to defend them.”

Minnesota’s most ardent Republican activists have shown a preference for the most conservative Republican candidate for president.

In a straw poll taken at the party’s meeting of its central committee over the weekend, 32 percent of the group cast their vote for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, followed by 16 percent for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, and 11.7 percent for Carly Fiorina.

The 283 delegates who voted are a fraction of the people expected to show up for the Republican caucuses on March 1, of course, and represent the most conservative wing of the party. (At the same gathering in 2012, the straw poll favored Rick Santorum, who gathered less than one percent support this year.)

More than just offering a snapshot of delegates’ preferences at this early date, though, the poll tells campaigns how active to make their Minnesota operations.

For the Cruz campaign, it’s obvious. “The next stage is drilling down into every single senate district and BPOU [basic political operating units, the smallest organizational units in the party] and making sure we are organized,” said Brandon Lerch, Minnesota director for the Cruz campaign.

For the remaining campaigns, the weekend vote gives them a start value. Like national preference polling, it will help decide whether a candidate still has a shot, or has settled so far down in the pecking order that the campaign goes into suspension.

Among other things, the straw poll also demonstrated party activists’ tendency to buck trends. Frontrunners Donald Trump and Ben Carson earned 10 percent and eight percent of the vote.

Rand Paul, whose father Ron Paul ultimately carried the Minnesota delegation’s votes to the 2012 Republican National Convention, won 10 percent of the vote. Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Chris Christie, and Mick Huckabee barely made a dent, each gathering just over or under one percent of the vote of the delegates. 

Rep. Ron Erhardt

The man who gave Democrats their first legislative seat representing Edina in modern history is facing a re-election challenge from within the DFL.

Heather Edelson, a former child advocate with Hennepin County, is running for the DFL endorsement against 11-term incumbent and former Republican Ron Erhardt in House District 49A. 

Edelson said she felt the “time is right” for her to make a move into politics, an arena in which she has no previous experience. “By all means I am a political outsider,” she said. “We all start somewhere. Ron didn’t start out with experience.”

Edelson, 34, called Erhardt to let him know of her decision.

Erhardt’s response was typically blunt. “I told her, ‘You’ve got to work your buns off over there,’ ” he said. “And I told her, ‘You’re going to have to raise one hundred thousand dollars. That’s how much it costs now in this district.’”

Erhardt, 86, is one of the most experienced members in the Minnesota Legislature. He served as Edina’s state representative for nine terms as a Republican, focusing on transportation, and joined a handful of other GOP legislators to override then-Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s veto of a transportation funding bill.

In 2008, he lost the party endorsement to the more conservative Keith Downey, who won the seat and is now chair of the Republican Party of Minnesota. 

Erhardt said he came back as a DFLer because he was frustrated by being consistently relegated as a moderate Republican to “the back row” by caucus leadership. He won in 2012 and 2014. 

He is known for his candor and his eccentricity. In May, when lawmakers were responding to outbreak of avian flu, he put on a lab coat and stethoscope and attempted a humorous speech on the House floor about the dangers of eating infected turkey. He later apologized. 

Heather Edelson

Erhardt seems genuinely puzzled by Edelson’s challenge.

“When you want to run against an entrenched incumbent is when he’s doing something wrong,” he said. “Or when he’s a bad person. I’m doing good things and I'm a good person.”

Edelson acknowledges Erhardt’s accomplishments, but would go in a different direction, with a concentration on mental health services and disability advocacy guided by her own experience as the mother of special need twins.   

Edelson said she plans to abide by the DFL endorsement, scheduled for the district convention in April. Erhardt dodged the question, saying, “It’s early in the game.”

On the Republican side, Dario Anselmo, who lost to Erhardt in 2014, will make a second run for the seat. It continues to be an important piece of political real estate for both parties.

At a meeting of Republican activists last weekend, where a straw poll was taken on presidential preference, the Donald Trump campaign presence was minimal and, with 10 percent of the vote, so, apparently was his popularity.

But while many in the group found much to dislike about Trump, there were sidebar conversations to the effect that Trump is getting some things right.

Janet Beihoffer, the state party’s national Republican committeewoman, was at that meeting. She heard some of those comments, which she says are similar to what she hears as she talks to Republicans and nonpolitical types around the state.

My colleague Eric Black identified the emotional nerve Trump is striking – “Why Donald Trump’s poll numbers keep going up and up,” as well as the political canniness of his proposal on Muslims – “Two and a half reactions to Trump’s idea of banning Muslims from entering the U.S.”

Beihoffer wouldn’t comment on the politics of Trump’s proposal, but said from what she hears, there’s more than emotion at work.

"Donald Trump is verbalizing people’s frustration — right now, it’s immigration. But, people are afraid for other reasons: Jobs are disappearing (Disney hires foreign workers to do American jobs and makes Americans train them before they can leave); wages are stagnant (if someone has a job); addressing terror is confined to verbal semantics; costs are rising; health insurance premiums are skyrocketing; security at airports is questionable at best (how many security checks have failed?).

Janet Beihoffer

"And people don’t see the political elite addressing these problems — many of which could be fixed if the laws on the books were enforced.

"You wonder why people support Donald Trump? He put these issues on the table. People are scared that the America they knew is disappearing. They elected people to enforce the law and provide growth solutions. They are not seeing it.

"Their frustration is being addressed by Donald Trump. Will they all vote for him? I don’t know, but I do know the frustration out there is alive and well and Donald Trump is tapping into it,” she said.

Beihoffer’s conversations with activists may appear to contradict the flood of Republican criticism of Trump’s proposals. They are definitely anecdotal. But they illustrate how, even among people who turned their back on Trump in a straw poll, there is a measure of support for the issues that are the core of his campaign for president.

The Ted Cruz campaign for president took a chance booking a venue as large as the Harriet Island Pavilion in St. Paul for a rally. 

Not to worry. Thursday night, 500-plus Cruz supporters packed the place, a testament to the Texas senator's increasing strength in the Republican field of presidential candidates. They cheered, hooted, and hollered at the candidate who spits out bites of his conservative philosophy with a Texas drawl and John Wayne simplicity.

When he is president, he said, “We will have a president willing to utter the words ‘radical Islamic terrorism.’ ” 

When he is president, he said, “We will take on … the alphabet soup of federal agencies that descend like locusts,” destroying businesses.

When he is president, he said, he would padlock the IRS building and “take all 90 thousand [employees] and put them down on our southern border.” “That’s somewhat tongue in cheek,” he added, addressing the qualifier to the national and local media in attendance. 

His supporters say they believe he will keep his promises. “I like that he’s bold. I like that he says he what thinks, that he’s willing to stand up to bullies,” said Jessie Nordvall of Savage.

Cruz displayed that directness to reporters as he doubled-down on positions he took during the Republican candidate debate Tuesday. “I oppose amnesty. I oppose citizenship. I oppose legalization for those here illegally,” he said, referring to the jousting match between him and Sen. Marco Rubio about immigration legislation.

He scorned criticism from Hillary Clinton and others that his proposal to “carpet-bomb” ISIS strongholds was naïve foreign policy.  “Democrats and many of their supporters in the mainstream media have howled loudly at the notion that we would have a commander in the chief that would actually stand up and be serious about defeating ISIS,” he said. “If am elected president, we will not weaken, we will not degrade ISIS. We will utterly destroy ISIS. We will carpet bomb them into oblivion and any militant across the face of the planet will understand if they go and join ISIS, if they take up arms and wage jihad against innocent Americans they are signing their death warrant.”

Comments like that are “hurtful, divisive, and downright dangerous rhetoric,” said Minnesota DFL party chair Ken Martin in a statement.   

But Minnesota Republicans, like conservatives in other caucus states where Cruz is focusing his efforts, appear to be coalescing around his candidacy. By a two to one margin, Cruz won a recent straw poll taken at a Minnesota GOP leadership convention. His state campaign says Cruz is now well positioned to win the Minnesota Republican caucuses on March 1.

“People are tired of what I call campaign conservatives, people who talk a good game on the trail but haven’t walked the walk,” Cruz said before he addressed the crowd. He referred to supporters as “that old Reagan coalition come back together,” who during the caucus and primary season next year will unite behind his candidacy. 

Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign efforts in Minnesota are ramping up a notch.  

The senator’s operation, chaired by former GOP gubernatorial candidate Jeff Johnson, is working to secure a Rubio visit and is soon expected to release of roster of prominent political supporters in Minnesota.

The targets of this attention are the 50,000 or so Republican voters who will attend the state’s March 1 precinct caucuses and cast a binding presidential preference vote.   

“Our focus right now is solely on getting Marco Rubio supporters to show up on March 1,” said Johnson. “Our hope is to win the caucus and bring more delegates for Rubio [to the Republican National Convention] than anyone else.”

In a December straw poll conducted at a state Republican party leadership meeting, Rubio placed a distant second to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who subsequently made a well-attended campaign stop in St. Paul. But Rubio’s supporters contend that he holds a competitive position among caucus goers in Minnesota, similar to other states where Rubio polls well against Cruz and Donald Trump.

“I think if I had to tell you one complaint over the past 20 some years of activists, it's that we don’t pick a conservative that has a message that resonates among non-conservatives,” Johnson said. “Marco is able to do that.”

“We expected the straw poll results,” said Greg Peppin, an experienced political hand and volunteer member of Rubio’s state leadership team. Peppin said there is no question that as the primary season proceeds, candidates will drop out. 

“So where do those supporters go?” he asked. “You can draw a logical conclusion that Rubio stands to gain exponentially more than Cruz would.”

Jeff Johnson

Former state Sen. Amy Koch is a Rubio supporter.  She’s comfortable with where Rubio places in the pack. “He’s been doing well in the debates,” she said. “He’s going to be top three in Iowa and New Hampshire.”  And Koch agrees with Peppin that Rubio is acceptable to supporters of Carly Fiorina, Jeb Bush, and Chris Christie. “You start to come to a candidate that unifies and besides being a young Latino, he can unite us.” 

Peppin says the Rubio operation consists of 50-plus volunteers working to recruit caucus goers at the precinct level, plus a dozen members of his leadership team.

Although the structure of the organizations differ, the size of Rubio's team is on par with that of the Cruz, Rand Paul and Fiorina campaigns in Minnesota, though the latter three have paid directors who organize teams of volunteers.

As much as anything, the time and effort these campaigns are devoting to Minnesota demonstrate the anything-is-possible nature of the competition for the Republican nomination that could still be in question when Republicans meet in July in Cleveland. 

Minnesota Speaker of the House Kurt Daudt said that he doubts there will be a special legislative session.

“I think it’s probably not real likely were gonna end up having a special session,” he told a meeting of the Republican Seniors of Minnesota in Bloomington earlier this week.  “We’re about two months from the beginning of our regular session and there’s a point at which it just becomes – it doesn’t make a lot of sense for us to call everybody back in for a one day special session.” 

In an interview, Daudt expounded on his reluctance. “We’re still open to it, but it’s not likely to happen simply because there are so many issues on the table,” he said. “The more issues you get on the table the more difficult it is for everybody to agree.” 

Daudt and DFL Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk have organized working groups to reach consensus on a host of issues: additional unemployment benefits for steel workers on the Iron Range; compliance with the federal regulation for enhanced security information on state driver’s licenses; and addressing income disparities between black and white Minnesotans. 

But Daudt said he’s not a fan of pre-agreeing on bills to be considered at a special session, a practice used to ensure that the sessions run smoothly and quickly.  “I really don’t like that because I’m kind of signing away my members’ constitutional right to debate and offer amendments,” he said.   

Gov. Mark Dayton has given legislative leaders a Friday deadline to decide if there is enough progress to warrant a special session. If not, Daudt said, “It doesn’t mean that we can’t take up these issues… really early in the regular session.”

House Republicans will focus on two priorities in the regular session, Daudt told the gathering of more than 100 GOP seniors: tax relief and transportation. 

He predicted Republicans would offer a transportation bill that he says would put “$6 or $7 billion into roads and bridges over ten years and do it without raising any taxes.” He noted that Dayton has said he does not expect a gas tax increase to be part of the transportation debate.

On tax relief, Daudt was specific. “One of the things that I really care about and that I want to accomplish is exempting social security income [from the state income tax],” he said.   “We are one of seven states in the country that taxes social security income. That’s going to be a huge priority of ours this session.”

To that, the Republican Seniors of Minnesota responded with a sustained burst of applause.

The focus of the Center of the American Experiment will not change under the direction of its new president, John Hinderaker. 

But the style will. 

Hinderaker succeeds Mitch Pearlstein, who founded the Minneapolis think tank 25 years ago. Hinderaker, who just retired as a law partner at Faegre Baker Daniels, already had a successful sideline as the founder of Power Line, the conservative blog where he and his colleagues launch verbal grenades at such targets as President Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton, Donald Trump, gun control and global warming, and where he will continue to be a contributor. 

In an interview with MinnPost, Hinderaker explained his plan to make Minnesota, and the world, more aware of the center’s policy initiatives on education, the economy, family, and the environment: 

MinnPost: Does a think tank still have role in the political world today, where the public seems to be less interested in policy and more in venting their anger and frustration? 

John Hinderaker: The center has an absolutely vital role to play here in Minnesota. To start with, politicians in general don’t lead, they follow. And they follow where the voters want to take them. So I think the vital task is much more important than lobbying around the edges. With some laws, the vital task is to communicate with people and to educate people on issues they care about like, for example, the state of Minnesota’s economy, like education. These are things that voters do care about and I think the center as a think tank is really uniquely positioned to communicate substantative facts and ideas to voters. I think ultimately that’s what’s going to change the political philosophical culture in Minnesota.

MP: So you’re confident that voters today are still willing to listen to policy ideas and not simple and simplified solutions?

JH: Sure. I’m not saying every voter is a policy wonk. That’s obviously not true, but as I said before, there are certain issues that people are concerned about, and the economy and education are two. I think one thing that an organization like the center can do, that political organizations are not good at doing, is to disseminate information to Minnesotans. For example, I think people believe that our economy is doing much better than it actually is, relative to other states. Some on the left are holding up Minnesota [as evidence] that the blue state model can still work, is still viable. One thing we can do and will do … is to inform some basic realities about how the state is really performing. 

MP: What is the misinformation you think Minnesotans have about our economy?

JH: For example, over the last 10 years Minnesota has ranked … 30th in the rate of job growth; 32nd in per capita income growth; 36th in disposable income growth — the difference obviously being due to our high taxes. That’s below average performance over the last 10 years and I don’t think most people in Minnesota know that. What we really want to do by disseminating that kind of information is stimulate discussion and debate. I want a lot of Minnesotans to say, 'Gosh, I thought we were doing better than that.' A tag line you are going to see repeatedly in our videos and our ads is Minnesota can do better. To be interested in solutions, people first have to perceive there is a problem.

MP: There are statistics and rankings that contradict your premise – studies that show Minnesota ranks high in its work force, high in innovation with sectors like medical technology …

JH: In its time, when they were newer, rising companies, as opposed to mature companies, the medical products companies that we have in Minnesota — which are fantastic companies, no doubt about it — were very high tech. And they still are, in a way, but if you look at the Kauffman Index on innovation, we rank very, very low. We were the original Silicon Valley.

MP: So what do you think happened?

JH: We have taxes that are way to high. We have stultifying regulations. We have a political culture that is way too complacent. Part of the problem is that we Minnesotans have been way too complacent, way too easily persuaded that we’ve got the right solutions, we’re doing things the right way. Everybody else should learn from us. While we have been resting on our laurels, the truth is we have been slipping behind. 

MP: Do you plan to take the center’s policy initiatives in a different direction?

JH: No. We’re not going to go in a different policy direction. What we are going to do is broaden our efforts at communication. Historically, the center, like most think tanks, has really undertaken to communicate with a pretty limited audience: the relatively limited number of people who are interested in things like research papers and programs about public policy issues. That’s a relatively thin slice. It’s an important slice, but I think that to really impact Minnesota’s political culture — and I mean that in the broad sense, not in the partisan sense, but in the broad sense of philosophically of how people feel, how they think about government — to be really influential we’ve just got to talk to a lot more people. I want to be communicating to millions of Minnesotans.  And I know a little bit about doing that. I know a little bit about mass communication.

MP: You mention the need to go beyond partisanship, although your Power Line blog is quite partisan. How do you mesh the two ventures?

JH: They are totally different entities. [But] I am going to use the Power Line to promote the center. And I am going to use the center’s content … as a source of supply for Power Line. But they are operating in different media. They’re different entities. They’ll remain different.

MP: Does Minnesota have a role to play in developing national policies?

JH: Absolutely, the distinction between local issues and national issues is just almost obliterated these days. Any local issue you can talk about is reflected on the national scene.

MP: How are you planning on doing that?

JH: Research papers, which lead to op-eds and which give rise to radio advertising and Internet videos. We are going to record our first radio ads next week, and I think our first Internet video is going to be finished tomorrow and you’ll be seeing some of these things.

MP: Were you always a conservative?

JH: Oh heck, no [laughs]. At one time I was way, way over on the left. I didn’t go to jail, but I was very far on the left and then I made a very gradual transition. I voted for Jimmy Carter in 1976. I voted for John Anderson in 1980. I’d figured out that Carter was disaster, but I thought Reagan was a dangerous radical and it was really observing the successes of the Reagan administration in the 1980s that caused me to become a conservative. And also just the experiences of life. Practicing law, living the real world, observing from that vantage point how things actually work, dispels a lot of left-wing illusions I think.

Jim Abeler

In the contest to win the Republican nomination in Senate District 35, the party's endorsement proved to be no advantage against a candidate with more name recognition, experience, and campaign funds. 

Tuesday, former state Rep. Jim Abeler defeated party activist Andy Aplikowski, 61 to 39 percent, in the fight for the right to face DFL candidate Roger Johnson in a special election next month. 

Abeler and Aplikowski were running to replace retiring Republican state Sen. Branden Petersen, a party favorite in this GOP stronghold despite his vote in 2013 in favor of same sex marriage.

Abeler, like Petersen, is a popular figure in the district — which covers the northern suburbs of Minneapolis — despite the former’s renegade vote in 2008 to override then Gov. Pawlenty’s veto of a transportation funding bill. Abeler left the Legislature in 2014 and sought the GOP’s nomination to run for U.S. Senate, a contest he ultimately lost to businessman Mike McFadden.

“I think the people recognized that we need a seasoned voice on the topics of health care, education and maybe transportation as well,” Abeler said of the reasons for his victory. 

Abeler had sought the GOP endorsement from delegates representing Anoka, Andover, and Ramsey, but said from the start that he would run in a primary if he didn’t get it.  He refused to directly criticize the process saying, “I think the endorsement should reflect the community as the whole.”

He added that he believes there is a value in a primary battle. “The benefit was that we reached out to the entire district,” he said. “Our final piece of mail was sent to thirty thousand people so we are actually pretty well positioned to [do] what we have already done.”

Abeler will face in Johnson in a special election February 9.

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio’s visit to the Twin Cities Tuesday wasn’t a lengthy one, but it was long enough to establish that he is the choice of many of the state’s mainstream Republicans. 

Former Speaker of the House Steve Sviggum and former Minority Leader Marty Seifert are part of Rubio’s leadership team. Charlie Weaver, head of the Minnesota Business Partnership, is also a supporter. They join Rubio’s Minnesota chair, Jeff Johnson, who has always stressed Rubio’s electability.      

Rubio spoke for himself at an event Tuesday morning in Minneapolis, where he combined a fundraiser with a brief media availability, stressing his unifying credentials.  

“The bottom line is: I remain in this race the only candidate that can achieve two things,” he said. “Unite the Republican Party and attract new people to our cause.”

In the first few of the Republican debates, Rubio appeared to struggle communicating his positive messages against the doomsday scenarios outlined by fellow candidates Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. 

Rubio has since taken a tougher stance on issues like immigration and taxes and sharpened his rhetoric, a tactic that was on display Tuesday. “The road we are on right now is the road of decline,” he said. “Our prestige on this planet has also been diminished.”

But Rubio did not hold on to that theme for long, turning to topics that evoked more compassion than passion.

“We are going to win young voters because we are speaking on behalf of them,” he said, referring to his concerns about college debt. “That’s why I spend so much time talking about single mothers. When I’m our nominee they will hear from us. They will hear about us and they will hear what we are fighting for.”

It’s personal, he said, because he has shared these struggles. “What you’re trying to achieve is happiness, which for them means being able to own a home and raise a family and retire with dignity.”

Sviggum believes that’s the message that will convince a majority of American voters in November. “I think that Marco brings that nice balance that is very electable in this country,” he said. “I think that he has an empathy and a sympathy that comes across for voters, especially young voters in this country.”

Rubio didn’t reach out to too many Minnesota voters — young or otherwise — on Tuesday; there were no public events on his schedule, and he soon left Minneapolis for fundraisers in Missouri, Chicago, and Boston before heading to New Hampshire to campaign.

But Rubio’s staff said that he is likely to return to Minnesota before March 1 for more direct contact with a critical group of voters: those who attend the state’s precinct caucuses to vote in the binding presidential preference poll.

If Donald Trump becomes the Republican nominee for president, blame Ronald Reagan.

Or at least, blame Establishment Republicans – i.e. the people who control the party system, the fundraising, and, once upon a time, the elections. They’re the ones dutifully following Reagan’s Eleventh Commandment: “’Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.”    

Until last week, when Trump and Ted Cruz started negative ads in Iowa, not one major party figure, including the candidates, had stepped forward to say, in effect, that the emperor has no clothes. That means not just tit-for-tat name-calling but sustained, effective arguments — in paid advertising as well as at the debates — to counter some of the positions Trump has staked out.

I should note that I’m neither a supporter nor detractor of Donald Trump.  I am, however, opposed to any candidate becoming political road kill simply because he or she was afraid of offending the supporters of a political juggernaut.  

Lessons from Minnesota’s past

I’ve had my own experiences with both sides of the conundrum Republican officials now face. In 1998, as communications director of the Norm Coleman campaign for governor, I fumed when Coleman refused to engage candidate Jesse Ventura directly, even when, in debates, Ventura would admit his ignorance of government.

Though Ventura wasn’t a Republican, the leaders of the Coleman campaign — including some well-paid consultants and pollsters — insisted that taking down the wrestler would alienate the affections of his supporters who, they believed, would return to the GOP fold on voting day.

But allowing Ventura to control the microphone only reinforced his message that Coleman and Hubert Humphrey were career politicians with no real sense of the everyday citizen. Coleman lost to Ventura by three percentage points — 56,363 votes — and I remain convinced that had he challenged Ventura the outcome would have been different. 

It was a lesson I had learned four years earlier. In 1994, Gov. Arne Carlson, who had been denied the endorsement of his own Republican party, faced Alan Quist in a primary. 

Quist was a staunch social conservative who won national fame for a 30-hour lecture he gave as a state representative about the evils of sex. He said that women were genetically predisposed to subservience, and edited a children’s educational series that postulated that dinosaurs lived alongside humans until the 12_th century.

What’s not to criticize?

All of it, according to some Republican Party activists and Carlson supporters — many of whom were and continue to be bold-faced names in the party.  They strenuously objected when the Carlson campaign and the candidate himself pointed out and occasionally mocked the absurdity of Quist’s positions.

Despite the repeated protests from some corners of the GOP, the campaign stayed with the plan of attack, and Carlson won the primary with 60 percent of the vote. I’m convinced that failure to call out Quist would have led to Carlson’s defeat.

Out of fighting shape?

Which brings us to Donald J. Trump. Perhaps, faced with Trump’s unflagging dominance in the race, his opponents may shake off their fears of offending the Trump supporter who, it would appear, doesn’t mind being offended. 

Party stalwarts could follow some of the suggestions found in this widely circulated New York Times commentary by former Bush administration official Peter Wehner, an exception who proves the rule of complacency among establishment figures. 

Wehner offers some of the less effective arguments being used against Trump: that he is inexperienced, that he is crude and even cruel. But Whener also exposes weaknesses that could have been more effectively exploited, like Trump’s embrace of Vladimir Putin; or his unsuitability to be entrusted with access to the nation's nuclear arsenal. 

Because Trump has had a relatively easy time staying on top, the party and the GOP candidates — including Trump himself — may also soon realize they’re out of fighting shape for the battle that is sure to come in the general election.

The part of the Republican establishment that is anti-Donald Trump should make him earn the nomination. What have they got to lose?

What do the Iowa caucus results mean for Minnesota’s Republican caucuses on March 1?

For Sen. Ted Cruz, Tuesday’s winner, it means digging in even deeper with old-fashioned, precinct-to-precinct, person-to-person organizing. “This is not going to be campaign he manages through the press and sophisticated marketing,” said Brandon Lerch, Cruz’s Minnesota campaign director. “We’re calling Lake of the Woods [County], we’re calling Rock County; we are hitting every single piece of this state, going full force in the metro as well. We want everybody in to hear from a Cruz supporter as to why he is the best candidate.”

Based on his success in Iowa, Cruz and his supporters are not likely to stray from the message that he is strict interpreter of the U.S. Constitution and a rock-solid Christian conservative opposed to abortion and gay marriage.

For Sen. Marco Rubio, fresh off a strong third-place finish, Iowa’s results mean further polishing his credentials as the candidate with the most appeal to the conservative mainstream. Part of that strategy involves continuing with the game plan of becoming the preferred candidate of those who initially pledged support to Chris Christie, Carly Fiorina, Rand Paul or John Kasich. “The game comes down to the second choice — who are the survivors?” said former Republican house minority leader Marty Seifert, who’s now on the Rubio team.

“He will definitely get a boost out of these next few primaries [New Hampshire and Nevada],” which will impress legislators who have run, won and will influence caucus turnout in their districts, Seifert predicted.

Rubio’s Iowa performance made a difference to at least one state Senator, Julie Rosen, of Vernon Center, who initially supported Chris Christie. “Rubio will be my choice,” she said. “And I’d appreciate if everybody would put their support toward him because he’s very electable.”

And then there’s Donald Trump – the elephant not in the state (to paraphrase Fox News’ Megyn Kelly). While Cruz, Rubio and Fiorina stay within the lines of traditional caucus campaigning, Trump has no formal state volunteers, no contact with the Minnesota Republican Party, and, reportedly, no success in hiring a state director who could put in place any of the above. 

He’s also unlikely to visit Minnesota before caucus day, another factor considered important to a strong caucus showing. Both the Cruz and Rubio campaigns have penciled in visits from the candidates at end of February.

Political observers agree, however, that Trump will nevertheless be a factor in the Minnesota caucuses, if only to motivate rival supporters to maximize their turnout efforts.

On the day of the New Hampshire primary, it’s time to consider the many problems of a caucus system, like the one Iowa — and Minnesota — employs. Compared to a primary, a caucus is time-consuming, hard to understand, and inconvenient.  

There’s also another problem, which was demonstrated last week in Iowa.  A few hundred people closed up in a middle school gym is a Petrie dish for rumors that could, in fact, affect results.  

To recap: Amid the caucuses, some supporters of Sen. Ted Cruz started circulating the rumor that Ben Carson was going to drop out of the race. The rumor started when an overeager supporter misinterpreted Twitter messages that Carson was not immediately going on to campaign in New Hampshire. 

Carson did not drop out. He is campaigning in New Hampshire. And he told CBS News he believes the rumors affected the results in Iowa, where he had a fourth place showing behind Cruz, Donald Trump, and Sen. Marco Rubio.   

“It’s a very contained environment where it’s easy to throw things around,” said former Minnesota House minority leader Marty Seifert, a Rubio supporter and veteran of dozens of caucuses. “If there are things that go out in the mail a week or two in advance, there’s time for people to refute. At conventions, there’s no time to respond, or maybe you don’t even hear it.” 

Both Democrats and Republicans have tried to change Minnesota law to move the state to the primary system. But party activists, who see caucuses as the only true test of grass roots support, have blocked those efforts.

One of those activists has come up with an idea that could split the difference, however. Luke Hellier is a public relations executive, former staffer for Congressman Erik Paulsen, and a Rubio supporter. He suggests that Minnesota should allow absentee ballots to be cast for the presidential preference ballot that is taken at caucuses every four years.  

Hellier makes the argument that requiring attendance at a caucus in effect disenfranchises too many people — everyone from parents with child care needs to those in the military. An absentee ballot would allow wider participation while keeping the caucus system intact.

Until then, the only way to vote for a presidential candidate and, in turn, the Minnesota delegates who will help choose the Democrat and Republican party nominees, is to go to a precinct caucus on March 1 — where, if nothing else, caucus-goers would be wise to be suspicious of whispering campaigns about any candidates. 

MinnPost photo by Brian Halliday

Sen.-elect Jim Abeler

Jim Abeler had to fight for the Republican nomination for the state Senate, but he breezed to victory in Tuesday’s special election for a seat representing the Twin Cities’ northern suburbs. 

Abeler defeated DFLer Roger Johnson by more than 50 points, winning 74 percent of the total vote. 

Abeler won the right to face Johnson after beating GOP endorsee Andy Aplikowski in a primary last month. The seat was vacated by the retirement of Branden Petersen, who — like Abeler — is a popular Republican with an independent streak.

Abeler, a chiropracter, will take up his duties representing Anoka, Andover, Coon Rapids, and Ramsey when the legislature convenes on March 8. He says he wants to return to the role he played while serving as a member of the Minnesota House: a Republican who worked with Democrats.

“You may recall there were many times I was the only Republican conferee on health care and human services bills,” he said. Being in the minority, he added, will not change his effectiveness. “Being in majority means you get to set the agenda but it doesn’t mean that [Republicans] cannot have influence on the outcome.” 

Human services, health care and transportation will remain the focus of his legislative efforts, he said.

In 2008, Abeler was one of a handful of Republicans to override then Gov. Pawlenty’s veto of a transportation bill that contained a gas tax increase. But Abeler suggested that this session, he would take a different approach. “I understand gas taxes were popular in 2008 but they are not popular in 2016,” he said.  “Because of the surplus, the general fund should become part of the solution. I think there is warmth in the legislature for this kind of solution.” 

Chad Anderson

Republicans were so pleased with the victory Chad Anderson scored over DFLer Andrew Carlson in House District 50B, in Bloomington, that he was sworn into office Tuesday, just a week after he was elected.

The GOP’s excitement was understandable — Democrats had held the seat since 1998 — but the victory was no fluke. The House Republican Campaign Committee placed cable TV ads accusing Bloomington City Council member Carlson of raising property taxes. But it was direct voter contact that clearly made the difference, as Anderson, his volunteers and paid staff went door-to-door and explained why he would make a great state representative. In the end, in an election that was decided by 130 votes, more people in the district were talking about Anderson than about Carlson.

The question is whether the victory is a one-off, born of a very particular set of circumstances in Bloomington, or a trend that portends good things for Republicans in a presidential election year, a situation that normally favors strong Democratic turnout.

“This should serve as a wake-up call for Democrats that we cannot take any district in any part of the state for granted, even in a presidential election year,” House Minority Leader Paul Thissen told MinnPost after Anderson’s win.

One DFL operative predicts that in a general election, with 75 percent voter turnout — compared to 15 percent last week in Bloomington — Republicans cannot maintain the same level of ground game in every competitive House race.                                                 

Traditionally, the DFL has been far better at that aspect of campaigns than Republicans. Even Republicans acknowledge the superiority of the DFL get-out-the vote operation. In 2014, the Republican Party admitted this weakness and tried to upgrade its efforts, opening 18 field offices and hiring two-dozen paid staffers. Even so, that effort paled in comparison to the DFL’s operation, with 30 field offices and 125 paid staffers.

With no statewide offices on the ballot this November, the unknown factor in voter turnout is the identity of each party’s presidential candidate. Republicans believe Hilary Clinton will turn off Democrats in rural Minnesota, where the GOP made many of its gains in 2014.  Meanwhile, the DFL predicts a Republican ticket topped by either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz would similarly depress turnout by GOP-leaning voters, especially in suburban districts like Bloomington.

But the emphasis on the ground game on both sides makes it clear that old-school campaigning is still critical. Even in this era of data driven nano-targeting, politics is personal, and talking to people is the best way to get their votes. 

In the summer of 1996, when Barbara Carlson’s ex-husband, Arne Carlson, was running for re-election, the then-KSTP talk-radio host decided that was the best moment to describe their sexual relationship, divulge their marital woes, imply that he hadn’t served in the military, and — not coincidentally — launch a new book.

And this was from a woman who supported Arne’s re-election bid.

Barbara was outrageous and entertaining. And as the governor’s communications director at the time, I had to remind Arne — constantly — that provocation was the No. 1 rule of talk radio. When he became upset that Barbara didn’t back down, I had to reminded him about the No. 2 rule of talk radio: Never apologize.

Minnesota Second Congressional District Republican congressional candidate Jason Lewis learned those same rules at KSTP, the broadcasting umbrella where he, Barbara Carlson, and I all worked.

As a local and national talk-show host, Lewis filled hours of airtime with conservative commentary that outraged and entertained. And while that background may play well with the delegates in the district who determine who gets the GOP nomination, his Republican opponents have found plenty to complain about.

The replay surfaced when Star Tribune blogger Michael Brodkorb published comments Lewis made on his radio show in 2012 about the dispute over health-care coverage for birth-control pills.

I never thought in my lifetime where’d you have so many single, or I should say, yeah single women who would vote on the issue of somebody else buying their diaphragm. This is a country in crisis. Those women are ignorant in, I mean, the most generic way. I don’t mean that to be a pejorative. They are simply ignorant of the important issues in life. Somebody’s got to educate them. [Audio here]

There's something about young, single women where they’re behaving like Stepford wives. They walk in lock step – is that really the most important thing to a 25-year old unmarried woman – uh getting me to pay for her pills? Seriously?! Is that what we’ve been reduced to? You can be bought off for that? [Audio here]

You’ve got a vast majority of young single women who couldn’t explain to you what GDP means. You know what they care about? They care about abortion. They care about abortion and gay marriage. They care about 'The View.' They are non-thinking. [Audio here]

As a man who’s poked at pols most of his career, Lewis did seem a bit surprised that the tables turned so quickly. “Where is the context?” he asked. “I am not opposed to birth control. The issue was who should pay for it, and whether someone is constitutionally entitled to have birth control paid for.”

But he didn’t stay defensive for long. “Was I provocative? Yes,” he said. “Was I wrong? Absolutely not.”

Being absolutely right is Jason Lewis’s brand. He challenges the left and the center — and sometimes history.

“Slavery was mercifully conquered,” he wrote in his book, "Power Divided is Power Checked: The Argument for States' Rights," published in 2012. But he also questioned whether abolishment of slavery was a sufficient enough cause for President Lincoln to trample on the rights of southern states.

His columns for the Star Tribune, praising the filibuster and decrying the Occupy Wall Street movement, regularly drew withering responses from MinnPost writer Eric Black, who faintly praised Lewis for his “self-blinding brilliance.”

As a commentator, Jason Lewis never conceded. Furthermore, he used protest to prove that his opponents were illogical whiners. “Everybody has a grievance. We have a multiplicity of grievances that is going unabated,” he said, brushing off concerns that his comments will damage him politically. “In this society obsessed with grievance somebody is going to claim to be offended, but people are smart enough to recognize when it’s a hit.”

In his view, that’s what his opponents did in criticizing his remarks on birth control.

“What’s interesting is how quickly they adopted the war-on-women narrative,” he said. “I am not opposed to birth control. I am opposed to anybody saying you need to pay for what I want.”

He knows that Democrats are already preparing a thick file that will be used against him should he become the Republican nominee. But Lewis claims he never “took a position that I couldn’t defend then and can’t defend now.”

He may even benefit by the rules that seem to be governing politics today. Never apologize. Continue to provoke. Sometimes entertain.