Looking Back At Minnesota Governor's Races
Last week I profiled 20 years worth of Minnesota Senator's races. Gubernatorial races tend to be less exciting to those who don't live in a certain state, but there have still been some doozies in the recent past. Minnesota in particular has had some crazy ones, with four of the last five being memorable. Here are some highlights:
1990--This was the first gubernatorial race I remember. I was 13 years old and not fully tuned in since it wasn't a Presidential race, but the high drama of this particular race made it impossible to be ignored. Two-term incumbent Democrat Rudy Perpich, a colorful Iron Ranger (being colorful is a prerequisite to living on the Iron Range, I think) who defied traditional ideological characterization was seeking a third term and found himself holding onto a modest lead against conservative challenger Jon Grunseth, the Republican nominee who had beaten moderate Arne Carlson in the primary. From out of nowhere in the final couple weeks of the campaign, Grunseth found himself facing allegations of child molestation involving two teenage girls hanging out in the Grunseth family's backyard pool. With less than a week to go before the election, Grunseth adamantly denied the molestation charges but nonetheless dropped out of the race, elevating State Auditor Carlson to the GOP nomination. At that point, the election began to hinge around, of all things, abortion. Perpich was a pro-life Democrat while Carlson was a pro-choice Republican. Given the state's sinking economic condition, metro area voters who never fully connected with Perpich in the first place found Carlson an acceptable alternative to Perpich and to the more conservative Grunseth. As a consequence, Carlson's five-day campaign resulted in a win, with an unusual county map that was mostly blue outstate but red even in the heart of the metro area (Hennepin and Ramsey Counties). Arguably the two biggest upsets of November 6, 1990, were both in Minnesota, with Paul Wellstone and Arne Carlson narrowly prevailing over the incumbent Rudys (Boschwitz and Perpich).
1994--Far less drama this year. The drama that did occur all came in the endorsement process where the sincere but politically weak State Senator John Marty prevailed in a crowded Democratic endorsement and subsequent primary. On the GOP side, the hard-core pro-life activists that rejected the moderate Arne Carlson for Jon Grunseth four years later rejected Carlson once again this year, endorsing the hard-right Allen Quist and giving the incumbent Governor a black eye. Getting a black eye from the party helped Carlson's cause in the end though as he beat Quist handily in the September primary and then faced a weak campaign against the lightly funded DFL challenger Marty whose "no PAC money" campaign pledge almost completely shut him off the airwaves until the final week of the campaign. It was the first Minnesota gubernatorial race of my life where the outcome was predictable....a Carlson reelection landslide. Come election night, Carlson won by a 2-1 margin and carried 84 of Minnesota's 87 counties (Marty won only in northeastern Minnesota's St. Louis, Lake, and Carlton Counties) and, most impressively, managed to carry all three of Minnesota's biggest cities....St. Paul, Duluth, and even Minneapolis. Never again in my lifetime do I expect to see any Republican win in any of these cities. It was the only Republican landslide I've witnessed in Minnesota in the two decades I've been paying attention to political contests.
1998--The wackiness was back big-time in Minnesota in the 1998 race. St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman switched from a Democrat to a Republican specifically to run for this race and had little trouble getting the nomination. The Democratic side had its usual deluge of contenders, with Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman getting the party endorsement but Attorney General Skip Humphrey riding the coattails of his name to win the September primary despite his bleak and uninspiring performances in previous high-profile statewide races. Coyly and shrewdly smirking in the background was center-left Reform Party candidate Jesse Ventura, the former pro wrestler who was Mayor of a Minneapolis suburb and had a local radio show that raised his profile in the state and helping him register in the low double-digits in the polls. Humphrey had small leads heading into October until the dynamic of the race was turned on its head by the televised debates. Humphrey and Coleman went after each other, predictably, while Ventura capably and intelligently answered all the questions and managed to seem like a witty breath of fresh air compared to the stuffy major party standard-bearers. Still, Ventura continued to have a hard time getting enough people to take him seriously even though his poll numbers were ascendant. The weekend before the election, Ventura's clever ads were filling the airwaves and I just sensed something in the air that suggested a Ventura victory had suddenly become a real possibility even though the polls still officially showed Humphrey and Coleman duking it out in the 35-40% range with Jesse in the low 20s. The rest, as they say, is history as Ventura "shocked the world" pulling in 37% of the vote, clearly at the expense of Humphrey whose numbers cratered to 28% on election night and whose victories were limited to the Iron Range and northwestern Minnesota farm counties that are not even in Minnesota media markets. Definitely one of those "only in Minnesota" elections, but the most priceless result of the night was seeing Coleman coming in THIRD place in St. Paul, the city for which he was the sitting mayor.
2002--Another unpredictable stunner of a race featuring two very hard-fought endorsement battles in both parties. All candidates agreed to abide by the endorsement this year rather than proceed to a primary, leaving the Republicans with House Majority Leader Tim Pawlenty and the Democrats with Senate Leader Roger Moe, two parties who both conspired in the legislature to punt the state's dire budget issues to the following year using one-time gimmicks as a way of simultaneously one-upping Governor Ventura and avoiding tougher budgetary decisions that would harm their own candidacies. A high-profile Independence Party candidacy from former southern Minnesota Democratic Congressman Tim Penny was extremely competitive throughout the summer and early fall, with Penny branding himself as the sensible centrist not as rigidly ideological and thus better positioned to handle budget issues than Moe or Pawlenty. For months, the polls were pretty evenly divided among the three candidates, with Penny narrowly leading in most. All the winning candidate was likely to need was 35%, and that's exactly what Democrat Moe was counting on, running a dreary and almost invisible campaign that ignored southern Minnesota and hoped to get to 35% simply with the DFL base of Minneapolis, St. Paul, and his own political base in northern Minnesota. The three-way deadlock finally budged a little in early October when Pawlenty's campaign was found guilty of illegally using campaign donations in its advertisements and a judge decreed the campaign could run no more TV ads, a decree that would have effectively ended his campaign. But the decree was overruled just in time for the candidate debates, where Pawlenty played the role of Ventura four years later, the charismatic guy sitting in between the uninspiring middle-aged stiffs Moe and Penny. Polling those last two weeks reflected the race's altered dynamics as Penny's support crumbled while Pawlenty's surged. Moe was static in the mid-30s, his campaign strategy of ekeing out 33.3% +1 having collapsed now that Penny was no longer competitive. Pawlenty apparently got a little more momentum from the Wellstone Memorial in those closing days of the campaign and, unlike the Senate race, the outcome here seemed certain, with the least responsible of the three candidates poised to take over the reins of state government amidst a then record $4 billion deficit. That outcome played out as expected on election night with Pawlenty winning 44% of the vote, a healthy eight-point margin over Moe, and Penny rolling in at a dismal 16%, pretty much forfeiting all of the suburban-based Ventura coalition of four years ago to Pawlenty.
2006--The narrative of the 2006 race was less complicated than the two previous races since this year's Independence Party candidate was not a major factor, even though he did ultimately swing the election. Tim Pawlenty enjoyed approval ratings right near the 50% range and most Republicans were comfortable that he'd have an easy reelection against the abrasive Attorney General and Democratic nominee Mike Hatch. But as the election neared, it was pretty clear that 2006 was going to be a strong Democratic year and Hatch was either tied or narrowly ahead of Pawlenty in the polls. Most Republicans remained confident that Pawlenty's charisma advantage would prevail while Hatch's mean streak would be publicly exposed before the election. Turns out they were right, at least on Hatch, as an embarrassing gaffe by Hatch's running mate over ethanol-based E-85 ultimately led Hatch to call an interrogating reporter a "Republican whore" over the phone....with only four days to go before the election. Meanwhile, a good number of left-leaning voters were seeing something they liked in eloquent Independence Party candidate Peter Hutchinson, and it's a good bet that a significant number of would-be Hatch voters ultimately defected to Hutchinson. Any other year than the 2006 Democratic landslide, Pawlenty would have had an easy re-election, but he still barely eked it out, beating Hatch by a mere 22,000 votes mostly on the strength of his numbers in the suburbs while Hatch's strength was mainly confined to Roger Moe's Minneapolis, St. Paul, and northern Minnesota coalition. Still, Hutchinson scored 6% of the vote, pulling in his best numbers in heavily Democratic urban precincts and almost assuredly costing Hatch the election.
2010 is poised to be another wild Minnesota gubernatorial race with more than a dozen candidates vying for the statehouse being vacated by Pawlenty. If recent history is any indication, it should be another wild ride. I don't anticipate 2010 to be a good year for Democrats, but Pawlenty's derelict stewardship of the state probably won't put the Republicans in much better standing. For that reason, I could envision a strong showing or even an outright victory for the Independence Party is they nominate another compelling candidate in the mold of Hutchinson.
1990--This was the first gubernatorial race I remember. I was 13 years old and not fully tuned in since it wasn't a Presidential race, but the high drama of this particular race made it impossible to be ignored. Two-term incumbent Democrat Rudy Perpich, a colorful Iron Ranger (being colorful is a prerequisite to living on the Iron Range, I think) who defied traditional ideological characterization was seeking a third term and found himself holding onto a modest lead against conservative challenger Jon Grunseth, the Republican nominee who had beaten moderate Arne Carlson in the primary. From out of nowhere in the final couple weeks of the campaign, Grunseth found himself facing allegations of child molestation involving two teenage girls hanging out in the Grunseth family's backyard pool. With less than a week to go before the election, Grunseth adamantly denied the molestation charges but nonetheless dropped out of the race, elevating State Auditor Carlson to the GOP nomination. At that point, the election began to hinge around, of all things, abortion. Perpich was a pro-life Democrat while Carlson was a pro-choice Republican. Given the state's sinking economic condition, metro area voters who never fully connected with Perpich in the first place found Carlson an acceptable alternative to Perpich and to the more conservative Grunseth. As a consequence, Carlson's five-day campaign resulted in a win, with an unusual county map that was mostly blue outstate but red even in the heart of the metro area (Hennepin and Ramsey Counties). Arguably the two biggest upsets of November 6, 1990, were both in Minnesota, with Paul Wellstone and Arne Carlson narrowly prevailing over the incumbent Rudys (Boschwitz and Perpich).
1994--Far less drama this year. The drama that did occur all came in the endorsement process where the sincere but politically weak State Senator John Marty prevailed in a crowded Democratic endorsement and subsequent primary. On the GOP side, the hard-core pro-life activists that rejected the moderate Arne Carlson for Jon Grunseth four years later rejected Carlson once again this year, endorsing the hard-right Allen Quist and giving the incumbent Governor a black eye. Getting a black eye from the party helped Carlson's cause in the end though as he beat Quist handily in the September primary and then faced a weak campaign against the lightly funded DFL challenger Marty whose "no PAC money" campaign pledge almost completely shut him off the airwaves until the final week of the campaign. It was the first Minnesota gubernatorial race of my life where the outcome was predictable....a Carlson reelection landslide. Come election night, Carlson won by a 2-1 margin and carried 84 of Minnesota's 87 counties (Marty won only in northeastern Minnesota's St. Louis, Lake, and Carlton Counties) and, most impressively, managed to carry all three of Minnesota's biggest cities....St. Paul, Duluth, and even Minneapolis. Never again in my lifetime do I expect to see any Republican win in any of these cities. It was the only Republican landslide I've witnessed in Minnesota in the two decades I've been paying attention to political contests.
1998--The wackiness was back big-time in Minnesota in the 1998 race. St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman switched from a Democrat to a Republican specifically to run for this race and had little trouble getting the nomination. The Democratic side had its usual deluge of contenders, with Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman getting the party endorsement but Attorney General Skip Humphrey riding the coattails of his name to win the September primary despite his bleak and uninspiring performances in previous high-profile statewide races. Coyly and shrewdly smirking in the background was center-left Reform Party candidate Jesse Ventura, the former pro wrestler who was Mayor of a Minneapolis suburb and had a local radio show that raised his profile in the state and helping him register in the low double-digits in the polls. Humphrey had small leads heading into October until the dynamic of the race was turned on its head by the televised debates. Humphrey and Coleman went after each other, predictably, while Ventura capably and intelligently answered all the questions and managed to seem like a witty breath of fresh air compared to the stuffy major party standard-bearers. Still, Ventura continued to have a hard time getting enough people to take him seriously even though his poll numbers were ascendant. The weekend before the election, Ventura's clever ads were filling the airwaves and I just sensed something in the air that suggested a Ventura victory had suddenly become a real possibility even though the polls still officially showed Humphrey and Coleman duking it out in the 35-40% range with Jesse in the low 20s. The rest, as they say, is history as Ventura "shocked the world" pulling in 37% of the vote, clearly at the expense of Humphrey whose numbers cratered to 28% on election night and whose victories were limited to the Iron Range and northwestern Minnesota farm counties that are not even in Minnesota media markets. Definitely one of those "only in Minnesota" elections, but the most priceless result of the night was seeing Coleman coming in THIRD place in St. Paul, the city for which he was the sitting mayor.
2002--Another unpredictable stunner of a race featuring two very hard-fought endorsement battles in both parties. All candidates agreed to abide by the endorsement this year rather than proceed to a primary, leaving the Republicans with House Majority Leader Tim Pawlenty and the Democrats with Senate Leader Roger Moe, two parties who both conspired in the legislature to punt the state's dire budget issues to the following year using one-time gimmicks as a way of simultaneously one-upping Governor Ventura and avoiding tougher budgetary decisions that would harm their own candidacies. A high-profile Independence Party candidacy from former southern Minnesota Democratic Congressman Tim Penny was extremely competitive throughout the summer and early fall, with Penny branding himself as the sensible centrist not as rigidly ideological and thus better positioned to handle budget issues than Moe or Pawlenty. For months, the polls were pretty evenly divided among the three candidates, with Penny narrowly leading in most. All the winning candidate was likely to need was 35%, and that's exactly what Democrat Moe was counting on, running a dreary and almost invisible campaign that ignored southern Minnesota and hoped to get to 35% simply with the DFL base of Minneapolis, St. Paul, and his own political base in northern Minnesota. The three-way deadlock finally budged a little in early October when Pawlenty's campaign was found guilty of illegally using campaign donations in its advertisements and a judge decreed the campaign could run no more TV ads, a decree that would have effectively ended his campaign. But the decree was overruled just in time for the candidate debates, where Pawlenty played the role of Ventura four years later, the charismatic guy sitting in between the uninspiring middle-aged stiffs Moe and Penny. Polling those last two weeks reflected the race's altered dynamics as Penny's support crumbled while Pawlenty's surged. Moe was static in the mid-30s, his campaign strategy of ekeing out 33.3% +1 having collapsed now that Penny was no longer competitive. Pawlenty apparently got a little more momentum from the Wellstone Memorial in those closing days of the campaign and, unlike the Senate race, the outcome here seemed certain, with the least responsible of the three candidates poised to take over the reins of state government amidst a then record $4 billion deficit. That outcome played out as expected on election night with Pawlenty winning 44% of the vote, a healthy eight-point margin over Moe, and Penny rolling in at a dismal 16%, pretty much forfeiting all of the suburban-based Ventura coalition of four years ago to Pawlenty.
2006--The narrative of the 2006 race was less complicated than the two previous races since this year's Independence Party candidate was not a major factor, even though he did ultimately swing the election. Tim Pawlenty enjoyed approval ratings right near the 50% range and most Republicans were comfortable that he'd have an easy reelection against the abrasive Attorney General and Democratic nominee Mike Hatch. But as the election neared, it was pretty clear that 2006 was going to be a strong Democratic year and Hatch was either tied or narrowly ahead of Pawlenty in the polls. Most Republicans remained confident that Pawlenty's charisma advantage would prevail while Hatch's mean streak would be publicly exposed before the election. Turns out they were right, at least on Hatch, as an embarrassing gaffe by Hatch's running mate over ethanol-based E-85 ultimately led Hatch to call an interrogating reporter a "Republican whore" over the phone....with only four days to go before the election. Meanwhile, a good number of left-leaning voters were seeing something they liked in eloquent Independence Party candidate Peter Hutchinson, and it's a good bet that a significant number of would-be Hatch voters ultimately defected to Hutchinson. Any other year than the 2006 Democratic landslide, Pawlenty would have had an easy re-election, but he still barely eked it out, beating Hatch by a mere 22,000 votes mostly on the strength of his numbers in the suburbs while Hatch's strength was mainly confined to Roger Moe's Minneapolis, St. Paul, and northern Minnesota coalition. Still, Hutchinson scored 6% of the vote, pulling in his best numbers in heavily Democratic urban precincts and almost assuredly costing Hatch the election.
2010 is poised to be another wild Minnesota gubernatorial race with more than a dozen candidates vying for the statehouse being vacated by Pawlenty. If recent history is any indication, it should be another wild ride. I don't anticipate 2010 to be a good year for Democrats, but Pawlenty's derelict stewardship of the state probably won't put the Republicans in much better standing. For that reason, I could envision a strong showing or even an outright victory for the Independence Party is they nominate another compelling candidate in the mold of Hutchinson.
posted by Mark at 4:23 PM
2 Comments:
I am looking back at some of the New York Governor races.
The first I can remember is 1994. I was only nine years old and longterm long time Democratic Governor Mario Cuomo was in trouble. By late summer, Cuomo had fallen well behind Republican George Pataki in most polls and looked dead. In the final week, Republican New York City Mayor Rudy Guiliani endorsed Cuomo and he shot into the a mid to high single digit lead. However, lower than expected Democratic turnout and the Republican sweep of the nation allowed Pataki to pull off a 49%-45% upset. One of the most disappointing nights in history for myself and all other Democrats.
1998: Although New York is a very Democratic state, Pataki, like many other Republicans nationally, benefitted from the strong economy that Bill Clinton helped produce in the 1990's. Because of this Pataki was able to easily fend off New York City Council Speaker Peter Vallone by a 54%-33% margin. Though Vallone did carry the city 60%-33%, but lost by nearly three to one elseware in the state.
2002: As New York was struggling from the 2001 recession, Pataki clearly should have been vulnerable. However, with a little bit of help from Osama Bin Laden on 9/11 which struck New York City, he was able to insolate himself from economic troubles. Some polls in the fall showed Pataki's support soft enough for it to be possible that Democratic state Comptroller Carl McCall could pull off an upset, but Pataki won by an uninspiring 49%-34% margin with 14% going to wealthy independent candidate Tom Golisano.
2006: With George Pataki finally calling the quits, it seemed almost certain that Democratic Attorney General Elliot Spitzer would be elected governor. Republicans have almost no bench in the state other than Rudy Giuliani and he wouldnt run. Instead, Republicans were stuck with former state Senator John Faso, who lost by 41 percentage points and carried just small counties.
In 2010, I expect that Attorney General Andrew Cuomo will run and win. I dont see how David Patterson could even make it out of a primary. If he somehow did, any Republican would probably beat him.
California too has had its fair share of crazy gubernatorial elections, even without 2003 in the mix and as it has gotten less competitive at the federal level.
1994 - Except for George Deukmejian, every California governor becomes extremely unpopular and Pete Wilson was no exception after signing a tax increase and facing a very shaky economy. So he started using wedge issues, especially immigration with Prop 187, which sought to deny government services to illegal immigrants. The tactic worked, as Wilson defeated Jerry Brown's sister Kathleen by a wide margin, even carrying L.A. County with a majority. (Dan Lungren also did in the Attorney General race, and those two would be the last Republicans to win a majority in L.A. County as well as win the county in a regular election.)
1998 - This election was unique in that it featured a blanket primary, which SCOTUS struck down in 2000. The Democratic side shook out to newbie airline exec Al Checchi, Rep. Jane Harman, and Lt. Gov. Gray Davis. Davis was the underdog for most of the campaign and was struggling in fundraising, while millionaires Checchi and Harman burned millions trashing each other, allowing Davis to surge ahead and ultimately to the runoff. Dan Lungren was the top Republican though he was virtually uncontested. In the general Lungren portrayed himself as Reagan's heir, while Davis was able to portray Lungren as too conservative for California and won by 20%, winning normally Republican counties such as San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino, Ventura, San Luis Obispo, and Del Norte and holding Lungren to only 52% in Orange.
2002 - Like his predecessor, Davis's popularity crashed and burned in the face of a struggling economy and massive deficits, as well as the electricity crisis. After polls came out that showed Davis as a sure loser against moderate ex-L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan, Davis ran ads in the Republican campaign attacking Riordan and allowing the more conservative Bill Simon to sneak through. The general was pretty much all-negative, and Davis squeaked through with 47%, but turnout and approval of Davis were ultra-low, setting up the perfect storm for a recall the next year. However, California managed to buck the nationwide trend and elect Democrats to all its constitutional offices.
2003 - The recall election snapped me into paying attention to politics. I had known Davis was unpopular, but I hoped that the recall would not succeed because I feared it would set a bad precedent for voters to turn out their politicians whenever they felt like it and nothing would get done. After Arnold jumped in, my nervousness also jumped, and I was upset that then-Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante would be a spoiler as the only big-name Dem in the race. My fears were probably proven correct, as the recall passed 55-45 and Bustamante got a third of the vote. If he was not on the ballot, the recall might not have succeeded.
2006 - After the 2005 election disaster and the toxic atmosphere for Republicans, I became optimistic that we'd be able to beat Arnold, though my optimism turned to worry after the disastrous primary between Angelides and Westly and Arnold acting more like a Democrat, and was proven right as Arnold cruised that year.
Now as I look back, I see Arnold's wins in 2003 and 2006 as a mixed blessing, since he can't run in 2010, and without him we will very likely have the trifecta in redistricting. Jerry Brown now has the Democratic field all to himself, barring a last-minute entry, which is unlikely unless that entrant is a megamillionaire. On the Republican side, Meg Whitman has been a walking disaster like Fiorina and Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner has gone nowhere fast and I even almost forgot he was still in the race. Tom Campbell has been relatively uncontroversial and he may still be formidable, as he could be Arnold's pick to replace now-Congressman Garamendi as Lt. Gov. and would thus get a leg up.
Post a Comment
<< Home