When Robert Zimmerman grew up in Hibbing, Minn., the area’s politics were as deep blue as the waters of Lake Superior to the east. The nearby taconite mines churned out iron ore, and the miners reelected left-leaning congressmen like clockwork.
As President Trump rumbles into Minnesota for a rally on Thursday night, those words again apply to Dylan’s home state. Republicans have long seen Minnesota as a key target. Trump nearly won the state in 2016 and would have been the first Republican to do so since Richard M. Nixon. But Trump’s endless scandals, his bullying brand of politics and his trade-war folly are giving Democrats a political gift in a swing state that Republicans need to win in the upcoming midterms.
Because of Al Franken’s resignation in January, Minnesota has two U.S. senators on the ballot this year. Both are incumbents from the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (Minnesota’s version of the Democratic Party). But perhaps more astonishing is the fact that four of Minnesota’s eight congressional districts are competitive. Two red seats are likely to turn blue, but two blue seats could also turn red — a tectonic shift triggered by Trump that demonstrates how he has redrawn conventional political lines.
Around Hibbing, in Minnesota’s 8th Congressional District, Republicans have one of their best opportunities to flip a Democratic seat. Many mines have gone dormant. The Main Streets of Virginia, Eveleth and Aurora used to be thriving; now the median age in the district has skyrocketed and the bustle has turned to bust. The region is dotted with shuttered storefronts, antique shops and dive bars. And for those who feel nostalgia for the boom times, the notion that Trump could make Minnesota’s Iron Range Great Again – with a Hail Mary trade war – is alluring. Everything else failed. Why not give Trump a shot? The race is considered a toss-up.
But as the Trade War giveth, it also taketh away. Trump’s rally is being held in Rochester, Minn., the economic anchor of the 1st Congressional District. The incumbent vacating the seat, Tim Walz, is a Democrat now running for Minnesota governor. But with the seat open, the district’s fundamentals favor Republicans: Most of the district is rural, 90 percent white and comparatively affluent (partly thanks to the 35,000 employees of the world-renowned Mayo Clinic health-care hub in Rochester).
Even so, Trump has given Democrats better odds. His signature health-care proposal was opposed by the medical community. High education levels in the district favor Democrats too, as college-educated white people tend to have negative opinions of Trump.
Even more striking are the political shifts underway among farmers in the district, as Trump’s quixotic trade war begins to tilt soybean farmers along the Iowa border against Trump.
“The trade war is really doing long-term damage to our farmers out here,” Gary Wertish, president of the Minnesota Farmers Union, recently told me. “Soybeans is the big one — the price has fallen approximately a couple of dollars a bushel; it’s been about a 20 to 25 percent reduction since Trump started the trade war with China.” Worse, the steel tariffs (that miners in Minnesota’s 8th Congressional District are celebrating) are hitting farmers hard in equipment purchasing and repairs. As Wertish put it: “Farmers are getting squeezed on both ends.”
Trump’s cynical attempt to provide a one-time payment to farmers isn’t cutting it either. “The amount of money that they’re proposing is not even close to what the tariff wars have cost farmers,” Wertish added. He worries that the export markets that Minnesota’s farmers have cultivated for decades could disappear permanently, even if the trade war ends soon. And Wertish warns that family farmers and younger farmers may be forced out of agriculture — even after they “get their crop in the bin” — if they can’t pay their bills because of Trump’s trade war.
As a result, a district that would normally favor Republicans in this cycle is now a toss-up. Trump may have thrown away an easy GOP pickup.
At the same time, Trump has given Democrats a huge political gift in the suburbs of Minneapolis and St. Paul, particularly in the Republican-held 2nd and 3rd Congressional Districts. Due to Trump, “the Twin Cities and the suburbs are boiling over with progressive energy,” according to Jeff Blodgett, a leading Democratic-Farmer-Labor strategist. “The changing politics of the suburbs is going to dominate what happens here in 2018 and beyond.” Trump has alienated huge swaths of historically Republican voters in each district. Both the 2nd District and the 3rd District are now considered “lean Democratic” by the Cook Political Report.
Trump might fire up the crowd at his rally, but his visit will certainly fire up Democrats in the suburbs. If energized Democrats manage to win two longtime Republican suburban strongholds and can hang on in the rural 1st District and the 8th District, they will make serious headway on the path to taking back control of the House.
Of course, a lot can happen between now and November.
As Bob Dylan reminds us: “And don’t speak too soon / For the wheel’s still in spin / and there’s no tellin’ who that it’s namin’ / For the loser now will be later to win / For the times they are a-changin’.”
