“When our children tell us who they are, it is our job as grownups to listen and to believe them,” Flanagan said of trans-identified kids.
Tuesday, Minnesota’s hard-fought primary Senate campaigns culminated in the nominations of Peggy Flanagan for Democrats and Michele Tafoya for Republicans. Both candidates will face off in the state’s midterm elections in November as they vie for the seat being vacated by retiring Democratic Sen. Tina Smith, who announced her retirement in February of last year, citing family obligations.
Tafoya, who worked as a sports reporter at NBC for more than a decade, is a relative long shot in a state that has not elected a Republican to statewide office since former Gov. Tim Pawlenty in 2006. The state has not elected a Republican senator since 2002, when former St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman was elected to a single term before losing by roughly 300 votes to Democrat Al Franken.
Tafoya has made recent fraud revelations in her state a core piece of her campaign, with “Stop the Fraud” displayed in bold letters on her campaign website.
“The status quo politicians let criminals steal billions of dollars of Minnesota taxpayers’ hard-earned money,” her website reads. “They let fraudsters rob us blind rather than ask basic questions that might have seemed politically incorrect. We need to clean up our state and lead the way toward a nationwide anti-fraud agenda.”
Tafoya promises to deport any immigrant who is convicted of fraud and to fight for harsher punishments for those who defraud the government and Minnesotans.
The former sports reporter has also taken a strong stance in the ongoing cultural debate over men competing in women’s sports, calling Sophie Cunningham a hero while blasting the WNBA.
“I’m losing faith in this league,” Tafoya told Fox News’ Dan Dakich. “I have talked about this when this league had its inaugural first three, four seasons. I was one of the three play-by-play voices. It was Robin Roberts, Hannah Storm and myself, and I worked with Reggie Miller, and we had a blast. And it was a celebration of these women. This league has now somehow morphed into something that feels like activism on display.”
Democratic nominee and former Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, who defeated moderate Democrat and Rep. Angie Craig, has a distinctly different set of priorities for the state. She has focused on Trump’s “threat to democracy” and building what she calls a “fair economy.”
“Trump is seriously threatening our democracy, and Democrats’ focus cannot be to simply make life only a little less lousy for folks,” her website reads. “We must recognize that this is not normal and stand together. We’ve got to fight for more.
“I’m focused on building a fair economy that gives people the opportunity to afford the lives they want to live — for themselves and their families.”
Flanagan’s campaign also centers around neutering ICE, if not defunding the agency altogether. “Peggy believes that ICE is out of control and that the agency must be dismantled and the immigration system reimagined around dignity, safety and due process for all,” her campaign reads.
Flanagan has also garnered the endorsement of Minnesota Rep Ilhan Omar as well as Senator Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, cementing herself squarely in the far-left flank of the Democratic Party.
The Lt Governor, who is serving alongside an unpopular Tim Walz administration that has been bruised by fraud allegations, has taken a radically different stance on trans issues than her now-opponent Tafoya after going viral a month ago for calling gender affirming care for minors life-saving and life-affirming.
“When our children tell us who they are, it is our job as grownups to listen and to believe them. That’s what it means to be a good parent,” she said.
Flanagan also criticized President Trump for his critique of the Somali community in Minnesota in a video filmed in her car.
“I just watched the video of Donald Trump attacking the beautiful Somali community that calls Minnesota home,” she said. “They are part of the fabric of our state. These are teachers and nurses and neighbors and the mayor and our friends. And we are going to stand shoulder to shoulder with our neighbors.
The video came after prosecutors charged nearly 100 people, the overwhelming majority of Somali descent, in schemes that exploited child nutrition, daycare, autism services, and other welfare programs. The Feeding Our Future case alone involved roughly $250 million in fake meal claims. Federal estimates suggest half or more of the $18 billion spent across 14 Minnesota programs since 2018 may have been stolen.