I’m posting MPR’s fine customized election results widget in this post to preserve it for all time (or until MPR cuts off the feed, whichever comes first). I’ll just make a few comments about the legislative races on the Iron Range, mostly for the benefit of about eight people. First, the results:
I’ve already discussed Obama and Franken on the Iron Range. The legislative races here produced no surprises. As many of you know (and in the interests of full disclosure), I am Rep. Tom Anzelc’s campaign manager. Tom won a second term Tuesday, scoring almost the same exact vote percentage as 2006 but this time amid much higher vote totals for the presidential year. Importantly, we won all three counties in the district which can be attributed to how hard Tom has worked to cultivate relationships and trust in the borderland of Koochiching and Lake of the Woods counties. (Remember, though, I’m biased). We lost a couple of points from some conservative precincts north of Grand Rapids where our Republican opponent Marv Ott is from, which is the only reason Tom didn’t gain points from 2006. Ott tried pretty hard and deserves credit for that. Meantime, the IP’s Bill Hamm earned 6 percent in this district, which was surprisingly strong considering that his entire focus was medicinal marijuana.
In 3B, Loren Solberg carried traditional DFL numbers in Itasca and Aiken counties against a very hard working Republican opponent burdened by a name that is too long for lazy bloggers to go look up how to spell.
In 5B, Tony Sertich won re-election against bar owner John Larson with 70 percent. Larson fought harder than any Republican in 5B for some time, including a healthy amount of TV buys. Tony took it seriously and won by a solid margin.
In 5A, Tom Rukavina was driven below 80 percent for the first time in a couple cycles. Somewhere over Pike Township, the expletives still hang in the air.
In 6A, David Dill won without much contest. These big districts like 6A and my home 3A often run silent because the distance between towns and constituencies dampens the water cooler effect and makes organizing much harder.
Otherwise, the only really big news out of my sphere of observation is that DFLer John Persell won the open 4A seat in Bemidji, beating GOPer John Carlson. This is a credit to Persell, whose been a DFL activist for a long time, but also to the energetic outgoing Rep. Frank Moe who stepped down to focus on his family. Moe had a big impact on this district when he burst onto the scene four years ago and was instrumental in turning it from a pure tossup seat to what now appears to be a perceptible DFL lean.
In Duluth, all incumbents won as well. Congratulations to Roger Reinert, the newly elected State Representative in West Duluth, for winning the biggest margin of victory in the Zenith City. Roger, along with most of his DFL primary opponents, was very responsive and exceedingly respectful of this blog, which I appreciate.
I’ll just tell one story about Roger that shows why I think he’ll do a good job for Duluth. During an e-mail exchange about a candidate questionnaire, I casually mentioned to Roger that my family would be making a rare trip out of the woods to visit the Duluth Zoo. Instead of just offering pleasantries, Roger wrote back with a detailed suggestion of all the things we could do for fun in his future district in addition to the zoo. Granted, if we had done everything he suggested we would have dropped a couple grand (he had B&Bs and everything in there) but the effort seemed sincere. Way to go, Roger … Duluth can use your energy.
I love your commentary. It is so really obvious how different campaigns have to be.
I spent the last days doing 600 doors GOTV, walking my precinct, putting notes on doors. This is in service to my precinct since I am precinct chair. This is my most effective tool for state wide candidates.
I also sometimes think, if I was in outstate Minnesota I could do a whole small town. It would be the same number, however a whole town is much more impressive than a precinct.