"I'm only considering because the top 5 people I expected to run aren't," Duluth City Council President Jeff Anderson replied when I asked him why he's considering running to take Jim Oberstar's seat back from Chip Cravaack. "Tom Bakk (Senate Minority Leader), Tony Sertich (Chair IRRRB), [Duluth Mayor] Don Ness, [State Sen.] Tony Lourey and [State Rep.] Roger Reinert aren't running."
"If any of them were, I'd be supporting them. Roger was the last one. I asked him if he was running, because I'd work hard for him. He told me all the reasons why he wasn't interested."
The race to replace Rep. Chip Cravaack (R-MN) will be one of the hottest races in the nation as Minnesota's Eighth District has been a Democratic (DFL in MN) stronghold. Unfortunately, the demographics are changing and I am expecting redistricting will add more southern, conservative precincts to the district.
-- cross-posted from MN Progressive Project, home of the Michele Bachmann Bizarro World --
Anderson is a Iron Range success story. He grew up in Ely, went to college locally and "left for the big city ... Duluth." He's the owner of a successful business and he's won an election before. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) generally prefers candidates to have won election prior to running for Congress.
"I'm a fourth generation Ranger," he said. "I grew up in same house my great-great-grandfather from Finland built."
Anderson would also be a ground-breaking candidate; he's openly gay.
On the one hand, if he ran he'd be able to tap into the national progressive fundraising networks because of his compelling story.
On the flip-side, I asked about how he thought this would play out in the southern-most precincts in the district, the very conservative Twin Cities suburban districts where Cravaack lives. He replied that he would stand for the principles all DFLers do; equality for all.
Upon further reflection, the Range is notoriously homophobic. Several people I spoke to mentioned that this would be a serious challenge (and this is putting it mildly according to one source). Anderson would have to overcome homophobia even amongst the DFL base in parts of his district.
Anderson also had some interesting analysis concerning running in the Eighth District:
"Oberstar's numbers have been going down year after year," he explained. "Comparing presidential year to the next presidential and comparing mid-term to the next mid-term, his support has been eroding. Obama beat Oberstar up here. Dayton beat Oberstar up here and even Al Franken beat his numbers."
The indication is that he understands we DFLers have to work hard to get our voters back.
Furthermore, he understands that the cliche about the Iron Range's biggest export still holds true...
"Look at Carly Melin's numbers amongst voters under fifty," he explained. Melin recently won a special election to replace Tony Sertich who was appointed to the IRRRB. "They're tiny. Our biggest export is young people. I think I can change that."
"I've worked in Duluth to make it a good place to live and work. We have new leaders in Duluth who are improving things."
And he believes that he's candidate who could bring those kinds of changes to the whole district. Provided, of course, that he decides to run.
One final anecdote about the 2010 MN-08 race from him:
"I was talking to a moderate Republican in the fall of '08," he said. "He told me 'I just drove down to Duluth from the Range and I saw loads of these Cravaack signs. I had no idea who he was so I looked him up online. I think he's got a chance so I'm going to give money to him.' These are the types of people that Cravaack won over."
"Cravaack built a grassroots campaign," Anderson continued. "Where Oberstar's numbers have been slowly eroding over the years."
He thinks we can take back this seat with a hard-working, grassroots campaign like DFLers have been running across the state in all kinds of races.