The Weekly Wrap 6-15
KSTP/SurveyUSA released a poll last week that I will address in a future, standalone, post. In the meantime, The Wrap™ is here to scratch your Minnesota politics itch.
♣ Matt Entenza, candidate for state Auditor, filed a complaint this week against the incumbent Auditor, Rebecca Otto, with the Office of Administrative Hearings claiming that she broke the law with a Facebook post denying that she voted for photo voter ID.
This is what Otto said in the Facebook post:
No, Lauren. It was not around in 2003. No one can find a bill on the issue when I served. Disappointing Matt [Entenza] will say anything on this issue.
As I’ve pointed out in a previous post, and as MPR points out here, the fact is that she did indeed vote for photo voter id language. Language that Entenza voted against. And Entenza isn’t the only person who thought of these votes as being in favor of photo voter id.
Still, state Sen. Mary Kiffmeyer, R-Big Lake, who sponsored the 2012 voter ID ballot question and who was Secretary of State in 2003, said that she considered the old language a form of voter ID.
In some ways, by denying that she voted for these bills Otto is doing exactly what Entenza wants her to do, not talk about her achievements as Auditor but instead talk about her time as a legislator. As a bonus for Matt Entenza, she’s also talking about Matt Entenza a lot.
When he first got into the race I was wondering what Entenza thought his path to victory was, because he wouldn’t have gotten into the race unless he thought he had one. Now I’m beginning to wonder if Otto knows how to handle a challenge from the left, because so far, she’s been playing right into his apparent plan.
♣ MPR’s PoliGraph takes on a claim by GOP Gubernatorial contender Marty Seifert that he is clean of the stink of lobbyist contributions.
“Not accepting lobbyist contributions so far this election, and in all my previous elections, has made my campaign unique,” said Seifert in a press release.
What did PoliGraph discover to be the reality?
For instance, during his previous gubernatorial bid, Seifert took $25,000 from political action committees formed by interest groups representing car retailers, nurse anesthetists, hospitals, sugar beet growers and gasoline retailers, among others.
Of that $25,000, more than $3,600 came from political action committees formed by legal and lobbying shops, including Best & Flanagan, Dorsey & Whitney, Faegre Baker Daniels, Gray Plant Mooty, Lindquist & Vennum, Messerli & Kramer and Winthrop & Weinstein.
So Marty Seifert has never accepted contributions from lobbyists, except of course for the numerous times that he has accepted contributions from lobbyists.
♣ Rachel Stassen-Berger wrote about a recent Pew poll that concerns American’s political ideology complete with lots of graphs!
♣ Ads!
The Minnesota Jobs Coalition attacks MNSure using six month old headlines!
♣ The Duluth City Council recently took up the issue of Ranked-Choice voting:
The Duluth News Tribune says City Council President Linda Krug is pushing the effort, with an ambitious timeline. She wants the City Charter Commission to decide by next month whether to approve the change, with council action coming by mid-July, to be ready for a possible November referendum.
In the end though, the city Council voted 5-4 against adopting the new voting system for this Novembers elections. That vote angered Krug:
“Shame on you councilors,” she said. “I’m very disappointed that you would deny the citizens of Duluth and the charter commission an opportunity to study this issue because you don’t like it. You’ll have to sleep with that tonight.”
Yes, shame on the Duluth City Council for not voting for something because they don’t like it.
♣ There are dueling narratives right now concerning the Iron Range, the DFL and mining that are pretty well summed up in the following two articles; the first, by MinnPost’s Briana Bierschbach, is the more well known concern-trolling narrative that is a vestige of the 1978 “Minnesota Massacre.” The other narrative, by Aaron Brown in the StarTribune, is the newer, less concern-trolly, narrative.
Thanks for your feedback. If we like what you have to say, it may appear in a future post of reader reactions.