Republicans are mounting an unexpectedly competitive challenge for Minnesota’s open Senate seat, raising the possibility of an upset in a state where the party has not won a Senate election for nearly a quarter-century.
Sabato’s Crystal Ball, a nonpartisan political forecasting outlet, moved the contest between Democratic Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan and Republican former broadcaster Michele Tafoya from Likely Democratic to Leans Democratic on Wednesday.
In an email to Newsweek on Thursday, the forecaster's managing editor, Kyle Kondik, cited Flanagan’s “soft” polling and the “uncertainty in Minnesota this year” as reasons for the shift.
She “should probably still be fine,” he added. The forecaster’s published analysis said that the race had not attracted the heavy outside funds flowing into the principal Senate battleground, suggesting the Democrat was still favored.
But the downgrade comes as Minnesota Democrats face pressure on several fronts, including disputes over social services fraud and immigration enforcement, as well as escalating political confrontations involving Governor Tim Walz and Representative Ilhan Omar. Against that backdrop, a Senate contest Democrats might ordinarily expect to keep within their grasp looks to be potentially slipping away from them less than three weeks before Election Day.
While several Senate contests have shifted toward Democrats, Minnesota was the only Democratic-held seat among the five races adjusted by the Crystal Ball this week to move toward Republicans.
The tightening race came into sharper focus Friday as Flanagan and Tafoya faced off in what is likely to be their only one-on-one battle before Election Day. The hourlong MPR News debate featured sharp exchanges over fraud, immigration, affordability and the candidates' relationships with President Donald Trump and Walz.
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Tafoya repeatedly sought to tie Flanagan to the Walz administration's record, while Flanagan argued that her opponent would be a “rubber stamp” for Trump despite Tafoya's efforts to portray herself as an independent voice.
Flanagan’s team remained confident despite the ratings change and tight public polling, according to a person associated with the campaign.
“We feel good, we feel stable, we feel strong, but do we need voters to turn out? Absolutely,” the person told Newsweek.
The person pointed to Flanagan’s primary performance as evidence of enthusiasm. Official results show she received 411,853 votes, more than all nine Republican Senate candidates combined.
The person would not say whether the campaign’s internal polling matched the public surveys.
Newsweek emailed the Tafoya campaign for comment.
Flanagan vs. Tafoya: What the Latest Polls Show
A KSTP/SurveyUSA poll released Wednesday placed Flanagan 3 points ahead, with 45 percent to Tafoya’s 42 percent. Nine percent were undecided. The result represented an improvement for Flanagan after the pollster found the candidates tied at 42 percent in September, but it still left the Republican within striking distance.
A separate Mason-Dixon poll put Flanagan ahead 47 percent to 43 percent among 800 likely voters. A RealClearPolitics polling average on Friday gave her a 2.6-point advantage, down from approximately 5 points earlier in the campaign.
The SurveyUSA results revealed a sharp geographic divide. Tafoya led in three of Minnesota’s four surveyed regions, while Flanagan held a 23-point advantage in the Twin Cities. Flanagan also performed strongly among younger voters, while Tafoya led among older groups.
Minnesota Fraud and Immigration Battles Shape Senate Race
The controversies surrounding Minnesota Democrats have also supplied Tafoya with a central argument against Flanagan: that the lieutenant governor shares responsibility for Walz’s administration.
Tafoya has focused particularly on fraud in state-administered programs. “Of course, we are going to talk about fraud, fraud and fraud,” she told KSTP in August.
“Governor Walz said he wished more had been done sooner, and I agree with him,” Flanagan told KSTP, while pointing to legislation intended to stop and prevent fraud.
“She is absolutely outraged and understands where Minnesota’s anger is coming from,” the person associated with her campaign said.
The issue took center stage again during Friday's debate. Tafoya accused Flanagan of trying to distance herself from problems that emerged while she served as lieutenant governor.
“She was second in charge in this state, and she's just going to point her finger at Governor Tim Walz when she demanded it be the Walz-Flanagan administration,” Tafoya said. “But suddenly she has nothing to do with this.”
Flanagan responded that Walz had accepted responsibility for addressing fraud and said her own portfolio had focused on other Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Party priorities, including paid family and medical leave, as well as free school lunches.
The issue has received national attention. The Justice Department announced charges against 15 defendants in alleged Minnesota Medicaid and benefits fraud schemes involving more than $90 million.
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Immigration has produced a parallel confrontation. Walz and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, also a Democrat, have argued that federal immigration operations hampered fraud investigations, while congressional Republicans have accused state officials of failing to protect public money.
Immigration also produced one of Friday's sharpest exchanges. Flanagan reiterated her call for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to be “ripped apart” and replaced with a system featuring secure borders alongside “dignity, due process, humanity, and a pathway to citizenship” for law-abiding immigrants who have been in the country.
Tafoya said America should be “a nation of immigration and also a nation of law and order.” She criticized the way the Trump administration's immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota was initially handled, while also accusing Walz and Flanagan of a “massive failure” of state leadership during the operation.
The debate also put both candidates' relationships with major figures in their respective parties under scrutiny. Tafoya did not say whether she would share a campaign stage with Trump, who endorsed her earlier this week, while Flanagan did not say whether she would campaign with Walz.
“Peggy, Donald Trump isn't on the ballot. You and I are on the ballot,” Tafoya told Flanagan.
A Historic Upset
A Republican victory would end a 24-year drought for the party in the North Star State. Minnesota last elected a Republican senator in 2002, when Norm Coleman defeated former Vice President Walter Mondale by 49.53 percent to 47.34 percent.
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Flanagan remains the favorite, but the narrowing margins have turned the race into an under-the-radar test of whether Republicans can capitalize on voter dissatisfaction with Minnesota's Democratic leadership and break a Senate losing streak stretching to 2002.
Newsweek’s reporters and editors used Martyn, our AI assistant, to produce this story. Learn more about Martyn here. Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Edward T. Cummins