Days before primary, Minnesota voters are divided, energized
"There is that four-letter word -- hate, which is really prevalent. The question is how do you join people together?" said Kaczmarek, 74, a retired tax accountant. Favro, the 27-year-old barber, said, "It is very, very, very split. There are protests here every Saturday."
The fractured and motivated mood of
An open governor's race, two
"Everything is riding on these midterms and the election coming up in two years," said
Ellingson is still researching candidates' stands on issues such as health care and the minimum wage. He has voted in every presidential election since turning 18, but will vote in his first midterm Tuesday.
Energized voters like Ellingson are fueling a surge in involvement this year. "It's a terrible time in history," said
As of Thursday, 86,909 people had voted statewide, compared with 29,455 on the same date in 2016 -- an increase of 195 percent, according to the Secretary of State's Office.
Conventional wisdom suggests that those numbers reflect urgency among voters eager to reverse
But
Manoles voted early for
The lively campaign for governor, which also features three DFLers -- state Rep.
A Pawlenty victory would be "disastrous" for the state, said
In a year when a record number of women are running for office, some Murphy and Swanson supporters said gender was a decisive factor.
Other Minnesotans offered a slew of issues that will influence their votes: veterans' needs, affordable housing, the farm economy, the stability of Medicare and
But the president -- his governing style, his rhetoric and whether his policies should be encouraged or thwarted -- is a dominant theme. His name isn't on the ballot, but it is on many voters' minds.
At the barbershop in
This is how
Kubinski's mom is in a nursing home, so he's frustrated with the health care system. He thinks too many people claim disabilities; they qualify for free fishing licenses, so he meets many of them. And he wishes the country would "take care of more of our own people and not give [immigrants] the world."
He felt that way long before Trump's 2016 campaign, Kubinski said, "but he's just finally saying what everybody's thinking."
There are "more good candidates than there has been in the past," Murman said. "It's definitely more important this year. We just have to keep the [blue] wave going."
Beneath that enthusiasm, however, there's a strain of dispirited pessimism among some of the state's voters.
"They're not unimportant, but they probably actually motivated people on the other side," he said. "I thought there were big issues being sidestepped," such as the
"We've become so polarized, so emotional," Russell said. "I think it's going to take some kind of national crisis for everybody to come together."
She chose candidates who won't govern with "moral cruelty," she said. "I feel so powerless. ... This feels so small to me, but it feels essential."
"I'm through with talking points," she said. "I want to hear why people believe what they believe, why they vote the way they vote, and I don't want something cookie-cutter. I want my elected officials to represent me, and I want them to listen to me."
Ananda-Owens is encouraged by reports of increased voter registration among the young. "I'm not prepared to write this country off. I'm absolutely not prepared to write democracy off," she said.
"This is one of those elections where I feel I have to get off of my chair and start working for the people who I believe in. It's time for us to start grabbing hands and working together instead of just shouting each other down."
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