Tim Walz Sets His Course

Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN)

Earlier this year, Kamala Harris announced that she would not be running for Governor (and has since been on a "burn every bridge book tour" that I don't know that I'm going to write about, but indicates to me that she has no intention of running for President in 2028, as this is not the kind of book tour you run if you eventually need campaign endorsements).  But her running-mate, up until this past week, had largely kept shy about what he planned to do next.  For a while, it looked like Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz might consider running for the US Senate (potentially even against his Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, who is running for the open seat currently-held by Tina Smith, and if you believe most local Minnesota gossip, has a complicated relationship with the man she spent most of his first two terms being quite close with).  But he declined.  Then it looked like he might retire in the wake of the death of his political ally & friend Melissa Hortman (for those unfamiliar with Minnesota politics, had Walz stepped aside, there's a strong possibility that Hortman would've run for the open Governor's race, potentially even with his endorsement).  But Walz this week announced that he will run for reelection, seeking an unprecedented third four-year term.

Minnesota, unlike most states, does not have a limit on the number of terms that the Governor can serve (it's one of only 13 states where that's the case).  But unlike places like Vermont, Texas, Wisconsin, & Iowa where this has been proven by longtime incumbents such as Terry Branstad & Tommy Thompson, Minnesota has never had a governor win a third term since the state went to four-year terms.  Orville Freeman was the last governor to successfully win a third term, but it was in the 1950's when the state only had two-year terms for the Governor.  Since 1962 (when they switched over to four year terms), no governor has successfully won a third term, and honestly...few have even considered or been eligible for one.

In the case of two governors (Arne Carlson & Mark Dayton), neither of them sought another term (Dayton's health was pretty bad by the time he was done so it's unlikely another campaign would've ben well-advised, Carlson likely could've won one as he remained popular, and certainly could've been a calming compromise in the insanity of the state's 1998 election).  Tim Pawlenty initially declined to run for a third term in 2010 (it's questionable whether he would've won one, but given the hard red wave that year it would have been a tossup, even against someone as formidable as Dayton), at the time focusing on a presidential campaign in 2012.  But when that fizzled, he took another stab at the nomination in 2018 for a third term...but in the MAGA era, couldn't even win the primary.

The most famous case of a Minnesota governor attempting a third term was in 1990, when Gov. Rudy Perpich went for what was really a fourth term, as Perpich had briefly been governor in the late 1970's when Wendell Anderson resigned to become a US Senator.  Tangent time: if you've read this blog for a while, you know I loathe the idea of people not referring to a partial political term as a "term" because term is not inherently a word that solely means a specific unit of time...that would be what the phrase "full term" is for, but I digress.  Suffice it to say that Perpich was attempting to do something that had never been done before-be elected to a third four-year term after winning in 1982 & 1986.

Perpich's election was fraught.  He had been in politics for 20 years (the Democrats hadn't had a ticket without him since 1970), and people were ready for a change, particularly in a down economy.  But the Republicans didn't nominate the popular-and-moderate State Auditor Arne Carlson, but instead businessman Jon Grunseth, who was ahead of Perpich for most of the campaign.  Grunseth, though, three weeks before the election, was caught in a massive sex scandal, where it was alleged that he had gone skinny-dipping with four teenage girls (one of which was his stepdaughter) in the early 1980's.  Grunseth initially refused to drop out, and Carlson started to wage a write-in campaign.  With the Republican vote split, it seemed like Perpich was going to accidentally get his third term despite being unpopular...until Grunseth was convinced to drop out, and in an era before widespread early voting which would've made this impossible, Carlson was put on the ballot and beat Perpich by 4-points.

Walz is not in the same position as Perpich.  He is considerably more popular (though less popular than he was before he unsuccessfully sought the governorship), and while Democrats might be tired of him, in the Trump Era it's unlikely that they'll throw him out for someone else, and indeed, the Republicans appear poised to nominate the man Walz defeated in 2022, Scott Jessen, again (though other candidates are running, Jessen is the biggest name so far).  Walz's decision makes what could've been an ugly primary between Secretary of State Steve Simon and Attorney General Keith Ellison (both of whom skipped the Senate race this year, likely with an eye on Walz retiring) a non-issue (at least until 2030, when Walz's running-mate could potentially be the most important name in the race, making Simon & Ellison's decisions not to go for the Senate look a bit like bad timing on their parts).

This also keeps the window open for Tim Walz in 2028's presidential race.  Walz made headlines in 2024 for stating he had "no intention to run for president" as one of the reasons Kamala Harris allegedly picked him, but anyone who has followed politics for a while knows that's something people say until they don't say it, and I expect Walz to heavily consider running for president.  In the past 100 years, we've had 24 losing VP candidates (not counting Walz), and 10 of them ended up running for the nomination, which sounds low until you remember that two of them (Charles Curtis & Charles McNary) died before the next election, and five others (Estes Kefauver, Lloyd Bentsen, Jack Kemp, Sarah Palin, & Paul Ryan) did not tamp down speculation they would run, even if they ultimately did not, essentially running a public opinion campaign even if they didn't run an actual one.

But to put some perspective on this for Walz, only two of those 24 (Walter Mondale & Bob Dole) would get the nomination, and neither of them would win the general.  You have to go back to 1920 for the last time a losing VP candidate (Franklin Delano Roosevelt) would eventually become president.  Walz's chances of making history in Minnesota as its longest-serving governor seem bright, but if he has his eye on redemption for 2024 on a national scale...he's got a lot of history to overcome.