house speaker paul ryan swung through the western minneapolis suburb of plymouth wednesday evening to rally supporters behind gop rep. erik paulsen. | getty by maggie severns 11/03/16 11:58 am edt there was no more fitting place for house speaker paul ryan to be six days before the 2016 election than minnesota, where three house races have turned on their heads in ways that are good, bad and just plain strange for republicans defending their house majority. minnesota is the 2016 house landscape in miniature: donald trump has pulled new gop districts onto the battleground map but democrats are still fighting to close the deal with voters <u+2014> and are also playing defense in ancestrally democratic, blue-collar seats in which trump has energized the republican party. story continued below ryan swung through the western minneapolis suburb of plymouth on wednesday evening to rally supporters behind gop rep. erik paulsen, who is facing his most difficult race since he won his first term in 2008 because democrats saw trump polling poorly in the 3rd congressional district and recruited a challenger to try to ride an anti-trump wave. <u+201c>there are two kinds of people in politics: show horses and workhorses,<u+201d> ryan told a crowd of 200 in a parking lot outside the local gop headquarters. paulsen is a workhorse, ryan said. in keeping with ryan<u+2019>s october pledge to focus on the house, he didn<u+2019>t mention trump once. a lone attendee carried a trump/pence 2016 sign, but aside from him there was no sign of the top of the ticket. paulsen, an establishment republican and aryan ally, faces the possibility that educated voters in his tony suburban district might abandon the gop ticket because of trump. yet nothing is quite that simple in the district-by-district scramble for the house. up north in the blue-collar iron range, republicans could unseat 8th district rep. rick nolan, who has become the most endangered house democrat in the country thanks in no small part to trump's success. and to the south, in the 2nd district, inexperienced republican jason lewis <u+2014> whose controversial past statements on the radio echo trump <u+2014> had been expected to flame out in the suburban race to replace retiring goprep. john kline, but he has defied expectations in both parties by staying afloat into the final week of the election against democrat angie craig, a health care executive and political neophyte. if all three seats were to flip next week, party control over large sections of minnesota would be redrawn among urban-rural lines, as they increasingly have been around the country in recent years. paulsen<u+2019>s district is considered the safest for republicans, while minnesota observers expect the two other races to be close. but even longtime state operatives are queasy thinking about the unknowns that could still lie ahead between now and tuesday. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s never been so volatile<u+201d> in minnesota, one gop strategist said. <u+201c>it just feels like something could spiral one way or the other that<u+2019>s not even in our control.<u+201d> white house by sarah wheaton even lewis joked about how he<u+2019>s surprised onlookers by hanging on wednesday, after a radio appearance in northfield, 40 miles south of paulsen<u+2019>s district. <u+201c>did you ever think, all these months later, i<u+2019>d be here?<u+201d> lewis asked with a smile. operatives on both sides of the aisle agree there will be no "wave year" in which democrats ride anti-trump sentiment to victory. the two suburban districts that democrats are targeting would be hard-fought victories for the party, owing in part to factors beyond trump, even in the best-case scenario <u+2014> and there might not be any victories at all. the democratic congressional campaign committee found that moderate republican voters in paulsen's district dislike trump at exceptionally high rates early this past spring, sparking democrats to recruit terri bonoff to enter the race. but as the year progressed, it became clear anti-trump feeling alone couldn<u+2019>t carry bonoff, and she<u+2019>s become more vocal about attacking paulsen<u+2019>s political weaknesses, like votes to defund planned parenthood that democrats say are unpopular in the district. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s not enough just to try to link these candidates to trump. for us, really,we've got to talk about how out of touch erik paulsen is,<u+201d> state democratic-farmer-labor party chairman ken martin said. dccc recruitment chairman denny heck, a second-term congressman from washington state, stopped in both minneapolis-area districts on wednesday to pump up democratic canvassers, his last stop out of state before heading home to campaign in his district. <u+201c>he came out here because they<u+2019>re afraid,<u+201d> heck said of ryan. his advice to the canvassers: <u+201c>you can sleep when you<u+2019>re dead.<u+201d> after the rally in plymouth, ryan and national republican campaign committee chairman greg walden of oregon dashed downtown to the exclusive minneapolis club to fundraise for republican stewart mills, who has nolan in the fight of his life in northern minnesota<u+2019>s 8th district. the district has become the most expensive house race in the country, driven by spending from both parties. recent steel industry layoffs in northern minnesota created widespread anger in the region and primed union democrats to support trump, accelerating an otherwise slow blue-to-red shift among voters. 2016 by kenneth p. vogel trump has sizable support in nolan<u+2019>s district, but democrats have some insurance in the form of a longstanding voter turnout machine. there are 55 paid field staffers in the 8th district alone, despite democrat hillary clinton being expected to easily win the state. <u+201c>when you think about how volatile the electorate is not just around the state but around the country, the ground game can give you a little more sense of predictability in an unpredictable election,<u+201d> said martin. the dfl<u+2019>s calculations of early voting thus far found that 65 percent of early votes in the district have been democratic ballots. lewis came burdened with a trump-like opposition research file of hair-raising past statements from his radio career <u+2014> he once said young single women are <u+201c>unthinking,<u+201d> for example <u+2014> and he<u+2019>s struggled with fundraising amid concerns he<u+2019>s a liability. but trump is not as toxic in the 2nd district, where voters have shown an independent streak in the past, as he is in paulsen<u+2019>s bordering home turf. and lewis started the race as a well-known figure in the district from his radio career. according to a new internal poll from the craig campaign, craig currently leads lewis 45 percent to 40 percent in the district, a number that echoes another recent independent poll . still, both parties have continued to spend on that race into the last days of the campaign. the craig campaign has also poured energy into a field program that lewis<u+2019> campaign cannot match. democrats have made more than 1.5 million voter contacts and knocked on more than 400,000 doors in the district alone, an effort that <u+2014> in addition to being a party focus across the country <u+2014> reflects minnesota voters<u+2019> longtime emphasis on civic engagement. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s how politics is done in minnesota, going back to the tradition of paul wellstone,<u+201d> craig spokesman mychal vlatkovich said, referring to the late senator and former local northfield professor. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s how politics are done here, it<u+2019>s how you win races here.<u+201d> by michael grunwald by bill scher by thomas wright by joshua zeitz
ryan stumps on minnesota<u+2019>s miniature house battlefield - politico
maggie severns sarah wheaton kenneth p. vogel michael grunwald