With Election Day encroaching, where do Minnesota's major races stand?
MINNEAPOLIS -- Tuesday is Election Day, and there have been some last-minute endorsements.
This week, former President Barack Obama endorsed Gov. Tim Walz and Keith Ellison for attorney general. Last week, former President Donald Trump endorsed Dr. Scott Jensen for governor and Kim Crockett for secretary of state.
In tonight's Talking Points, Esme Murphy looks at the state of the races.
It's almost here, and a lot of voters have said they are ready for the election and all of those ads to be over.
Check out WCCO's 2022 Election Guide
Many of the races are very close, according to polls. The final poll on Minnesota races comes from KSTP/ SurveyUSA. In that poll, Walz leads Jensen 51% to 43%, with 4% undecided and 2% preferring someone else. In the attorney general's race, Republican Jim Schultz has a lead over DFL incumbent Keith Ellison by 7 points, 49% to 42%, with 9% undecided.
Democratic incumbent Secretary of State Steve Simon leads Republican challenger Kim Crockett 47% to 41%, with 12% undecided.
In the state auditor's race, Ryan Wilson leads incumbent Democrat Julie Blaha 44% to 39%, with 14% undecided.
This poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9%. Things can also shift at the last minute. Take the AG's race four years ago. This same poll in late October had Ellison trailing his Republican opponent Doug Wardlow by 7 points. He ended up winning by 4 points.
Democratic and Republican analysts Abou Amara and Amy Koch were guests on WCCO Sunday Morning.
"It was real close in 2018, which was a terrible year for Republicans, and yet he was struggling in 2018," Koch said. "Now you come to 2022, it's a great year for Republicans, we have a good candidate on the ballot who has run a great campaign ... I think this is Jim Schultz's to win."
"There's no question this is a close race. If you do a poll of polls though, not this one poll but look at all of them, it's about a 50-50 split," Amara said. "In that environment, it's going to come down to who has the best operation. Hands down, Keith Ellison has a better turnout operation than Jim Schultz."
There has been less polling in the razor-tight 2nd Congressional District race between Democratic incumbent Angie Craig and Republican challenger Tyler Kistner. Complicating that race: there is a third-party candidate, Paula Overby, who died in early October, but she remains on the ballot, representing the Legal Marijuana Now Party.
Incredibly, this same scenario happened two years ago. Legal Marijuana Now Party candidate Adam Weeks died weeks before the election. He remained on the ballot and still got 24,000 votes.
You can watch WCCO Sunday morning with Esme Murphy and Mike Augustniak at 6 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. every Sunday.
