Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan won the Democratic primary for retiring Sen. Tina Smith’s seat on Tuesday, delivering progressives another major victory in the party’s ideological war.
Flanagan, who had the backing of Smith and left-wing heavyweights like Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), defeated moderate Rep. Angie Craig in a bruising race that largely revolved around two lightning-rod local topics: the Trump administration’s deadly immigration crackdown and the state’s welfare fraud scandal.
Flanagan excoriated her rival’s record on immigration enforcement throughout the campaign, calling Craig’s vote for the Laken Riley Act last year “disqualifying” and hammering her support for a resolution that contained a sentence expressing “gratitude” for ICE. Craig said in March that she regretted her vote on the GOP-led immigration bill. She also pushed to impeach then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem at the height of “Operation Metro Surge.”
Flanagan’s victory — despite being significantly outraised by Craig — is another proof point that progressives continue to be competitive in statewide primaries even in swingy territory.
The lieutenant governor cast her campaign as “the many versus the money” and harnessed grassroots anger at the establishment and outside influence to power her win. Republicans hope they can make the general election competitive against Flanagan in the slightly Democratic-leaning state by attacking her on the fraud scandal, though Republicans haven’t won a Senate race in Minnesota since 2002.
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