Ahead of President Donald Trump’s Thursday rally in the state, Minnesota Democrats revealed on Monday that they fear Trump’s ambitious ground game in the state could help the president flip the state in 2020.
The Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party (Minnesota DFL) launched a fundraising campaign on Monday, saying it needed resources to compete with the organization that Trump’s team is building in the state.
“Trump is coming to Minnesota this week to break our blue wall and flip our state red in 2020. That can’t happen,” Minnesota DFL tweeted. “Here’s why this is bad news for Dems everywhere: 1) Donald Trump came within 1.5 percentage points (or 44,470 votes) of winning statewide in Minnesota in 2016. That’s the 2nd closest Democratic state in the country after New Hampshire.”
The Minnesota DFL conceded that it cannot keep up with the Trump campaign’s organization on the ground and emphasized that “Trump almost winning Minnesota was not a fluke.”
“Minnesota, one of the last bastions of progressivism in the Midwest, has been trending more and more red in the last few presidential elections,” Minnesota DFL noted. “The Trump campaign is staffing up in Minnesota in ways we’ve never seen before, and frankly we just can’t keep up. Trump and the GOP already have over two dozen staffers on the ground, and are promising more, and they have already trained over 600 volunteers in Minnesota!”
The Minnesota DFL also pointed out that Trump is “personally obsessed” with winning Minnesota after he defied all of the political pundits and experts in 2016 when he almost flipped the state. The DFL warned that if Trump carries Minnesota, it will be nearly mathematically impossible for Democrats to take back the White House.
“Here’s the bottom line: There is no path to a Democratic victory in the Presidential race without Minnesota in the blue column,” Minnesota DFL added. “If Trump flips MN red by flooding our state with money and campaign staff, we are guaranteed to have four more years of President Donald Trump.”
Trump will hold a Thursday evening rally at the Target Center in Minneapolis, and Minnesota GOP chair Jennifer Carnahan told CBS Minnesota on Sunday that “there have been nearly 100,000 people that have signed up online for tickets.”