Minnesota can be the firewall to stop the spread of socialism across our country, or we can be the next domino to fall.
From coast to coast, candidates openly aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America have won their primaries and will now be on the ballot this fall. Whether it’s New York, Michigan, or even Florida, candidates who once would have been considered far outside the mainstream are now the Democratic nominees in elections that will determine control of the Senate, House, and state legislatures across the country.
We don’t have to imagine what DSA control of our political institutions will mean for ordinary Americans — we have already lived it in Minnesota.
In 2023-2024, DSA-aligned Democrats had full control of Minnesota’s political institutions. Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) and Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan were in the executive branch, and Democrats had control of both the Minnesota House and Senate, with many powerful committee chairs being DSA-aligned.
What was the result when they had free rein? For starters, complete fiscal mismanagement, as they spent our $18 billion surplus, raised taxes by another $10 billion, and still left us with a deficit.
The expansive and expensive government mandates have made life unaffordable for most working families and seniors. It started with the Big Government overreach during COVID-19, when Walz and Flanagan closed schools, churches, and small businesses around the state for nearly 18 months. Then DSA Democrats made it harder for businesses and families to recover by increasing the sales tax, the gas tax, car tabs, and boat license fees. Socialists may claim to want “affordability,” but their policies have made everything more expensive.
The DSA didn’t just pass their economic agenda, however. They also pushed through their goals of early release for felons, restored voting rights before felons’ full sentences were complete, and even tried to restrict the free speech of Minnesotans.
But it doesn’t end there, as these same radicals successfully passed driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants, free college and free healthcare for illegal immigrants, and the mandating of carbon-free electricity by 2040.
The most harmful item on their agenda was to make Minnesota a “trans sanctuary state,” including allowing life-altering surgeries for minors who could be brought to Minnesota without parental permission.
If Democrats gain further control in state legislatures or Congress, they will continue to push these radical policies from coast to coast. They will not stop until they realize their larger goals — expanding government control in every sector of the economy and every aspect of our lives.
This is an insidious destruction of our American values from within our borders. We must ask ourselves not which candidate we want to win, but what kind of government we are willing to accept. What kind of state and country do we want to be?
The DSA and their enablers in the Democratic Party want the government, not the private sector, to be in charge of healthcare, education, housing, childcare, and food distribution (free grocery stores), and they plan to pay for it by continuing to increase taxes on those who still work for a living.
To the DSA, if you work hard and are successful, you must not be paying your “fair share.” In Minnesota, they have openly called for “class warfare” as they touted their plans to “soak the rich” — a new fifth-tier income tax level of 10.85% and the first-in-the-nation wealth tax to confiscate a percentage of your total net worth every year.
Instead of actually helping workers, families, and seniors, these policies will continue to incentivize an exodus from blue states, reducing jobs and economic growth and driving up taxes and prices for those who remain. The DSA’s policies are making life less affordable for working families and seniors, but they gaslight the public, saying they care about affordability, when what they really care about is expanding their power to control our lives. Their policies create dependency and make life less affordable for everyone who is not on public assistance.
History is littered with their failed policies. What they fail to understand is that markets work, despite their best efforts to destroy the market economy. Capital and labor are mobile, and people and money will go where they are rewarded for work and for productive investments that create growth.
There is no such thing as a free lunch. The use of government power to force economic equality actually makes most people worse off.
What is at stake in the November election, in Minnesota and around the country, is whether we will have more or less government control of our lives and our economy.
DSA-aligned candidates who are promising affordability are selling a hackneyed lie. Less government intervention in the economy, not more, is what will give us greater freedom and innovation and create more prosperity and opportunity for all.
Minnesota is the epicenter of fraud, illustrating what happens when the government grows beyond our ability to manage all of these bureaucratic programs. Minnesota’s fraud scandals should be a warning: Big Government socialists reward their political base at the expense of hard-working people and vulnerable citizens.
If Democrats gain control of Congress, they will take these crippling ideas nationwide. We can’t let Flanagan join Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) as they destroy the American dream with their socialist nightmare.
Moderate Democrats should take a hard look at where their party is headed. Republicans need to ask whether we are doing enough to stop it.
I FLED CASTRO’S NIGHTMARE — THIS NEW WAVE OF IMMIGRANTS IS IMPORTING IT
Minnesota does not have to follow the path of New York, California, Washington, or Oregon. We can show the country how voters can reject the DSA’s radical agenda and instead support common-sense candidates who will ensure the government lives within its means, reward hard work and investment, and expand citizens’ freedom and opportunity instead of restricting it to government-run programs.
We can be the breaker that stems the rising tide of socialism and protects the American dream.
Kristin Robbins is the chairwoman of the Minnesota Fraud Prevention Committee.