Liveblogging: Secretary of State

Editor’s Note: This space will contain live coverage from the Mary Kiffmeyer (R) and Mark Ritchie (DFL) campaigns, and will be updated throughout the day.

1:46 pm: This morning, The Nation called Ritchie “the most outspoken champion of reform” among all SoS candidates nationally. Written by John Nichols, editorial page editor for the Capital Times and one of the founders of the media reform organization Free Press, the essay concludes: “There are a lot of important races to be decided today. But few candidates hold the promise that Mark Ritchie and his fellow contenders for Secretary of State positions do for the restoration and renewal of our battered American democracy.”

1:30 pm: Here’s how the candidates said they’ll be spending today: Mary Kiffmeyer will be “working on official election business” most of the day and will end up at the Sheraton in Bloomington for the GOP party. Mark Ritchie has been out “meeting as many people as possible,” according to campaign manager James Haggar. His plan is to spend a little quiet time at home before heading the DFL party at the Crowne Plaza in St. Paul.

8:00 am: Once sleepy, the downballot race for Secretary of State has taken on new importance thanks to the infamy of Ken Blackwell of Ohio in 2004, Florida’s Katherine Harris in 2000, and others. Here in Minnesota, the race pits two-time incumbent Mary Kiffmeyer, who is accused of playing politics with what should be a non-partisan office, against trade policy expert Mark Ritchie. I’ll be liveblogging the race this evening and spending time with each campaign. But first, some background…

Without polling, this race is difficult to call. If Kiffmeyer has an advantage, it’s incumbency. While she trailed Ritchie in fundraising, her name recognition is high, buoyed by two terms in office. She also takes credit for Minnesota’s historically high voter turnouts; the general election of 2004, a presidential year, had Minnesota’s highest turnout in more than four decades. Her tenure has been packed with controversy, from her “Behaviors of Homicide Bombers” posters (said to target Muslim men) sent to polling places to recent accusations that she failed to update the official elections website to reflect changes to voter residency requirements enacted by law in 2005.

Mark Ritchie’s biggest strength is that he’s not Republican, and he can tout the impressive statistic that he lead a coalition of organizations that registered an unprecedented number of new voters–five million–through 2004′s November 2 project. As president of the nonprofit Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy for 20 years, he can claim an outsider status: he’s not a career politician and, unlike Kiffmeyer, has remained free from party and ideological entanglements. He also picked up a key endorsement, that of Kiffmeyer’s predecessor, Joan Growe, who served in the office for 24 years.