Sharon Sund to challenge Erik Paulsen
Thursday, August 04, 2011 at 7:30 am
- 8 Comments
Republican Rep. Erik Paulsen has drawn his first challenger for the 2012 campaign cycle in Plymouth resident Sharon Sund. Sund is seeking the DFL endorsement in Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional District, which encompasses Hennepin County except for Minneapolis and its immediate suburbs.
“Using my experience as a scientist, manager, and developer of green technologies I will work to move the 3rd district toward a prosperous future for all,” Sund remarks on her website. “As a community volunteer and organizer I have worked with diverse groups across the state to forge common ground and achieve significant results.”
Sund faces an uphill, but not impossible, battle; the district has been held by a Republican since 1961.
The district was seen as a tossup in 2008 when moderate Republican Jim Ramstad retired. Paulsen bested Ashwin Madia 49 to 41 percent that year. And in 2010, he won the district with 59% of the vote against DFLer Jim Meffert.
The district is a presidential swing district, going for George W. Bush with 51 percent in 2004 and for Barack Obama with 52 percent in 2008.
Sund says her visits to Paulsen’s offices prompted her to run.
“It became painfully evident that he was only interested in continuing failed policies,” she writes. “He was determined to continue to vote the same way even if it destroyed what we value in our country.”
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Comment posted August 4, 2011 @ 8:57 am
“experience as a scientist, manager, and developer of green technologies”
If the 3rd District is basically a Taliban stronghold, she might have problems. I wish her well, but aren’t all those qualifications in direct conflict with the basic Republican message of :
Keep our constituents ignorant of facts, don’t believe the scientific community unless they say what we want them to say, green is bad black coal and oil are sacred.
Comment posted August 4, 2011 @ 11:28 am
I am ALL IN – this is my district (it is a MODERATE district – see Ramstad for further evidence) and it is time to oust Paulsen, who is clearly a shill for the corporations…and is blindly being pulled by the ALEC strings.
Pingback posted August 5, 2011 @ 11:07 am
[...] MN-03: Possible Some Dudette Sharon Sund will make the race against second-term GOP Rep. Erik Paulsen, who cruised in 2010 after a tough 2008 open-seat race against Democrat Ashwin Madia in this swingish suburban district. [...]
Comment posted August 5, 2011 @ 12:53 pm
Nice website, Sharon.
Is she a serious candidate? Looks like we’re back to the B-team in our attempts to get rid of 3rd district GOP congressmen. Anyone with political experience interested in running? Any current/former state legislators? What about Mari Ruud? She was rad. There has to be someone!
Comment posted August 5, 2011 @ 1:26 pm
Ms. Sund – I look forward to familiarizing myself with your positions on the issues of the day. I certainly know of Rep Paulsen’s proposals, and I am bored with his “as above, so below…” echoing ad nauseum the RNC marching orders. Show us what you’re thinking and we’ll go from there.
Comment posted August 6, 2011 @ 12:55 am
Though Sharon has not yet served as an elected representative, does not mean that she lacks experience.
Sharon has worked in the trenches, moving some of our current D.C. representation, to be
more of what we elected them to be; representatives of the people!
Sharon is not a DLC type, Blue Dog, or DINO. Haven’t we seen enough of that type of “so called Democrat”, to last us a life time? I sure have! It’s time to send a real Democrat to Washington, someone who remembers who her real constituents are, and will fight for a better America for all.
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