3rd District

A flashpoint in the 3rd Congressional District mini-debate on TPT’s Almanac program Friday (video) was Republican candidate Erik Paulsen’s charge that DFL candidate Ashwin Madia has illegally coordinated his campaign with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, an independent group. Madia denied it and challenged Paulsen for proof. State Rep. Paulsen produced from his breast pocket [...]

The National Republican Congressional Committee has continued to cut back on its planned TV advertising buys in Minnesota, with a second week of ads canceled in the 3rd Congressional District and a week called off for the first time in the 6th as well. That’s the situation at KSTP and, according to MPR’s Polinaut blog, [...]

With less than a month to go in one of the country’s hottest congressional contests, outside groups — other than the major parties’ congressional campaign committees — are rolling out ads in Minnesota’s 3rd district. One that’s new is from Health Care for America Now, a 501(c)(4) nonprofit coalition, asserting that Republican Erik Paulsen is “Not on Your Side [...]

UPDATED Well, they do call it the Independence Party. It turns out the party’s candidate in the 3rd Congressional District race, David Dillon, has donated a considerable sum of his own money to his campaign through Sept. 2: $122,000. That’s 81 percent of his campaign’s $150,513 war chest, which according to a fresh report from the Center for Responsive Politics’ opensecrets.org, makes Dillon the eighth biggest self-funding candidate for the U.S. House or Senate this year, by percentage of total money raised.

DFLer Ashwin Madia holds a five-point lead over Republican state Rep. Erik Paulsen in Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional District race, according to results of a new poll released Monday by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC). It’s a sizable swing from Paulsen’s three-point lead in an independent poll six weeks ago. But as in that survey, the difference in Monday’s results between the leading candidates — Madia with 44 percent to Paulsen’s 39 — is within the poll’s percent margin of error. More after the jump, including a Republican ad retreat; courting business; and dueling national endorsements.

Is the Republican Party of Minnesota unaware of current demographics in the West Metro congressional district it has held for 50 years? U.S. Census data suggests that the suburban-identity politics that Republicans advanced last week writes off a third or more of the 3rd district’s residents.

On WCCO-TV Sunday, State Rep. Erik Paulsen spoke for the first time on Republican claims that DFLer Ashwin Madia is less qualified for the state’s 3rd district U.S. House seat because he’s not a father, rents, and doesn’t fit the district’s “demographic.” Asked if he would condemn the line of attack, Paulsen dodged the question — without acknowledging his campaign’s role in rolling out the personal slams. More after the jump, including videos of WCCO’s interviews with all three candidates.

Here’s five minutes of video from a press conference held today by Ashwin Madia, DFL candidate for U.S. Congress in Minnesota’s 3rd district. In this clip, Madia addresses the economy; Republican characterizations of his background as less well suited to the district than that of his opponent, state Rep. Erik Paulsen; ads by outside groups attacking Paulsen that have been called inaccurate; and an incident in which a Madia campaign volunteer removed Paulsen signs from a public right-of-way. Also: six-minute clip of GOP response.

The knives are out in the 3rd District congressional race. A new Ashwin Madia attack ad answers Sen. Erik Paulsen’s, a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee mailing reaches with a strip-club charge, and a Paulsen stand-in plays up Madia’s marital and residential status (single, renter) and calls him “carpetbagger.”