Minnesota Senate 2026: Flanagan vs. Tafoya Briefing

This briefing reflects reporting and polling available as of October 1, 2026. Candidates, endorsements and polling can change before Election Day on November 3, 2026.

Why This Race Matters

Minnesota’s Senate seat is open because Democratic Sen. Tina Smith is retiring, and polls now show Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan (DFL) and former NBC sideline reporter Michele Tafoya (R) within a few points of each other. Republicans have not won a Minnesota Senate race since 2002, Alpha News noted, so a Tafoya win would be a rare Republican pickup in a state Democrats want to hold. The campaign has turned on fraud in state social-services programs, immigration enforcement and how closely each candidate is tied to an administration: Flanagan to Gov. Tim Walz’s, Tafoya to President Donald Trump’s.

The Race

Flanagan won the August 11 DFL primary with 59.0% of the vote to Rep. Angie Craig’s 39.4%, and Tafoya took the Republican nomination with 52.1%, according to the Minnesota Secretary of State. Nine Republicans and six DFL candidates appeared on the primary ballots.

A KSTP/SurveyUSA poll of likely voters taken September 9 to 14 found Flanagan and Tafoya tied at 42%. The same survey showed Sen. Amy Klobuchar, the Democratic candidate for governor, ahead of Republican Lisa Demuth 47% to 40%, down from 52% to 36% a month earlier. Alpha News noted that the pollster’s primary-season surveys had missed the Republican governor’s primary result and the size of Flanagan’s win.

Other September surveys put Flanagan narrowly ahead, The Hill reported: Quantus Insights by four points, co/efficient by one point, and InsiderAdvantage by 46% to 45% among 1,200 likely voters polled September 28 and 29. This article did not verify who sponsored each poll.

Forecasters disagree on how competitive the race is. The Hill notes the Cook Political Report has rated it Likely Democratic since August, while RealClearPolitics moved it from Leans Democratic to Toss Up this month and averages the polls at Flanagan +1.6, according to Alpha News.

The Candidates

Peggy Flanagan (DFL) has been lieutenant governor since 2019. She supports Medicare for All and has called for abolishing ICE, saying in a primary debate that it should be taken apart, while also saying she backs immigration enforcement for secure borders, NBC News reported. Sen. Tina Smith, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren endorsed her, and she would be the first Native American woman in the Senate.

Michele Tafoya (R) covered Sunday Night Football for NBC before entering politics. She describes herself as “pro-choice” and supports abortion access up to 12 weeks of pregnancy, according to the Star Tribune. The paper also traced her shift from discouraging Trump from running again to praising his leadership, and reported that national Republican leaders saw her as their best chance to win the seat.

Libertarian Rebecca Whiting and independent Marisa Simonetti are also on the ballot and drew 2% and 1% in the InsiderAdvantage poll. Both are well below 5%, but in a race this close even a small share could matter.

Top Issues

Fraud and accountability. Tafoya’s campaign centers on fraud in state social-services programs. CBS News reported in December that prosecutors put losses in the Feeding Our Future meal-program case near $250 million, with more than 75 people charged, and that a federal prosecutor suggested total losses across 14 state Medicaid programs could reach into the billions. That higher figure is a projection, not a court finding. Flanagan says more should have been done sooner but that she did not run the agencies involved, according to a separate Star Tribune report.

Immigration and ICE. Flanagan wants ICE dismantled and rebuilt. The Trump administration cited the fraud scandal when it deployed thousands of Department of Homeland Security officers to Minnesota, The Hill reported. Our report on a judge dismissing the Justice Department’s challenge to Minnesota’s sanctuary policies covers one legal front. This article did not find a detailed Tafoya immigration plan in the sources reviewed.

Trump and the Iran war. Flanagan has tried to tie Tafoya to Trump and the Iran war, Alpha News reported. For background on the conflict, see our coverage of the ceasefire breakdown and talks.

Evidence Check

Claim (Tafoya): Flanagan was part of a Walz administration that let fraud spread and should be held accountable. Check: Partly supported. The Star Tribune reports she was one of the administration’s top officials but did not run the agencies at the center of the scandal or direct the response, and that her own duties were limited. Walz’s former chief of staff told congressional investigators she was included in fraud-related meetings because of her role as lieutenant governor, and a former human services commissioner said she was present for some conversations with Walz. That commissioner did not recall speaking with Flanagan about autism or homelessness programs. Flanagan says Walz led the state’s fraud response.

Claim (Tafoya): The race is a statistical tie. Check: Supported by several polls, not all. Results range from a tie to a four-point Flanagan lead. None of the September polls this article reviewed showed Tafoya ahead.

Claim (Flanagan campaign): Tafoya backs a president who has pardoned fraudsters and took donations from a businessman accused of fraud. Check: The Star Tribune reports the campaign cited Trump’s pardons and donations to Tafoya from the late Waste Management founder Dean Buntrock, whom the Securities and Exchange Commission accused of leading an accounting-fraud scheme in the 1990s before a 2005 settlement. This article could not verify the donation amounts or the scope of the pardons, and neither is connected to Minnesota’s fraud cases in the sources reviewed.

Supporter Voices

The reporting this article reviewed offered mostly campaign and party voices rather than rank-and-file supporters, and this article could not locate Minnesota voters quoted by name on either side.

Flanagan: She has described her campaign as being about “the many versus the money,” and Smith, Sanders and Warren backed her, NBC News reported.

Tafoya: In one ad she tells voters, “Let’s fire her in November,” referring to Flanagan, the Star Tribune reported. National Republican leaders have backed her bid as the party’s best chance in the state.

How This Race Is Being Framed

Republicans and right-leaning outlets frame the race as a referendum on Walz-era fraud and one-party control, with Tafoya as a moderate outsider. Alpha News, a center-right Minnesota outlet, calls fraud a potentially winning issue for Republicans.

Democrats frame it as a choice about Trump, the Iran war and health care. NBC described Flanagan’s primary win as another victory for the party’s progressive wing, a dynamic also visible in our Michigan Senate briefing.

InsiderAdvantage pollster Matt Towery called his one-point result “unusual” for a blue-leaning state and pointed to Walz’s falling approval and the fraud cases, The Hill reported. Polls in a race this close, including those from firms whose sponsors this article could not verify, are better read as a range than as a forecast.

Discussion Questions

Have you ever voted for a candidate outside the party you usually support? What made you do it?
Does a lieutenant governor share responsibility for what a governor’s administration does?
Which matters more in a Senate race: a candidate’s personal background or their stance on the issues?
Tafoya calls herself pro-choice but runs as a Republican. Does that help or hurt her?
Flanagan wants to dismantle ICE. What, if anything, should replace it?
Why do polls in this race differ so much from one firm to the next?
How should voters weigh a fraud scandal when a candidate did not run the agencies involved?
Should a state that has not elected a Republican senator since 2002 still be seen as competitive?
How closely should a senator’s votes follow the president they support or oppose?
Imagine you are an undecided Minnesota voter. What would you want to learn before Election Day?

Minnesota Senate 2026: Flanagan vs. Tafoya for an Open Seat