07/30/2026
Whoever wins this primary, we're supporting her against any Republican in November. Full stop.
But when our chapters were deciding whom to endorse, a lot of them kept coming back to Angie Craig's vote for the Laken Riley Act. Here's why.
Angie Craig is qualified. She's won difficult elections, delivered real results, and represented a district Democrats can't take for granted. The question wasn't whether she could do the job. It was what that vote told us about her judgment in the moment we're living through.
Craig and Peggy Flanagan came into politics through different paths. That matters, because hard choices tend to send people back to the approach they trust most.
Both were raised by single moms who struggled to get by. Craig built a career in corporate healthcare, then flipped a Republican-held congressional district and defended it through several difficult elections. Her strength is working within large institutions, reading a divided electorate, finding a position people can live with, and preserving enough support to keep governing.
There's an important place for that kind of politics. In a functioning democracy, it's often how progress gets made.
Peggy's path ran through organizing in Minnesota's urban Indigenous community, training organizers at Wellstone Action, and helping lead the coalition that raised Minnesota's minimum wage. Her instinct is to bring people together, press institutions harder, and expand what those institutions are willing to do.
Neither woman belongs to only one world. Craig has built political coalitions. Peggy has spent years governing from inside the State Capitol. But their careers point to different instincts under pressure.
The question isn't which approach is always right. It's which one fits this moment.
If Republicans were looking for workable compromises, Craig's approach might be exactly what we needed. But this administration isn't searching for common ground. It's testing the limits of presidential power, the law, and how much harm the public will tolerate.
In that environment, the middle doesn't stay put. Every time Democrats move toward it, Trump pushes farther.
That's why the Laken Riley vote mattered.
The bill was named for a 22-year-old nursing student whose murder was horrifying. It required federal detention for immigrants merely arrested or accused of things like theft or shoplifting. No conviction needed.
Republicans brought it forward right after an election where immigration had hurt Democrats badly. They presented it as basic public safety and made clear that anyone opposing it would be attacked as weak on immigration.
For a Democrat in a competitive district, voting yes probably looked like the practical compromise: respond to public concern, avoid the attack, and preserve room for other fights.
But the warnings came before the vote. Civil rights groups and immigration attorneys said the law threatened due process and would give more authority to an administration already promising mass deportation. Others warned that Democratic support for one of Trump's first immigration priorities would tell the administration that at least some Democrats could be pressured into stepping aside.
Nearly every Democrat representing Minnesota voted no. Senators Klobuchar and Smith voted no. Reps. Omar, McCollum, and Morrison voted no. Angie Craig was the only Minnesota Democrat in either chamber to vote yes.
Craig's since said she regrets the vote and calls it a mistake. We take her at her word.
But difficult votes still tell us something. They show which danger a leader sees first.
One danger was immediate and political. Immigration had hurt Democrats. Craig represented a swing district. Republicans had an attack ready.
The other danger was larger. Trump had returned promising mass deportation and fewer limits on his own power. The bill gave his administration more authority, and bipartisan support, before most Americans had seen how aggressively that authority would be used.
A lot of our chapters believed that was the greater danger.
We watched an administration test, day after day, how far it can go. It treats facts as optional, legal limits as obstacles, and vulnerable people as useful targets. Each time it pushes farther, it watches to see who resists and who decides resistance is too politically costly.
In ordinary politics, finding the middle can be a virtue. But when the other side keeps moving the middle, a cautious vote meant to avoid one attack can make the next abuse easier.
Operation Metro Surge made that painfully clear. The Laken Riley Act didn't create the surge. That came through separate executive decisions and existing enforcement authority. But the vote gave us an early look at how fear of appearing weak on immigration could limit how firmly some Democrats pushed back.
Once the surge reached Minnesota, we saw how vulnerable our neighbors were and how empowered the administration felt. It also changed how some people saw this race.
Rowan Wagner, a 27-year-old paramedic from Marine on St. Croix, began the race thinking Craig made the most sense. She'd won difficult elections and delivered real results. He'd even gone to one of her fundraisers as his mom's guest.
Then he started treating patients during the surge. A lot of them had delayed medical care because they feared encountering immigration agents. Some were a lot sicker by the time they came in.
His question changed from who could win to who would stand with the people being harmed.
That question led him to Peggy Flanagan. He went to his first precinct caucus, volunteered to become a delegate, and supported her at the DFL convention.
The Laken Riley vote gave a lot of chapters reason to question whether Craig's instincts fit this moment. But concern about one candidate isn't enough reason to endorse another.
The case for Peggy comes from her own record.
She's spent her career bringing people together, taking on powerful institutions, and turning that work into results. She helped build the coalition that raised Minnesota's minimum wage. In office, she helped deliver paid family and medical leave and school meals for every child.
Her campaign's followed the same pattern. She refused corporate PAC money and spent months meeting with local chapters, union members, and delegates. She showed up, answered questions, and asked people directly for their support.
That work helped her earn the DFL endorsement. It's not an instruction to primary voters. It's evidence of how Peggy believes power should get built, and who she'll still have to answer to after the election.
There's a place in politics for leaders who know how to negotiate, find the workable middle, and keep a difficult coalition together.
But there's also a time when politics calls for someone who'll defend and protect the people they represent with their full voice and heart. Someone who, faced with a chance to oppose this administration's excesses, does it with joy and energy, and with the belief that we're stronger together.
This is such a time. And that's why we chose Peggy Flanagan.
For opportunities to support your choice, check the first comment. 👇
