MINNESOTA CAUCUSES

Posted Wednesday, March 2, 2016 4:13 pm

REGIONAL— Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders proved the overwhelming winner in Tuesday night’s DFL caucuses in Minnesota, trouncing former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton by a 62-38 percent margin in unofficial returns with some precincts still unreported.

Meanwhile, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio tallied his first win of the primary season, garnering 37 percent of the vote in a five-way contest on the Republican side. Donald Trump experienced his biggest drubbing in the race so far, polling a distant third with just 21 percent of the vote.

But the night, at least in Minnesota, belonged to Sanders, who tallied 114,265 caucus votes (with 86 percent of precincts reporting, according to The New York Times) more than all five of the Republican candidates combined. Enthusiasm for Sanders drew heavy turnout at most precincts, stunning party organizers in some cases, even though they had planned for large crowds.

Sanders won handily in all eight of Minnesota’s congressional districts, and drew his strongest support in the First District, in far southern Minnesota, where he polled 66 percent of the vote. The Eighth District was close behind, handing Sanders a 65-35 percent margin over Clinton.

Locally, many precincts gave even bigger margins for Sanders. DFL caucus-goers in Ely backed Sanders by a whopping 152-33 margin. Betty Firth, who helped organize the Ely caucus, described turnout as “amazing,” with three to four times the number of attendees as showed up in 2008, when the race between Clinton and Barack Obama sparked significant interest. “I think this is what a revolution looks like,” added Firth.

In Tower and Soudan DFL caucus-goers backed Sanders 38-16, while Cook and Orr area voters, who gathered at the North Woods School, backed Sanders by 76-27.

Jerry Storm, of Cook, said turnout in the Cook area caucus was a record. Storm said he wasn’t surprised by the strong showing for Sanders. “There’s been a real grassroots effort for his campaign, led by George and Robin Pliml, and Tom and Missy Roach. They’ve done a nice job.”

Tom Roach said he’s drawn to Sanders by his consistent message over the years. “He’s very honest and transparent,” he said. Roach said he sees big money in politics and climate change as the two biggest issues facing the country, and he sees Sanders as being more persistent in addressing those concerns.

Robin Pliml said she sees Sanders as “genuine and trustworthy,” and added that she hasn’t been as excited about a political candidate in a long time.

Sanders’ huge statewide victory came despite the fact that Clinton enjoyed the backing of the state’s top political leaders, including Gov. Mark Dayton, Sen. Al Franken and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, and Tuesday’s vote suggests the DFL’s top leadership may out of touch with the views of the party’s grassroots.

Minnesota Republicans, on the other hand, seemed to rally around a candidate most often identified as the choice of the party’s establishment. Rubio’s strength, however, was focused in the Twin Cities metro region, and southern Minnesota, while Texas Sen. Ted Cruz topped the field in the Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth districts, comprising the vast majority of central, northern, and western Minnesota. In the Eighth, Cruz claimed 33 percent of the vote, to 28 percent for Trump and 25 percent for Rubio. Trump won a narrow victory in St. Louis County, with 412 votes to 400 for Cruz. Rubio took third in St. Louis County with 290 votes, while Ben Carson took fourth with 119 votes. Complete DFL totals in St. Louis County weren’t available as of presstime.

Ely Editor Keith Vandervort and Cook-Orr Editor Tom Klein contributed to this report.