Three candidates in tight race to replace Ramstad

Jim Ramstad probably could have stayed in Congress as long as he liked. But last September, the popular Republican said nine terms was enough.

"I didn't want to stay in Washington forever," he said when he announced he would retire from the House of Representatives.

"After 17 years of getting on the plane every Monday and not coming back until Friday, I'm burned out," he said. "I'm tired."

One year later, the race to replace Ramstad in Minnesota's 3rd District is one of the most tightly contested house races in the country.

By the time it's over, Democrat Ashwin Madia, Republican Erik Paulsen, and the Independence Party's David Dillon most likely will have competed in the most expensive congressional race in state history.

The 3rd District has been represented by a Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1961. But voting trends in the district, which is a C-shaped area comprising suburbs to the north, south and west of Minneapolis, suggest that party's popularity is slipping.

In 2004, President Bush barely won a majority in the 3rd District, getting 51 percent of the vote. In the 2006 Senate race, Democrat Amy Klobuchar won the district with 56 percent of the vote.

Ashwin Madia hopes the momentum continues in his direction.

"I think we have the greatest country in the entire world, and we can do so much better than what we've been doing in the last eight years," the Democrat said in an interview.

KARE 11 sat down with all three candidates in late September as the race was heating up.

Madia is a lawyer who quit his day job to run for Ramstad's seat. He is a former Marine, a veteran of the current Iraq war, and the son of Indian immigrants.

"(When) my parents came to this country, they had $19 between them," he said, repeating a story he tells often on the campaign trail. "The very first thing they bought was an $11 bottle of champagne. So they started off with just $8 in this country, and they lived every single dream they ever wanted."

Erik Paulsen, the Republican, was Jim Ramstad's state director and has been endorsed by his former boss.

Paulsen is a business analyst at Target Corporation, where he spends his time in the "real world," as he likes to say. He also has spent the last 14 years as a member of the Minnesota House of Representatives, and he was the Republican Party's leader in the house for two of his seven terms.

"Plus, I have four kids at home," he said as he introduced himself to voters at a recent meet-the-candidate gathering.

In his interview with KARE, Paulsen said his party has moved away from its ideals.

"I think fiscal conservatism is a bread-and-butter issue, it should be, of the Republican Party," he said. "Unfortunately some Republicans have gotten away from that."

Someone who would agree with that statement is David Dillon, the third major-party candidate in the race.

Dillon is the CEO of Meyers Printing Companies, was a Republican, and now is a member of the Independence Party.

"I realized it couldn't be right," he said of his former party. "What the Republican Party was pursuing, the far-right social agenda and the loss of the courage of their convictions on fiscal responsibility, was a real major concern."

Dillon also spent some time as a Democrat, growing up with a DFL father, Gerry, who once ran for mayor of Minneapolis.

Dillon now he sees himself as removed from what he calls the "partisan food fight" and the back-and-forth of a race that took a recent turn toward the negative.

As the ad Dillon ran on cable TV said, "Red Guy, Blue Guy like to make the mud fly. You want a real change? Give somebody else a try."

Madia and Paulsen have begun to go after each other in TV ads, and outside groups have run particularly harsh ads attacking Paulsen.

All together, it's estimated the candidates will spend a total of more than $6 million on the race, and outside groups will spend thousands more.

The debates have been civil, for the most part, though they've become heated when talk turns to social issues.

Madia has gone after Paulsen for his votes in the state legislature to make same-sex marriage unconstitutional and to change school science standards so teachers can present alternatives to evolution.

"There are so many things that we ought to be focusing on, that I don't think we ought to be using public dollars or our constitution to try to impose our religious beliefs on other people," Madia said in a Sept. 22 debate in Minnetonka.

Pauslen responded, "Mr. Madia seems to think most of the issues we talk about in this campaign should be focused around social issues. That is not what I've done in the state legislature."

Dillon, who has sided with Paulsen on tax issues, agreed with Madia in this exchange.

"I've come to like both of the guys sitting at the table with me," Dillon said. "The plain fact of the matter is that Erik has come out of the right wing of the Republican Party."

When Paulsen sat down with KARE, he downplayed his marriage and science votes, which happened while he was majority leader.

"You know, those issues are going to, at some point, get a hearing," he said. "I mean, at some point, there should be votes on many issues."

But Paulsen said social issues are not his priorities.

"My priorities are, by and large, economic growth issues and making sure that people are figuring out how they're going to pay for their gas, how they're going to pay for their health care," he said.

In Congress, Paulsen said he would vote to keep President Bush's tax cuts in place.

"With the economy in the fragile condition it is right now, we should not be raising taxes," he said. "And I don't think there's a family or business owner in this state who would disagree with that."

KARE 11 asked all three candidates what they'd tackle first if they're elected.

Ashwin Madia said he would "get this economy back on track again."

The Democrat said he would balance the budget and pay down the debt first.

Then, "Get a comprehensive energy strategy in this country, so we can get off this dependence on oil," Madia said. "And third, to invest in our people so we have the most competitive workforce on the face of the planet."

On tax cuts, Madia said he supports them for small businesses and people earning less than $250,000 a year.

"What I am for, though, is getting rid of the Bush tax cuts on oil companies and pharmaceutical companies, and the very, very super rich," Madia said.

David Dillon, the IP candidate, also talks about several issues as priorities under one big economic umbrella.

"I think my number one priority is, certainly, energy policy," Dillon said in the interview. But he then moved quickly into a discussion about reforming health care.

"We ought not to have a country in which somebody goes broke or loses their house because they get sick," he said. "We ought to be past that."

Dillon also said the deficit has to come down, and he vows he'll resign if he is elected then votes for a budget that's not balanced.

"I'd hold taxes where they are," he said. "I would not cut taxes. I would not increase them. So the people saying, 'Let's get rid of the Bush tax cuts,' are really saying, 'Let's increase taxes.'"

All three candidates call themselves "fiscal conservatives."

Madia, like Dillon, was a Republican until the deficit exploded. He also thought weapons inspectors should have been given more time before the U.S. invaded Iraq.

"If they give me the honor of representing them in Washington," Madia said of the voters in the 3rd District, "I'll be the hardest working congressman in the entire U.S. Congress."

Paulsen hopes the seat remains red.

"I think, ultimately, I'll be able to win, just because I have a good message that resonates with voters at a grassroots level," Paulsen said. "And having that active group on the ground is what makes a difference in campaigns."

Dillon says real change is neither red nor blue.

"The whole country will sit up and take notice if Minnesota sends an Independent to Congress," he said.

All three say they're best qualified to replace Jim Ramstad, who called serving in Congress his dream.

"I was able to fulfill that childhood dream," Ramstad said when he announced his retirement last year. "So how could I have any regrets?"

By Scott Goldberg, KARE 11 News Read Scott's Blog

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