Vaccine Doubts Fuel Dr. Scott Jensen's Rise In Minnesota Governor Race

WATERTOWN, Minn. (AP) — The small-town family doctor angling to become Minnesota’s next governor smiled, leaned into the camera and told his Facebook viewers that Sweden had just paused the Moderna vaccine for people under age 30 over “significant concern” about heart inflammation. Dr. Scott Jensen, clad in a white lab coat, quickly pivoted: “So what happens to military people who are threatened with a dishonorable discharge if they are unwilling to potentially put their heart health at risk?”

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Jensen’s video drew a cautionary label from Facebook attesting to the safety of vaccines. Earlier this year, he had been temporarily banned from advertising on the site and was kicked off TikTok for allegedly spreading misinformation, though the social media platforms never said exactly why. The Minnesota Board of Medical Practice has opened — and dropped — four investigations against Jensen, based on anonymous allegations that he spread misinformation and gave bad advice about COVID-19. Jensen has discussed the cases on social media but declined to release the letters he received from the board, whose investigations are not public unless they result in disciplinary action.

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Jensen, 66, often deviated from Republican orthodoxy during a single term in the Minnesota Senate that ended last year. He was willing to at least consider gun control legislation, such as universal background checks, and legalizing recreational marijuana. He brokered a compromise to end a bitter partisan stalemate over insulin prices. He took on industry by winning enactment of a law to regulate pharmacy benefit managers.

As the pandemic took hold, he began questioning the federal government’s methodology for determining when the disease should be listed as cause of death. That launched him on a path of frequent appearances on Fox News and other conservative media. In May, he was briefly a plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking to block vaccines for 12- to 15-year-olds that was filed by America’s Frontline Doctors, led by Simone Gold, who was arrested during the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. More recently, he called for “civil disobedience” and legislation to ban vaccine mandates by employers.

https://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2021/10/20/vaccine-doubts-fuel-dr-scott-jensens-rise-in-minnesota-governor-race/