Minnesota Republicans divided: confront disinformation, embrace it or ignore?

Amid the talk of cracking down on crime and defending religious freedom, the debate among Republicans jockeying to run for Minnesota attorney general soon took a hard turn to insurrection. One candidate suggested that the Jan. 6 rioters — including some who were in the audience this late January evening in Chisago County — were improperly prosecuted. Another proudly pointed out that at least two of her staffers were at the U.S. Capitol that day.

"Quite honestly, it seemed at the time that the election of Joe Biden was actually somewhat of a coup, and that the truth [was] the person who won was President Trump," said Lynne Torgerson, a Minneapolis attorney and one of five Republicans seeking the endorsement to challenge DFL Attorney General Keith Ellison. "And so, I think in a lot of ways, the people at the Capitol on January 6 were heroes and trying to preserve who was actually elected."

As Minnesota Republican candidates try to win back statewide elected offices for the first time in more than a decade — and also control of the Minnesota Legislature — at least a half dozen are mixing false claims about mass election fraud and the COVID-19 pandemic with other talking points on public safety and the economy. Now under new leadership, the Minnesota GOP is at a crossroads as it approaches this spring's convention: Forcefully rein in discredited and conspiratorial claims, or stay quiet while levying allegations of the same practices against their political opponents?

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Yet multiple Minnesota Republicans running for governor, attorney general and secretary of state are among a growing number of statewide candidates nationwide to promote false claims that the 2020 election was not legitimate. Others have supported unproven treatments for COVID-19 and claimed that deaths attributed to the disease were being overcounted. To date, the topic of curbing disinformation has not been a prominent focus in the higher reaches of the Republican Party.

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https://www.startribune.com/minnesota-republicans-divided-confront-disinformation-embrace-it-or-ignore/600158723/

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And they want to be AG..