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Brian Hobson
From Ballotpedia
This page was current at the end of the individual's last campaign covered by Ballotpedia. Please contact us with any updates.
Brian Hobson (Democratic Party) ran for election to the Minnesota House of Representatives to represent District 5A. He lost in the general election on November 5, 2024.
Hobson completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. Click here to read the survey answers.
Elections
2024
See also: Minnesota House of Representatives elections, 2024
General election
General election for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A
Incumbent Krista Knudsen defeated Brian Hobson in the general election for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Krista Knudsen (R) | 71.3 | 18,855 |
 | Brian Hobson (D)  | 28.6 | 7,551 | |
| Other/Write-in votes | 0.1 | 22 | ||
| Total votes: 26,428 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary election
The Democratic primary election was canceled. Brian Hobson advanced from the Democratic primary for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A.
Republican primary election
The Republican primary election was canceled. Incumbent Krista Knudsen advanced from the Republican primary for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A.
Campaign finance
Endorsements
Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Hobson in this election.
2022
See also: Minnesota House of Representatives elections, 2022
General election
General election for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A
Krista Knudsen defeated Brian Hobson in the general election for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Krista Knudsen (R) | 70.5 | 14,735 |
| Brian Hobson (D) | 29.5 | 6,159 | |
| Other/Write-in votes | 0.0 | 10 | ||
| Total votes: 20,904 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary election
The Democratic primary election was canceled. Brian Hobson advanced from the Democratic primary for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A.
Republican primary election
The Republican primary election was canceled. Krista Knudsen advanced from the Republican primary for Minnesota House of Representatives District 5A.
Campaign themes
2024
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Brian Hobson completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Hobson's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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I am a 20 year+ teacher. I am a small town Minnesotan through and through having grown up, and taught almost my entire career in small Minnesota towns. I am a believer in both my absolute luck having been born into and raised by a family that provided for me not great wealth, but great opportunities. I feel a massive responsibility to try to pay my great fortune forward. As I tell my third graders often, “we have to pay attention to what is important. We don’t have time to waste!”
- A roof over our heads that we can afford to keep and maintain is the very first step to all other success. I think everyone should get to have a home.
- No matter where a young person grows up, every young person should know they can become an adult with opportunities, skills, knowledge, and the freedoms to pursue a life of their choosing.
- Folks should be able to afford to live, and we live in rural areas and small towns we should continue to have reasonable and affordable access to healthcare, childcare, and elder care.
As a career teacher, education, workforce and career training is a driving force in my life. As a community member, many things drive me to volunteer and participate including community connectedness through arts, elder and senior social connection, childcare, and community mental health.
My Dad was an immensely responsible, generous, usually calm and caring person. One of his greatest joys, even though he was a Superintendent of the entire school district, was to take a portion of his extensive marble collection into a kindergarten or first grade classroom and teach the smallest people about marbles and marble games. He used his passions as a gateway to teaching others. That is my example, my model, my north star.
There are a lot of great thinkers, experts, and wise practitioners in the world. I appreciate Ezra Klien's willingness to engage with those he disagrees with, the idealism of Gene Roddenberry (Star Trek), and the sometimes flawed but insightful ideas of Thomas Paine and James Madison. My current read is A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.
Elected officials must be people of the highest integrity. While being fairly paid to do the work of serving the public is absolutely essential to ensure that many different people from all walks of life are able to serve, being an elected leader can not be used for self aggrandizement, personal financial gain beyond fair compensation, or to build connections used for personal gain. Elected officials are elected to serve. As I often remind my third graders, “Responsibility means doing the right thing, even when no one is watching,” and it is my responsibility to model that value.
Integrity, responsibility, and honesty. The ability to listen, learn, and apply knowledge in a practical way.
Listen, learn, represent interests with integrity and honestly work toward practical solutions to solve, or begin to improve upon, important and pressing problems.
I would like to serve and rekindle the idea that regardless of party politics, some people of good faith are willing to serve and try to do the right thing. I require no credit, applause, or notoriety. After I have served I would like the legacy to be another honest, person of integrity to take over and represent me honorably.
The Space Shuttle Challenger explosion in 1986. I was 7 years old.
Mowing grass for my neighbors. From the time I was 10 with a few and continuing to grow to dozens of yards in high school, college and even in my earlier years of teaching. My Dad joined me in the expansion and after his retirement to add some landscaping services and other yard care services. We finally stopped when I was in my later 20's.
The Scha was Here. Invisible people are capable of making a difference.
Starship captain or maybe engineer on a starship could be so interesting.
The Wellerman - Sea Shanty
Cooperation, and the expectation of responsible leadership based on respect and good faith, as is I think the relationship of a citizen and all branches of government.
Housing and workforce development, Building community connectedness and educational options among young people that allows them to see themselves with boundless opportunities whether they choose to live in rural communities, urban centers, or anywhere in between.
Experienced, honest leaders with institutional knowledge and a willingness to mentor new legislators is absolutely needed, as is "new Blood." As a now experienced teacher, I am absolutely aware of the difference between enthusiasm and experience. Both are absolutely wonderful qualities and a balance makes the strongest team.
Of course. The legislature should be, by definition, a place of discussion, consensus building, cooperation and compromise in which forward looking thoughtful people have firm principled stances, but are also practical and solution driven bring an openness to the legislative process. The good is not the enemy of the perfect, and not a single one of us can “fix it.” It takes all of us.
Amy Klobachar: Hard working, consensus builder, practical problem solver.
Nope, I don't have much of an ego.
An in home childcare provider shared about the struggles of operating this smallest of businesses. She mentioned the expenses involved, the limited options available and the significant amount of compliance and departmental communications she is obliged to do regularly all with the admirable goal of protecting our youngest community members. It is limiting her and other interested providers ability to provide this essential service in our rural communities.
Comedy is situational
On a very limited scale and scope, emergency powers are occasionally important.
1. Rural Child care process streamlining- Centralizing and reducing all childcare regulation and communication to a single department/agency with clear, simple, and easy to meet guidelines for in home childcare, and a similar streamlining for center based childcare.
2. Housing construction, and rehab in rural Minnesota - Allowing for very low cost financing and Do-It-Yourself training for new homeowners who will build new or renovate older, unused housing stock. It will give folks the chance to acquire skills to maintain and add "sweat equity" which increases both their stake in homeownership, financial stability, and future wealth.
2. Housing construction, and rehab in rural Minnesota - Allowing for very low cost financing and Do-It-Yourself training for new homeowners who will build new or renovate older, unused housing stock. It will give folks the chance to acquire skills to maintain and add "sweat equity" which increases both their stake in homeownership, financial stability, and future wealth.
Education Minnesota, DFL rural caucus, AFSME Minnesota
Education, Health and Human services, Rural Development
Responsible leaders should be able to account for and explain both the purpose and the outcome of policy. Integrity dictates adapting to new information even if it does not conform with ones hopes, beliefs, feelings, or expectations. This also means being open and transparent in allowing anyone to view data with relative ease.
MN has this and while not often, has been used to good effect a number of times.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
2022
Brian Hobson did not complete Ballotpedia's 2022 Candidate Connection survey.
Campaign finance summary
Note: The finance data shown here comes from the disclosures required of candidates and parties. Depending on the election or state, this may represent only a portion of all the funds spent on their behalf. Satellite spending groups may or may not have expended funds related to the candidate or politician on whose page you are reading this disclaimer. Campaign finance data from elections may be incomplete. For elections to federal offices, complete data can be found at the FEC website. Click here for more on federal campaign finance law and here for more on state campaign finance law.
See also
2024 Elections
External links
Footnotes
Current members of the Minnesota House of Representatives
Leadership
Speaker of the House:Lisa Demuth
Majority Leader:Harry Niska
Representatives
District 1A
John Burkel (R)
District 1B
Steve Gander (R)
District 2A
Bidal Duran (R)
District 2B
Matt Bliss (R)
District 3A
Roger Skraba (R)
District 3B
District 4A
Heather Keeler (D)
District 4B
Jim Joy (R)
District 5A
Krista Knudsen (R)
District 5B
Mike Wiener (R)
District 6A
Ben Davis (R)
District 6B
Josh Heintzeman (R)
District 7A
Spencer Igo (R)
District 7B
Cal Warwas (R)
District 8A
Pete Johnson (D)
District 8B
Alicia Kozlowski (D)
District 9A
Jeff Backer (R)
District 9B
Tom Murphy (R)
District 10A
Ron Kresha (R)
District 10B
Isaac Schultz (R)
District 11A
Jeff Dotseth (R)
District 11B
Nathan Nelson (R)
District 12A
Paul Anderson (R)
District 12B
Mary Franson (R)
District 13A
Lisa Demuth (R)
District 13B
Tim O'Driscoll (R)
District 14A
Bernie Perryman (R)
District 14B
Dan Wolgamott (D)
District 15A
Chris Swedzinski (R)
District 15B
Paul Torkelson (R)
District 16A
District 16B
Dave Baker (R)
District 17A
Dawn Gillman (R)
District 17B
Bobbie Harder (R)
District 18A
Erica Schwartz (R)
District 18B
Luke Frederick (D)
District 19A
Keith Allen (R)
District 19B
Tom Sexton (R)
District 20A
Pam Altendorf (R)
District 20B
Steven Jacob (R)
District 21A
Joe Schomacker (R)
District 21B
Marj Fogelman (R)
District 22A
Bjorn Olson (R)
District 22B
Terry Stier (R)
District 23A
Peggy Bennett (R)
District 23B
Patricia Mueller (R)
District 24A
Duane Quam (R)
District 24B
Tina Liebling (D)
District 25A
Kim Hicks (D)
District 25B
Andy Smith (D)
District 26A
Aaron Repinski (R)
District 26B
Greg Davids (R)
District 27A
Shane Mekeland (R)
District 27B
Bryan Lawrence (R)
District 28A
James Gordon (R)
District 28B
Max Rymer (R)
District 29A
Joe McDonald (R)
District 29B
Marion Rarick (R)
District 30A
Walter Hudson (R)
District 30B
Paul Novotny (R)
District 31A
Harry Niska (R)
District 31B
Peggy Scott (R)
District 32A
Nolan West (R)
District 32B
Matt Norris (D)
District 33A
Patti Anderson (R)
District 33B
Josiah Hill (D)
District 34A
Danny Nadeau (R)
District 34B
Vacant
District 35A
Zack Stephenson (D)
District 35B
Kari Rehrauer (D)
District 36A
Elliott Engen (R)
District 36B
Brion Curran (D)
District 37A
Kristin Robbins (R)
District 37B
Kristin Bahner (D)
District 38A
Huldah Hiltsley (D)
District 38B
Samantha Vang (D)
District 39A
Erin Koegel (D)
District 39B
Sandra Feist (D)
District 40A
Kelly Moller (D)
District 40B
David Gottfried (D)
District 41A
Wayne Johnson (R)
District 41B
Tom Dippel (R)
District 42A
Ned Carroll (D)
District 42B
Ginny Klevorn (D)
District 43A
Cedrick Frazier (D)
District 43B
Mike Freiberg (D)
District 44A
Peter Fischer (D)
District 44B
Leon Lillie (D)
District 45A
Andrew Myers (R)
District 45B
Patty Acomb (D)
District 46A
Larry Kraft (D)
District 46B
Cheryl Youakim (D)
District 47A
District 47B
Ethan Cha (D)
District 48A
Jim Nash (R)
District 48B
Lucille Rehm (D)
District 49A
Alex Falconer (D)
District 49B
District 50A
Julie Greene (D)
District 50B
Steve Elkins (D)
District 51A
Michael Howard (D)
District 51B
Nathan Coulter (D)
District 52A
Liz Reyer (D)
District 52B
Bianca Virnig (D)
District 53A
Mary Clardy (D)
District 53B
Rick Hansen (D)
District 54A
Brad Tabke (D)
District 54B
Ben Bakeberg (R)
District 55A
Jessica Hanson (D)
District 55B
Kaela Berg (D)
District 56A
Robert Bierman (D)
District 56B
John Huot (D)
District 57A
Jon Koznick (R)
District 57B
Jeff Witte (R)
District 58A
Kristi Pursell (D)
District 58B
Drew Roach (R)
District 59A
Fue Lee (D)
District 59B
Esther Agbaje (D)
District 60A
Sydney Jordan (D)
District 60B
Mohamud Noor (D)
District 61A
Katie Jones (D)
District 61B
Jamie Long (D)
District 62A
Aisha Gomez (D)
District 62B
Anquam Mahamoud (D)
District 63A
District 63B
Emma Greenman (D)
District 64A
Kaohly Her (D)
District 64B
Dave Pinto (D)
District 65A
Samakab Hussein (D)
District 65B
District 66A
Leigh Finke (D)
District 66B
Athena Hollins (D)
District 67A
Liz Lee (D)
District 67B
Jay Xiong (D)
Republican Party (67)
Democratic Party (66)
Vacancies (1)
