Kirsten Hagen Kennedy

Democratic primary election

Democratic primary for U.S. House Minnesota District 8

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Joe Radinovich	44.1	30,732
		Michelle Lee	27.5	19,182
		Jason Metsa	13.2	9,229
		Kirsten Hagen Kennedy	11.7	8,133
		Soren Christian Sorensen	3.5	2,415

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	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 69,691
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Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

• Leah Phifer (D)

This page was current at the end of the individual's last campaign covered by Ballotpedia. Please contact us with any updates.

Kirsten Hagen Kennedy

Democratic Party

Elections and appointments

Last election

August 14, 2018

Contact

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Kirsten Hagen Kennedy (Democratic Party) ran for election to the U.S. House to represent Minnesota's 8th Congressional District. She lost in the Democratic primary on August 14, 2018.

Five Democratic candidates competed for the toss-up open seat in Minnesota's 8th Congressional District. No candidate received an endorsement from the Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party at its multi-ballot nominating convention in April and incumbent Rep. Rick Nolan (D) did not seek re-election.

This district was seen as critical for the party to retake control of the U.S. House. Although represented by a Democrat in 2016, the district flipped from supporting Barack Obama by 6 points to backing Donald Trump by 15 points in the presidential election that year.

• Click here to learn more about the August 14, 2018, Democratic Party primary.
• Click here to learn more about the November 6, 2018, general election.

Elections

2018

See also: Minnesota's 8th Congressional District election, 2018

General election

General election for U.S. House Minnesota District 8

Pete Stauber defeated Joe Radinovich and Ray Sandman in the general election for U.S. House Minnesota District 8 on November 6, 2018.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Pete Stauber (R)	50.7	159,364
		Joe Radinovich (D)	45.2	141,950
		Ray Sandman (Independence Party)	4.1	12,741
		Other/Write-in votes	0.0	156

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	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 314,211 (100.00% precincts reporting)
= 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.
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Democratic primary election

Democratic primary for U.S. House Minnesota District 8

Joe Radinovich defeated Michelle Lee, Jason Metsa, Kirsten Hagen Kennedy, and Soren Christian Sorensen in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Minnesota District 8 on August 14, 2018.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Joe Radinovich	44.1	30,732
		Michelle Lee	27.5	19,182
		Jason Metsa	13.2	9,229
		Kirsten Hagen Kennedy	11.7	8,133
		Soren Christian Sorensen	3.5	2,415

---

	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 69,691
= 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.

Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

• Leah Phifer (D)

Republican primary election

Republican primary for U.S. House Minnesota District 8

Pete Stauber defeated Harry Welty in the Republican primary for U.S. House Minnesota District 8 on August 14, 2018.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Pete Stauber	90.0	45,391
		Harry Welty	10.0	5,047

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	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 50,438
= 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.

Endorsements

Ballotpedia tracks endorsements by organizations and elected officials. We have located the following endorsements in this race. To notify us of other endorsements, please email us.

Democratic primary election endorsements
Endorsement	Kennedy	Lee	Metsa	Radinovich
Federal officials
Rep. Rick Nolan (D)				✔
State officials
Lieutenant Governor Yvonne Prettner Solon (D)		✔
Former state Rep. Jeremy Kalin (D)	✔
Minnesota Senate Minority Leader Tom Bakk (D)			✔
Organizations
American Federation of Government Employees				✔
United Steelworkers			✔
Boilermakers Local 647			✔
FCW Local 1189			✔

Campaign finance

The chart below contains data from financial reports submitted by candidates for Minnesota's 8th Congressional District to the Federal Election Commission.

Name	Party	Receipts*	Disbursements**	Cash on hand	Date
Kirsten Hagen Kennedy	Democratic Party	$21,443	$15,716	$5,165	As of September 30, 2018
Michelle Lee	Democratic Party	$64,189	$65,689	$0	As of December 31, 2018
Jason Metsa	Democratic Party	$286,672	$286,473	$199	As of October 15, 2018
Joe Radinovich	Democratic Party	$2,432,207	$2,390,503	$41,704	As of December 31, 2018
Soren Christian Sorensen	Democratic Party	$610	$536	$74	As of June 30, 2018
Pete Stauber	Republican Party	$1,777,703	$1,759,367	$18,336	As of December 31, 2018
Harry Welty	Republican Party	$0	$0	$0	Data not available***
Ray Sandman	Independence Party	$20,291	$21,694	$0	As of December 31, 2018
Source: Federal Elections Commission, "Campaign finance data," 2018. This product uses the openFEC API but is not endorsed or certified by the Federal Election Commission (FEC). * According to the FEC, "Receipts are anything of value (money, goods, services or property) received by a political committee." ** According to the FEC, a disbursement "is a purchase, payment, distribution, loan, advance, deposit or gift of money or anything of value to influence a federal election," plus other kinds of payments not made to influence a federal election. *** Candidate either did not report any receipts or disbursements to the FEC, or Ballotpedia did not find an FEC candidate ID.

Mining and environmental policy

The Democratic-Farmer-Labor candidates participated in a candidate forum on April 4, 2018, where they offered differing opinions on the interests of pro-union miners and environmentalists:

• Kennedy noted that not mining in Minnesota would result in importing those materials from third-world countries where fewer worker protections exist. "We want to move toward a green economy; we want to use technology. To move us there we need minerals and the minerals we are looking for are found in Minnesota on the Iron Range," she said.

• Lee said, "I support iron ore mining and unions. I am not convinced we can do copper-nickel mining in a water-rich environment."

• Metsa said experts involved in the permitting process should be trusted. "When it comes to our projects, we need to support our state employees and public servants and they have recommended that these things can move forward. ... Their work is essentially what they have spent their fields and entire careers learning expertise in. We need to trust [their judgment]," he said.

• Phifer said, "Copper-nickel mining is what we're discussing here today. ... The PolyMet/Twin Metals copper-nickel type of mining has never been done in Minnesota and it is very, very different and it is very, very risky in a water-rich environment like we have here." She added that she would likely be uncomfortable with such a project, regardless of whether companies prepared for cleanup activities.

• According to the Duluth News Tribune, Radinovich "seemed to agree with precious-metals mining in northern Minnesota, calling for transparency and high standards that he said could 'assure proper closure after the life of the project.'"

Polls

Minnesota's 8th Congressional District, Democratic primary
Poll	Radinovich	Lee	Metsa	Kennedy	Other/Undecided	Margin of Error	Sample Size
Victoria Research May 12-17, 2018	17%	16%	9%	6%	52%	+/-4.9	400
Note: A "0%" finding means the candidate was not a part of the poll. The polls above may not reflect all polls that have been conducted in this race. Those displayed are a random sampling chosen by Ballotpedia staff. If you would like to nominate another poll for inclusion in the table, send an email to editor@ballotpedia.org

See also

• United States House of Representatives
• Minnesota's 8th Congressional District election, 2018
• Minnesota's 8th Congressional District

External links

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Footnotes

[show]

Minnesota's current delegation to the United States Congress

Senators

Amy Klobuchar (D)

Tina Smith (D)

Representatives

District 1

Brad Finstad (R)

District 2

Angie Craig (D)

District 3

Kelly Morrison (D)

District 4

Betty McCollum (D)

District 5

Ilhan Omar (D)

District 6

Tom Emmer (R)

District 7

Michelle Fischbach (R)

District 8

Pete Stauber (R)

Democratic Party (6)

Republican Party (4)