The Minnesota Legislature’s 2025 session came to an end a couple of weeks ago, and this was a budget year. But we still don’t have a budget. The big sticking point? Democratic and Republican leaders agreed on a framework for a budget deal, and one of its terms was that Minnesota would no longer provide unlimited free health care to illegal alien adults. That proved so controversial that it may blow up the agreement.
We covered here the bizarre scene in Minnesota’s Capitol when the budget framework was being announced in a joint press conference, and dissident Democratic House and Senate members tried to break into the room. Failing to do so, they settled for chanting and demonstrating in favor of unlimited free health care for all illegals in the corridor outside.
This, of course, is the same dynamic we see across the country–the far-left activist wing of the Democratic Party pitted against the supposedly moderate majority of that party. But are the far leftists actually a minority of Democrats? I doubt it.
My organization pays for a quarterly poll, done by Meeting Street Insights, in conjunction with our magazine Thinking Minnesota. We got results of our most recent, just-completed survey today. One of the questions asked about support for, or opposition to, paying for health care for illegal immigrants. As you would expect, Minnesotans oppose that program by 61% to 37%. But the partisan breakdown is remarkable. Republicans oppose free health care for illegals by 93% to 6%. As usual, independents side more with Republicans than Democrats: they oppose free health care for illegals by 65% to 33%. But Democrats? They actually favor this program by 65% to 31%.
Which means that the zany, chanting wackos who besieged the Capitol press conference a few weeks ago represent the large majority of the Democratic Party. Their constituents are with them.
This bodes ill, I think, for Democrats. Their candidates are already jockeying for the 2028 presidential nomination. Democratic primary voters are even farther to the left than the rest of the party. So, is there any reason to doubt that the leftmost candidate seen as viable will win the 2028 primaries? I don’t think so.
This is why Tim Walz, for example, is going around the country giving incendiary speeches. It is not unreasonable to think that, with high name recognition following his vice presidential run in 2024, and if he is seen as holding down the far-left pole on the Democratic spectrum, he will win the nomination. A Democrat who tries to appeal to the majority of Americans on issues like health care for illegal immigrants will be playing to only a minority of his own party. If nothing changes, and if more moderate elements of the party can’t engineer a different result as they did in 2016, a Democratic wipeout in 2028 could be the result.
