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Former President Donald Trump will head to Minnesota on a day off from his hush money trial for a Republican fundraiser Friday night in a traditionally Democratic state that he boasts he can carry in November.
Trump will headline the state GOP’s annual Lincoln Reagan dinner, which coincides with the party’s state convention, after attending his son Barron’s high school graduation in Florida.
Trump will use part of the day granted by the trial judge for the graduation to campaign in Minnesota, a state he argues he can win in the November rematch with President Joe Biden. No Republican presidential candidate has won Minnesota since Richard Nixon in 1972, but Trump came close to flipping the state in 2016, when he fell 1.5 percentage points short of Hillary Clinton.
Trump returned to Minnesota several times in 2020, when Biden beat him by more than 7 points.
“I think this is something Trump wants to do. He believes this is a state he can win. We believe that’s the case as well,” David Hann, the chairman of the Republican Party of Minnesota, said in an interview.
Democratic U.S. Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota, a Biden ally, said the Trump campaign is “grasping at straws” if it thinks he can win the state.
“The Biden campaign is going to work hard for every vote,” Smith said in an interview. “We’re going to engage with voters all over the state. But I think Minnesota voters are going to choose President Biden.”
Trump will appear at Friday’s dinner after going to see Barron Trump’s graduation from the private Oxbridge Academy in West Palm Beach, Florida. The former president had long complained Judge Juan M. Merchan would not let him attend the graduation before Merchan agreed not to hold court Friday.
Hann is co-hosting Friday’s dinner along with Trump’s state campaign chair, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, who represents a central Minnesota district. Hann said Emmer was instrumental in bringing the former president to Minnesota.
