Harris, Walz Use Minnesota’s Progressive Reform As Economic ‘Road Map’

To understand the economic vision of the Harris-Walz presidential ticket, Minnesotans say just look to the North Star State.

“I have heard some of the things discussed in the ticket,” Minnesota AFL-CIO Chairman Bernie Burnham told CNBC in an interview. “It’s kind of a reflection of what’s going on here.”

Under Democratic Governor Tim Walsh, Minnesota expanded union protectionsover $1 billion was approved housing resources, established universally paid family and medical leaveis funded free school mealshiking corporate taxes and more.

Taken together, they make Minnesota a kind of proving ground for progressive policies that have faced opposition at the federal level.

Now, with Walz on the ticket as running mate Kamala Harris, Minnesota’s playbook is getting national attention.

“It’s definitely a roadmap,” Amy Koch, a Republican strategist who previously served as a Minnesota state senator, told CNBC.

Already, several of Harris’s campaign finance priorities mirror policies Walz championed in Minnesota.

The vice president has suggested stronger coding protection of workersinvesting to build three million new homes, providing a $25,000 subsidy for all eligible homebuyers who qualify, and expanding the child tax credit, the earned income tax credit and other tax programs. He has also supported an increase in corporate tax.

But at the same time, Harris toned down the rhetoric about corporate greed and big business monopolies that animates so many of President Joe Biden’s speeches.

That led some leaders in corporate America to hold out hope that if elected president, Harris would give them a bigger seat at the table than her predecessor.

But if Harris takes notes from Walz’s approach to Minnesota, that hope may be more than a pipe dream.

Walz’s progressive political agenda has swept through the Minnesota Legislature at lightning speed — the lion’s share of it in the first months of 2023, when he begins his second term.

In November 2022, when Walz was re-elected governor of Minnesota, the state’s Democratic Party, known as the Democratic-Farmer-Labor, or DFL, won a rule trifecta with slim majorities: margin of one seat in the Senate and six seats in the House.

“I’ll be honest with you, it was a little bit of a surprise,” said former DFL Minnesota state Sen. Jeff Hayden. “We were all gasping,” he told CNBC.

A month later, the new DFL majority had more good news.

The Minnesota Office of Management and Budget reported that the state will enter the 2023 legislative session with a budget surplus of $17.6 billion;. It was the largest one-year budget surplus in Minnesota history, the product of high tax collection rates and lower-than-expected spending levels.

Now the DFL had both the majority and the money it needed to pass its agenda.

Minnesota Democrats also realized how fragile their trifecta was.

The land of 10,000 lakes is reliably blue in presidential elections. But in situation level, it is much less partisan. The last time Minnesota Democrats won both houses of the legislature and the governor’s office was in 2012, and promptly lost that trifecta in the next election cycle.

With that 2014 loss still a vivid memory, Minnesota Democrats knew they might only have a few months to turn their priorities into law.

“People just threw caution to the wind,” Hayden said.

During his second term, Walz signed several big bills in lawincluding a $2.3 billion education budget, along with measures to vest access to abortion and transgender protection, legalization of marijuana, expansion housing subsidies tax and childcare credits, strengthening worker bargaining protections, pay for free school meals and ban so-called corporate “junk fees”.

The political push for Minnesota’s universal paid family and medical leave, which Walz signed last year, was driven largely by unions and progressive advocacy groups.

“We had a very important seat at the table,” said Elianne Farhat, the executive director of TakeAction Minnesota, a progressive nonprofit. “It was really a good model and way of what we would say is a kind of governance together: community and elected officials.”

But Walz had to weigh those interests against pressure from Minnesota’s important business community, which the state is proud of. Over a dozen Fortune 500 companies are headquartered there, including Target, General Mills and UnitedHealth.

Former high school teacher and union member with zero shares, Walz has few obvious financial or professional ties to the private sector. He also has a personal interest in the welfare of the people, which he showed on the campaign trail, and which is a key element of his brand politics.

Walz has since committed $1 billion to developing affordable housing and millions more to preserving the state’s existing public housing. He also signed a rights of tenants package that made it more difficult for owners to evict residents.