Bush in Minnesota, Once Kerry Territory

Seeking to solidify his lead in the presidential race, President Bush rolled through southern Minnesota on a bus tour today designed to make inroads into territory once considered safe for his challenger, Sen. John F. Kerry.

“Isn’t it great to be a toss-up state?” said Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, as he introduced the president at a political rally in this farming community northwest of St. Paul. “With your help we can put Minnesota in the Republican column for the first time in 32 years.”

Polls show Bush making gains against Kerry in Minnesota, a traditional Democratic bastion that voted for Democrat Al Gore in 2000. However, a state poll released today by the St. Paul Pioneer Press showed Bush leading Kerry 46% to 44% among likely voters. The poll had a margin of error of 4 percentage points, which means the result is a statistical dead heat.

Those results contrast with another state poll released a day earlier by the Minneapolis Star Tribune that showed Kerry leading the president by 50% to 41% among likely voters.

Republicans and Democrats disagreed over which poll was more accurate, but both agree that the state — which was once considered reliably in Kerry’s column — is now a contest.

“We’re taking a bus tour across your beautiful state,” Bush said. “I’m asking for the vote.… I want to win and I know we are going to win.”

Larry Jacobs, head of the 2004 Elections Project at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, said that the results of the two polls are not contradictory when both margins of error are considered.

“This is a toss-up to a slight Kerry advantage,” Jacobs said.

However, Republicans have been gaining in state elections in recent years, and the Bush campaign hopes to translate that trend to national politics, Bush said. And the president’s campaign visit also forces Kerry to spend time and money protecting his advantage.

“The president has already been very successful in forcing John Kerry to defend territory that ought to be a Democratic lock,” Jacobs said.

Bush was targeting three counties in rural parts of Minnesota that voted Republican in 2000. After St. Cloud, Bush hosted a discussion on healthcare in Blaine, Minn., before heading to a second rally in Rochester, Minn.

Bush’s decision to highlight healthcare today was also a sign of confidence because national polls give Kerry higher marks on the subject.

The president accused Kerry of wanting to put government in charge of healthcare.

“When we reform and strengthen healthcare, the health decisions must be made by doctors and patients, not by bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.,” Bush said.

On healthcare, home ownership and Social Security, Bush said, “we have a difference in philosophy in this campaign. It’s a clear difference. My opponent’s programs will expand government. Our programs will expand opportunity.”

It was Bush’s fifth visit to the state this year; Kerry has traveled to Minnesota six times.