Minnesota Lawyer
"If you put in perspective the fact that we have this huge freshman class as well as a change from minority to majority — and this enormous deficit that we’ve got — we really have a huge job ahead of us." — Rep. Kurt Daudt
A talk with freshman Rep. Kurt Daudt, the House GOP’s lone rookie assistant majority leader
State Rep. Kurt Daudt knows that he’s got his work cut out for him. The Republican lawmaker from Crown was elected by the 33 new Republican members of the state House to be the lone freshman assistant majority leader in their caucus. In that role, Daudt will likely have to be a voice representing the diverse class of new members to caucus leadership while simultaneously helping them learn the ropes. That will be difficult while Daudt is still assaying the lay of the land himself.
But Daudt isn’t new to the world of Minnesota politics. The 37-year-old’s election to succeed Rep. Rob Eastlund in House District 17A is the most recent development in a steadily rising political career. Daudt has been elected to town and county boards and has served on the Minnesota Republican Party’s executive council. Last year he managed GOP Rep. Marty Seifert’s campaign for governor. His familiarity with the major political players was a critical reason for his election to represent his freshman colleagues.
Capitol Report caught up with Daudt to get a freshman’s perspective of the just-ramping-up legislative session.
Capitol Report: This is a huge freshman class. How would you characterize this group coming in?
Rep. Kurt Daudt: It really is a diverse group. I would say they are probably a fairly conservative group, not necessarily aligned with any particular wing of the Republican Party. I think everybody has issues that they care about, but the main one would probably be smaller government and not increasing taxes. So I think that’s definitely what you’ll see coming out of this freshman class as a common thread.
CR: Now, facing a $6.2 billion budget deficit, do you think that those issues are going to translate smoothly into legislation? Or are there going to be challenges there for some members?
Daudt: I’m not naïve to the fact that that’s a big hill to climb. However, I would think with the incoming freshmen, one issue that they feel real strongly about is not increasing taxes. So we’re going to have to find ways to be more efficient or more creative with how we provide the services to the residents of Minnesota.
CR: It was Sen. Geoff Michel who said at a recent press conference that this freshman class, unlike others in the past, is one that won’t be seen but not heard – basically, that they’re going to play a big role in shaping legislation this session. Is that something that you foresee happening with this group?
Daudt: I would agree with that. It’s really a wide-ranging group of people that come from very different backgrounds, but they’re a very experienced group of people. Not necessarily with the Legislature, but with other walks of life. We’ve got economists and war veterans and schoolteachers, accountants, attorneys, all kinds of different backgrounds. So I really think when people get to know the freshmen, they will be very impressed.
I think that this group will want to have an active role. They didn’t run to come here and not participate. However, I think they’re a humble group. They understand that all of us have a lot of learning to do about the process on how to get things done here in St. Paul.
CR: Have you talked about freshmen shaping bills early on? Do you know of any specific ones that are coming out of the gate?
Daudt: I have had some discussions with the leadership about what our priorities will be. I’m probably not going to give you an exclusive scoop on what our first 10 bills are going to be. But just as it relates to the freshmen, I think that the freshmen are going to have a wide-ranging set of issues that they want to deal with. I think we’ll probably see a lot of business reforms as far as licensing [is concerned]. They’re going to want to make it much easier to do business in Minnesota, create jobs and get the economy back moving again.
I think each member will probably find their niche on what they want to work with. Mine initially will be trying to solve some of the problems that were created in the last couple of sessions with Green Acres. My district has the largest number of landowners in the state that were affected by the changes made to Green Acres in the last couple of election cycles.
CR: Are freshman thinking about forming a separate caucus at all?
Daudt: We’ve actually talked a little bit about that. I don’t know if that’ll come or not. I think the freshmen would like to keep in touch with each other. The one thing that we have in common is that we’re all here for the first time together. So I would suspect that we will probably, as a group, want to have some communication regularly about that. I don’t know that we’ll see an issues-oriented freshman caucus trying to wield some power or something within the caucus. But I think it’s probably wise for us to meet on occasion and talk about how we can help each other out.
CR: Have you started to set goals or priorities with freshman members?
Daudt: We really haven’t. We had a three-day orientation that was kind of an orientation retreat. That was a bipartisan thing, so we didn’t really get into issues. It was more just educating us on how the system works here, and we talked about committees and had some senior members come in and talk to us a little bit about how things work and what their experience has been, how they’ve gotten bills passed, that kind of thing. So it really hasn’t been anything issue-oriented at this point.
CR: Have some of the more veteran members reached out to the freshmen?
Daudt: I think what you see are geographic relationships that start to form. If there’s a more senior member from the western metro, they’ll help out a freshman from the western metro. There’s really a bigger thing going on here, too, with the transition from a minority to a majority. So a lot of the senior members are taking over committees and they’re learning the ropes, so I think the freshmen are thinking, or hoping, the communication could be better. It’s certainly no one’s intent to leave anybody out of the loop. It’s just that everybody is busy right now.
CR: Have you set any personal goals about what you want to do to represent this big class of people?
Daudt: It was an honor to be elected from the freshman class as assistant majority leader. I take my role as being a help to the new members rather than as a speaker for them. I’ve told the freshmen: I’m happy to help you in any way that I can. If you have an issue that you need help with, or questions, certainly bring those to me. Don’t, however, feel like you have to go through me. We have five or six assistant majority leaders and any one of those can help any one of you. It’s kind of a big responsibility to think that 30 of my colleagues would be coming to me looking for help or assistance. But I think the main reason that the caucus decided to put a freshman on the leadership team was to make sure that the freshman perspective was represented.
CR: What are some of the challenges that new members are going to face early on?
Daudt: I think some of it is just going to be kind of learning the ropes. It’s a tough environment to really learn the ropes because of the big transition from the minority to majority. If you put in perspective the fact that we have this huge freshman class as well as a change from minority to majority – and this enormous deficit that we’ve got – we really have a huge job ahead of us.
We all come in so eager to participate and to be really a productive, helpful member of the team. But yet, I don’t know that we even really grasp what it is that we’ve got in front of us with this big budget deficit. We’re really going to have some tough decisions to make. But I think this freshman class is really steadfast to hold the line on tax increases. They don’t feel like this is an economy where we can raise taxes. We feel like there’s other ways to create revenue through job and economic growth.
CR: A lot of freshmen got vice chairmanships of committees. Why do you think that was?
Daudt: I think it probably had a lot to do with their personal experience. I really think that Speaker [Kurt] Zellers and Majority Leader [Matt] Dean really tried to look at the group as a whole and where the talents lie and who might be the best person to fill a position, rather than what might be politically expedient. I wouldn’t guess or second-guess why they did what they did, but it really seems like we do have a pretty good talent pool in the freshman class.
