There are just four districts across the state where incumbent legislators from opposing parties are squaring off in the general election. But three of those contests are in a single central Minnesota Senate district that stretches from Iron Range mining towns in the north to the Pillsbury State Forest in the south.

A steady downpour didn’t keep Indian gambling workers from flocking outside the state Capitol in St. Paul last April. At least 1,500 people gathered outside on the building’s steps, some arriving by the busload from reservations hours away. Clad in raincoats and shielded by a canopy of umbrellas, workers thrust signs into the air that read, “Rural jobs count too” and “Don’t gamble with my job!”