Delegates in Rochester selected Sen. Scott Newman, R-Hutchinson, to compete for state attorney general and former Long Lake Mayor Randy Gilbert to run for state auditor in the first endorsements of the state party convention on Friday

Though legislators have already passed $443 million in tax cuts, they're still wrangling over the differences between two bills that would provide roughly $100 million in additional tax relief. The House has passed $323 in new spending, which must be meshed with a $210 million bill from the Senate.

Simon's 2013 fundraising total was several times larger than both of his opposing candidates' total collections last year.

The teachers union counts 70,000 educators among its members.

Former Long Lake Mayor Randy Gilbert is the only announced Republican challenger

A handful of August primary elections are heating up across the state thanks to the new redistricting map, an uptick in legislative retirements and widespread dissatisfaction with the job lawmakers are doing in St. Paul.

U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar has long been viewed as all but invincible in 2012. Six years ago she trounced a three-term congressional incumbent by 20 percentage points, the largest margin in a U.S. Senate race in Minnesota in three decades.

On Saturday, Pat Shortridge was elected as the state party chairman in a statewide gathering of GOP activists in St. Cloud. Afterward the veteran GOP strategist suggested that the party had turned an important corner.

In late November, a group of roughly two dozen Republican activists gathered at a residence in Edina to discuss the future of the state Republican Party. The meeting included a broad cross-section of the GOP’s notoriously fractious base.