Weekend Reformer: Stephen Miller moves up

Good morning, Reformers. 

President Donald Trump announced Friday he’s elevating Stephen Miller to White House chief of staff, the first shake-up of his administration officials since Democrats trounced Republicans in the midterms Tuesday.

The move comes after voters rebuked Trump, giving Democrats sizable majorities in both the House and Senate this coming Congress. In a backlash to Trump, Hispanics who voted for the president in 2024 shunned him in the midterms.

Miller is considered the architect of the administration’s immigration crackdown, advocating for the surge of immigration agents into mostly Democratic-led American cities throughout 2025-26, including Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota.

In January after federal agents fatally shot Alex Pretti in Minnesota, Miller posted on X: "A would-be assassin tried to murder federal law enforcement and the official Democrat account sides with the terrorists.” In his last moments, Pretti was helping a bystander and was disarmed by agents before they shot him.

States Newsroom’s Ashley Murray reports. 

Read our election day coverage, i.e. interviews with nearly two dozen voters across the metro and beyond. 

And, in case you missed it, read our election night coverage on Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s gubernatorial win; Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan’s Senate win; and the DFL’s majorities in both chambers of the Legislature, mirroring national Democrats’ victory in Congress. 

In the U.S. House, progressive Democrat Matt Little won Minnesota’s 2nd Congressional District soundly, I reported. That district was previously the state’s most competitive. Seemingly that title now goes to the 1st Congressional District, where Democrat Jake Johnson held a razor-thin lead in unofficial results against Republican U.S. Rep. Brad Finstad in what would be a major upset, pending the results of a likely recount, Maya Betti reported. 

The national wave of anti-Trump fervor that swept the country this election cycle seems to have permeated every geographic region of Minnesota: Every state House district shifted leftward in 2026 compared to 2024, with several districts moving left by over 15 percentage points, I reported. 

I looked at political group spending data and found that outside groups — such as PACs and party caucuses — spent three times more on negative ads than positive in the lead-up to the general election. Also, for the first time in over a decade, Republican-aligned outside groups are spending more money in statewide and legislative races compared to DFL groups.

Flanagan, in her first news conference since being elected to the U.S. Senate, hailed the new voices headed to Congress after Democrats won landslide victories across the country in Tuesday’s midterms, Max Nesterak reported. Voters elected at least 10 new Democratic senators, already the largest incoming class of elected first-time Democratic Senators in 40 years, with results from Alaska and Mississippi still outstanding. Many made history: Flanagan is the first Native American woman elected to the Senate, Abdul El-Sayed of Michigan the first Muslim and Chris Pappas of New Hampshire the first out gay man.

During Klobuchar’s first press conference as governor-elect, she rehashed the promises she made in her campaign – she’s going to start an audit on day one to identify fraud and areas of wasteful spending. She wants to transform government to make it more efficient, Michelle Griffith reported. Also per Michelle: New GOP House Minority Leader Harry Niska says  Klobuchar has already called him, and he praised parts of her agenda. 

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, along with attorneys general from Washington, New Mexico and Oregon, is suing the Trump administration over new Medicaid work requirements passed in the tax and spending law know as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, I reported. The states are employing a legal strategy based on an argument successfully used by conservative states to oppose Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion. 

3M, which is responsible for widespread groundwater contamination from so-called forever chemicals in the eastern Twin Cities metro, will pay $7.35 billion to settle the vast majority of outstanding personal injury claims against it, Brian Martucci reported.

Our resident Emmerologist, Chad Maschke, argued that Rep. Tom Emmer’s nationwide tour on behalf of Republican candidates didn’t seem to help them much, and now he’s fighting for his job as GOP whip, but in the minority. 

“Most of his campaigning time went to Republicans who lost, and they won’t be in the room when the conference picks its next whip.” 

Editor Patrick Coolican reviewed some of the open bigotry against Somali Americans this campaign. He points to massive turnout figures in Somali precincts and a total repudiation of Republicans statewide, and concludes that bigotry only served to keep its adherents out of power.

And, ICYMI: Patrick’s takeaways from the election, delivered in Wednesday’s Daily Reformer. 

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