Olson: GOP’s Chris Madel will need more than snark to win the governor’s race

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Chris Madel’s long-shot Republican gubernatorial campaign commenced at his Hennepin Avenue law office with the same defiance he’s brought to courtrooms in his decades as a successful trial attorney.

As Madel walked to the podium, supporters chanted his last name. He looked up, thanked them for coming and chided them. “I could have done without the chanting,” he said.

Madel’s comfortable making others uncomfortable. He had gathered supporters in his airy, industrial downtown office as he prepares to move the Madel law firm to new digs in Excelsior.

He loves Minneapolis but worries about the safety of clients and staff as they come and go. “I can’t look them in the eye and wonder if one of them is going to get hurt and it’s on me,” Madel said.

Public safety and cops are at the core of his campaign. He dismisses violence interrupters, the civilians hired by the city to help curb crime before it happens, as ineffective.

Now he’s inserting his brash man-against-the-machine approach into the governor’s race, throwing verbal punches left and right.

“I don’t have this battery of people behind me saying, ‘Oh my God, say this, don’t say that,’” Madel said.

His lack of political acumen was obvious as the centerpiece of his launch was an hourlong PowerPoint resembling a looping final argument after a long trial rather than a cohesive start to the campaign.

His PowerPoint detailed four focus areas: Attack fraud, make the streets safer while supporting cops, strengthen schools and make government more affordable and efficient.

“I have no clue why any of these things should be political,” Madel said, a breathtakingly disingenuous statement.

On fighting fraud in state government, Madel said it’s “a matter of, do you know how the ‘sort’ function works on an spreadsheet?”

If only it were so simple. The state needs to do much better fighting fraud, but the lawless fraudsters are constantly poking for new loopholes, and spreadsheet acumen alone won’t stop them.

To fight street crime, Madel wants to eliminate judicial and prosecutorial discretion so felons in possessions of firearms receive the mandatory minimum sentences.

And he wants police to be empowered to police. “It is high time we let cops do their jobs without some jackass politician second-guessing their every move," Madel said.

His solution to struggling schools is startlingly straightforward: Eliminate all mandates and concentrate on teaching reading and math. “You learn to read, you read to learn. It’s not that difficult,” he said.

As for affordability, Madel said he learned in college that he spent less money when he had less money and so government should do the same. He proposed eliminating the income tax on the first $75,000 and ending property tax increases on homeowners who are 65 and older.

Property tax reform’s a worthy aim, but shouldn’t there be a means test so that a multimillionaire in a lakeside mansion isn’t treated the same as a fixed-income retiree in a modest condo?

“I will do everything in my power to lower your taxes,” Madel said, sounding like a run-of-the-mill Republican without a vision beyond the personal pocketbook.

Madel allowed only a couple quick questions when he was finally done with the PowerPoint and responded mostly by deflecting with defiance.

He’ll have to be more reflective in the future as he’s trying to gain access to an inside lane on the race, the Republican endorsement and nomination.

Nor did Madel spare the existing GOP field, saying the Republicans are limiting their campaign themes to “Tim Walz sucks.”

Madel’s not afraid of a fight. He’s got that part of politics down. But governing also requires conciliation and cooperation. The my-way-or-the-highway approach doesn’t work at the State Capitol.

By the time Madel had clicked through his PowerPoint, his opponents had pounced on social media.

Republicans criticized his past donations to Democrats. Madel said that running a law firm is a bipartisan endeavor. “If you are looking for an apology from me, you have come to the wrong person,” he said.

He also said that he believes state trooper Ryan Londregan, who sat in the front row, is free because of his bipartisan donations. “You have a problem with that, I don’t give a shit,” Madel said.