The DFL Gamble: Competing Gubernatorial Campaign Strategies

Should the DFL run to the left and mobilize young and urban voters mostly in the Twin Cities Metro
area to win the governorship, or go with a moderate candidate with a regionally balanced ticket in hope of capturing traditional Metro voters as well as picking up support in greater Minnesota, such as the Iron Range?  This appears to be the strategy dividing the leading contenders for the DFL gubernatorial nomination going into the August 14, primary  and beyond into the general election.
There will be an August 14, DFL gubernatorial primary featuring St. Paul Representative Erin Murphy and her lieutenant-governor Erin Maye Quade, an Apple Valley Representative, versus First Congressional District Tim Walz from Winona, and his running mate,  Peggy Flanagan, state representative, from Plymouth.  The two campaigns, while offering nuanced and sometimes real differences on public policy, offer more profound contrasts in terms of campaign strategies and how to respond to changing Minnesota politics in the age of Donald Trump.
There are at least three factors critically defining contemporary Minnesota politics.  The first is that the state has shifted from being a solidly DFL one to that which mirrors the partisan divide found nationally and in many other states. Divided government, shifting of partisan control of the legislature, and geographic sorting and split party control all are traits in Minnesota politics now.  One can also point to a narrowing of partisan identification where as of 2016 the DFL only enjoyed a 37%-35% advantage over the Republicans, down from more than ten points a generation ago.
A second fact is that in 2016 Donald Trump came within 45,000 votes of defeating Hillary Clinton in Minnesota. The question is whether his election was a fluke–sexism toward Clinton, her campaign strategy, or something unique about Donald Trump–or whether the election was a continuation of a trend line of a state tending Republican.  Consider in 2008, of the 87 counties in Minnesota, Obama won 42 of them.  In 2012 Obama won 28, and in 2016 Clinton only won nine counties, including Hennepin, Ramsey, St. Louis, and Olmsted.  Republicans had gained 33 counties over two elections.  In comparison, in the 2014 gubernatorial election, the Democrat Mark Dayton won 34 counties.  In Minnesota, as nationally, Democrats appear to be the party or urban areas and are losing rurally.
From 2008 through the 2012 and then into the 2016 presidential elections, the actual number of votes and the percentage of votes received by the Democratic presidential candidate in Minnesota declined.  In 2008 Barack  Obama received 1,573,454 votes compared to John McCain’s 1,275,409–a difference of 298,045.  In 2012 the gap between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney narrowed to 225,942.  Then in 2016 it was 44,765 between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump – a steady narrowing of the gap between the Democratic and Republican candidate.  But this narrowing of the gap was not necessarily a sign of Democratic voters switching to vote for Trump, it was DFLers staying home.  From 2008 to 2016 the actual number of votes being cast for the Democratic presidential candidate dropped by 205,638, while the number of Republican voters increased by 47,542.  Conceivably part of this shift was a result of changing voter preferences, and given that CNN exit polls suggested a tightening in the percentage of Minnesota voters who consider themselves Democrats versus Republicans.  Yet when looking at voter turnout in 2016 compared to 2012, it was up in many Republican while down in Democratic areas such as Hennepin County.
A third fact is that there is overall a generational and demographic shift occurring in Minnesota politics, with for the Democrats the base of their party turning increasingly to Millennial liberal voters who reside in the Twin Cities urban core.   Once part of the DFL coalition, the Iron Range increasingly is more mercurial, perhaps less reliable to vote Democrat than in the past.
Given the above, the question is how should the DFL respond? Early on post-2017 the received wisdom was that DFL needed to run a more moderate candidate who could connect with  rural Minnesota while at the same time still mobilize Metro voters.  After all, this is what Mark Dayton successfully did, as well as Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar.  The assumption here is that  a Democrat cannot win statewide office simply on the basis of the Metro vote–it also needed to build greater Minnesota coalitions.  Enter Tim Walz and Peggy Flanagan.  Walz was seen as a centrist DFLer who successfully won in a swing congressional district as being a person who could win enough rural votes–maybe even pick up some of the Trump supporters–and win the governor’s race.  He along with Peggy Flanagan, a Native-American and a liberal state representative from a swing suburb who was supposed to appeal to the metro Millennials liberals, was seen as the ideal ticket.  It featured traditional regional or geographic balance, a moderate-liberal balance, and perhaps  a stance on issues, such as guns, that would be electable.  Early on, de facto the DFL leaders seemed to agree and the Walz-Flanagan soared in terms of fund raising and early caucus support.
But along the way several things happened.  The Me-too movement and Al Franken’s resignation as well as high profile sexual harassment allegations involving Donald Trump, Harvey Weinstein, and members of the Minnesota Legislature  have activated a record number of women to run for office, portending a female  surge in 2018.   Then there were the Parkland school shootings, potentially radicalizing Millennials and Gen Z into political activism and making gun control a defining issue of orthodoxy for a new  political cohort along with Single Payer (health insurance).  Given these events, and the large population base in the Twin Cities, could someone run for governor by moving to the left, mostly foregoing rural votes, and instead make them up by heavily  mobilizing women and young voters in urban areas, especially in the Metro area?  This is the strategy  it appears in the DFL nominating Erin Murphy for governor and her picking Erin Maye Quade as her lieutenant governor.
Walz-Flanagan versus Murphy Maye Quade offer voters a contrast on policy ideas, but they also offer DFL primary and general election voters a contrast in campaign strategies.  The two offer differing views on how to respond to the changing political landscape of the state and what is  the appropriate strategy for Minnesota in the age of Donald Trump.  This is the DFL gamble, and  selecting the wrong one will have significant implications for both the party and the state.