Kiscaden joins Doran in DFL race

01/10/2006

She changes parties to be his running mate

BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press

Looking to broaden his appeal to independents and Republicans, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Kelly Doran on Monday announced as his running mate state Sen. Sheila Kiscaden of Rochester, the Legislature’s lone Independence Party member.

First elected to the Senate in 1992 as a Republican, Kiscaden switched to the Independence Party in 2002. After Doran picked her, she announced that she was switching again, this time to the Democrats, her third party in four years.
“I’m returning to my roots,” Kiscaden said at a Capitol news conference. While she was growing up in St. Paul, her father and her uncles were all members of building trades unions and staunch Democrats.

She joined the Republican Party as an adult, but the GOP refused to endorse her for re-election in 2002 because she was too moderate for conservative party activists.

“I’m a centrist,” she said, and she thinks the Democratic Party is changing to reflect her values.

As for abandoning the Independence Party, she said, “I have a lot of respect for the people who are trying to create a middle ground. The Independence Party is about trying to create a middle ground, but the Independence Party has the deck stacked against them, and they haven’t been very successful.”

State Independence Party Chairman Jim Moore said that while Kiscaden and his party both want to cut down partisanship, “we fundamentally disagree on the means to achieve it. She feels that a moderating influence can move the DFL toward better public policy. We are convinced that true change cannot come from a political party that vigorously defends the status quo while collecting massive amounts of money from powerful interests seeking influence.”

Former state Finance Commissioner Peter Hutchinson is expected to announce his candidacy for governor on the Independence Party ticket later this month. Kiscaden said he tried to recruit her to be his running mate.

Doran, a wealthy shopping center developer from Eden Prairie who has never been elected to public office, said Kiscaden, 59, brings governmental experience to the ticket that he lacks.

“There is no stronger, more qualified candidate for lieutenant governor than Sheila Kiscaden,” he said. She is recognized as a legislative expert on health care, he said, and if elected she would be “our administration’s focal point for fixing our broken health care system.”

Doran said Kiscaden would help him attract moderate voters to the Sept. 12 Democratic-Farmer-Labor primary. He said he is undecided about seeking endorsement at the state DFL convention in June where he would be competing against Attorney General Mike Hatch, state Sens. Becky Lourey and Steve Kelley and perennial candidate Ole Savior. The primary winner will challenge Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

Kiscaden said she decided to give up her Senate seat because she believes as lieutenant governor she could provide the leadership and statesmanship to return civility to politics and the bipartisanship needed to get things done.

State Republican Party Chairman Ron Carey labeled her an opportunist. “Kelly Doran’s choice of Sheila Kiscaden as his running mate confirms their position as the most opportunistic and unprincipled ticket in DFL history,” he said in a statement.

But Pawlenty welcomed her to the race. “She’s been seeking a political home for months or years,” he said. “I hope this is a comfortable place for her.”