New candidate enters Senate race

Priscilla Lord Faris out to prove that the race isn’t over yet

By Dan Linehan

MANKATO — Priscilla Lord Faris believes Minnesota’s Democrats endorsed the wrong man for the wrong reasons to take on Sen. Norm Coleman this fall.

Al Franken secured the party’s endorsement, she claims, because of his fundraising ability and name recognition.

But the race isn’t over yet.

On Sept. 9, Democratic voters will decide who will appear on the ballot this November. (In Minnesota, only Democrats can vote in the Democratic primary)

So Lord Faris, sensing a vulnerable candidate, waited for someone she thought could beat Coleman before filing on the last day.

“I may seem like a Johnny-come-lately, but I’ve been in tune (with the race) every step of the way,” she said Wednesday during a stop in Mankato.

She has until Sept. 9, the date of the primary, to convince Democrats that her local roots would be a better match against Coleman than Franken’s name recognition.

“He’s a turnoff for voters,” she said.

The reasons: His comedy is coarse and hurtful, he has tax troubles, he doesn’t have a long history of public service — or even residence — in Minnesota and is trailing Coleman in the polls by 15 points.

(Another poll has the candidates at a virtual dead heat)

Lord Faris describes herself as a fourth-generation Minnesotan with decades of experience here, from campaigning for Hubert H. Humphrey’s 1968 presidential run to her current law practice.

Franken, she says, has spent most of his life in New York, much of it spent as a comedian telling precisely the sorts of jokes that would compromise a political campaign.

“That’s why we don’t have comedians in the Senate,” she said.

She also called him the Democratic version of Rush Limbaugh and suggested he won’t be able to work across the aisle in the Senate.

That barb comes from Franken’s often-edgy comedy, which Republicans have seized upon in the campaign.

And, given his trailing poll figures, she believes it’s working.

In all, many of her criticisms of Franken echo Republican charges, with the message that he’ll lose this fall.

As an alternative, she has little more political experience — she served on the Sunfish Lake City Council — but much stronger Minnesota ties and familiarity.

She has a lifetime of professional work here and her father, Lord Miles, was a Minnesota attorney general and longtime federal judge.

Still, despite all her experience in Minnesota, one of her biggest challenges is to convince Democrats that the contest isn’t over.