Attorney general race: Why would we enlist a Trump ally in our fight against Trump?

The most pressing issue for the next Minnesota attorney general will be the ongoing fight to force the Trump administration to govern by the rule of law and the U.S. Constitution. 

When Trump’s minions were withholding evidence from state and local law enforcement in the federal killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, Attorney General Keith Ellison and Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty sued the feds. Last month, they announced that the feds had turned over key evidence, like Good’s car. 

After prosecutors charged ICE agent Christian Castro, alleging he shot an innocent man in the leg and then lied about it, Trump’s ally Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has been holding up Castro’s extradition. Ellison again sued. 

On another front, when Trump assumed monarchical powers and levied tariffs, which has raised the price of nearly everything for American consumers, Ellison was among the attorney generals who successfully sued to stop him (though Trump is at it again on that front). 

Minnesotans have been in the fight of our lives against the Trump administration, which has to rank among the most lawless in American history. It’s gotten so bad that — as ProPublica reported recently — federal judges across the country have called Trump’s Justice Department at various times “unlawful,” “unethical,” “unseemly” or otherwise dishonest. 

Which is why it wouldn’t make any sense to elect a Trump ally to the job of attorney general, who is Minnesota’s chief legal officer. (That’d make as much as sense as the federal government hiring someone from the American Chemical Council to regulate chemical safety; oh, wait, they did that.) 

And, to be sure: Republican nominee for attorney general Ron Schutz is very much a Trump ally. 

The Republican Attorneys General Association is dropping a seven-figure ad buy against Ellison. Check out this photo of Don Jr. Trump with association leaders. 

RAGA, as it’s known, is connected to the mastermind of the Trump Supreme Court, Leonard Leo. 

Leo, who is co-chairman of the board of the Federalist Society, is closely connected to RAGA and various big money GOP groups, which shrewdly see state attorneys general as a key policy, political and legal lever.

Schutz, a successful trial lawyer and fixture of the Minnesota conservative legal establishment, has been a member of the Federalist Society for more than 30 years. 

The group has successfully implanted their right-wing judicial philosophy on the federal bench, including the current supermajority on the U.S. Supreme Court. 

We’re talking overturning Roe v. Wade, giving President Donald Trump immunity from criminal prosecution and gutting the Voting Rights Act.

Beyond the company he keeps, what Schutz has said he’ll do as attorney general is not comforting — insofar as he’s said anything.

How did Schutz react to ICE’s lawless assault on the constitutional rights of Minnesotans? He attacked Ellison for “wasting taxpayer money suing the Trump admin to block ICE from doing their job — enforcing immigration laws in Minnesota.”

Were they “enforcing immigration law” when they killed Good and Pretti? Or dragged an American citizen out of his home without a warrant? Or racially profiled countless Minnesotans? Or stopped clergy and lawyers from visiting people in detention? 

I asked Schutz’s campaign what he would do as attorney general to get Castro back here to face justice. And which, if any, of the more than 70 lawsuits filed by Ellison against the Trump administration that Schutz would drop or continue. 

Schutz didn’t respond. 

I also asked about another high-profile Ellison case, in which he alleges Big Oil defrauded Minnesotans by lying about what they knew about climate change. As multiple investigations have found, the oil companies knew humans burning fossil fuels were causing climate change but then seeded the information atmosphere with phony doubt while the problem only worsened. 

Again, no response from the Schutz campaign, but he did tweet that the lawsuit was part of a “radical green agenda.” 

There’s nothing radical about expecting the world’s largest and most powerful corporations to be truthful with the public. 

I’ve written critically of Democratic-Farmer-Labor elected officials’ lackadaisical initial response to the raiding of our state and federal treasury by fraudsters. Including Ellison’s foolish decision in the fall of 2021 to meet with people who sought his help getting the executive branch to go easier on what we politely call program integrity, just weeks before the raids that finally put an end to the Feeding Our Future debacle. 

Ellison came across during the leaked audio of the meeting as utterly oblivious to what was happening, while inappropriately criticizing the Walz administration, i.e., his client.

I don’t doubt that he didn’t come into office hoping to focus on Medicaid fraud, and I’m sure he doesn’t love touting the work, especially when so much has been found in one community. Regardless, his office informs me they’ve charged 377 people with Medicaid fraud and secured 358 convictions since his tenure began in 2019. That’s a conviction about every eight days since he took office in 2019. 

Every year the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General puts out a statistical report on states’ Medicaid fraud control units, and Minnesota has ranked in the top 10 in fraud convictions, despite our relatively low population compared to places like other top-ranking states like Florida and California. 

Ellison also hired a 20-year veteran of the FBI as a lead investigator. 

Point being: Ellison seems to have gotten the message.

As for Schutz, here’s what he said during a TV interview when asked what he would do in the case of an “unlawful decision” on the part of the Trump administration. 

“What I can tell you is my goal is to protect the citizens of Minnesota.” 

OK, sounds good. 

But then this: “I, I doubt if President Trump is going to be, you know, taking some action that would be blatantly illegal. I know Dems think he has done that. I can tell you from having spent a lot of time in the courtroom, there can be differences of opinion on this.”

Enough said.