‘Godly leadership’: Lisa Demuth’s Pentecostal faith is a driving force behind her politics

Lisa Demuth asked God whether she should run for Minnesota House minority leader.

On the morning Minnesota House Republicans were electing a new leader after a bitterly disappointing 2022 election, Demuth read the Bible verse 1 Peter 4:10: “God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.”

Demuth then had breakfast that morning with other elected officials, and one of them recommended she read a Bible verse ahead of the caucus election: the very same 1 Peter 4:10.

Demuth took this as a sign from God.

“I looked at the colleagues and said, ‘I’m running for leadership,’” Demuth recalled during a talk at a statewide Assemblies of God conference.

Demuth rarely talks about her faith publicly, but the Reformer’s review of several recorded talks she’s given at religious conferences in recent years indicate she served as her church’s worship leader for 16 years and she has frequently turned to God and her well-worn Bible to guide her legislative decisions.

Her faith is just one of many details of her life that remain largely hidden from public view, even as she asks Minnesotans to make her the state’s chief executive in command of a $66 billion, two-year budget and 50,000 public employees.

Demuth faces stiff political headwinds — she can’t escape her party’s association with deeply unpopular President Donald Trump and his relentless attacks on Minnesota. She’s been forced to balance an effort to separate herself from Trump on issues like trade-killing tariffs and the war in Iran, while remaining true to Republican voters’ — and perhaps her own — devotion to him.

But her greatest obstacle may be her quiet refusal, at least thus far, to share the kind of story that many Minnesota voters long for — about who she is and what’s propelled her to seek the governor’s office.

Demuth’s campaign for governor did not respond to the Reformer’s interview requests or answer an emailed list of questions.

Demuth’s unwillingness to evoke her history in her governor campaign contrasts with her Democratic-Farmer-Labor opponent, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who has written two memoirs, basked in publicity for over two decades and endured a childhood that was occasionally memorialized by her father, a Star Tribune columnist.

Central Minnesota roots

Demuth, 59, was born in Paynesville, Minnesota, where her mother also grew up. Her step-father was an immigrant from Panama who served as a church pastor there. He died in June. He became a U.S. citizen in 1976 and was a Metro Transit bus driver for 30 years, according to his obituary.

Growing up biracial in mostly white central Minnesota in the early 1970s grew difficult for Demuth, she told a local radio host in 2023. Her family was supportive of her, and she never felt different until 1st grade, when a 4th grade boy in her school called her the n-word almost every day, she said.

“That’s what precipitated our move back to the metro area,” Demuth said “We just needed a bit more diversity.”

In an interview with the Star Tribune earlier this month, Demuth said her mother received welfare benefits for a short time. Asked how this lived experience shaped her view of the use of social safety net programs in Minnesota, Demuth said her story can motivate others to get off of welfare.

“I’m happy to talk about it if that can be an encouragement to someone else, that, you know what, you can have hard times and you can overcome,” Demuth said.

She graduated from Kennedy High School in Bloomington and went right into the workforce.

“I knew I wanted to work,” said Demuth, adding in the 2023 interview that “school was not my favorite.”

If elected, she would be Minnesota’s first governor without a four-year college degree since Jesse Ventura.

Demuth married in 1985 when she was 18. She moved to her husband’s hometown of Joliet, Illinois, about 40 miles southwest of Chicago. While there, Demuth worked in title insurance at the First American Title Company.

Two years later, Demuth filed for divorce, alleging that he was “guilty of extreme and repeated mental cruelty towards (Demuth) in that he assumes a morose and hostile attitude towards (her),” according to the 1987 divorce filing.

Demuth also alleged her husband refused to discuss the issues in the marriage and said he “acquired the affections and attentions of another woman.”

Demuth, whose maiden name is Pittman, has never publicly discussed that period of her life or her divorce. She would only tell the local radio host that she moved to Illinois because of a “life change.”

She met her current husband, Nick Demuth, through a local Jaycees group, a nonprofit civic and leadership organization for young adults. Demuth moved to Cold Spring — where Nick Demuth lived — and eventually became a stay-at-home mom to four children.

During her time as worship leader at her Assemblies of God church, Demuth was responsible for the church’s music program. She said this is where she learned how to work with a team.

Assemblies of God

Assemblies of God is the world’s largest Pentecostal denomination. Pentecostalism traces its origins back to the Azusa Street Revival of 1906-1909 in Los Angeles. The central figure of the revival is William J. Seymour, the son of emancipated southern slaves, who moved to L.A. and began preaching that the only way Christians can claim to be baptized by the Holy Spirit was to speak in tongues.

The idea was novel and controversial, and his preachings drew large crowds and media coverage.

“Men and women would shout, weep, dance, fall into trances, speak and sing in tongues and interpret into English,” the Assemblies of God Heritage Magazine wrote in 2005. “There was no robed choir, no hymnals, no order of service, but there was an abundance of spiritual enthusiasm.”

The revival drew even more attention because although it originated in a small Black church, the movement was welcoming of Latino, Chinese and white Americans — an unusual occurrence at the time when racial integration was uncommon, said Darrin Rodgers, director of the Flower Pentecostal Heritage Center in Missouri, in an interview. The Assemblies of God denomination was founded in 1914 and now has about 3 million adherents in the U.S., with another 89 million members worldwide, Rodgers said.

Assemblies of God is decentralized, meaning local churches largely decide their worship style. But Assemblies of God churches follow 16 fundamental truths, which declare the Bible as “the infallible, authoritative rule of faith and conduct,” and that the “baptism of believers in the Holy Spirit is witnessed by the initial physical sign of speaking with other tongues.”

Getting into politics

Demuth’s family was not political growing up. She says she didn’t follow politics or even current events until 2007, when she read in the local newspaper that several open seats on the ROCORI School Board had no candidates.

“I couldn’t believe that somebody hadn’t stepped up. So I tore that paper out of the newspaper and left it on my husband’s place for dinner,” Demuth recalled on the 2023 radio show. “I said, ‘Hey, you need to run for the school board. This is really important.’ And he said, ‘I would never run for the school board. You do it.’”

In her telling, Demuth at first said no. When her husband asked why not, she couldn’t come up with an answer. So she made a few calls and ran as a write-in candidate for the school board, since the filing deadline had passed. She went on to serve on the school board for 11 years.

She was elected to the Minnesota House in 2018 after then-Rep. Jeff Howe, who was her representative at the time, called and asked her to run for the House since he was going to run for the Minnesota Senate.

After Howe called her, Demuth read Romans 16:23 about the disciple Paul thanking a man who worked in public works, she said in an Assemblies of God conference. Demuth took that as a sign that God wanted her to serve her community through the Legislature.

She showed the verse to her husband, Nick: “He said, ‘Well there’s your answer. You’re apparently supposed to do this,’” Demuth recalled him saying.

Demuth, the legislator

Demuth was a relatively unknown state representative from 2018 to 2022, authoring education legislation, several child protection laws and a bill to require record-keeping in the Child Care Assistance Program — one of the programs from which fraudsters have bilked money in recent years. She became the first woman and person of color to lead Minnesota House Republicans in 2022. 

Colleagues describe her as a thoughtful legislator who listens well and delegates. Demuth is not known as a policy wonk, instead bolstering other members’ ideas and letting them become the public face of an issue.

Rep. Dawn Gillman, R-Dassel, said she’s watched Demuth grow in confidence since assuming her leadership role, never shying away from hard conversations while maintaining her professionalism. Gillman described Demuth as a “Godly woman” and a “bulldog.”

“People are longing for truth and transparency, and I believe religion — or God — teaches us to show up in a way that is truthful, that is loving and kind, and that’s what (Demuth) did consistently,” Gillman said in an interview.

Demuth reflected on her time as minority leader during the 2023 Assembly of God conference, and she emphasized the importance of public service.

“The reason I believe that involvement in politics does matter is I believe that God in this day, in 2023, is stirring the hearts of believers to figure out how we can lead people through this time, and I know that there is a desperate need for godly leadership,” Demuth said.

Demuth talked about the Democratic-Farmer-Labor trifecta passing a law codifying abortion rights, calling it “terrible,” but she was happy that her caucus didn’t “take the bait” and engage in long-winded, unruly debates when lawmakers considered the bill, which could then hurt Republicans’ reelection prospects.

In 2023, Demuth was the chief author of a bill banning third-trimester abortions and requiring the licensing of abortion clinics. A few years prior, she authored a bill banning abortions after a heartbeat was detected and included a criminal penalty for doctors who performed such abortions.

In the conference, she discussed the bill that made Minnesota a trans refuge state and protects people from legal repercussions for traveling to Minnesota for gender-affirming healthcare.

Demuth said that bill was “devastating” because, she alleged, it would harm children.

“You know who seeks to harm our children when it comes right down to it? It is Satan. That is his goal: is to harm our children,” Demuth said, then quoting a verse from Luke.

“Temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come. It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea, than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin,” said Demuth, reading the verse aloud.

“And if we are pushing trans rights on children, that is what we are accountable and responsible for,” Demuth added.

At a 2025 Assemblies of God conference, Demuth told the audience that her Bible reads like a journal because she underlines and writes notes whenever a verse resonates with her.

“As I look out over culture, over our world, over politics, the things that are changing and moving so often, I think that it is now even more important that the people of faith, that we must follow God and trust that He is going to be the one that will place us exactly where He wants us to be,” Demuth said.

Demuth’s apparent theologically inspired politics are contested by other religious leaders. While many evangelicals support President Donald Trump and his policies, he’s faced substantial resistance from Catholics and Protestant denominations.

For example, Christian faith leaders have been outspoken critics of attempts to denigrate immigrants in America, like when Minnesota Republicans sought to take undocumented people off of state-subsidized health insurance. Demuth was instrumental in the effort to strip away this benefit.

“I’m here because of my love for the immigrant brothers and sisters and (because) we need to continue to reach out and walk with them and help them,” said Bishop Kevin Kenney, an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis at a Capitol press conference last year.

During Operation Metro Surge last winter, over 60 faith leaders openly called for changes to the immigration enforcement operation and for the protection of the “most vulnerable among us.”

A rising political star

Demuth became Minnesota’s first Black House speaker in 2025 after she played a key role in Republicans toppling the DFL trifecta in 2024 by flipping three key swing districts. This brought the House to a 67-67 tie between Republicans and Democrats. After the 2024 election, a judge ruled one of the newly elected Democrats ineligible for office because he didn’t live in the district.

Republicans sought to use the temporary 67-66 advantage to win full control of the chamber, and Demuth threatened to refuse to seat a Democratic member who won a contested race.

To prevent this usurpation, Democrats boycotted the session for three weeks and then won a Supreme Court case. The two sides came to an agreement wherein the Democratic lawmaker was seated, and Demuth could claim the speakership for the whole two-year session.

She used her caucus’ power of exactly half of the House to force the DFL to roll back MinnesotaCare, the state-subsidized health insurance for undocumented immigrant adults. House Republicans also blocked numerous tax increases proposed by Democrats.

Given the sweeping progressive agenda of the 2023-24 legislative session under the DFL trifecta, Republicans were pleased that Demuth had managed to put the brakes on. They began urging her to run for governor.

She launched her race in late 2025, just as Minnesota politics was about to be hit with a tornado: National scrutiny of fraud in Minnesota’s safety-net programs was followed in quick succession by the arrival of thousands of federal officers, Walz’s departure from the race, the deaths of two American citizens at the hands of immigration agents and the launch of Klobuchar’s candidacy.

Campaign for governor

Demuth’s gubernatorial campaign has at times overcome a stiff current. She’s the first Republican since 1994 to win the primary despite losing the party endorsement. She prevailed in the primary over the better-known and Trump-endorsed Mike Lindell.

She has another asset during this campaign: money.

Demuth is the first Minnesota Republican in a statewide race in recent memory to receive the substantial backing of outside money. Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, who own a Wisconsin shipping empire and spend tens of millions of dollars on Republican campaigns, have already spent at least $14 million on an independent expenditure committee known as Restore Sanity.

A key organizer and fundraiser for the Super PAC is Tommy Merickel, the right-hand man of Star Tribune owner and Minnesota’s richest man, Glen Taylor.

She also has the unpaid help of a well-known GOP lobbyist and consultant Ben Golnik, a registered lobbyist who represents Big Pharma, the tobacco industry, a horse racing track and other clients.

Restore Sanity PAC has spent millions familiarizing Minnesotans with the until-now largely unknown Demuth and torching Klobuchar as a continuation of the policies of Walz.

Klobuchar’s campaign for governor has raised over $12.5 million since launching her campaign at the end of January and has spent $9 million, mostly on consulting and ads.

River of Life

Demuth attends River of Life church in Cold Spring, a town of about 4,200 located 80 miles northwest of Minneapolis. The church was founded in 1993, and it recently completed an addition that includes a coffee shop, a stone fireplace and two levels of seating in addition to the spacious, 750-seat sanctuary.

On a recent Sunday, hundreds of parishioners attended the 10:30 a.m. service, walking into the spacious entry way with vaulted ceilings and wood beams. Demuth wasn’t in attendance. Next to the fireplace stood several volunteers encouraging people to vote in the Nov. 3 election, directing them to use a QR code that took them to a voter registration site.

Pastor Kirby St. John reiterated the message during the service: “Get out and vote. It’s our right to do that.” St. John declined to speak to the Reformer. 

That day the church invited guest speaker Martha Tennison, an 84-year-old evangelist who preached about forgiveness in dark times. She talked about her husband serving as the lead pastor at a Kentucky church in 1988 when a drunken driver crashed into a bus full of the church’s youth, killing 27 of the 67 people on board. Her son was aboard the bus and survived.

Many in the sanctuary were emotional, gasping and shaking their heads whenever Tennison shared a harrowing detail from the story, like when a boy attempted to save his brother who was burning alive in the wreckage but couldn’t or that one of the boys — prior to the bus ride — said he didn’t believe Jesus would return one day. He died in the crash.

After telling the story, Tennison encouraged all the attendees to come to the center of the room, hug and pray for one another. Parishioners grasped each other and wept.

“Church, we have no promise of tomorrow,” Tennison said.

Correction: A previous version of this story misstated that Demuth’s father died in June. It was her step-father. Demuth has called him her father in several interviews.