Jon Chalmers, Bloomington
I write in response to Tolkkinen’s comment concerning rural policy. I grew up in a rural part of this state and I currently work in three different rural areas. She complains of those of us in the metro saying: “Too bad, you voted for him”, with regard to the way in which Trump’s policies affect rural Minnesota. She is right that 35% of Minnesota Outstate voted for someone other than Trump, but did these 35% expressed their opinion in small cities or only in the polls? Too many times, the vitriol of Trump supporters removes the opinions of those who think differently. While I lead to rural job sites, I often pass flags with words that denigrate Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. These same flags with a bad will of Trump are not seen in the metro.
Tolkkinen says rural people want mining (and unions that have obtained the habitable salary), the protection of firearms and less taxes. But just as the blue states subsidize the poorest red states, more taxes from the metropolitan areas of Minnesota take place towards rural regions of our state. And when a large “cabin” is built on a lake in the rural regions of Minnesota, the county benefits from land taxes. Biden’s policies who helped farmers fight climate change (coverage crops, non-tension methods, farmers’ payment for wind turbines and solar energy on their land) were quickly abandoned for a vote for Trump, despite his promise to reconstruct the prices that injured them the first time. Although I am ready to bring farmers into the democratic fold (because we have to gain control in 2026), I am convinced that they will disperse their problems once. They will always believe that immigrants / people of color get a better deal than they are and that climate change is a hoax.