Brad Finstad’s Re-election Chances Shift Slightly
His odds are still very good, though, being the incumbent with a cash-on-hand advantage.
Last week the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics updated its ratings for several congressional races across the country. Most were due to redistricting, but some were based on typical campaign factors like fundraising and voter sentiment.
Brad Finstad, who represents the Southern Minnesota district of MN-1, was included on the list. Finstad’s race was shifted from Safe Republican to Likely Republican, indicating that his vulnerability has slightly increased.
The Center for Politics explains:
Jake Johnson (D), a local high school teacher, did outraise Finstad in the first quarter of 2026. As we think about what a really big hypothetical Democratic wave might look like, we thought it made sense to highlight some places that typically haven’t been competitive lately but were in 2018, the last big Democratic year. MN-1 fits that mold even though it is very much a longshot Democratic target.
In February, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee added MN-1 to the seats it’s targeting in this year’s midterm elections, with the hopes of gaining control of the U.S. House.
This congressional seat has gone back and forth between the two political parties depending on the country’s political winds. Gil Gutknecht (R) represented it for 12 years before Tim Walz (D), another high school teacher who came out of nowhere, won and held it for another 12 years before becoming governor. Jim Hagedorn (R), whose father represented the same area in the ‘70s and ‘80s, then secured the seat before dying in office in 2022. Finstad won the special election to complete Hagedorn’s term, beating former Hormel Foods CEO Jeff Ettinger, and has held it since then.
Democrats are clearly motivated in this race, with Johnson outraising Finstad by over $130,000 in the first quarter this year. In 2025, Johnson tracked Finstad pretty well in fundraising, with Finstad just raising $6,000 to $17,000 more per quarter, not counting the first quarter, before Johnson got into the race. That extra quarter of fundraising, plus the connections that come with an incumbency, help Finstad to have a current cash-on-hand advantage of $833,714 versus Johnson’s $571,155.
Click here to read the Center for Politics’ full write-up on Finstad’s race and others.