Amy Klobuchar raises nearly $5 million as she ramps up campaign for Minnesota governor

MINNEAPOLIS - U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar has raised nearly $5 million since she announced her run for governor on Jan. 29, a staggering haul for a candidate who only recently started ramping up her campaign.

Klobuchar's first-quarter fundraising sum of $4.85 million, announced Wednesday, April 15, dwarfed the amount raised by the field of GOP candidates for governor. She now has more cash on hand than every Republican candidate for governor combined, despite entering the race several months after them.

"The tens of thousands of Minnesotans who have stepped up to support our campaign underscore the deep trust that Minnesotans have in Senator Klobuchar as a leader who brings people together to get things done," Klobuchar's campaign manager, Joe Radosevich, said in a statement.

But Republicans in Minnesota have long been outspent by Democrats and still remained competitive. Minnesota House Speaker Lisa Demuth, who won the state GOP's straw poll for governor in February, said she is "ready to take on Amy Klobuchar and the Democrat money machine this November."

Demuth raised about $226,000 during the first quarter of the year. She has $544,000 on hand.

"As Speaker, I have set fundraising records every year as caucus leader, and I am ready to do the same this year, leading the Republican ticket to victory in 2026," Demuth said in a statement.

The fundraising news comes as candidates for governor are preparing to seek their parties' endorsements at state conventions next month.

Klobuchar spent the past couple of months largely focused on her job in the U.S. Senate. But her campaign activity has picked up recently, with Klobuchar appearing at local party conventions in Eagan and Eden Prairie this past weekend.

In Eden Prairie, Klobuchar talked about her decision to enter the governor's race and outlined some of her priorities to a crowd of a few hundred DFL activists. She recounted how Walz invited her to the governor's mansion a few days after the start of the new year and told her he was going to drop out of the race.

"I said, ‘OK, can you wait a few days before announcing?' " Klobuchar recalled. "And he goes, ‘I'm going to announce tomorrow.' "

Klobuchar said the trauma Minnesota experienced over the past year from political assassinations, a mass shooting and Operation Metro Surge put things into perspective.

"I love my job" in the Senate, Klobuchar said, "but I love our state more."

As governor, Klobuchar told the crowd she would seek to "root out every single bit of fraud" in the state's social services programs: "People will not be ripped off again by fraudsters."

Other priorities she mentioned include building more affordable housing, lowering the price of health care and groceries, and "expanding businesses, big and small."

Democrats in Minnesota have become more optimistic about this year's elections since Klobuchar announced her run.

Klobuchar has won all her Senate races by double-digit margins. After she announced her run for governor, the nationally watched Cook Political Report shifted its rating for the Minnesota governor's race from "likely Democrat" to "solid Democrat."

"When she's at the top of the ticket, we will take back the House, and we will have better majorities in the Senate and the House," state Sen. Steve Cwodzinski said at the convention in Eden Prairie.

Republican candidates for governor have been making the rounds with their party's delegates since last fall.

The field for governor is crowded on the GOP side, but a few clear contenders have emerged: Demuth, retired health care executive Kendall Qualls and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell.

Qualls said he raised more than $123,000 in the first quarter. He finished second in the February GOP straw poll for governor.

"We don't need more career political insiders," Qualls, who's never held office, said in a statement this week. "We need business leaders with a track record of success in the private sector to fix what's broken in St. Paul."

Lindell, who has ties to President Donald Trump and other prominent figures in his orbit, has not yet reported his quarterly fundraising total.

He told the Minnesota Star Tribune recently that he's raised more than $1 million since he launched his campaign in December. He recently held a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago.

Lindell's year-end campaign finance report for 2025 showed he spent more than half the money he raised on copies of his self-published autobiography.

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This story was originally published April 15, 2026 at 11:44 AM.