Breaking News from Pod Save America - Amy Klobuchar on Running for Governor, Democrats Fighting Back, and State Fair Food

Episode Date: September 14, 2026

Jon Lovett hits the Minnesota State Fair with Senator Amy Klobuchar to talk about her race for governor, billionaire-funded attack ads, and the fine art of butter sculptures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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You're richer than you think. It's 9 a.m. This is my first hot dog of the day is a prancho pup. There's the big pumpkins. This is the snack I'm having while waiting for Cemetery Clobuchar. There's just no way to eat this on camera without looking insane. So I'm going to take a bite of this, but we are going to block it out like it's pornography. Whenever I take a bite of food, we are going to bleep it.

We're going to cover it, okay? Because I'm going to eat a lot today and it's going to be disgusting. Disgusting. Disgusting. Oh, fuck yeah. We're doing it. Look at this. How are you? Amy. I'm good.

Oh, thank you. You're doing good? We're doing great. We're talking about the governor's race. Yeah. Do you think it's too early for a Pronto Pub? I don't think it's too early. No, it never is right. Oh, now we've got beer at 9 a.m.

I like that. John Lovett. John Lovett? He's got like a cool show. Yeah. Yeah. Super famous. Yeah.

The interview being over the course of one Pronto pup is kind of funny. funny. How long have you been coming to the fair? Uh, since I was probably five years old. So can I tell you a story? Yeah. So when you came on love it or leave it when I was in Minneapolis, Yes, I'll never forget this. We had a great time. We were, right when I came down and said hello to you.

Yeah. And we were saying, oh, we're going to go, we're going to have a great conversation, and we're going to talk about Girl Scout cookies. Yeah. And I went out to go produce a show, and you were in with your staff. Yeah. And my producer trained. Travis, who was writing the show with me,

happened to still be in the room. And you just, you turned on a dime and you turned to your whole team and you're like, we're talking about Girl Scout cookies. What do we know about Girl Scout cookies? I need to know about Girl Scout cookies. There is a reputation for you that you are tough. At times it's become almost a little bit of a joke.

Do you feel sometimes that like, you know what? Like, that's a badge of honor? Is there ways in which you feel like, you know what? I've learned how to be a tough boss in different ways? Like, how is that, how do you think about that? I think right now we need accountability. And I believe in high expectations of me, my staff, and we need that right now.

Because otherwise, things just people, you don't want people to lose trust in their government. You see this across the country. I don't care if people are left, middle, right. If they can bring people with them and do good things and gain trust, that's good for democracy right now. Are you seeing ads? Are you seeing negative ads on TV?

Oh, yeah. Are you seeing attack ads about Senator Klobuchar? Yeah. You know who pays for them? It's a billionaire from Wisconsin is paying for my opponent's attack ads. And I'm going to go negative. He is a Packers fan. And that's really all you need to know about it.

You gotta close that border. Yeah, I mean, it's... My partner is from here, and I like come to really love coming here. Yeah. And there was that period of time where it just felt like the Twin Cities were just getting hammered. No, it's just hammered by so many things. And I just said that I want to get us to a better place. You look at the spirit.

in Minnesota through what happened with ice. When you think about 50,000 people marching and 10 below zero weather and people bringing strangers kids to school, people feeding people they didn't know and bringing them food. Standing guard. I was here. I came during that time. And it was extraordinary what happened here. It really was.

It was like it's going to be one of the top five civil rights moments of this century. It really is. Hey, it's John. Last year, 2,500 people joined us at CricketCon for conversations with some of the smartest organizers, least annoying politicians, and most interesting voices in politics about how to fix this mess. We're doing it again, November 5th through the 7th in Washington, D.C. It's even more podcast panels and workshops. Plus, there will be drinks, which we'll need after the midterms, no matter which way they go.

Get your tickets at cricketcon.com, where we'll also announce the lineup. If you're a friends of the pod subscriber, a limited number of discounted tickets are still available. Get them before they run out. See you at CricketCon. What number of statewide campaign is this for you? So this will be the fifth one. I'm not counting presidential. I went back and I looked at those 2020 debates.

And there's this famous moment where the moderator says to everybody on that stage, would you decriminalize the border? And basically everybody raised their hand. You were in the night before and you said there are ways in which you could make reforms, but no, you're not going to sign on for decriminalizing the border. You know, we're in this moment of people saying, woke one was crazy. I feel like there's a way in which people kind of lost themselves during that primary, but I don't think that applied to you.

I think you actually, and I think it hurt you a little bit, right? Like that you were tagged as being somebody who was like not where the base of the party was. And I wonder how you think about that now and how we're in this moment where people are reevaluating or apologizing for what they said back then and what you think about that. Yeah, I didn't have to apologize because I've been true to myself. And I think that's how you run. That's what you do. And from the very beginning that I,

have been consistent and I have tried to be someone who thinks what's the right thing to do here and then to do it. And I knew at that moment where they talk about decriminalizing the border and there's no way I'm going to be for this. I'm a former prosecutor. I believe we should have comprehensive immigration reform. I've been on every bill to do it. But that's a way different than saying we should just have an entirely open border,

which I don't agree with. So I said it then and it stood the test of time. So do you wonder what that's balance? Yeah, let's, yeah. Okay, so the queen bee, you find the queen bee by, if it has a red dot on it. Hi, how are you? Hi, I'm good.

And whenever you find the queen bee with the red dot, okay, then you get to ring the bell. Yeah. Okay, can I do it then or should we let him do it? You got it, you got it. Okay, I see the queen bee. There we are. It doesn't usually sit like that.

The queen, it usually, is on the move. But right now she seems surrounded. There she is. There's one queen bee in the whole beehive kind of hive. And it's what I'm talking about, it's showing results then. And in fact, our tagline is results, not excuses.

Because the way I figure it, there are so many headwinds from Donald Trump right now, but they're a constant, but they can't be an excuse when you're a governor. You've got to take them on when they're doing things that hurt your state, ice, or some of the Medicaid cuts the effect on rural hospital. But then you also have to be very clear. You have to be really clear that you're going to try to get things done for the people. There's also, I think, like, you know, Mamdani showed a style of communicating what you're doing all the time. That's right.

And that's a, yeah. And you can't maybe do that for everything and he's him. Yeah. He can dive into a pool into a suit with a suit on. Come on. I look, I think that would make news. There you go. There are examples like with Spencer Cox in Utah.

Okay, he's taken on some of the tech issues, meant it. So I just try to look at examples all over. Shapiro with, you know, the bridge, getting things done matter, but you're right, communicating about it. showing accountability, including in Minnesota on the fraud. How many people have been prosecuted? What's happening right now? What changes have we made?

Giving them regular updates. Because otherwise, it just feels like something they see on the news. OK, here we go. People just come up to you at the fair and just feed you. Oh, you're part of the team. OK, because this has been happening. Very excited.

Can I get in there? Thank you. Yeah, they're super good. Yeah. Mouth traps. Curds, we got cheese curds from mouth drop. Yeah, they're the best. They're the spolk.

I don't have any other. Wow, do you want to say hi to my friend this sculpture here? Yeah, yeah, let's get in there. Hey, how are you? In the old days, they would, the butter carvings would end up on the floor, the butter shavings. And as a kid, I would wait because they would put them on saltine crackers and serve them. Hygiene dictated, new rules, and they... We went woke.

They got rid of that. And now you can't eat the butter. off the floor. And then you may wonder what happens to the butter bus. What happens to the butter bus? Well, some of them put them in their freezers. The features do degrade over time. For sure.

True for all of us. A big freezer. They put it in there. And then others of them bring them to their town corn feed and people just dig in. Super scary to go in there. He sometimes has me visit because it's slippery. And so if you go in there and happen to slip on top of the princesses your political career over. Okay I'm looking for you here. Oh yeah

where's yours? Right here coming up. So this was just just yesterday there she is from Bigelow Minnesota. Yeah. Come on pretty good. Yeah pretty good. Yeah it was a great job. Yeah, it really does. And I want you know something I have a long held position which is that we should be fighting to declare that it's oat juice and almond juice. It's It's not almond milk. Milk is milk. Oh, yeah.

That is a position of our dairy farmers. It doesn't actually make sense. If you squeeze an apple, you get apple juice. If you excuse an almond, you get almond milk. Just because it's, what are we talking about? Thanks for hanging with me at the fair. Look, I'll be honest, I think a lot of people are like, oh, Amy Klobuchar, she's got this in the bag.

I don't need to pay attention to what's happening in Minnesota. I want to make sure Peggy Flanagan wins the Senate race, but you're ahead in the polls. But there's a lot, like, I don't think people realize how much money is being dumped into the race right now. So what, just so people, why, what's happening right now in Minnesota? Right now what's happening is $4 million have been spent on negative ads against me. So it's a four to one ratio.

So this guy in Wisconsin, U-Line, who is one of top five donors of Donald Trump, he's right underneath Elon Musk, he's four, he's five, first super PAC spending right now. And he has dumped all this money in this race. And I keep telling the people in Minnesota, he is a Packers fan that guys. Packers fan. And I don't think that we should be having a billionaire from Wisconsin picked the governor from Minnesota. I want to be the people's choice. My opponent, she can be the choice of this billionaire in Wisconsin. I'm going to be the people's choice. And you said you're going to go on this ride with me right now. Eventually, yeah, eventually. I'm thinking maybe if I can

earn the trust of people and be the governor, that that would be a historic moment if we did it when I'm governor. Is that a promise? Is that a promise? That's a consideration. Yeah, but you're going to have your own, That's politics. You're going like, you're going like network now, sort of. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, that's right. The big time, Saturday night, cable news. Would you ever do that?

I think I have one, but that was enough. For everything, once. Thank you to Senator Amy Klobuchar. Thank you for watching. And do us a favor and subscribe to this channel. We are building a pro-democracy independent media company. And by supporting what we're doing here, you help get good information in front of more people in a very right-wing media environment. And otherwise, I'll see you next year at this.

State Fair.