Mike Lindell Misses Deadline to Formally Contest Minnesota Governor Primary Result
Key Takeaways
- •Mike Lindell missed the deadline to file an official challenge and post the required payment for a recount of Minnesota's Republican gubernatorial primary, which he lost to Lisa Demuth by about 45,000 votes.
- •The Minnesota Secretary of State's office prepared a recount plan estimated at $825,000, and under state law a candidate must personally fund a statewide recount unless the margin falls within one-quarter of 1 percent.
- •Lisa Demuth, who became the first Black speaker of the Minnesota House in February 2025 under a power-sharing agreement, advances as the Republican nominee for governor into the November general election.
- •Lindell continues to solicit money for his election protest even though the recount deadline has passed.
- •Lindell has previously faced financial consequences over his election claims, including defamation lawsuits from Dominion and Smartmatic and a $5 million arbitration award confirmed by a federal judge in 2023.
Mike Lindell, the MyPillow founder and prominent promoter of election fraud claims, has missed a key deadline to formally contest the outcome of his race for governor of Minnesota, despite his continued insistence that he won.
The Daily Beast reported Tuesday that although Lindell maintains he won his primary election for governor, he failed to meet the deadline to file an official protest of the results.
"Lindell received a resounding 45,000 fewer votes than the winner, Minnesota House Speaker Lisa Demuth, but vowed last week to request a recount based on unspecified 'anomalies' that he claimed his team had uncovered," the report said.
Demuth, a Republican from Cold Spring, became the first Black speaker of the Minnesota House in February 2025, elected under a power-sharing agreement after the 2024 election left the chamber split 67-67.
However, when the moment arrived to submit his findings and mount an official challenge to the vote count, Lindell did not follow through.
"The Minnesota Secretary of State's office prepared a recount plan on Aug. 18 that was estimated to cost Lindell $825,000, and set Monday as the deadline to formally submit the request and post a 'bond, cash or surety' for payment," the report said.
Under Minnesota law, a recount in a statewide race is publicly funded only when the margin falls within one-quarter of 1 percent, so a candidate trailing by tens of thousands of votes must bear the full cost personally, which is what the upfront payment requirement reflected.
Lindell built MyPillow into a major bedding company before becoming one of the most visible advocates of disproven claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump. Those claims have already brought substantial financial consequences beyond the recount price tag: voting-machine companies Dominion and Smartmatic sued him for defamation, and in 2023 a federal judge confirmed a $5 million arbitration award against him after he declined to pay a cyber expert who won his 2021 "Prove Mike Wrong" election-data challenge. He continues to solicit money to press forward with his protest of the election, even though the deadline has now passed.
With the recount window closed and no official challenge filed, Demuth moves forward as the Republican nominee for governor into the November general election.
Source: Alternet; primary reporting by The Daily Beast (earlier coverage).
