Former NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya has filed paperwork to run for Minnesota’s Senate seat in the 2026 election, joining a crowded field of Republican hopefuls in the 2026 election.
Tafoya, 61, a resident of the Minneapolis suburb of Plymouth, has been eyed as a possible candidate by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and met with the Senate Leadership Fund and other stakeholders in Washington, DC, in December, The Post previously reported.
She has not publicly addressed the “Tafoya for Senate” campaign since it was filed with the FEC on Tuesday.
The four-time Emmy Award-winning sports journalist is entering the GOP primary after incumbent Sen. Tina Smith (D) announced she wouldn’t be seeking a second term last February.
Smith, 67, said her “decision is not political, it is entirely personal” with intentions to retire in early 2027 to spend more time with her family.
Tafoya has been vocal on social media regarding issues happening in her home state and around the country, including sharing The Post’s exclusive report Tuesday about 7,000 illegal immigrant gang members being arrested during President Trump’s first year in office.
“Why would anyone protect these people from law enforcement?” she wrote on X the same day she filed her statement for candidacy.
Since Smith’s announcement, Democrats have been gearing up for a messy primary pitting Rep. Angie Craig against the progressive favorite, Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, with outsider Billy Nord having thrown his name as a nominee, too.
Republican nominees in the crowded primary include former Minnesota Senate Minority Leader David Hann, ex-NBA player Royce White and US Navy SEAL veteran Adam Schwarze.
Tafoya started her career at Minneapolis’ radio station KFAN, covering the Minnesota Vikings and the University of Minneapolis before being hired by CBS in 1994.
The longtime sports reporter then moved to ABC and ESPN and became the sideline reporter for “Monday Night Football.” She also did stints with a local radio station and returned to the NFL sidelines with NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” crew, a position she held from 2011 to 2022.
Tafoya covered the Los Angeles Rams’ victory in Super Bowl LVI in February 2022 as her last sports assignment before leaving her career and joining Kendall Qualls’ campaign during the Republican primary for Minnesota governor, according to the Minnesota Star Tribune.
She shot down speculation that she was pulled from the air, rather had “been waking up every day with a palpable pull at my gut that my side, my view, my middle-ground moderate viewpoint, is not being represented to the rest of the world,” Tafoya told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson
The soon-to-be vacant seat has been a Democrat stronghold since Al Franken defeated incumbent Norm Coleman (R) in the 2008 election.
Minnesota may have two new senators representing it in the upper chamber in 2027, as Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D) is said to be seriously considering a run for the governorship of the North Star State.
Klobuchar, who was first elected to her seat in 2007, has been viewed as a successor of Gov. Tim Walz (D) after he dropped his bid for a third term on Jan. 5 as he faces major scrutiny over a massive welfare fraud scandal and the ongoing unrest following the fatal shooting of activist mom Renee Nicole Good by an ICE agent earlier this month that erupted under his watch.
Walz had met with Klobuchar in private before he made the announcement, CNN reported.
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