MINNEAPOLIS — In 2020 President Donald Trump said if he lost Minnesota he would never come back to the state.

“What we’ve done for Minnesota — I lose Minnesota, I’m never coming back,” Trump said. “I don’t care. I’m never coming back.”

Trump did lose, but is coming back for a GOP fundraiser this Friday in St. Paul.

Trump made several campaign visits to Minnesota in 2020, repeatedly saying Minnesota was the state that got away from him in 2016.

That year, despite only one last-minute campaign appearance here, Trump almost pulled off a shocking upset. He lost to Hillary Clinton here by less than 2%.

Minnesota has the longest-running streak of voting for Democrats in the presidential race in the nation. The last time Minnesota voted Republican was 1972 when the state voted for Richard Nixon. 

Despite campaigning here several times in 2020, Trump lost by a decisive margin of 7 percentage points to Joe Biden. 

Despite saying he would never come back, Trump will be here this Friday night for the Minnesota GOP’s annual Lincoln Reagan dinner, one of the party’s biggest fundraisers. Internal party polling reportedly shows Trump and Biden are closer than expected in Minnesota. 

The chair of the Minnesota GOP, David Hann, was a guest on WCCO Sunday Morning at 10:30 a.m.

“The Trump campaign believes that Minnesota is a winnable state and they have begun to focus on winning Minnesota for the Republicans, and I think they are right, I think it is winnable,” Hann said.

In the end, this presidential race will likely come down to the Electoral College. Another critical state for both candidates is Wisconsin, which like Minnesota, has 10 electoral college votes. Both Biden and Trump have already campaigned in Wisconsin, something you can expect to see more of in the five-and-a-half months left until the November election.

You can watch WCCO Sunday Morning with Esme Murphy and Adam Del Rossso every Sunday at 6 a.m. and 10:30 a.m.