MyPillow Guy says he will run for Minnesota governor in 2026
SHAKOPEE, Minn. (AP) — President Donald Trump’s ardent supporter Mike Lindell, known to viewers as “MyPillow Guy,” officially entered Minnesota’s gubernatorial race Thursday in hopes of winning the Republican nomination to challenge Democratic Gov. Tim Walz.
“I’m not leaving any town unturned in Minnesota,” Lindell told The News in an interview before a news conference scheduled for Thursday.
He said he has a history of problem-solving and personal experiences that will help businesses and combat addiction and homelessness, as well as fraud in government programs. The issue of fraud has particularly affected Walz, who announced in September that he will seek a third term in the 2026 election.
via News
A television presenter and electoral denier
Lindell, 64, founded his pillow company in Minnesota in 2009 and became its public face through infomercials that became ubiquitous on late-night television. But he and his company faced a series of legal and financial setbacks after becoming one of the main amplifiers of Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. He said he has overcome them.
“Not only have I built businesses, but I’m also a problem-solver,” Lindell said in his trademark quick-fire style. “I was able to overcome the largest attack on a company and a person, probably other than Donald Trump, in the history of our media… legal warfare and all.”
While no Republican has won statewide office in Minnesota since 2006, the state’s voters have a history of making unconventional decisions. They shocked the world by electing former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura as governor in 1998. And they elected a veteran television host in 1978 when they elected home improvement company owner Rudy Boschwitz as a United States senator.
Lindell has frequently spoken about how he overcame his crack addiction with a religious conversion in 2009, when MyPillow was underway. Her life took another turn in 2016 when she met the future president during Trump’s first campaign. He served as a warm-up speaker at dozens of Trump rallies and co-chaired Trump’s Minnesota campaign.
Trump’s endorsement could be the key to determining which of several candidates will win the Republican nomination to challenge Walz. But Lindell said he doesn’t know what Trump will do, even though they are friends, and said his campaign does not depend on the president’s support.
Its streaming platform Lindell TV was in the news in November when it became one of several conservative news outlets that gained credentials to cover the Pentagon after agreeing to a new restrictive press policy rejected by virtually all legacy media organizations.
Lindell has weathered a series of storms
Lindell’s open support of Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen sparked a backlash when major retailers discontinued MyPillow products. By his own admission, revenues plummeted and lines of credit dried up, costing him millions. Several providers sued MyPillow over billing disputes. News stopped running its commercials. The lawyers abandoned him.
Lindell has been sued twice for defamation over his claims that voting machines were rigged to deprive Trump of a victory.
A federal judge in Minnesota ruled in September that Lindell defamed Smartmatic with 51 false statements. But the judge deferred the question of whether Lindell acted with the “actual malice” that Smartmatic must prove to collect. Smartmatic says it is seeking “nine-figure damages.”
In June, a Colorado jury found that Lindell defamed a former Dominion Voting Systems executive by calling him a traitor and awarded $2.3 million in damages.
But Lindell scored a victory in July when a federal appeals court overturned a judge’s decision that upheld a $5 million arbitration award to a software engineer who challenged data that Lindell said demonstrated Chinese interference in the 2020 election. The engineer had accepted the “Prove Mike Wrong Challenge,” which he launched as part of his 2021 “Cyber Symposium” in South Dakota, where he pledged expose electoral fraud.
The campaign ahead
Lindell said his crusade against electronic voting machines will be just part of his platform. While Minnesota uses paper ballots, it also uses electronic tabulators to count them. Lindell wants them counted manually, although many election officials say automatic counting is more accurate.
Some Republicans in the race include Minnesota House Speaker Lisa Demuth of Cold Spring; Dr. Scott Jensen, a former state senator from Chaska who was the party’s 2022 candidate; state Rep. Kristin Robbins of Maple Grove; defense attorney and former federal prosecutor Chris Madel; and former executive Kendall Qualls.
“These guys haven’t experienced what I’ve experienced,” Lindell said.
Lindell did not commit to honoring the Minnesota Republican Party’s endorsement and giving up the primary if he loses, expressing confidence he will win. He also said he will depend on his supporters to finance his campaign because his own finances are depleted. “I don’t have the money,” he admitted.
But he added that since it became known last week that he had filed paperwork to run, “I’ve received thousands and thousands of text messages and calls, saying from all over the country… ‘Hey, I’m going to donate.'”