The former professional basketball player won the Republican primary and will face off against three-term Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) in this fall’s presidential election.
Royce White, who played for the NBA’s Sacramento Kings in 2014, beat out a crowded field of candidates in the North Star State with a key endorsement from former President Trump’s inner circle.
That includes endorsements from Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Arizona Senate candidate Kali Lake and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, who has also been endorsed by the state Republican Party.
According to the Star Tribune, White has previously described himself as a “MAGA extremist” and was closely aligned with the former president’s right-wing populist positions.
White’s victory was seen as a rebuke to the Minnesota Republican Party, where he defeated his main rival, former U.S. Navy officer Joe Fraser, who had the backing of two former Republican senators and one former governor.
Royce has raised just over $125,000 in private donations during the election, meaning she will go into the general election with about $53,000 in cash on hand.
That’s a fraction of the $12 million Klobuchar has personally raised, and she’s also outraised Royce: She entered the race with $6.5 million in cash on hand.
However, it is unlikely that Royce will win the general election.
In recent years, Minnesota has tended to lean Democratic, and Minnesotans have not elected a Republican to the White House since President Richard Nixon in 1972.
Klobuchar, a Minnesota senator, has been re-elected twice since her first campaign in 2006. She is the first woman to represent Minnesota in the U.S. Senate.
A moderate Democrat, she voted with former President Trump about a third of the time.
She won in 2006 with about 58% of the vote, followed by 65% in 2012 and 60% in 2018.
