"Now it's 1998 and the American dream lives on in Minnesota because we shocked the world!"
That was 25 years ago today, when Minnesota elected a former professional wrestler and Hollywood actor Jesse Ventura to become the state's governor. The victory for Ventura was shocking, not just in Minnesota but across the country.
Running against a traditional Republican in former St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman, and the son of a legendary Minnesota Democrat, former state Attorney General Skip Humphrey, the Independent Ventura stormed to the lead in the last weeks of the campaign and thanks to a massive turnout from young voters, did indeed shock the world.
"The moon looked really weird that night," Ventura told WCCO's Chad Hartman Friday. "There was some strange stuff coming off. It was, you know, the late fall, and I'll never forget my son looking at me and he said, 'dad, something really strange is gonna happen.'"
Ventura said he spent the Election Day relaxing and watching his "favorite movie", JFK.
"I was fairly confident it would go to the wire, because the last word I got was the media was calling it a three-way race, it was too close to call," said Ventura. "I remember Maria Shriver called me, and said 'Jesse, can I get an interview tonight when the Election is over?' I said absolutely. She went back to the network and said 'I've got Jesse Ventura'. And the head guy said 'no, we don't need it, we don't interview losers.'
Eventually NBC called after he won, and Ventura said they wanted him to talk to lead anchor Tom Brokaw.
"I refused," recalled Ventura. "The only person I'll talk to is Maria Shriver. She called. And I did that interview."
Longtime KSTP Political Reporter Tom Hauser, who hosted the WCCO Morning News on Friday, looked back at the historical victory for Ventura with WCCO Radio Morning News Editor Steve Simpson.
"It was quite a ride the four years I spent covering Jesse Ventura," said Hauser who also wrote a book about the experience, Inside the Ropes with Jesse Ventura. "And with the passage of time it becomes even more and more remarkable that he actually pulled that off."
Simpson was in Indianapolis in 1998 covering news there, and says it was a big story across the country.
"This was a guy that everybody knew," says Simpson. "He was Jesse Ventura the wrestler. And he what? He's running for governor? And what? He won? It was quite something to watch from afar as well."
Hauser notes that the only way Ventura could win was in the three-way race he found himself in.
"You didn't have to win a majority of the votes, you had to win a plurality and I think he won 37% of the vote. And he beat established politicians," says Hauser.
Coleman finished at 34%, Humphrey at 28%, showing how razor-thin the margins were in the race.
"The subsequent unfolding of the Ventura Administration and his gubernatorial run was fascinating," Hauser explains. "The Minnesota media followed him everywhere. He was in New York on the David Letterman Show. He was on Jay Leno out in LA. I went to Japan with him, I went to Mexico, traveled the world. Washington D.C., he was at the White House in the East Room with President Clinton talking China trade of all things. It just all seemed surreal, especially that first year."
Then there were the "jackals".
"We were the jackals, that famous episode where one day we all came into our offices at the Capitol Press Corp and we had press badges under our door that said your name, your media affiliation and media jackal," Hauser said Friday. "I still have it, it's one of my prize possessions. There were not many handed out, maybe 15, and I have one of them."
Hauser also noted that publicly, Ventura would be combative. But it was different behind the scenes.
"That was his way of poking us, a little bit, but I'll tell you, he had a combative relationship in public, like at news conferences, he loved to spar, we were like wrestling opponents to him," notes Hauser. "But then when the cameras were off, and you were just talking to him one-on-one, he was a pretty good guy. Most of us got along with him pretty well, and it was amazing how his wrestling persona was so much like his gubernatorial persona. He would be the villain and he would battle with you in public, but he was a pretty nice guy. He would probably hate to be outed as a pretty nice guy."
While governor, Ventura noted in an interview with WCCO's Capitol Reporter Eric Eskola in 1999 that many of the things he said in interviews was merely having fun. Some of those things got him in hot water, such as a Playboy interview where Ventura said organized religion was for "weak-minded people." Or when he famously said he wants to come back in his next life as a 38DD bra.
"Again, it's an interview that is fairly lightheartedly, with jokes in it, and not meant to be written in stone but apparently, again, it is," said Ventura. "It's just something I have to learn I guess, that I can't be honest."
Eskola asked the governor if there was anything he wanted Minnesotans to know.
"I would tell Minnesotans to please have a sense of humor, which we all do," said Ventura.
It was four years Minnesota won't soon forget.