MARSHALL — Southwest Minnesota was under a political spotlight Monday night, as all nine of the declared Republican candidates for governor gathered for a forum event at the Southwest Minnesota State University conference center. The candidate forum drew an audience of more than 100 people, as well as some statewide news media.

“Tonight, all the collection of people here makes us the Republican capital of Minnesota for a day,” SMSU College Republicans club adviser David Sturrock said as he welcomed attendees. “It’s always important for us to get statewide leaders and statewide coverage here in southwest Minnesota. So we’re very pleased, very honored to have you all help make that possible.”

The candidate forum was organized by a partnership of the SMSU College Republicans and the Lyon County Republicans. The panel of candidates included Minnesota House Speaker Lisa Demuth, R-Cold Spring, state Rep. Kristin Robbins, R-Maple Grove, former U.S. Naval intelligence officer Phillip Parrish, Minneapolis attorney Chris Madel, 2022 gubernatorial nominee Scott Jensen, businessman Kendall Qualls, food company executive Patrick Knight, former mixed martial arts fighter Brad Kohler and former St. Cloud City Council member Jeff Johnson.

As candidates answered moderator questions Monday, there was a definite show of support for President Donald Trump. When asked if there were any of Trump’s policies they disagreed with, candidates didn’t have a lot of criticism.

“I am grateful that President Trump has put America first. We have been lacking that for a number of years,” Demuth said.

“I support almost all of President Trump’s policies, and I would say the one that I’ve been working with his administration on is to get help in here stopping the fraud,” Robbins said.

Jensen said there were Trump policies “that I absolutely do agree with,” including securing the southern border.

“I think the way the tariffs were unrolled was problematic for me,” Jensen said. “I wish that President Trump had just taken a little time to help us understand what we were trying to accomplish.”

Kohler and Johnson said some of Trump’s comments were frustrating. Kohler said Trump’s social media comments on minorities hurt Republican efforts to reach out to people of color in the Twin cities.

“When this stuff comes out at 3 a.m. on a tweet, and you wake up and suddenly now you’re losing your ground with the minorities, it’s very frustrating,” Kohler said.

“When the President did call a group of people garbage, I had a hard time with that,” Johnson said, referring to Trump’s recent comments about the Somali community. “Everyone’s made in the image of God. And I realize that there are some groups that frustrate the President, some that don’t. For me, that was hard to hear that comment.”

Nearly all of the candidates said they would seek Trump’s endorsement. Jensen said he was not seeking the endorsement of any sitting politician, but he would be happy to accept an endorsement from Trump.

There were several areas where candidates’ positions overlapped. All nine candidates spoke about the need to reduce taxes and government spending, and to tackle fraud in Minnesota. Across the board, candidates also said they would support legislation banning transgender athletes from girls’ sports, and said they would disallow sanctuary cities and counties in Minnesota.

When it came down to how to address fraud in Minnesota, candidates did have some criticisms for state legislators.

“It’s easy to blame Walz for the fraud, and he does own a lot of that. He’s the C.E.O. of the state,” Johnson said. “But you know who else? There are some members of the Legislature who need to step up and take their part of this.”

“All of the state government – Republicans and Democrats – have done nothing with respect to fraud since 2017 . . . They’ve done literally nothing except write letters,” Madel said.

Jensen said Minnesota needed to fight harder to stop government spending. “Trump showed the path. We need to shut government down if we need to. You’ve got to draw a line in the sand,” he said.

Qualls said a key goal ahead for Minnesota Republicans would be mobilizing their base.

“If we go into the primary divided, we’re going to give Tim Walz a third term,” Qualls said. “We have to solidify behind a candidate before that primary. We can’t do it two months before the general election.”