Little, Pratt Vie For Craig's Open Seat In South Suburban Swing District

By Alyssa Chen, Minnesota Reformer

October 20, 2026

In a TikTok video from January, Matt Little stands a couple feet away from a federal immigration agent sitting in a car with his window open.

“There’s some bad folks that joined to do some bad things,” Little says to the agent, who wears a black neck gaiter covering most of his face and black baseball cap. The two talk briefly. Little had followed the agent in his car, the caption said, joining thousands of Minnesotans who sought to disrupt immigration operations that had become infamous for racial profiling and the killing of two Americans.

In the caption, Little promises to “hold ICE accountable” if he’s elected to Congress.

The 41-year-old attorney, former Lakeville mayor and one-term state senator is running to represent the 2nd Congressional District, which encompasses the south suburbs of the Twin Cities and rural Le Sueur County and has been the state’s most competitive for about a decade. The seat is currently held by U.S. Rep. Angie Craig, who gave it up for an unsuccessful Senate run.

Just a year before Operation Metro Surge, in January 2025, Craig voted in favor of the Laken Riley Act, a punitive immigration bill. Her decision lined up with what she had told MinnPost when she was reelected in 2024: “I really believe that voters want someone who has a moderate, centrist voting record.”

Little has said he wouldn’t have voted for the bill and promises to fight for an “Anti-ICE Bill of Rights” that cuts U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement funding to pre-Trump levels and replaces ICE with another federal immigration agency.

A few weeks out from the election, Little isn’t too worried that his ICE chasing might’ve pushed swing voters into the arms of his Republican opponent, state Sen. Eric Pratt.

“If your politician wasn’t out there trying to help people and protect people, then where are they gonna draw the line?” Little said to the Reformer on Oct. 8.

“Whether it hurt or helped us in this election, I don’t care as much,” he added.

Pratt, Little’s mild-mannered opponent and the top Republican on the Minnesota Senate Finance Committee, has accused Little of “screaming on TikTok” instead of solving problems during the surge.

Pratt’s campaign declined repeated requests for an interview, but he’s struck a more moderate tone on immigration compared to many in his party — the 2024 Republican National Convention featured signs that read, “Mass deportation now.”

“We are a nation of immigrants. We do need to take a look at immigration reform,” Pratt said during an Oct. 9 MPR News debate.

During a September WCCO debate, Pratt said that he told the White House it needed to “back down” during the immigration enforcement surge, and that he began reaching out to decision-makers in both parties after Renee Good was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan Ross.

Pratt was also in D.C. when Trump’s “border czar” Tom Homan was sent to Minnesota to replace Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, signaling the beginning of the end of the surge, Pratt said in the KSTP debate. Little retorted that he was in Minnesota, “doing my best to protect the people I care about and our neighbors.”

The race between Little and Pratt is a barometer of the swift changes in American politics in the past two years. If elected, Little would represent a leftward shift for the swing district that had a streak of voting red until 2018, as well as the possibility that Operation Metro Surge has led to enduring changes in the attitudes of suburban, exurban and even rural Minnesotans on the issue of immigration enforcement.

Pratt and Little debate Trump, healthcare, war

First, however, Little has to beat Pratt, who has managed to avoid getting caught up in Trump-era theatrics, which is no small feat. (When Little’s campaign revealed that Pratt’s field director had posted racist and antisemitic content to social media, Pratt quickly announced his resignation.)

Pratt worked in finance and banking for three decades, most recently at U.S. Bank. He’s touted his experience leading risk management and fraud prevention teams as proof that he’ll effectively cut spending and prevent fraud in government programs, a central issue in Minnesota politics following revelations of widespread fraud in the state’s safety net programs. He also served on the board of St. Gertrude’s, a nursing home.

Pratt was first elected to the state Senate in 2012, overlapping with Little from 2017 to 2021 before Little lost to Republican Sen. Zach Duckworth of Lakeville. In addition to the Finance Committee, Pratt serves on the Senate Jobs and Economic Development Committee and Capital Investment Committee. He chaired the jobs committee during the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic; during a debate, he cited his work with state Rep. Mohamud Noor, DFL-Minneapolis, on a bipartisan $1.6 billion omnibus economic recovery bill as an example of making “real, tough decisions.”

Sen. Eric Pratt, R-Prior Lake, deliberates the aspects of an amendment brought forth by Sen. Jason Rarick, R-Pine City, to an omnibus education policy bill during a floor session Tuesday, April 9, 2024. (Photo by A.J. Olmscheid/Senate Media Services)

Immigration is among several issues Pratt and Little have repeatedly clashed on in public debates leading up to Nov. 3.

Pratt has pitched himself as an “independent voice,” touting his bipartisan bills in the Minnesota Senate, while Little has accused Pratt of “quiet extremism” and being “all in on Trump.” On PBS Almanac, when asked to clarify his stance on Trump, Pratt said: “I don’t agree with my wife on everything, I don’t agree with the president on everything. And I’m not going to be a rubber stamp for anybody’s policy. I’m going to represent the people of the 2nd District.”

Little has said he would vote in favor to end the Iran war, and called the conflict a “complete bungle” and “absolute mess.” Pratt has been more ambiguous: He’s said he doesn’t want the U.S. to be in Iran “any longer than we need to,” and that “the president needs to be more clear on what the objectives are of this war,” but that the U.S. “cannot allow Iran to become a nuclear power.” (Trump claimed after 2025 bombing that the Iranian nuclear program had been “complete and totally obliterated.”)

Little’s stated policy priority is Medicare for All, under which the government would insure all Americans for medically necessary healthcare instead of private health insurance companies. Pratt denounces Medicare for All, and instead proposes “bending the cost curve” and “reducing fraud, waste and abuse” in healthcare, a sector which now comprises more than one-sixth of the American economy. He also advocates for tighter controls on pharmacy benefit managers, which are the opaque middlemen of the pharma business.

To address the impending depletion of the Social Security trust fund, Pratt has said the U.S. needs to look at “gradually increasing the retirement age” and consider giving younger people the opportunity to opt out of the program. Currently, income above $184,500 isn’t taxed by Social Security; Little has said he’d vote to eliminate that cap and make all income taxable by Social Security.

Little has pointed out that Pratt worked at U.S. Bank when it had the practice of opening fake customer accounts to meet sales goals, for which the bank was eventually fined $37.5 million. Pratt said that he wasn’t in the fraud department at the time and was not personally responsible and accused Little of misleading voters with “reckless speech.”

Humor as an ‘offensive tool’

The last time Little lived in D.C., he was in his early 20s and working for the letter carriers union.

“My vantage point and my leverage at that time was minimal,” Little said. “This time, I’d like to build as many relationships as I can within the party, but also try and find some room to work with any Republicans.”

He became Lakeville’s youngest mayor at 27 in 2012, before running for the state Senate in 2016 and winning a Republican district. Little has a private law firm where he sues assisted living homes for abuse and neglect, among other personal injury cases.

In 2020, when running for state Senate reelection, Little gained a large following of Gen Z fans from wielding TikTok and lip-syncing to trending audio clips. Politico published an article titled “Meet the politician who lives on TikTok,” and reported that he was the most-followed American politician on the app, with over 140,000 followers. (Other politicians’ TikToks have since amassed followings of millions.)

Little’s TikTok account, now used for his congressional campaign, still has over 140,000 followers, but his relationship to the app has shifted since 2020, when he was defeated for reelection in a red-leaning, south metro state Senate district.

“I just don’t care for it as much anymore. Honestly, I’m just not that interested,” said Little, who deleted the app from his phone and instead sends clips for his team to post.

On social media, the campaign’s videos are generally either serious (Matt Little confronts an ICE agent) or comedic (Matt Little prepares to break the world record for most hands shaken by a politician). In person, Little shifts smoothly from humor to intensity, often layering the two.

Scott Jensen, a Chaska physician who served with Little and Pratt in the Senate from 2017 to 2021, described them both as respectful colleagues. He said Little “has a sense of humor that’s outside the box.”

“Matt enjoys laughter,” he added.

Little had run into Jensen on Oct. 3 at the GOP booth at South St. Paul’s “On the Road Again” festival, a packed annual affair with thousands of attendees, a classic car show, the self-proclaimed “World Championship Booya” competition, and a handful of campaigning politicians.

Jensen, whose 2022 campaign for governor was hindered by his vaccine skepticism and waffling position on abortion rights, is the GOP nominee for state auditor.

Little had a hard time advancing his bills — his party was in the minority during his tenure — “because of partisanship,” Jensen said.

“I think we’re both at times willing to be mavericks. And I think when you’re a maverick, sometimes people are nervous about it,” Jensen said.

“Yeah, a lot of people call me Tom Cruise,” Little jumped in, with a reference to the blockbuster movies about Naval aviators. “It’s really odd, you know.”

Jensen: “Do you have a need right now to change from serious conversation to humor?”

Little: “Constantly. Yeah.”

Jensen: “Because I thought we were having a serious conversation.”

Little: “Well, we had those in the Senate. But here we’re at the Booya, we’re having a good time,” Little said. “I’m voting Zack Filipovich. Get that on the record,” he added to the Reformer, referring to Jensen’s DFL opponent. Later, Little told the Reformer that he uses humor as an “an offensive tool,” i.e., a political weapon.

It’s a style that’s not without risk — a well-placed quip can also bruise the inflated ego of a colleague. Reflecting on his time in the state Senate, Little said he is “pretty brash” and admitted that he could have built relationships better.

“But that doesn’t mean I’m not gonna fight my ass off for what I’m saying. I’m gonna fight hard for things I believe in that I think would help people, and if I run into walls, I’m gonna try and run through ‘em.”

The Minnesota Reformer is an independent, nonprofit news organization dedicated to keeping Minnesotans informed and unearthing stories other outlets can’t or won’t tell..