When I Stopped Outsourcing My Political Thinking

For most of my adult life, I was politically confident without being politically curious.

I voted on the big stuff. I knew which party I supported. I had opinions about the issues everyone was arguing about. I knew which side stood for compassion, which candidates thoughtful, educated people supported, and which political positions reflected decency rather than ignorance, selfishness, or hatred.

Or at least I thought I knew.

I was not especially politically informed. But I was morally settled.

My confidence did not come from studying the issues. It came from believing I had already identified the good guys.

And that was enough for a long time.

Like everyone else, I was busy. Work, family, finances, relationships, happy hours, playdates, a house to clean, and the zillion ordinary demands of adult life. Politics was something I encountered through headlines, social media, and the people and institutions I trusted.

I let them do much of the sorting for me.

And at the time, I didn’t think of it as outsourcing my political judgment. I thought of it as listening to credible people. If nearly everyone in my life seemed to agree, why would I assume I knew better?

Looking back, I realized I’d stopped asking questions because I already believed I knew the answers. Along the way, I’d absorbed not only certain political conclusions, but a whole moral framework around them.

Good. Compassionate. Educated. Reasonable. I wanted to fall into all those categories, and I was pretty sure I did.

The implication was clear: if you reached a different conclusion, something was probably wrong with your intelligence, your empathy, or ability to reason.

That is a powerful way to keep people from asking questions.

But then public policy began intersecting with my own life in ways I couldn’t ignore. I started reading beyond headlines, attending political events, testifying before legislators, and talking with candidates and elected officials. I became curious. I wanted to know what the story left out. I became more interested in the conversation than the viral clip. I began to see a distinction our political culture often blurs: consuming political content is not the same thing as practicing thoughtful citizenship.

I used to think being politically aware meant keeping up with political news.

But knowing what everyone is angry about this morning is not civic engagement.

Many people do not have the time, capacity, access, or interest.

Understandably.

But curiosity is available to all of us.

It asks, What if I’m missing something?

It reads beyond the headline. It listens a little longer. And it allows two decent people to examine the same facts and reach different conclusions.

The more questions I asked, the harder it became to fit neatly into anyone else’s political story.

I did not want a new tribe to tell me what to think.

Over the past several years, as I’ve paid closer attention to Minnesota politics, I’ve become increasingly concerned about the direction of our state on issues ranging from public safety to education and the growing tendency to treat political disagreement as evidence of moral failure.

Those concerns changed what I looked for in candidates. I began valuing competence, accountability, and a willingness to govern over ideological performance.

For years, I cared as much about what my vote signaled socially as what it accomplished politically. Did the candidate seem likable? Did they use the right language? Would people I respected approve of my vote? Did supporting them signal that I was compassionate, intelligent, and socially aware?

Those questions can feel important, especially in a culture where voting has become an expression of identity.

But elected officials do not need to be my friends.

So, I now find myself asking different questions.

Who understands the responsibilities of the office they may hold?

Who appears steady under pressure?

Who can work with people who disagree?

Who is willing to make unpopular decisions?

Who demonstrates judgment rather than performance?

And this year, that process has led me to support Lisa Demuth for governor.

Not because she’s a Republican. Not because I agree with every position she’s taken. And not because I believe any candidate deserves unquestioning loyalty.

As Speaker of the House, Demuth has already had to govern in an evenly divided Legislature, where nearly every consequential decision has come with intense political pressure. I found myself paying close attention to how she handled those moments.

Leadership isn’t tested when every option is popular. It’s tested when every choice carries real political and personal consequences. Watching her navigate one of the most emotionally charged legislative debates in recent Minnesota history, I was struck less by whether people agreed with every decision than by her willingness to continue carrying out what she believed the responsibilities of her office required, despite intense public criticism.

Those observations reinforced what I had already begun to value in leadership: competence, accountability, steadiness, and a willingness to govern over ideological performance.

That’s ultimately why I believe Demuth is the strongest candidate to move Minnesota in a better direction.

Someone else can study the same race and reach a different conclusion. That’s part of democracy. What matters to me is that the conclusion is genuinely theirs.

The hardest part of changing my politics wasn’t changing my vote.

It was accepting that some people would decide who I was because of it.

Ironically, that fear had shaped far more of my political thinking than I realized.

I don’t miss the certainty.

Certainty was easy.

Curiosity asks more of me.

It requires me to question my own assumptions, resist easy narratives, admit when I’m wrong, resist easy narratives, admit when I’m wrong, and occasionally disappoint people whose approval I once valued.

It’s slower. It’s messier.

But at least now, my political conclusions are earned rather than inherited.