Peggy Flanagan becomes first Indigenous US senator
By the AFREEQUE newsroom, based on Bénin Web TV
Peggy Flanagan, Minnesota’s Democratic lieutenant governor, won the Senate election with 53.71% of the provisional vote, against 43.55% for Republican Michele Tafoya. She becomes the first Indigenous woman elected to the US Senate and will take office in January 2027, according to Associated Press projections.
Peggy Flanagan, the Democratic lieutenant governor of Minnesota, won the US Senate election against Republican Michele Tafoya with 53.71% of the provisional vote, according to projections by the Associated Press announced overnight from 3 to 4 November 2026. She becomes the first Indigenous woman elected to the United States federal Senate.
Provisional results from Minnesota’s secretary of state give Peggy Flanagan 1,520,295 votes, compared with 1,232,677 for Michele Tafoya, or 43.55%. The state’s 4,105 polling stations have submitted their results, which still need to be certified. The victory allows the Democrats to retain the seat held by Tina Smith, who was not seeking re-election, and Peggy Flanagan is due to succeed her in January 2027.
A member of the White Earth Nation, part of the Ojibwe people, Peggy Flanagan won the Democratic primary in August against Representative Angie Craig. Her campaign highlighted public services, family rights and reducing the influence of great wealth, while Donald Trump’s immigration policy and the cost of living dominated the debates. Michele Tafoya, a former journalist covering NFL American football broadcasts, was seeking to shift the seat to the Republican camp. No Republican has won a Senate election in Minnesota since 2002.
Peggy Flanagan’s election came on the same day as the projected victory of Deb Haaland in New Mexico, the first Native American woman expected to lead a US state. It forms part of a series of Democratic results in the United States, following Keisha Lance Bottoms’s victory in Georgia, announced on 4 November, and Abdul El-Sayed’s election to the US Senate, also announced on the same day.
