Minnesota scientist announces bid for governor, citing poor COVID-19 response

On Thursday, Minnesota scientist and entrepreneur Hugh McTavish announced that he would be running for governor as a third-party candidate, noting division in the state government and what he said was poor handling of the COVID-19 pandemic as his reason for entering the race.

McTavish, who is both an author and inventor, founded pharmaceutical companies Squarex and IGF Oncology, which respectively are developing a topical to prevent cold sores and targeted cancer drugs. 

McTavish will appear on the ballot under the Independence-Alliance Party, which is the same party of former wrestler Jesse Ventura, who historically upset Republican Norm Coleman and Democrat Skip Humphrey in the state’s 1998 race for governor. 

“In today’s elections, candidates seek to win by dividing us and appealing to anger and fear, and then after winning they impose their policies on us and those policies are chosen by the money interests that funded their campaign,” McTavish said to reporters during a news conference.

“Not me. I am running to unite us, not to divide us, and after winning I will have all of us, the people, choose our policies.”

Part of that policy selection, according to McTavish, will come as he plans to implement a system in which 1,000 randomly selected Minnesotans would be chosen to decide whether bills are signed or vetoed that come to the governor’s desk from the Legislature.

McTavish also slammed coronavirus measures imposed by Democratic Gov. Tim Waltz in order to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 during the pandemic, arguing that they had done more to harm mental health and education than promote public health and safety.

McTavish has authored a book entitled “COVID Lockdown Insanity,” in which he says the shutdown resulted in major depression in tens of millions of Americans. He also argues that mask wearing had negligible effect in stopping virus causes and deaths.