Pawlenty’s good rhetoric, mixed record on pro-sports subsidies

Pawlenty’s position on public subsidies to private enterprise is especially confusing when one takes the case of financing a new sports stadium. Pawlenty voted to use taxpayer dollars to finance a new baseball stadium for the Minnesota Twins  in 2001, despite having called professional baseball a “cartel” in 1997.  In that year, he voted against using taxpayer dollars to build the stadium,  claiming that he opposed any public involvement. He blasted “subsidizing billionaires so they can pay millionaires” according to press accounts at the time.  Pawlenty then flip-flopped again on the issue in 2002, voting against the proposed stadium.  By 2006, Pawlenty had flipped for a third time, and signed a bill that funded most of the $522 million new stadium with public dollars, including a 0.15 percent sales tax increase in Hennepin County.