MyPillow CEO and staunch supporter of President Donald Trump, Mike Lindell, says he’s ready to take a leap into politics once again.
According to reports, Lindell filed official paperwork yesterday to run as a Republican for governor of Minnesota in 2026.
The businessman said he’s the most qualified person to “save” Minnesota, and plans to make a formal announcement at his Minnesota pillow factory on Dec. 11, according to a report from The New York Post.
However, it appears that Lindell is also giving himself a potential out.
“I’m 98%, but I can’t say 100%,” Lindell told The Post about whether he’ll formally announce that he’s running for governor, noting that his campaign manager insisted that he file the paperwork despite not being completely certain.
Lindell would face a crowded GOP primary, with Minnesota state Rep. Kristin Robbins and Scott Jensen, a former challenger who lost to sitting Democratic Gov. Tim Walz in 2022.
“I haven’t even looked at all that,” Lindell said of his GOP competition. “If I run, it’s going to be because I want to save my state, and I believe I’d be the best qualified of anyone to do it.”
Walz announced his intends to seek a third term after being Kamala Harris’ running mate in the 2024 presidential election.
Lindell, a Minnesota native and based his MyPillow company in the state, built MyPillow from the ground up into a multi-million dollar company after recovering from an addiction to drugs and later launched his own television network.
Lindell felt compelled to run for his state’s top spot, and said the way Walz has been running the state has been shameful.
“I’ve lived in Minnesota my whole life, born and raised there, and what’s going on with the fraud and with our governor – it’s shameful,” he said.
Under Walz’s leadership, Minnesota has been hit by a series of massive welfare fraud scandals in recent years, which are now under the microscope of the Trump administration and congressional leaders.
The Treasury Department and House Oversight Committee have both launched investigations into Walz’s alleged failure to safeguard taxpayer money.
“It’s a shame,” Lindell said of the rampant fraud in his home state, “that money was all earmarked for people that really needed help. It’s disgusting.”
This week, more than 480 Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) employees have come forward and accused Walz of ignoring their warnings about massive fraud in the state — and said the governor illegally retaliated against the whistleblowers who tried to stop it.
“I watched Minnesota go down, down, down, under horrible leadership, and it’s one of those things, if nobody else can get it done, do it yourself,” Lindell said. “I don’t trust anyone else to get this done.”
Lindell said he expects to “pull more people that are traditional Democrats” than Republicans, because of his previous work in Minneapolis on addiction treatment — “before all this political stuff.”
Lindell said he hasn’t spoken to Trump about his potential campaign or a possible endorsement.
In a statement, the Democratic Governors Association slammed Lindell’s potential gubernatorial bid.
“Mike Lindell is the latest extreme, out of touch candidate to jump into what is becoming a more chaotic and dangerous race to the far-right by the day — and his entrance into the race is a bitter pill-ow for Minnesota Republicans to swallow,” DGA spokesperson Izzi Levy said.