NAFTA's been a big problem for sugar.

I don't know how you change that. There's hardly anybody left like me in the Democratic Party in Congress. These districts have been so gerrymandered that, in most of them, a Democrat can't win. Somebody like me trying to start off today, he'd never get endorsed. Because I'm too conservative.

Pushing gun control drives people [in my district] crazy, gay marriage, abortion, deficit spending.All of that stuff adds up to be a problem for Democrats.

[Rural people] have a different lifestyle, and they don't want to change it. They're happy with the way things are. It's causing the party political problems.

You can't have a majority party in Minnesota or throughout the country without [support from] the people in these [rural] districts. Given the position [the Democratic Party] has taken, it's very hard to see how you can do that.

NAFTA's been a big problem for sugar.

The [Democratic] party's become an urban party, and they don't get rural America. They don't get agriculture.