Aaron Kania is a former law enforcement officer, wildland firefighter, and who most recently served as a Forest Service official. He is the DFL endorsed candidate running for Minnesota House Seat 3A in Northern Minnesota. John Parker and Jim Pounds met with him to talk about the issues Kania is running on. This is the second part of our conversation with him. You can read the first part about DOGE’s impact on Minnesota’s ability to fight wildfires here.

Please note, Kania is not a member of the LGBTQ community and this is part of our 2026 Election Coverage for LGBTQ voters to get to know candidates in their districts.

Interview with Aaron Kania

John Parker:
Obviously, the forest fires are, I’m sure, a big thing that are coming up when you’re talking to voters right now. We’ve been hearing a lot about healthcare and affordability. So we’re curious, as you’re talking to voters a week out from the primary, what are you hearing from them about what are the big issues that they’re talking about for this year?

Aaron Kania:
Definitely. We have a clinic closing in Silver Bay. That’s going to be tough. And every clinic and hospital I go to, this is a real issue that they’re facing. They’re looking at their budgets as far as how they can stay in the black and stay open. It’s one thing when you close a clinic up here, you’re 30 miles away. And with our winters and lack of transportation, this is huge. This is a really big problem that people are really worried

But I think the other thing I’m really hearing, and I’ve done a lot of door knocking, this is a rural area, and I’ve talked to 850 people at their door. And I’ve done another 30 meet and greets out in the community and just finished my 20th parade. So I’m getting my steps in and I’m definitely meeting people.

The thing I hear really loudest above everything is the dividedness, the divisiveness. When people can’t talk to their neighbors, when they can’t talk across the kitchen table to their own family, this is a real problem.

And it gets really hard to solve problems when we get stuck on things that make no difference really to any of us.

And so that’s with my experience as the district ranger in my career, even as a law enforcement officer. You had to tone it down. You had to work together in order to solve problems. So that’s something I’m bringing to the table is bringing diverse groups together and finding that common ground. It’s extremely important.

Jim Pounds:
This is a Republican health seat that you’re trying to flip, right?

Aaron Kania:
It is. We’ll be flipping the biggest district in the state of Minnesota.

John Parker:
Yep. Wow.

Aaron Kania:
And it’s the Boundary Waters District. And that’s one of the other major issues is mining upstream of the Boundary Waters. There’s a project proposal for that. Again, as the district ranger, that’s something I’m very familiar with and know how to work through and bring those communities together.

John Parker:
The frustration that we continuously see, knowing that 80% of queer voters voted for Kamala Harris and Tim Walls, is that we want to talk about affordability and healthcare. And across the aisle, they want to talk about [banning] books and athletics. And so we’re hopeful that we’re reaching a point here now in non-metro parts of the country where folks are like, “Can we please start talking about real issues here and stop trying to get books banned?” And so I’m curious, are you starting to see that shift happening at all when you’re talking to voters in greater Minnesota?

Aaron Kania:
Wow, that’s a very good question. It really depends on where people are coming from when we meet them at the doors, because we’re really talking to everybody. And I’ve been thinking about this a lot, just actually doing a lot of research to try to mentally process it. When I was in sixth grade social studies, I learned this comment or this concept of your rights end where the next person’s rights begin. And it’s called the social contract.

And that is our founding documents. That’s the Declaration of Independence: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. And I think what I see is people are extending their rights beyond where they should normally end, and they start getting into other people’s rights.

And when I hear some of these things about what you should do in your life, that’s a violation of the social contract. Unless that thing you should do is causing other people to be unsafe.

If the thing you’re doing is jeopardizing somebody else’s safety, then you shouldn’t do it. That’s again, the social contract. And so when people are like, “They shouldn’t do this or they shouldn’t do that,” that really is undermining the basic premise of what I learned in sixth grade.

You can read the first part of our conversation with Kania about DOGE’s impact on Minnesota’s ability to fight wildfires here. For more information about Aaron and the issues he’s running on head to kaniaforhouse.com. As of this writing, early voting is underway and election day is August 11th.