We’re not asking for a lot. There is serious business we need to attend to and Minnesota needs a governor that will work hard every day.

Tom Emmer wants to be governor of Minnesota. But, instead of working for the people and showing up to vote on important legislation, Tom Emmer missed votes and made lots of excuses.

Emmer told the Star Tribune that he missed a vote on a bill that would make it easier to expunge some kinds of criminal records because he stepped out of the chamber to “get a cookie.”¹

Emmer even missed a vote requiring some drunk driving offenders to use a breath-activated car ignition system and longer license revocations for repeat offenders… because he was “out to lunch.”²

Although he has yet to use the time-tested “the dog at my homework” defense, Tom Emmer is running out of excuses for missing work. So we thought we’d ask for your help to come up with excuses for the other 140 votes Tom Emmer missed this year.

Send in your excuses for Tom Emmer online, we’ll compile them in our “Tom Emmer Excuse Generator” and pass them on to him to use between now and the November election.

Tom Emmer could really use some help coming up with excuses for missing important campaign events. Just last week, Tom Emmer skipped out on an important debate on the issues facing Greater Minnesota, causing the Winona Daily News editorial board to write “it’s insulting to believe that Emmer couldn’t spend the gas money to get to Winona and talk about issues that matter to Greater Minnesota. You have to wonder about a guy who wants to be governor but doesn’t want people to know where he stands – or is too busy to say.“

Head on over to MissedVotes.com and submit some excuses for Tom Emmer to use the next time he’s thinking about ducking out on a debate.

While most of us would get fired if we missed that much work, Tom Emmer thinks it makes him qualified to be our governor.

Help Tom Emmer come up with better excuses for the campaign trail so we don’t have to continue listening to his lame ones.

It shouldn’t be hard to make your excuses a little more believable than ones Emmer came up with.

Once, he told the minority leader that he had to miss a vote on a natural resources bill to attend his daughter’s softball game. Problem was, the vote was at midnight.³

1.  “Emmer also missed a vote Thursday on a bill making it easier to expunge some kinds of criminal records. He said he missed it after stepping out of the chamber to get a cookie.” [Star Tribune, 05/13/10]

2.  “Emmer was one of three House members who didn’t vote on the measure. ‘I had a lunch I had to go to at noon, and it ran over, simple as that,’ Emmer said in an interview on the House floor after the vote.

How would he have voted if he had been there? ‘I have no idea,’ Emmer said, adding, ‘Had I been here, I assume I would have voted in favor of it.'” [Star Tribune, 05/13/10]

3.  Zellers: “I believe his daughter had a softball game and he had not yet attended. He wanted to go see Katie play softball.”

KFAI: “At midnight?”

Zellers: “Well, maybe afterwards he took her out for an ice cream, maybe, you know, spend some time with his family.” [KFAI, 05/13/10]