The small town of Belgrade, Minnesota (56312) is part of the greater Stearns County. Belgrade is an unincorporated community and, as such, does not have its own local politics or political candidates. However, Belgrade is governed by the larger county government. Stearns County has a Board of Commissioners which is made up of five members elected to staggered four-year terms and one non-voting Chairman appointed by the Governor. The current board members are: Jeffrey Mergen, Joe Perske, Steve Notch, Leigh Lenzmeier and Dave Peterson. The board meets biweekly to discuss local policies that affect the entire county and all citizens of Belgrade. In addition to this Board of Commissioners, Stearns County has three additional local government bodies: a Soil & Water Conservation District Commission, a Planning Commission and an Extension Committee. All three are composed of locally elected officials with expertise on natural resources in the community and are responsible for making decisions about land use planning in Belgrade.
The political climate in Zip 56312 (Belgrade, MN) is strongly conservative.
Stearns County, MN is moderately conservative. In Stearns County, MN 37.6% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 60.1% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 2.4% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Stearns county remained overwhelmingly Republican, 60.1% to 37.6%.
Stearns county voted Republican in every Presidential election since 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Zip 56312 (Belgrade, MN) is strongly conservative.
Belgrade, Minnesota is strongly conservative.
Stearns County, Minnesota is moderately conservative.
St. Cloud Metro Area is strongly conservative.
Minnesota is leaning liberal.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Belgrade, Minnesota: R R r R R R
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D for the Democrat and I for the Independent. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in zip 56312 (Belgrade)
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 4 contributions totaling $90 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $23 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 57 contributions totaling $17,780 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $312 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)