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Our verdict

LiberalMind endorses Levi Bachmeier

Election Day is November 3. This is a special election, on a nonpartisan ballot, for the two-year unexpired term through 2028 — Kirsten Baesler left for the U.S. Department of Education, and Levi Bachmeier, a former teacher and West Fargo schools business manager appointed to the office in November 2025, faces Tracy Layne Foss, a teacher from Hatton. There are no party labels on this ballot, and there are none in our call: records and positions govern here. Research located no campaign-finance totals and no general-election polling for this race, and this article prints none. LiberalMind endorses Levi Bachmeier. Read the research, and see why.

How North Dakota got here

The vacancy chain, sourced: Superintendent Kirsten Baesler, elected in 2024 to a term through 2028, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on October 7, 2025 as Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education at the U.S. Department of Education. Gov. Kelly Armstrong announced on October 21, 2025 that he would appoint Levi Bachmeier, who took office on November 24, 2025 after the federal shutdown delayed Baesler's swearing-in. The 2026 winner serves the two-year unexpired term through 2028, and the seat is on the regularly scheduled ballot again in 2028. One secondary headline describes Bachmeier as running "for full term" — that is wrong; the term is the unexpired two-year term, and that is what is printed here.

This office is nonpartisan. In the June 9, 2026 nonpartisan primary, the top two advanced: Levi Bachmeier, first, with 55.7% (59,268 votes), and Tracy Layne Foss, second, with 29.9% (31,875 votes); perennial candidate Charles Tuttle was eliminated at 14.4%. The general-election roster — Bachmeier and Foss, no party labels — is confirmed by published sample ballots.

The money, stated plainly: research located no campaign-finance totals and no polling or ratings for any North Dakota statewide race in this set, including this one. No money figures are printed, because none were located. The June primary spread above is the only sourced competitiveness signal; no general-election poll was located.

Two context facts, printed as facts and not as the rationale for the call below: Bachmeier self-describes as a conservative, did not seek a party endorsement, and skipped the NDGOP convention. Foss holds a letter of support from the Democratic-NPL Party and an endorsement from the ND AFL-CIO. In a nonpartisan race, those facts describe the candidates' contexts. Our call rests on records and positions.

Levi Bachmeier — the appointed incumbent

Background and service: Former high-school social-studies teacher — two years with Teach for America at Pine Ridge. Education policy adviser and director for Gov. Burgum, 2016–2019. Business Manager of West Fargo Public Schools since 2019. He served on the State Board of Public School Education and the State Board of Higher Education before his appointment as superintendent on November 24, 2025. His stated program: kids first, support teachers, and money "into the classroom, not bureaucracy." On taking office he set out to visit all 165 operating school districts in the state.

Pros: The deepest education-specific record in this race, at every level the office touches — classroom teacher, governor's education policy staff, business manager of one of the state's large school districts since 2019, and service on both state education boards. His stated priorities are concrete and office-shaped: classroom money over bureaucracy, teacher support, and a plan to visit all 165 districts. He led the June primary with 55.7% in a three-way field.

Cons: His tenure in this office itself is brief — appointed in November 2025, in the job about a year at Election Day — and his record as superintendent, as opposed to his record in education work generally, is only that year long. That brevity is priced as brief tenure in the specific office, not as a demerit against the broader record, which is proven.

The flaw, plainly: None proven in service on this record.

Tracy Layne Foss — the Hatton teacher

Background and service: A teacher from Hatton. Her son is State Rep. Austin Foss of Fargo. She holds a Democratic-NPL letter of support and an ND AFL-CIO endorsement, per the sources noted above — context facts in a nonpartisan race, printed as such. Beyond her teaching, no further record was located in this research — no administrative service, no board service, no documented education-policy positions were pulled for this race. The thinness is printed as thinness.

Pros: A working classroom teacher from a small community, Hatton, bringing the classroom itself into a race for the office that oversees classrooms. She advanced from the primary with 29.9% and gives voters a genuine choice in a special election many states would leave to appointment alone.

Cons: On this research there is almost nothing beyond teaching to inspect — no located administrative record, board record, or stated program comparable to her opponent's documented history across teaching, policy, district finance, and both state boards. A voter who wants to know how she would run a state agency cannot learn it from the record located here.

The flaw, plainly: No proven flaw was located, in service or out of it. The deciding fact is an absence, not a flaw: a record beyond teaching was not located, against an opponent whose relevant record is documented at every level of the job.

The minor candidates, briefly

There are none in the general election — the top-two primary advanced exactly two candidates, and Charles Tuttle was eliminated in June. A standing check found no pedophile-association material meeting the proven standard for either candidate — absence noted, nothing implied.

OUR CALL

LiberalMind endorses Levi Bachmeier.

This call is made on records and positions, with no party labels on the ballot and none in the reasoning. Bachmeier's record covers the whole job before he was appointed to it — classroom teaching, education policy for a governor, six-plus years managing a large district's business, and seats on both state education boards — and his stated program puts money in classrooms over bureaucracy and teachers first. Foss is a classroom teacher whose record beyond teaching was not located in this research; there is no stated program or administrative record here to set against her opponent's. In a two-year unexpired term, with no time to learn the agency from zero, the documented record governs. Endorse Bachmeier.

For the complete Election 2026 breakdown — every race, claim by claim — see the full coverage on our website.

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

Sources

Election result — November 4, 2026

Result pending. No verified call (Associated Press or official) as of November 4, 2026. This page will be updated when the race is called or certified. The original article above is unchanged.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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