The Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party has endorsed two challengers to take on Republican Reps. Erik Paulsen and John Kline.

In Minnesota’s 3rd district, party delegates tapped Jim Meffert, a former president of the state PTA and chief executive of the Minnesota Optometric Association, to take on Paulsen.

Meffert won the endorsement in a close vote over forensic psychiatrist and military veteran Maureen Hackett, who had shown willingness to self-fund and had more cash in the bank than Meffert at the end of the year.

In the 2nd district, Democrats opted for construction contractor Dan Powers, a former member of the Burnsville City Board of Appeals, over former state Rep. Shelley Madore.

Either one would start as a serious underdog against Kline, a conservative running for his fifth term.

Kline has never broken 60 percent in his elections, but he’s always won by double digits in a district with a mix of suburban and rural communities south of the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area.