Link, By Hunter Woodall, Ryan Faircloth and Jessie Van Berkel Star Tribune
The headlined paragraph, does it show too dismissive an attitude? Perhaps.
Is the headlined paragraph idea Omar advanced true? 100%
Moreover, it might be time for Minneapolis to have a black mayor, and Samuels would be a better candidate than many, perhaps not as good as others. But the election shows he has name recognition.
A bottom line, were Samuels to run and win for mayor, he'd have to work a hell of a lot to be a worse mayor than Frey. That would take a ton of effort. And he'd likely have a sounder more rounded perspective on cop problems than was shown during the Floyd demonstrations, escalated by over aggressive cops in Darth Vader gear.
The Kroll-Frey response was gasoline on a fire. Bob Kroll at least is off the job today.
But the bottom line is that local policing is and always has been everywhere a local issue and it was bogus of Samuels to try to boost the loss of a reasonable referendum issue Omar (and many others) supported which was aimed toward reform of a problem, as somehow a cause to send Samuels to DC.
Surely, Samuels was electable and had name recognition, and did gain many votes. He likely would have made a better rep than the Christonationalist in CD7, Emmer, either of the two now running in CD1, or Stauber who cares little about the planet years into the future. He'd be in the Phillips-Craig level, likely. But likely less tied to corporatism than Dean Phillips, or Angie Craig who is a former med device upper management executive.
But Omar won a third term. From Strib's semi-editorial item- starting at the start:
U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar spent months largely ignoring her Democratic challenger.
"I have not given it a thought," Omar said in June when asked about the state of the primary race, going on to declare, "We're going to do great, as always."
But in Tuesday's primary, amid lower turnout and some voter frustration over her policies and style, the Fifth Congressional District nearly slipped from her grasp.
Omar barely beat former Minneapolis City Council Member Don Samuels in the DFL contest, turning him away by a little over two points. It was the closest a Democratic U.S. representative has come to losing a primary in the history of Minnesota's DFL Party, according to University of Minnesota Humphrey School research fellow Eric Ostermeier.
[italics added] Strib writers and editors might not like her policies and style, but that surely is a judgmental statement fitting the op-ed pages. But the paragraph does suggest a dismissive attitude toward her challenger. Oberstar got caught that way.
More Strib -
Minneapolis City Council Member Jeremiah Ellison, who backed Omar, said he thinks the close primary outcome had more to do with low voter turnout than it did with excitement for Samuels. He noted that Samuels earned 13,000 fewer votes than Omar's 2020 challenger, Melton-Meaux. But Omar also received fewer votes than she did two years ago, earning about 58,000 in Tuesday's primary compared to 103,000 in 2020.
"If you're not letting people know that you're vulnerable, which maybe her campaign didn't illustrate quite enough, people will stay home in big numbers," Ellison said. "And I think we saw a little bit of that."
Omar saw the number of votes in her favor drop in every city in her district, compared to the 2020 primary. Two years ago, she secured 58% of the votes districtwide, but that fell to 50% this year.
While the boundaries of the district have shifted slightly with redistricting, Minneapolis remains key to a Fifth District win. In the state's biggest city, Omar saw her percent of the total DFL primary votes fall from 64% in the last election to 55% on Tuesday. In the majority of cities in the district, Samuels bested Omar.
Okay. The lower turnout is a siren to DFL leaning voters for the general election.
Get off the chair and get the ballot in. GOTV, and then some. Early voting exists!!!
Redistricting, "shifted slightly," that is up for debate as to voter histories, etc., and the statement is given without supporting evidence. Indeed, the burbs were conservative by majorities, the city was progressive, by a majority less than last cycle - again, a GOTV siren for the general election.
Now. It is believed here that Republican crossover to the Dem side of the ballot to poison the well against Omar was not a factor. The basis for that belief is the statewide primary contest between Schultz and Wardlow. With that being a major GOP divisive contest, (semi-reasonableness vs. Christofascist Wardlow), the Republicans staying true to their GOP column of the ballot is believed here to have happened.
More of Strib -
Samuels repeatedly touted that he helped lead the opposition to last year's ballot question to replace the Minneapolis Police Department with a new department of public safety, while Omar supported the measure.
Minneapolis voters rejected the contentious policing proposal. Minneapolis City Council President Andrea Jenkins, who endorsed Omar, said she thinks Tuesday's election suggests Samuels' public safety messaging resonated with many Fifth District voters.
"A lot of African Americans are really concerned that we need to have respectful, accountable, approachable police in our culture and society," Jenkins said. "I think that played a role in Don's support."
[...] "These primaries shouldn't really be a surprise to people in the district," Omar said before primary day. "It's actually, I think, a good thing because that means I am advocating, I am pushing back against people who want to make sure the status quo is sustained."
Samuels dramatically outspent Omar in July, according to the most recent campaign finance reports. His expenditures totaled about $383,000, more than five times what Omar doled out between July 1 and July 20. That preprimary finance report showed Samuels had roughly $270,000 in cash. Omar had far more left in the bank, around $471,000.
The majority of Samuels' spending during that period — about $270,000 — went toward television ads. Thirty-second ads highlighting his background and efforts to combat gun violence frequently aired on local and cable channels in the run-up to the primary. Meanwhile, Omar's latest report did not list any spending on television ads.
30-sec TV ads are stupid, done by idiots, and influencing morons. Back to Strib -
Samuels' run was also boosted by a Super PAC called Make a Difference MN 05 in the closing days of the race that quickly spent hundreds of thousands after forming in late July. [...]
Slush money from undisclosed sourcing is pure evil. It should be illegal but our beloved "Justices" did Citizens United to us, so we suffer.
That slush-money link - opening text after a video blurb I did not bother watching -
Democratic Primary voters in Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District deserve positive communications. They need to see that Don Samuels is a man of integrity who has always worked to organize his community to reduce crime and gun violence.
Don is uniquely qualified to meet this moment and and lead the difficult conversations ahead about crime and police reform.
Yes! And the man should run for mayor. Really. He'd give Frey a contest, and there'd likely be a progressive or two running too, while with that ranked choice voting idiocy at play, who knows? Frey could be ousted, And that dark money operation, they should use the same text to boost Samuels to be elected mayor against Frey. Would that happen? Same money? Go figure.
Back to Strib-
[...] Omar's vote last November against a major infrastructure law further emboldened critics in the aftermath of her supporting the local policing ballot question and unsuccessfully pushing to deny Jacob Frey another term as mayor of Minneapolis.
She voted against the infrastructure bill because the progressive position was Build Back Better should be voted first; a position the Congressional Progressive Caucus abandoned for political reasons, leaving Omar to hold true to earlier caucus policy.
Frey, who endorsed Samuels, said he was hopeful after Tuesday's contest that Omar will "take the message that constituents want politicians to be working together."
"Would I be surprised if she continued with the vitriolic messaging? No, not entirely," Frey said. "But I hope she doesn't."
Shortly after that, Omar ridiculed Frey on social media in reference to a television interview the mayor did after Samuels lost.
"Our incompetent Mayor gets upset when we talk about his failures, but as the Mayor he is solely in charge of our city, it's police & public safety," Omar tweeted. "No matter how much media covers for him, people know our city is suffering because of his poor leadership and childish behavior."
"Vitriolic" is Frey's judgment when she dared criticize him. Omar speaks truth. Politicians like Frey dislike that. She could have called him pompous and conceited too as well as "childish," but she restrained herself. Strib concludes -
The message spurred Frey to call a reporter back and point out the irony.
"Am I surprised? No," Frey said. "I am disappointed, though."
Let Frey have the last dig in the pissing match? Great decision Strib. And that language: "point out the irony." What irony? Her calling him childish? Omar spoke the absolute truth about Frey, and he wants to have the last piss in the pissing match, calling a reporter [ one of the three Strib co-authors perhaps] to sling the last salvo.
Strib published the last salvo, so somehow they got it, were Frey to have called a different reporter than one on the Strib payroll writing the item.
And if it was one of the Strib item authors Frey called, don't you wonder, what else did he share? If more was shared on record, it should have been published too.