Ad Segment Voice / Adam Grant (34:20)
For our final race that we're spotlighting, let's look at the Minneapolis mayoral election. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey is running for reelection against 14 other candidates in a race that has garnered some comparisons to New York City's mayoral election. Frey's main opponent is State Senator Omar Fateh, a Democrat who, like Zoran Mamdani, is Muslim in his 30s and calls himself a Democratic socialist. Fatah has challenged Frey from the left, arguing that the mayor has failed to implement meaningful police reform in the wake of George Floyd's death and fallen short on addressing homelessness. Minneapolis elections are officially nonpartisan, though candidates can choose a party label to appear below their name, and the city uses ranked choice voting, allowing voters to choose their top three candidates in order of preference. While several prominent Democratic leaders have endorsed Frey, including Minnesota governor Tim Walz, Fatah has joined forces with two other challengers, attorney and businessman Jazz Hampton and Minister Dwayne Davis, to encourage voters to vote for all three of them as a quote Slate for Change Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota has also endorsed Fateh. Here's one view of the race in the Star Tribune Former Minnesota State Senator Patricia Torres Wray said Omar Fateh is the best choice for Minneapolis Mayor. Fateh came to the Senate determined to represent the voice of working people. He proposed to guarantee minimum wages for Uber and Lyft drivers who were getting poverty wages to provide University of Minnesota graduate students with stronger union protections and to make college in Minnesota not just affordable but free, ray wrote. Fateh worked with determination and strategy on every one of these policies, and today they are law for all Minnesota. He wants to raise the minimum wage to $20 by 2028, listen to the voters and pass rent stabilization while still exempting new construction and protect renters from eviction. These are real, tangible changes that can ensure families are not forced to choose between paying rent and putting food on the table, ray said. Fateh believes public safety comes from care, not crackdowns. He secured $19 million for Minneapolis for public Safety, which has remained untouched by the current administration. Now, here's a different view. Also in the Star Tribune, Adam Duanick, president and CEO of the Minneapolis Downtown Council, argued Jacob Frey's critics would rather see him fail than Minneapolis succeed. I've learned how important it is to approach nuanced and controversial issues with common sense and balance to achieve the best possible result, duanick wrote. Frey has demonstrated a similar approach, successfully employing poise, measured action and ultimately strong leadership leadership to overcome the adversity our city has faced and position it for continued economic recovery. Now is the time to assert that Minneapolis will recover as the cultural soul, the social capital and the economic engine of the region and the state. And for that we need leaders who can be resolute in their vision for the city and fuel change in these divisive times. Here's what we are watching in the race. The parallels between this race and New York City's are undeniable, but the comparison leaves a lot out. In fact, a better way to think about Minneapolis's mayoral election is through the lens of George Floyd in the summer of 2020. The defining issue of the race is public safety. Frey has promised to implement reforms recommended by the Biden Justice Department after Floyd's death, but Fatih says the incumbent has not done enough to address issues with the city's police. In turn, Frey accuses Fateh of supporting policies aligned with defunding the police, a movement that flourished in Minneapolis in 2020 but has since become politically toxic. The election has also garnered national attention due to outcry, mostly from the right, about Fatah's campaign events, where he spoke to Somali American crowds in Somali while waving a flag from a region of Somalia and encouraged them to support him. Notably, Mayor Frey has also been running campaign ads in Somalia. But if Fateh pulls off an upset but expect Republicans and conservative media to elevate him alongside Mamdani in their critiques of the new faces of the Democratic Party. So those are the seven races that we're highlighting ahead of today's elections. Now let's run through six ballot measures that we're also keeping tabs on. Number one, Coloradans will vote on Proposition MM, which authorizes the state to raise $95 million to fully fund a program that provides free breakfast and lunch to all public K12 students in Colorado. If passed, the state would reduce state income tax deductions for taxpayers earning $300,000 or more. To raise the additional revenue, Mainers will vote on question one, which would make several changes to the state's election laws. Most notably, it would add photo ID requirements for in person and absentee voting with some religious exceptions. Number three, Mainers will also vote on question two, a measure that would establish a process for obtaining an extreme Risk protection order, an ERPO, against individuals considered a significant danger of causing physical injury, also known as a red flag law. Once an ERPO is obtained, that person's access to weapons, including firearms, would be restricted and the proposal followed a mass shooting in the state in 2020. Number four, New York City residents will vote on Proposal 6, a ballot measure that would move local elections such as mayor and public advocate to presidential election years in an attempt to increase voter turnout. Number five, Texans will vote on Proposition 15, a proposal to add language to the state constitution that parents have the right to, quote, exercise care, custody and control of the parent's child, including the right to make decisions concerning the child's upbringing and the responsibility to, quote, nurture and protect the parent's child. And finally, number six, Texans will also vote on Proposition 16, which would amend the state constitution to state that, quote, persons who are not citizens of the United States cannot vote in Texas. State law already bans non citizen voting, but this amendment would affirm the requirements. All right, that is it for our election day preview. Looking forward to being back here tomorrow to break down the results of these races and more. For now, I'm going to send it over to John to read our have a nice day story and take us home and we'll talk to you tomorrow. John, over to you.
