The tl;dr here is to vote for Aurin Chowdhury but this is going to be a pretty long post because one of her opponents is presenting himself on his website as a lot more progressive than he is in any other context.
On the ballot:
Aurin Chowdhury
Luther Ranheim
Nancy Ford
Nancy is on the ballot as a DFLer but was quoted in an ad for the utterly reprehensible Shawn Holster calling him a “pragmatist, not an activist.” (Holster ran against Zaynab Mohamed last year and is a 3%er with a Twitter feed full of transphobia.) Nancy ran in 2021 and when asked about rent control responded by talking about how much she resented having to pay the minimum wage: “I was a property owner. I wouldn’t want to have government come in and tell me how to manage my property. I’m unhappy enough with them telling me what I have to pay my employees and x, y and z.”
I would not rank Nancy, and Luther’s willingness to actively campaign with her (Luther and Nancy are both encouraging their supporters to rank them 1 and 2) is at the top of a long list of reasons why his self-presentation on his website is disingenuous as hell.
If you look just at Luther’s website, he seems less awful than you’d expect: he talks about alternatives to police response for nonviolent crimes, the People’s Climate Equity Plan (I assume he means The People’s Climate and Equity Plan from MN350), and some other progressive-sounding stuff. Here’s where the rubber meets the road, though, as Luther would say.
- He’s actively campaigning with Nancy Ford, friend to Republicans, and encouraging his supporters to rank her second.
- An April fundraiser for Luther was hosted by Jackie Cherryhomes, Steve Minn (more on Minn here), and Steve Cramer of the Downtown Council; the point of contact was (documented asshole and former campaign manager for liar Mickey Moore) Alex Minn. More recently he had a fundraiser hosted in part by Carol Becker. The people embracing Luther are among the absolute worst people in Minneapolis politics.
- When he thinks he’s among friends (by which I mean landlords), he will say that he thinks Minneapolis can solve its financial problems by cutting the budget for bike lanes, which ludicrous on multiple levels. The fact that he dramatically changes his stance depending on who he’s talking to should be a warning sign to literally everyone who thinks he’s an acceptable candidate.
- Luther is completely unambiguous on his call with the landlords that he will oppose any form of rent control or rent stabilization. Again, in other contexts, he’s all mealy-mouthed about bringing everyone together to figure out the right numbers blah blah etc. (To be fair, he was also blunt about this at the Ward 12 forum, saying that rent control is unnecessary in Minneapolis.)
Anyway, just to reiterate, Luther is conservative, his friends are terrible, and you cannot and should not trust his stance on any issue.
In some wards Aurin would absolutely be the centrist option: she wants to bring up police staffing to meet the minimums required by the charter (rather than pointing out that this requirement is bullshit and should be removed from the charter), for example, and while she’s open to rent control it’s clearly with caveats (“Rent Stabilization is not the silver bullet for addressing the housing crisis but prevents predatory rent hikes which are happening now in our city and are displacing the most vulnerable in our community. I support new construction exemptions and creating a system to support small landlords in our city. I have not committed to any other feature because I want to ensure that Ward 12 residents have a voice in the policy-making process.” — I should note, I have a lot of doubts about rent control, especially as it was implemented in St. Paul, so I like her policy here more than a lot of the other people I’ve endorsed.)
Aurin’s endorsements are the polar opposite of Luther’s (the DFL, Take Action MN, and a bunch of elected officials I like). For that alone, I view her as the obvious choice. I would enthusiastically vote for Aurin Chowdhury if I lived in Ward 12. I would not rank either of the other two.
I have a book coming out this fall, in November! Liberty’s Daughter is near-future SF about a teenage girl on a libertarian seastead. A lot of it was originally published as short fiction in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. You can pre-order it in either book or ebook format from whatever you like.
I do not have a Patreon or Ko-Fi, so if you’d like make a donation to encourage my work, check out this first-year art teacher at Lucy Laney who is raising money to provide easels, drying racks, and art materials for her students. (Previously: a Music teacher at North High trying to replace the drum heads of the drums used by the drumline students. Funded!)
Will Tell Stories For Food 
I’m in another ward so have no direct interest in W12. But bullet voting, even if Chowdhury is likely to get a majority of first-choice votes, makes sense only if you think all other candidates are equally awful. In the event she’s eliminated, your ballot is exhausted, as you know, and the other voters will choose for you.
Naomi, Your work is invaluable. I love your direct phrasing and specifics that illustrate. Thank you.
For your information. Some “random info” about affordable housing in Mpls.
In the Bryn Mawr neighborhood we have a new development with approx. 350 units. 100 market rate apartments for seniors (over 55?) 100 affordable apartments for seniors. The rest are all ages and all market rate: loft apartments and three story town houses.
Details & the issues: Many of the market rate apartments have balconies, none of the affordables have balconies. The market rate apartment building has amenities. These amenities are not available to the tenants in the affordable bldg. My observation/opinion: sounds like current day segregation to me. Because developers have to make their money so affordable means cut back on quality? And access? Are we building new 2040 “projects” in 2023? Higher density than originally touted (sold) to the neighborhood. FYI These projects are called Wirth on the Woods. Kai
Kai Michels Ms. she/her kmichels@pro-ns.net 612-598-6390 24 Russell Av S Minneapolis MN 55405
>
This is my ward, and I’m not sure what choice I’m going to make. (I’m not particularly happy with the choices the DFL has had on offer on our ward’s ballots of late. They have won because the other people on the ballot were wacky, conservative, or dumb enough to take bad money in order to have a fighting chance. But they haven’t done much except make happy noises about their self-declared accomplishments since then. While the city and the neighborhoods in the ward have continued to suffer and decline in subtle but important ways.)
The problem I have here is the idea of voting for someone I’d never heard of until they moved to the ward, and in short order filed to run. And, more, voting for some who didn’t live in Minneapolis and in a neighborhood affected by everything that happened in 2020 and its aftermath. They can’t really represent most of us, credibly. They’ll just be talking at us, and for us. We don’t need more lip service, or utopianism. We don’t need yet another representative who only listens to their supporters, which are not as broad and deep as one might assume from the DFL etc endorsements.
I know Nancy well enough to know she’s a crank, but an honest crank. With a real stake and history in the neighborhood, doing things like getting the lightrail platform cleaned once in a while etc etc. (And fixed my jacket with an honest bid and good handiwork. Which is rare enough these days.) But she hasn’t done a great job of running a campaign.
All your reasons above aside, I’d vote for Aurin over the others because she’s been a council aide, and she is a council aide during this transition to the nonsense strong mayor system. She’ll be more effective much faster than any of the other candidates possibly could be.
In the flyer for Luther that came to our house, Stonewall DFL was listed as one of his endorsements, but on he’s not listed on the Stonewall DFL endorsements page. Aurin is.
When Luther’s supporter knocked on our door, I told her he wasn’t progressive enough for me, and the “in this ward? Really?” Vibes were strong.
Following up on my previous comment, the mailers (3) that came from/for Luther today are all awash in cops=safety language with not a shred of nuance, which would have lost him my vote if he ever had it, but the thing that’s bugging me is now he’s claiming endorsement from OutFront Action, but their website hasn’t posted anything but the date of Tuesday’s election in over a year. Does anyone know if they list endorsements anywhere else? Do they even endorse for city council seats?