I wrote about this race in the primary. On the ballot now:
Marion Greene (Incumbent, DFL-endorsed)
Abdihakim Arabow Ibrahim
I took a closer look at Abdihakim once the race had narrowed. He’s an engineer and a member of the St. Louis Park school board. A detail about him I find kind of interesting is that he’s endorsed by State Senator Ron Latz (SD 46) and joined him in condemning the planned event with Hasan Piker that Ilhan Omar and Minnesota Senator Omar Fateh have organized for next week. This is not usually where I’d expect a Somali-American politician to stand.
If you look at both websites they’re largely in favor of the same stuff, but looking at Abdihakim’s Facebook, his complaints about Marion are a lot more clear. I’m going to go through the points where they diverge, or where Abdihakim attacks Marion.
- Marion Greene (and the whole board) last year voted for a 49% raise for themselves; then withdrew that proposal and passed a 5% raise, instead. Abdihakim has made a big deal out of this, demanding that Marion apologize. The old salary was $122,225 a year and had been frozen at that level since 2016; adjusted for inflation to 2025 levels the salary would have been $167,564.37, which to be fair is lower than the proposed $182,141 but if your salary were a political football that got debated in public and you hadn’t had a raise in a decade, you’d probably try to get ahead of inflation, too. I hate this debate, honestly. This is a job. I want politicians to be able to afford the same stuff as mid-level corporate managers and I don’t want them to have to come from family money. Frankly, I think it’s a problem that state legislators and city school board reps earn as little as they do. I think this is a bogus issue.
- Marion Greene pushed back on the Hennepin County Sheriff’s office going $11 million over budget and questioned why they were doing the work of city police departments. This got seized upon by Sheriff Dawanna Witt as an opportunity to act persecuted. I don’t like Dawanna Witt (though her opponent wouldn’t be an improvement) and think it’s 100% part of the job of Hennepin County Commissioners to push back on departments, especially law enforcement departments, blowing through their budgets. Abdihakim has attacked her over this — although he also doesn’t want to write the Sheriff’s office a blank check. His website says he will “support the critical role of law enforcement, such as the Hennepin County Sheriff, in protecting our communities — while expecting agencies to stay within their allocated budgets.”
- Abdihakim thinks that as a long-time incumbent, Marion Greene should have gotten HERC closed by now. He has promised to “set a date for closing HERC permanently, along with a day-after plan for the economic and environmental impacts — no more delays or throat-clearing” within 100 days of taking office. Marion’s website says she supports “ethical closure of HERC,” by which I think she means, she’s in favor of closing it once the county can figure out something else to do with the trash, because hauling it out to a landfill is not in fact a net gain, environmentally speaking. If Abdihakim has said what he would do with the garbage, I wasn’t able to find it.
ETA 10/22: WedgeLive dropped an interview with Abdihakim, which you can watch here. (He also interviewed Marion a few months ago and you can watch that here.) I also heard from a friend who who said Marion’s constituent services have been terrible, which is a significant strike against her.
Anyway. If I lived in the district, I would vote for Marion. If you’re still trying to make up your mind, I will note that there is a planned debate sponsored by the Theater of Public Policy happening on October 26th.
This seems like a good year to fundraise for a trans nonprofit, so I’m fundraising this year for TIGERRS. I don’t have a Patreon, and a fundraiser lets me see in a tangible way that people value my work, which is really helpful as a motivator. (This project is a lot of work.) I raised $7,230 during primary season so I’ve raised the goal.
I also have a new book out! Obstetrix is about an obstetrician who gets kidnapped by a cult because they want someone on hand to deliver their babies; it’s a story about enduring, surviving, and not giving up. You can buy it anywhere fine books are sold, and I’ve been doing my best to keep Uncle Hugo’s, Moon Palace, and Dreamhaven Books in signed copies.
