This one is so straightforward (there’s only one candidate I would consider voting for, and spoiler, it’s Aisha Chughtai) and yet so messy (there’s somehow a lot to say about several of her opponents, for all of those who want more than “omg just vote for Aisha Chughtai.”)
On the ballot:
Aisha Chughtai (DFL-endorsed, Incumbent)
Nasri Warsame (DFL, but he’s no longer allowed to even try to get endorsed by them)
Bruce Dachis (DFL)
Greg Kline (Abolish Bike Lanes) (not making that up, that’s what he listed as his party)
Again, the tl;dr here is that you should vote for Aisha Chughtai if you’re in Ward 10.
Greg Kline (Abolish Bike Lanes)
Greg doesn’t have a website. I did find his Facebook and his LinkedIn, and I’m sure you’ll be shocked to know that he’s a Boomer who shared an anti-masking meme back in 2021. Also, if you think bike lanes should be abolished, you’re a bad person.
Bruce Dachis (DFL)
Bruce was in the news in 2021 because, you remember that lawsuit complaining about how confusing the public safety city question was, filed by Don and Sondra Samuels along with some other dude? He was the other dude. There were some questions raised (on Twitter) at the time about whether he actually lived in Minneapolis; allegedly he lives in this weird little metal box on top of the building where his office is. (I’m just going to say, there is no way he actually lives in that weird little metal box with his wife and stepdaughter, but they may have some other residence that’s legitimately in the ward. He and his wife got married in April and I found their wedding registry, there is NO WAY all those towels would even fit in that weird little box.)
On his website, he describes himself as a small business owner. Whenever someone calls themself a small business owner I try to figure out what sort of business they own, exactly? When I found Bruce’s LinkedIn and saw that it listed him as President of “Asset Accumulation Corporation” from 1984 to the present, I thought, “oh, someone made a fake LinkedIn for him as a joke,” but I dug a little further, and no: the name of his company literally is Asset Accumulation Corporation. That feels like the sort of corporation the villain runs in a movie based on a DC comic? Anyway apparently he does real-estate-related stuff. On the plus side, while he’s been a landlord (and answered questions about it on Lifehacker a while back) I didn’t find any tenants on Twitter talking about what an absolutely godawful landlord he is, so either he’s better at being a landlord than Scott Graham in Ward 7, or his tenants aren’t on Twitter.
His campaign vision centers cops and policing, says he will “never defund” (for the record, the Minneapolis Police Department has not been defunded) and mentions law enforcement again under homelessness (“We must also give law enforcement the resources they need to stop the flow on fentanyl into our communities” — what resources does he imagine will do this? he doesn’t say). He doesn’t mention transit anywhere, although under small businesses he says “we must make it easier for small businesses to operate by […] listening to small business owners before making key decisions” which I assume means “we must provide parking, endless free parking, and never consider removing parking for any reason ever,” because he sure seems like a Save Our Parking sort of guy.
ETA: He went on a right-wing radio show hosted by the MyPillow guy’s lawyer. Do not be fooled into thinking this guy is a Democrat.
Nasri Warsame (DFL, but he’s no longer allowed to even try to get endorsed by them)
So this guy wants to be a cop but hired as his campaign manager someone who worked as a consultant for Feeding Our Future. He starts his website by saying “actions speak louder than words” but this was the guy whose supporters started a brawl during the DFL convention while Aisha Chughtai was trying to make her speech.
I’m going to start by talking about the convention incident. Back in 2016, I wrote a “political conventions for beginners” piece aimed at people who might consider going to theirs for the first time. Going to a convention normally means that in exchange for giving up a perfectly good Saturday to go to a meeting somewhere like a high school auditorium, you get a somewhat outsized piece of political influence (maybe). Normally, they’re meetings, they’re kind of tedious, and they operate by a set of rules as specific and formal as a sports tournament. If you want to compete in a sports tournament, you are expected to learn the rules, and follow them. If you show up at a tennis tournament and want to kick soccer balls into the net instead of playing tennis, you sure will disrupt the tournament, and then you’ll be ejected and banned.
Aisha Chughtai and her supporters did absolutely nothing wrong at the convention. They got up on the stage so Aisha could make a speech; bringing a bunch of supporters up to stand behind you during this speech is completely standard. She went first because of a coin flip, Nasri Warsame was going to get his turn shortly and could have brought all his supporters up if he wanted; everything she did here was totally normal.
The other thing about a convention is that it’s very common for delegates to show up not knowing what to do or how it works, and it’s totally on the candidates and their campaigns to help them understand what to do. My advice in my “conventions for beginners” essay is, if you’re new to this, put on your chosen candidate’s t-shirt (it’s how they find you!), identify the people running the floor (they’ll have clipboards), and just follow instructions. Warsame had no idea himself what was going on (according to his excuse-laden apology at an event last week) but at the bare minimum he could have gotten up and signaled to his supporters to sit back down and chill the hell out when people first started to get wound up. He knew perfectly well it was going to be his turn next to speak! In his pseudo-apology, he said that if he’d known he would be held responsible for the actions of his supporters, he’d have come prepared to take action. Dude, of course you will be held responsible for the actions of your supporters. Especially when you were standing right there and opted to just stand around! What the hell do you even think “leadership” means?
In and of itself this would be a reason to not support him. The fact that “wants to be a cop” is central to how he presents himself: another absolute dealbreaker. But I did a bunch of research on his campaign manager back in May, and I might as well share that, too. I think Warsame did fire Abshir Omar eventually, but he was still working for Warsame’s campaign in June, and the Reformer’s reporting on his involvement with Feeding Our Future was a year ago, it was publicly known before Warsame hired him.
Abshir consulted for Feeding Our Future; he participated in a protest when the state first tried to cut off funds to the organization; and he ran a nonprofit, Tasho, that had six sites where they allegedly fed 5,000 kids per day. When I went down this rabbit hole in May, I discovered that the Center for the American Experiment had gotten the addresses of the sites. (The CAE is the absolute goddamn worst but I’m guessing they did not make this information up.) There are a number of addresses that I’m frankly skeptical of but the most eyebrow-raising is 924 3rd Ave NE. This is the address of the office for an income-restricted affordable housing development for seniors or people with disabilities. There are 24 units. Abshir Omar claimed to be feeding 500 children per day from this location. And Nasri Warsame hired him to run his campaign.
Don’t vote for this guy!
Aisha Chughtai (DFL-endorsed, Incumbent)
I really like Aisha! She is a solid, reliable progressive voice and vote on the City Council. She has been a supporter of transit, an advocate for pedestrian and biker safety, and a voice for police accountability and tenants’ rights. I would absolutely vote to re-elect Aisha if I lived in Ward 10.
(I am feeling bad about providing such a brief case for the incumbents I like, but I need to get through a lot of stuff and I’m feeling really, really behind right now.)
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 new Art teacher at Jenny Lind elementary who needs to stock her classroom with supplies — funded!)
Will Tell Stories For Food 