Four candidates for Minneapolis mayor weigh in on major issues facing the city
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During the last two mayoral terms, the city of Minneapolis has weathered the killing of George Floyd by a city police officer, controversy over how to handle homeless encampments, concerns about crime and a recent mass shooting at a school and church that killed two children.
With all this in the back of their minds, Minneapolis voters will choose a mayor and all 13 members of the city council this year. Early voting kicks off Friday and operates until the day before Election Day, which falls on Tuesday, Nov. 4.
There are 14 registered candidates challenging two-term incumbent Mayor Jacob Frey, most of whom aren’t actively campaigning or fundraising. But Frey’s three main opponents — Jazz Hampton, DeWayne Davis and Omar Fateh — are hoping to use the city’s ranked-choice voting system to deny the mayor a third term, urging their supporters not to list Frey on their ballots.
DeWayne Davis is a minister and former congressional aide. Davis said the city needs a mayor who works with the Minneapolis City Council, rather than competes against it. Davis said he realizes that he won’t always win over the council, but that he will work to maintain respect and trust even when he loses.
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“We can show the rest of the nations and cities of this nation what it looks like to be a functioning, thriving democracy, in a nation that's losing its democratic heritage,” Davis said. “In a nation that is fighting an administration that does not believe in the rule of law, we will be showing the rest of the cities not only how you resist, but how you build a functioning democracy to serve your people.”
Attorney Jazz Hampton is CEO of the app TurnSignl, which provides real-time legal advice during traffic stops. Hampton said he believes the mayor is a good person and hard worker, but that his disputes with the city council have prevented the city from progressing.
“It's time for a fresh chapter in our city, someone that can bring with them a sense of optimism and excitement for the entire city, for that new chapter, and to push us forward on these topics of public safety, affordable housing, the economic vitality of our city,” Hampton said. “We're going to move forward in a new way, without any of the political baggage or gridlock that currently exists.”
State Sen. Omar Fateh represents south Minneapolis in the state Legislature and is endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America. Fateh said he’s been disappointed by what he sees as Frey’s failure to reform police after George Floyd’s killing and his opposition to worker-friendly policies like the labor standards board. Fateh has campaigned on his experience in the state Senate and his work supporting groups like renters and low-wage workers.
“We've seen two terms, seven years going on eight years, of broken promises and endless vetoes,” Fateh said. “We have a mayor whose concerns lie with protecting the wealthy and the well-connected and not working class people in our vulnerable communities. And so people are ready for change.”
Frey is strongly contesting these challengers, having raised more money than all other candidates still in the race combined. Political Action Committees that support and oppose Frey are active and are expected to pump hundreds of thousands of dollars into the election.
Frey said under his leadership Minneapolis has seen gains in affordable housing, reductions in crime and increased recruitment of police officers.
“Over the past five years, we've faced unprecedented adversity head on, and while challenges of big cities certainly remain, we're in the midst of a great Minneapolis comeback,” Frey said.
Frey said he's learned from his experiences presiding over the city for the last two terms.
“I use those lessons every single day,” Frey said. “I'm running for one final term here to get the job done, and to lead Minneapolis in the right direction.”
Other candidates include DFLer Brenda Short and the Socialist Workers Party’s Kevin Dwire. The ballots will also list candidates Laverne Turner, Alejandro Richardson, Kevin Ward, Charlie McCloud, Xavier Pauke, Andrea Revel, Adam Terzich, Troy A. Peterson and Jeffrey Alan Wagner.
Note: Questions and answers are excerpts from MPR News interviews with each candidate.
How would you address the intersecting crises of homelessness, addiction and mental health? And what’s your strategy to deal with encampments?
Jazz Hampton: Hampton said his experience serving on the board of Catholic Charities Twin Cities has reinforced the importance of a housing first solution to homelessness. He also said the city needs to add more staff to the city’s homelessness outreach team and better integrate social services.
“It's not about sweeps; it's about solutions,” Hampton said. “If people refuse services that you're offering, let's get better services that they are more excited about or continue to go time and time again until we can convince them that we can present a better opportunity than is currently there.”
DeWayne Davis: Davis said police should be present as the encampments are “depopulated,” but that using law enforcement to sweep camps just moves the problem elsewhere and disconnects homeless people from services.
“Are we working with the city council to appropriate a certain amount of resources to retain providers, providers of human needs, substance use disorder counselors, mental health counselors?” Davis said. “You have to appropriate some real dollars to doing that. And so the goal would be that as soon as we see the encampment pop up, or even we just see a congregation of homeless people, that we can call all those providers to spring into action and put those people into case management.”
Omar Fateh: Fateh said Frey has failed to make a dent in homelessness during his seven years in office, despite his promise in 2017 to eliminate homelessness within five years. He blamed the mayor for the plight of residents in neighborhoods around encampments, who have reported violence, drugs and harassment.
“We know that we need a housing-first approach to deal with this in a humane and compassionate way, connecting folks to low-barrier job entry, to housing, to shelter, partnering with not only the city, but with our county and with our state to make sure that we have the funds and resources to get this done,” Fateh said. “[Frey] doesn't have any intent to have a plan, besides bulldozing folks block by block – we think that's inhumane.”
Jacob Frey: Frey cited a statistic from Hennepin County that shows a 33 percent drop in unsheltered homelessness in the county since 2020, which he said shows his approach is making some progress.
Frey said the city’s homeless response team works with Hennepin County to get people into shelter or homes and enroll unhoused people in culturally-sensitive services and addiction treatment. But he said the city has a responsibility to close homeless encampments that endanger the public.
“I'm the one that gets the briefings saying that a 12-year-old girl is being trafficked. I'm the one that gets the briefing that says that in a very short period of time, a retaliation shooting may take place,” Frey said. “I have an obligation to the city to keep people safe, and once services, shelters, have been offered and offered again, the right thing to do is to not have the large scale homeless encampment.”
What would you do as mayor to make sure housing is plentiful and affordable?
Frey: Frey said he’s helped get the city to the point where it’s producing eight and half times as much deeply affordable housing as before he took office. He believes the focus on building both affordable and market rate housing has helped keep costs down in Minneapolis compared to other cities around the country.
“That has been a strategy that has been proven to succeed and keep rents down so that more people can afford to live in our city. You know what hasn't worked? Rent control,” Frey said. “We didn't do it because it has failed in every city where it's been tried – and I'm somebody that doesn't follow the politics, we follow the facts.”
Hampton: Hampton doesn’t support rent control as it’s been proposed in Minneapolis, which he said could hinder development. He believes Minneapolis needs to address affordability, partly through examining how current zoning laws are being applied.
“We need to continue to encourage people to be here, encourage local folks to be landlords in this community and actually develop up the amount of affordable housing we have in the city,” Hampton said.
Davis: Davis supports some rent stabilization policies that are “dynamic and nuanced.” He does believe that supply is key in housing, but that more work could be done to support nonprofit developers who struggle to get access to funds for big projects. He’d also argue at the Legislature that we need more money for the city’s housing trust fund.
“What I would want us to do is to have a real concerted effort where we are trying to expand opportunities and incentivize these public and nonprofit developers to build projects,” Davis said. “One way to do that, of course, is give them access to city-owned property for little to no cost whatsoever.”
Fateh: Fateh has said he’ll push to pass a rent stabilization policy in the city and extend programs like the tenant opportunity purchasing act to build home ownership and try to prevent outside speculators from snapping up housing.
“We need to build much more affordable housing so folks are not spending more than a third of their income on rent,” Fateh said. “We want to make sure that we're continuing to build more affordable housing, real affordable housing and not pricing out our neighbors.”
As mayor, how would you address concerns about violence and property crime in Minneapolis?
Fateh: Fateh said he’d work as mayor to support statewide and national legislation to address gun violence.
“We've seen it in our public schools. We've seen it in our college campuses, and so we’ve got to have a solution to deal with the tragedies that have been occurring,” Fateh said. “We need a mayor that shows up to the Capitol to talk to people and demands better, which hasn't happened the last several legislative sessions.”
Frey: Frey believes the city needs more police officers, despite the fact that they’re seeing increased applications for open positions. He cited city planning and coordination with other local authorities after the unrest in 2020 for the quick law enforcement response following the shooting last month at Annunciation School and Church in south Minneapolis.
“Now is not the time for on-the-job training on that front, now is the time to make sure that we're able to execute a plan to both prevent these instances from happening and respond when they do,” Frey said.
Even though most violent crime is down in Minneapolis, Frey said more work remains to be done.
“We’ve got to do the work around violence prevention, which is happening. We’ve got to do the work around mental health response, which is happening, and we’ve got to do the work to make sure that we've got a properly staffed police department,” Frey said.
Hampton: Hampton said he would push for assault rifle and large capacity magazine bans in the city of Minneapolis, which would need legislative approval. He also said he’ll work to improve the relationship between Minneapolis police and residents.
“We need more police officers, and we need to ask police officers to do less things,” Hampton said. “The amount of calls they have to go to, the amount of things that we expect them to do on a day-to-day basis, it's too much, and that drives officers out of our city, it prevents new officers from coming in.”
Davis: Davis said the city needs more police officers, especially those who have roots in the city. He also wants to invest in violence interrupters and rebuild the city government’s relationships with neighborhood groups.
“We really do need our public safety commissioner to be the lead of a comprehensive violence intervention and reduction plan that is shared across offices and agencies and with the county,” Davis said. Minneapolis needs a “plan that is refreshed every single year with new information, with information we gain from that data evaluation we've been doing, certainly with data from the police about what's going on, but with everybody working from the same page.”
How would you respond as mayor if Minneapolis is targeted for federal intervention by President Donald Trump?
Davis: Davis said he’d use the city attorney’s office to aggressively challenge efforts to station U.S. National Guard troops in the city and other actions by the Trump administration. He’d also like the city to work closely with the state attorney general to legally challenge federal interventions.
“Not only are we being attacked illegally, but we are holding this administration accountable together,” Davis said. “We are finding actions that we can take to the court for injunctive relief, or to sue, every opportunity that we get to fight back and resist what's going on because it is illegal.”
Fateh: Fateh said the city needs to work with state and county officials to stand up to demands from the federal government, as well as partner with community organizations to train residents about their rights.
“We've seen the hostile federal government tackle or go after our public institutions, our public colleges, picking up our undocumented students in the middle of the night,” Fateh said. ‘We know now that we have an administration that's going to try to force you to sacrifice your values…and we need a mayor to stand up against that.”
Frey: Frey said his administration is preparing for a number of possible scenarios, and is taking action to preemptively sue the Trump administration along with attorneys general, governors and mayors from across the country.
“Some of the actions that Trump has taken in a number of different cities are flat out illegal and or unconstitutional, and we are taking the necessary legal action ahead of time, preparing briefings and memos to make sure that we are prepared when, in fact, something does happen,” Frey said.
Hampton: As mayor, Hampton said he’d work to ensure the city was in the loop on federal actions like the controversial raid in early June near the intersection of Lake Street and Bloomington Avenue in south Minneapolis.
“Do I think that Minneapolis police officers should be there at Lake and Bloomington? I actually do,” Hampton said. “I think their boots should be facing in the right direction, doing the job of protecting the residents of Minneapolis.”
Five years after George Floyd’s death, what still needs to be done to change policing in Minneapolis?
Hampton: Hampton said provisions of the federal consent decree dropped after opposition by the Trump administration should be written into the state consent decree to provide court oversight.
“Let's put it on paper and actually put some teeth behind it to ensure that we don't let it slide,” Hampton said.
Davis: Davis said Frey hasn’t done enough to add the requirements in the now-dismissed federal consent decree to the court-enforced agreement with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights.
“If we just keep checking the box, or if we keep just doing enough to get past the monitor and the courts, we're going to end up having another George Floyd incident,” Davis said. “We need leadership to work on that court enforceable settlement agreement, to set expectations to the chief of police and the police department, but also to let the residents know whether we are meeting those things, not just the letter of it, but the spirit of it, too.”
Fateh: Fateh said the city needs to beef up funding for alternatives to policing like behavior crisis response teams, who help people experiencing mental health crises.
“We know that we can take half of those [911] calls off of their plate so that they can be ready and able to address violent crime, which, by the way, is what I've been hearing from law enforcement at the Capitol,” Fateh said. “We’ve got to make sure that those alternatives are fully funded and make sure that every single resident when they call 911, they get the appropriate response at the right time.”
Frey: Frey said he’s “committed to every single line” of both the court-enforced settlement agreement between the city and the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and the now derailed federal consent decree with the U.S. Department of Justice. He said that the city will meet its obligations under the agreements, and that city staff have been teaching and training officers on the new policies.
“We’ve got to make sure that they're held accountable when they don't meet the standards that we're insisting on, and that they're held up as a good example when they do meet those standards,” Frey said of officers. “Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we want people on the street to feel the difference, we want them to see the trust that is being built out.”
