The Minneapolis City Council will likely be more evenly split between moderates and left-leaning council members after progressive candidates won open seats in Wards 7 and 12. These wards represent downtown Minneapolis, Loring Park, Lowry Hill, Bryn Mawr, and Kenwood, as well as the Longfellow and Nokomis neighborhoods.
Incumbents held onto their seats in Wards 1 through 5, which collectively represent Downtown, North, Northeast, and the Seward neighborhoods of Minneapolis, as well as in Wards 9, 11, and 13, which represent slices of south-central and southwest Minneapolis.
In Wards 6, 7 and 8, races were decided by ranked-choice voting, since no candidate received 50 percent of the first-choice votes plus one in Tuesday’s election.
On Wednesday morning, the city tallied the ballots of those who voted for the lowest vote-getters as their first choice and reallocated those votes to their second-choice — and in some cases, third-choice — candidates.
Under ranked-choice, votes are reallocated until a candidate in the race receives 50 percent plus one, or a majority of ballots, whichever comes first.
In Ward 6, Jamal Osman won re-election in a three-way race. In Ward 7, center-left candidate and environmental advocate Katie Cashman bested landlord Scott Graham by 177 first- and second-choice votes.
In Ward 8, incumbent and council president Andrea Jenkins beat challenger and activist Soren Stevenson by 38 first- and second-choice votes, or one-half of one percent.
State law allowed Stevenson to request a publicly funded recount because of how close the results were. But Stevenson’s campaign did not challenge the results and conceded the race on Thursday.
The Ward 6 and 8 races, both of which had four candidates running, underwent two rounds of reallocation. Ward 7, which had three candidates running, underwent one round. The Ward 7 race was decided shortly before 10 a.m. Wednesday morning. The Ward 6 race was decided shortly after that, at around 10:30 a.m. The Ward 8 race was finally decided just before 11:15 a.m.
In Ward 12, community organizer Aurin Chowdhury handily defeated Luther Ranheim and Nancy Ford to succeed outgoing city council member Andrew Johnson. Johnson, who started a new job in October, will step down in the coming days, allowing Chowdhury to begin serving the ward this month. The rest of the candidates will take office in January.
The election results come as the city struggles with how best to address public safety, housing, transportation, and climate change. The loss of more moderate council members who argued for a more prominent police presence signals Minneapolis voters in some neighborhoods want to approach public safety differently, in addition to rent control, affordable housing, homelessness, and climate change.
The successful left-leaning candidates support public safety policies that include a mix of policing, drug, and mental health counseling, as well as social services. Additionally, all of the candidates except for Cashman support some form of rent control, where landlords would be able to increase rents by a set percentage annually. All of the left-leaning candidates also support municipal sidewalk shoveling, as well as bike and transit lanes in a bid to encourage more people to use those options to get around.
Some council members on the left faced controversy. Councilmember Robin Wonsley, who represents Ward 2, won only 67 percent of the vote, even though she ran unopposed. She faced a last-minute write-in candidate, Michael Baskins, who opposes rent control and supports encampment sweeps.
“If Robin and the socialist members have their way with public policy, Minneapolis may well follow a self-destructive path of disinvestment akin to Portland,” predicts Baskins in a Facebook post. “Extreme rent control and a collapse in new housing construction? Bans on clearing homeless encampments with open drug use? Taxpayer-funded sidewalk plowing and ever-increasing similar gimmicks?”
Some candidates who were not endorsed by the Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) criticized those who were DSA-endorsed because the organization failed to initially condemn the attacks perpetrated by Hamas in early October.
Controversy surrounded the Ward 7 race, which was plagued by allegations that Cashman was a socialist and her opponent, Scott Graham, was a racist and an abusive landlord. Cashman is not a socialist and did not seek the DSA endorsement. Graham insisted the 290 violations he garnered as a property manager were “routine” and contended a former tenant who went public with her story about the deplorable living conditions she lived in “has a political ax to grind.”
In the days before the election, representatives from Ken Foxworth’s campaign demanded Graham apologize for comments he made at a fundraiser. Graham did not respond to requests for a response.
Although the city council is now more evenly divided politically, they do not have enough votes to override a policy veto by Mayor Jacob Frey. A veto-proof majority requires a two-thirds vote. In the case of the Minneapolis City Council, that number is nine.
In Saint Paul, Anika Bowie was declared the winner in the Ward 1 city council race after leading with 39.71 percent of first-choice votes. Cheniqua Johnson was declared the winner in the Ward 7 city council race, with 41.15 percent of the vote, after ranked-choice tabulation. As a result, St. Paul’s city council will be made up entirely of young, women of color. In addition, Roslyn Harmon was elected mayor of Golden Valley and the first Somali American elected mayor in Minnesota, Nadia Mohamed, who was elected mayor of St. Louis Park.
Voter turnout in the city council races is markedly lower than in previous years. This year’s turnout is especially low because the only races on the ballot were the city council races. About 33 percent of registered voters cast a ballot in Tuesday’s election, the lowest since 2013.
Because of redistricting to reflect 2020 census changes in the city’s population, council members faced reelection again this year, two years after the 2021 election.
The next Minneapolis election will be the Democratic and Republican primaries on March 5, 2024, to determine the nominee for President. Mayor Frey, as well as all city council members elected on Tuesday, will be up for reelection in November 2025.
| Ward | Unofficial Winner | Alignment |
| Ward 1 | Elliot Payne (i) | Left |
| Ward 2 | Robin Wonsley (i) | Far left |
| Ward 3 | Michael Rainville (i) | Center |
| Ward 4 | Latrisha Vetaw (i) | Center |
| Ward 5 | Jeremiah Ellison (i) | Left |
| Ward 6 | Jamal Osman (i) | Center |
| Ward 7 | Katie Cashman | Center-Left |
| Ward 8 | Andrea Jenkins(i) | Center |
| Ward 9 | Jason Chavez(i) | Far left |
| Ward 10 | Aisha Chughtai(i) | Far left |
| Ward 11 | Emily Koski (i) | Center |
| Ward 12 | Aurin Chowdhury | Far left |
| Ward 13 | Linea Palmisano (i) | Center |
| (i) – incumbent | ||
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