Despite a wave of fundraising for their opponents and strong challenges in several wards, the progressive bloc on the Minneapolis City Council survived election night.
With a key win in Ward 2 and a new face in Ward 8, progressives appeared to hold onto power despite losing Ward 7, where incumbent Katie Cashman lost her bid for a second term to challenger Elizabeth Shaffer.
Results late Tuesday evening showed seven progressives — six of them incumbents — winning seats on the 13-member City Council. Seven seats would be enough to hold a majority but not enough to override a mayor’s veto.
The progressive wing’s biggest loss of the night was Cashman, who conceded in an interview with the Minnesota Star Tribune. “I have no regrets because I ran a very grounded-in-values campaign,” she said. Asked if she was conceding she said, “Absolutely.”
At stake in the election — in which Mayor Jacob Frey was battling for a third term against a challenge from his left — are issues that touch every corner of Minneapolis, from taxes and public safety to housing and homelessness, as well as efforts to bring fresh vitality to Uptown, Nicollet Mall and the riverfront. For the past two years, the bloc of progressive council members has foiled the council’s more moderate faction and Frey.
In 2024, the bloc overrode Frey’s vetoes of a minimum pay rate for rideshare drivers, an Israel-Hamas ceasefire resolution and a carbon emissions fee. The bloc attempted but failed to override Frey’s veto of a new labor standards board and a denial of raises for about 160 high-paid city employees that Frey supported.
Marilyn Matheny, 87, said she voted for Frey and supports him in balancing out some City Council members who she believes are overly liberal.
“It’s to kind of stabilize the very extreme elements on the council,” said Matheny, who was interviewed outside a polling location at the Seward Tower East in south Minneapolis. “I’m not sure I like the direction they’re going, all that while I am very liberal in my politics.”
