Minnesota DFL revokes Omar Fateh’s endorsement for Minneapolis mayor

The Minnesota DFL took the unprecedented step Thursday of revoking the local party’s endorsement of state Sen. Omar Fateh in the Minneapolis mayor’s race, citing “substantial failures in the convention’s voting process.”

Fateh, a democratic socialist challenging Mayor Jacob Frey, won the endorsement at the end of a Minneapolis DFL convention in July that saw dozens of challenges, delays and miscounted votes. The local party’s endorsement of Fateh raised his profile and brought comparisons to New York lawmaker and fellow democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, who won the mayoral primary in New York City.

On Thursday, the state DFL’s Constitution, Bylaws and Rules Committee released a report that found that the electronic system used by the Minneapolis branch of the party at its convention was “substantially flawed.” The first ballot in the mayoral endorsing contest was undercounted by 176 votes, the state party said.

As a result, candidate DeWayne Davis was improperly dropped from contention when he should have made it to the second ballot, the report said. For those reasons, the committee concluded that the first and second rounds of voting for the mayoral endorsement “must be disregarded in [their] entirety.”

The decision means Fateh will no longer be identified as the DFL-backed candidate in the race. He also won’t have access to party lists of voters and other resources.

Graham Faulkner, Fateh’s co-campaign manager, admonished the state DFL committee for its decision. He said that “28 mostly out-state, establishment Democrats, including many Frey donors and supporters, met privately and voted to overturn the will of Minneapolis residents.”

“Our campaign sees this for what it is: disenfranchisement of thousands of Minneapolis caucus-goers and the delegates who represented all of us on convention day. The establishment is threatened by our message. They are scared of a politics that really stands up to corporate interests and with our working class neighbors,” Faulkner said in a statement.

The move is expected to deepen the schism between the party’s left flank and its more moderate members. In Minneapolis, more progressive members have been reshaping the City Council but have been unable to oust the more moderate Frey, who is seeking a third term.

Frey said in a statement he was glad “this inaccurate and obviously flawed process was set aside.”

“I am proud to be a member of a party that believes in correcting our mistakes,” Frey said. “I look forward to having a full and honest debate with Senator Fateh about our city’s future, with the outcome now resting squarely where it should — with all the people of Minneapolis.”

Fateh won the Minneapolis DFL’s support in the convention’s final minutes when a raise-your-hands style vote was called after it appeared many of Minneapolis Frey’s supporters had left the convention floor. Earlier in the evening, Fateh beat Frey 328 to 227 in the first round of balloting, coming short of the 60% threshold needed to secure the endorsement.

The convention fell into disarray after the first ballot because the electronic voting system got bogged down, resulting in faulty data.

Minneapolis City Council Member Linea Palmisano, who supported Frey and left the voting floor toward the end of the convention, also said she saw individuals picking up the delegate badges she and others had returned, and waving them as part of the final “show-of-hands” vote that clinched it for Fateh.

Along with revoking Fateh’s endorsement, the state DFL committee barred the Minneapolis DFL from holding another endorsing convention this year. It also placed the Minneapolis DFL on probation for two years and said it must be supervised by the state DFL’s executive committee during that period.

The Minneapolis DFL must submit best practices and compliance plans to the state party for approval, and establish “that it is capable of acting in accordance with standard DFL principles and practices.”

After the Minnesota Star Tribune broke the news of the revoked endorsement, DFL Chair Richard Carlbom issued a statement about the committee’s findings and called for party unity.

“Now it’s time to turn our focus to unity and our common goal: electing DFL leaders focused on making life more affordable for Minnesotans and holding Republicans accountable for the chaos and confusion they’ve unleashed on Minnesotans,” Carlbom said Thursday.

But Fateh supporters in Minneapolis and beyond were outraged.

State Sen. Jennifer McEwen, DFL-Duluth, said she thinks the decision to revoke the endorsement will hurt the party more than it will hurt Fateh. She endorsed Fateh’s campaign for mayor.

“It really is a kind of betrayal,” McEwen said. “I worry about people just leaving the party, or I worry about a fissure within the party.”

Minneapolis City Council President Elliott Payne, who supports Fateh for mayor, called the news “deeply troubling” and said it will have “reverberations beyond the city election this year.”

“When the donors don’t get the outcome that they want through the party process, they go to a super-party process outside of the norm to try to reverse the decision of the delegates,” Payne said of the state DFL’s move.

“Our party’s integrity would be undermined if we allow an endorsement won by cheating, favoritism and excluding votes to stand,” Palmisano said.