Readers Write: City election results, Trump’s ‘Great Gatsby’ party

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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Jacob Frey has won a third term as mayor of Minneapolis, and with it a chance to display more growth in the role than he did in his second. Perhaps he can see issues less as win-lose propositions and more as opportunities to listen, learn, find common ground, build alliances and trust and, by doing so, better pursue what is best for the city. One can only hope. The same can certainly be said for the City Council, which would do well to focus on practical approaches to improving city services for all its residents, not on theater unrelated to members’ elected office.

Various shenanigans made it harder than ever for voters to choose candidates based on actual policy positions. Voters were urged to use ranked-choice voting to express who they were against, not simply who they were for. PACs arrived in force and brought the same kind of nastiness to local races previously seen only in larger ones. All those additional dollars were spent to misrepresent issues and distort positions, throw shade on the opposition and manipulate rather than educate voters. One could do worse than tuning them out entirely.

Only voters enter the voting booth on Election Day, however, not PACs and their dollars, and the voters chose Frey for mayor. Some concessionary comments reflected this understanding, honoring the voters and their unique role. Jazz Hampton and DeWayne Davis offered congratulations to the winner, reflecting a sincere commitment to supporting both the mayor and the city. No such words from Sen. Omar Fateh, at least according to this paper’s coverage. That’s too bad, and the sort of thing voters remember.

With a win for Frey well short of a mandate and a tempering of the progressive wing of the council, the voters seem to be saying: Focus on the work we pay you to do. Learn how to get along. And get more done for the city of Minneapolis.

John Ibele, Minneapolis

An off-year election: the kind often marked by low turnout and voter apathy. But that wasn’t the case in Minneapolis this year. There is a clear divide, an internecine struggle going on: between the left-wing edge, orchestrated by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), and the more centrist Democrats (the DFL).

My family has lived and worked in this town for 150 years. Minneapolis history holds many shifting patterns, of good and evil, hard times and better times. Most people, including my family, have come here as immigrants, from other countries, other places, hoping to make a better life. And it seems to me — when reflecting on that local history — that Minneapolis is facing some of its toughest challenges in a long time.

My own view is that the main challenges to our common welfare are not coming so much from the criminals, the impoverished and the homeless among us. Nor are they coming so much from those diabolical Halloween caricatures of the rich and powerful that are fed to the public — a steady dose of attack propaganda by the mantras of the far left.

We are divided against ourselves and feuding, while large swathes of greater Minnesota, united by ice-cold MAGA fanaticism, observe from the sidelines and gloat.

The real challenges are coming from a federal administration that is systematically betraying (1) the rule of law, (2) constitutional human rights and equality and (3) one simple, fundamental, civic ethos: mutual respect and responsibility for one another.

Henry Gould, Minneapolis

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I congratulate the Minneapolis election officials who provided a smooth voting process, especially those who help us understand the unique complexities of ranked-choice voting. I congratulate the winners; I thank all of those who ran; and now, back to the difficult process of governing our city. To Frey and those elected to the Minneapolis City Council, please, please learn from the past. If we are to make progress on the critical issues facing our city, as you all so clearly described in your campaigns, it will require the hard work of listening to one another and a genuine willingness to work together. Frey is quoted in the Nov. 6 paper saying voters made a statement about the leadership they value, “good, thoughtful governance, where you work with your constituents and you love your city more than your ideology.” While we have yet to hear from the various council members on their thoughts for this new term, the opportunity for the mayor and the council to work together effectively is present once again.

Minneapolis citizens are watching closely, and we demand that you, all of you, listen, collaborate and move our city forward. Refusing to work together while blaming the other side is no longer an option.

Susan Sisola, Minneapolis

Mandate, schmandate! If Frey truly had a mandate, he would have won on the first ballot. I didn’t so much vote “for” him as much as I voted against the other candidates and the current City Council. Congratulations on your victory. Now, stop believing your own press and get to work for the people.

Ginger Downing, Minneapolis

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Thank you, Melvin Carter, for your eight years of service as mayor of St. Paul. Congratulations, Rep. Kaohly Her. I will deem your first term as mayor of St. Paul a success if four years from now I can walk the one block from my home to a clean light rail station and hop on the train without fear for my personal safety.

Liz Schading, St. Paul

Congratulations to those Twin Cities communities that chose new leaders with new ideas, and to those new leaders who offer hope for improvements, especially St. Paul’s new mayor Her. Unfortunately, Minneapolis was not so fortunate in retaining an incumbent Frey and a controversial City Council often opposed to his initiatives. Frey was the only somewhat rational choice, given the contentious nature of his competition. It is hard to get excited over the snail’s pace of progress the last eight years on homelessness, crime, addictions, failed businesses, fraud, downtown and uptown blight, traffic congestion, failing public schools and ever-higher property taxes.

At least we can look forward to our new and different depleted hometown team, the Minnesota Twins, through yet another year of “rebuilding.”

Michael Tillemans, Minneapolis

Enjoyed reading contributing columnist Ka Vang’s column on the Mar-a-Lago “Great Gatsby”-themed Halloween party (“Americans go hungry while Trump parties like Gatsby,” Strib Voices, Nov. 6). The general consensus is that President Donald Trump is Jay Gatsby; however, that is wrong. Gatsby represents the MAGA movement, enthralled with the trappings of the Gilded Age and a desire to be part of it. Trump is Tom Buchanan, a person whose cruelty knows no bounds. In the end, Nick Carraway, the narrator of the story says this about Tom and Daisy:

“They were careless people ... they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”