The race for Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District seat, currently held by U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, is shaping up to be one of the state’s most interesting in the 2022 midterms. Omar is already facing several Republican candidates — Royce White, Cicely Davis and Shukri Abdirahman — but as of this week, Omar has a new challenger from her own party.
Don Samuels, 72, a community organizer who previously served as a member on the Minneapolis City Council and the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education, announced this week that he would be running to unseat Omar in the DFL primary.
Born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica, Samuels said he made a lifelong commitment to living in low-income communities to help build them up. That’s what he’s been doing since he and his wife decided to move to the North Minneapolis neighborhood they’ve called home for over two decades.
“I have three children with my beautiful wife, Sondra, and we’ve lived in the most challenged community in the city for 25 years. And we did it deliberately, as I felt called…to continue the work of the civil rights movement. And that means, for us, reversing the brain drain from our inner cities … and to be present here for our children, meaning our community’s children.”
Samuels was elected to the Minneapolis City Council in 2003, representing Ward 5, and served there until 2014. In 2013, he ran for mayor following R.T. Rybak’s decision not to seek a fourth term, part of a crowded race eventually won by Samuels’ fellow Council Member Betsy Hodges. He then served a single at-large term on the Minneapolis school board.
During Minneapolis 2021 city elections, he was one of the most prominent figures — if not the most prominent — in the efforts to defeat Question 2, the proposed charter amendment that would have replaced the Minneapolis Police Department with a new Department of Public Safety. (The referendum failed, with about 56 percent of city voters voting against it.)
Samuels said that now is the time for him to run for Congress because he’s concerned about the direction the country is going in, and because he believes Omar’s “style” is “not compatible with the needs of the moment.”
A divide on policing
Though Samuels sides with Omar and other progressives on many things, he differs with her on one high-profile issue: policing.
Omar was an outspoken supporter of Question 2, explaining in a Star Tribune op-ed: “We have an opportunity, once and for all, to listen to those most impacted by police brutality and the communities who have been demanding change for decades.”
Samuels said that just a week after he moved to his North Minneapolis neighborhood years ago, a bullet came through the window of their new house. He said that there was a certain boldness to the people around him, where people would drive through stop lights routinely, for example.
“From our block, we saw children getting traumatized,” Samuels said. “We saw people dying, literally bodies in the street. And we saw our buildings burned…and then you talk about the carjackings — people are living in fear.”
Though Samuels didn’t support the effort to dismantle the MPD in favor of a Department of Public Safety, he also doesn’t believe that the current standard of policing is good enough.
“We can hold both truths at the same time,” Samuels said. “We want MPD to transform their behavior and treat our young men and our children fairly. We wanted justice. But we also wanted protection. Congresswoman Omar could only hold one of those ideas in her mind, and she picked one, to get rid of the police… It’s not either-or. It’s both-and. It’s nuanced, and I find that our congresswoman is not really capable of dealing with nuanced realities.”
Samuels disagrees with the notion, advocated by some progressives, that police departments are beyond reform. He compared reforming the police to the civil rights movement, saying that reform “has to be possible.”
“Can you imagine when people in the South couldn’t walk on the same sidewalk as a Black person and a white person couldn’t drink from the same water fountain? Can’t go to the same schools. Can’t answer a white person as an equal,” Samuels said. “People were thinking that wasn’t possible to change when they had no authority, no right to vote. If we can’t have that optimism in our day…come on, we can do this. And all we have to do is be together, not divided.”
Though Samuels’ stance on policing may set him apart from Omar in this year’s Democratic primary, it won’t make him much different from most Democrats in Washington. Most of the party has stayed away from the “defund the police” rhetoric altogether, and President Joe Biden even said in his State of the Union address last month that he supported giving more money to police departments across the country.
No time for symbolic gestures
Last year, Omar voted against passing the bipartisan infrastructure bill that had widespread support among Democrats. She was joined in her vote by the five other progressive Democrats known as “The Squad,” all of whom said they refused to vote for the bill because there wasn’t a corresponding vote for the spending plan called the Build Back Better Act.
“Passing the infrastructure bill without passing the Build Back Better Act first risks leaving behind child care, paid leave, health care, climate action, housing, education, and a road map to citizenship,” Omar said in a statement after her vote.
Samuels called Omar’s vote on the infrastructure bill — and Omar’s political strategy in general — to be combative rather than collaborative.
“She has the posture of an activist, and speaking truth to power even though she is power, and not really collaborating with her peers, and therefore she’s unable to deliver resources [to the Fifth District],” Samuels said. “Some people go to Washington to make a point. I’m going to go to Washington to make a difference.”
Samuels said he would be more willing to collaborate with Democrats on measures like the infrastructure bill, though he said if there’s an issue that he truly believes in he would break from the party. At the same time, he said it’s more important that the Democratic party vote in unison for the things that its constituents truly want and value.
“One person can do great damage just by insisting on being perfect. The perfect is the enemy of the good,” Samuels said. “And our congresswoman should not be the only person who gets to make a statement at the potential risk of losing resources.”
Though Omar herself did not respond to Samuels’ critique, a senior adviser for her campaign, Connor McNutt, called Samuels’ attacks part of a “misogynistic playbook” that her opponents have used in the past.
“Like many women in politics, Congresswoman Omar is used to having men belittle and diminish her accomplishments as a public servant,” McNutt said in an email. “It’s ironic that Mr. Samuels has chosen to less than 24 hours after the Congresswoman secured $17 million in transformational funding for the 5th District, two weeks after she introduced legislation to reform police departments nationwide by restricting no-knock warrants with Amir Locke’s parents, and a few weeks after she hosted First Lady Jill Biden in Minnesota to celebrate the $550 million she helped secure for childcare as a part of the American Rescue Plan.”
Didn’t take long to play the misogynism card, it seems. If misogynism means questioning her positions on various issues, count me in.
In any event, Rep. Omar has taken a number of controversial positions. I think it’s a very good thing that she will now have the opportunity to tell her side of things in a meaningful election.
Bingo, we have bingo. I would like Rep. Omar to respond with more specifics. It is true some of have been unfair to her; however Don Samuels is not one of them.
Unfair to HER? What about her completely unfounded accusations against her opponent in the last primary, claiming he was a Republican in disguise, and a tool of the Jews? (He is in fact from a family of civil rights activists, and has represented people in housing court, and as far as the anti-semitism — that’s not her first time. Remember her infamous “its’s all about the benjamins”?)
It’s deeply strange to focus on he infrastructure bill, about which subsequent events have proven Omar entirely correct. It was a strategic error to trust Manchin and Sinema to support Build Back Better after they got what they wanted out of the infrastructure bill.
But let’s be frank. Samuels is running, just as he was prominent in the opposition to reorganizing public safety, to make sure that there isn’t too much change and that it doesn’t happen too fast. He is meant to be a friendly face on he status quo money that runs this city.
Omar was correct and wrong. Big bills need to stand on their own merit. Or better yet, make them smaller and vote on the issues on their own.
Minnesota is supposed to do that, by the constitution, but every year there is a huge omnibus bill that gets passed. No one really understands what’s in there.
Didn’t take too long for the comment implying Mr Samuel’s, ……..well we all know what Mr Miller is implying about Mr Samuels.
“He is meant to be a friendly face on the status quo money that runs this city.”
Look at the 13 members of the Minneapolis City Council and point out the 7 that represent “the status quo money that runs this city”.
Here’s your real Boogie Man: elected officials that put their personal agendas like continuity in office and personal financial gain as their top priorities. None more guilty in Minneapolis than Ilhan Omar and the million plus squirrelled away with her new husband.
The question is, will her base rebel? I’m thinking not. Her base is as solid as Trump’s.
The guy who lost his last election?
You’re right. The base doesn’t decide elections. But you got to have it for any chance.
“Look at the 13 members of the Minneapolis City Council and point out the 7 that represent “the status quo money that runs this city”
Rainville
Vetaw
Goodman
Jenkins
Koski
Johnson
Palmisano
Not all of them all of the time but nonetheless.
Well, have known Don & family since the 90’s, we marched feet in the street with him back in the early 2000’s to rid 26th Ave. N of the 24-7-365 drug dealing, it was an continues to be a success, took us 3 years of near every weekend. Choose as you all see fit, but you have a; dedicated/committed/focused/no BS/open minded/balanced/solutions oriented candidate.
It’s a complete failure of reporting to allow this blatantly false rhetoric to get printed unchallenged: “Congresswoman Omar could only hold one of those ideas in her mind, and she picked one, to get rid of the police”. Charter question 2 would not have eliminated police. Stop letting politicians repeat this straw-man unchallenged. You have an obligation, as a news agency, to present the truth, not regurgitate political lies. Do better.
Umm, because Don Samuels is very personally invested in ensuring Don Samuel’s name is in the paper and Don Samuels has access to some form of political power? It will be entertaining to see which bedfellows this particular campaign brings together.
Mr. Samuels seems like a reasonable man, but I don’t like the picture this article paints. Slow, incremental change has done very little for this country. Omar and the “Squad” were correct when they warned us all Manchin wouldn’t keep his promises. We need progressives like Omar in Congress and in the Democratic Party – we already have plenty of moderates/centrists and the party needs balance.
One thing to grapple with… if “Defund the Police” was not such a prominent slogan for the left in 2020, polling on the issue suggests that the Democrats would have picked up more seats in the Senate and House, as had been expected. Then the Senate wouldn’t have been 50-50 and Senator Manchin wouldn’t have sole veto power over the Democrats’ agenda. But Defund the Police was used and was a slogan that was obviously polarizing, and I’m turn it was used with success in Republican campaign literature to defeat Democrats across the country.
Can you list the Democrats who used “Defund the Police” as a campaign slogan? I don’t think there were many, Defund the Police was a slogan used by community groups and protesters, but not Politicians outright. While many may have agreed with fundamental change in the way policing in this country is done, they shied away from the slogan. I know there is a lot of noise around it, but there weren’t candidates using it. Its another of those political myths like Donald won or Bernie supporters cost Hillary the election.
I don’t know how you can feel comfortable with this comment. Minneapolis Council Members Bender and Ellison were out front and furious with this demand.
Whether or not they used it as a “campaign slogan,” were knew where their sympathies lied.
Don Samuels has been strong on suggesting the middle road of both supporting the MPD as it currently stands in terms of its organizational structure, and reforming elements and personalities (or their separation from the MPD) who serve as uniformed officers.
The myopic views of Ellison and Bender looked at the behavior of a fraction of the police force and condemned all employees. This was childish and not indicative of very strong analysts of a problem.
Much of the Minneapolitan society also needs to develop maturity and a sense of peaceful behavior. We have a significant problem with gun violence in this community, and both many officers at MPD are jaded and on edge, as well as families not doing a better job of guiding their youth to behave and to avoid trouble-makers which bring them into possession of illegal and legal firearms and drugs.
Gun violence in Shenzhen, China, where one of my students lives, is unheard of. It is a city of 14+ million people in southeast China. The Chinese citizens and immigrants who I have known should be considered role models to the gangsters and wannabees who are a cancer on our community.
Police officers in this city have a very difficult job to do, and Mr. Samuels understands both this and is a frontline observer of how families in his community fail their children.
Don has been a significant employee of both the PlaySkool and Milton Bradley toy companies. He has a divinity degree from Luther Seminary in Saint Paul, MN, and serves on its board of directors. His brother is a human rights attorney in Jamaica, and they are fond of one another and their respective roles in their communities.
Please do a better job of recollecting the realities of members of my political party who have done unfathomable damage to community and civic relations both here and around the U.S.
ilhan Omar flat out said “defund the police, they are a cancer, no reforming police, get rid of them”. Hard to misinterpret that. Unfortunately for the citizens living in her high crime district, Omar is insulated from that crime and safety is not an issue.
Joe, read Mike Davidson’s comment. We need progressives like Omar so to counter knee-jerk extremist rights who jump on ‘gotcha’ comments without looking into context. Omar, like many of your far-right Republican representatives use attention getters… your boy Trump being the best example of that.
No Dennis everybody needs safe streets to walk. Safety is the number one issue for folks who actually live in high crime areas. For the many who don’t (including Omar), crime and safety are political talking points. Everybody needs to ask one question, which category do I fall into…… I personally listen to those folks who live in high crime areas and their cry for safer streets.
I want the streets to be safer, too. We’ve seen MPD outright murder at least four of our Black neighbors in the past two years with only one of those incidents resulting in any kind of punishment, and none from MPD itself. And no substantive changes to procedure or policy. Get this under control and maybe there would be some respect for the police in the first damn place. They can do their job without killing with impunity. Who else’s neighborhood needs to burn to get that message through to city leadership?
I will choose Omar over Samuels every day, because at least she seems to get this. Don clearly does not.
Jeremy, how many total murders are there in Mpls so far this year? Again, the folks that live in those communities of high crime want more policing not less!
All those who opposed Question 2 owe the people of Minneapolis a detailed plan for how they are going to “fix” the MPD. It was their complaint against supporters, so let’s hear their plan. Since the vote we’ve found that MPD was running a secret program called Operation Safety Net that spied on Journalists and Civil Rights Leaders. We’ve had a scathing audit released that slams MPD and Jacob Frey for their horrible response to the George Floyd protests. The audit was particularly critical of the MPD. The trial of Jaleel Stallings brought forth damning video evidence of MPD officers “hunting” protesters, and anyone else out on the streets, creeping up on them in unmarked vehicles and, without warning, shooting them with “non Lethal” weapons. The video is so bad that Stallings, who was accused of trying to kill cops, he actually SHOT his weapon in the direction of their van, was acquitted of all charges. I could go on, but you get my point. MPD has been a problem for decades, we’ve been hearing about reform all that time and yet here we are. So, please Don, what’s your plan?
Why bother, we know their plan, it’s the same as its always been. Throw together some meaningless committees, stall for time, hope the public gets distracted by something else long enough that the “next” crisis doesn’t actually force them to make changes that might require action and sacrifice from themselves, instead of the people they claim to care about.
And we know Question 2 failed because it explicitly offered no plan: Just the promises of the City Council that if it gets passed, trust us we’ll figure something out, it will be great. Calling out those who opposed Question 2 for a lack of planning is pretty hypocritical.
Nice try, but the hypocrisy lies with those who opposed Question 2, criticizing supporters for having no plan, winning and then presenting no plan of their own. MPD is rotten to its core, that needs to change, the opposition won so its on them to present a plan to fix that. Unfortunately I suspect that their real plan is the Status Quo, after all, for the majority of the population police brutality really isn’t a problem. Sure watching the cold blooded killing of George Floyd was uncomfortable, but that’ll dissipate and when future killings by police happen (we know its going to keep happening) the majority will tut tut about how unfortunate it was, cries for reform will go out, be ignored and everyone will go about their business.
Ahh, a plan!
It ain’t that hard and the Question 2 supporters were gutless to not put one forward:
How about:
The justice department take control of the MPD and cancel the federation’s contract.
Review all MPD officers for fitness to do the job if they are to be retained
Give the rehires new and additional financial incentives both short and long term
Provide significant housing allowances to live in the city and precinct
Fund connections between law enforcement and the schools to encourage career paths and closer links
Fund alternatives like community watch organizations and alternatives to traditional police calls
Automate to eliminate routine traffic stops through technology
Rebuild youth offender alternatives like Glen Lake to get young offenders out of the environment that has caused their initial trouble and into a positive environment: have a gun violation or violence against another, you are sentenced to a high school diploma in a nice school residential campus.
If you watched the Chauvin trial you would have seen every MPD member questioned as a pretty good representative of a major metropolitan police force. Just blowing it up was/is not a solution. An actual plan would have been easily approved, too bad the supporters did not have the courage to offer one.
Your assessment of a plan is fantastic, but what so many people I’ve spoken with who voted “No” don’t understand is without passing Question 2 the city council does not have the power to make the majority of your great ideas reality. The city’s charter is a leash the police union, police chief and now the mayor have on how the department is run and funded. It’s not that there are real issues with crime that in some cases require more policing. It is that real reform is not possible without changes to the city’s charter. Every “cat in a tree” type call will require an “armed peace officer” and there is a poison in the force that we cannot extract under the current rules. There is no flexibility in it.
Question 2 failed because it was poorly written and sold by its proponents. The “No” group was calculated and coordinated. They violated policy and the truth to sway the public. The police chief weighed in and the mayor lied about reforms he claimed to already have made. Angry signs protesters carry claiming we need to “Defund” are a rally call claimed by republicans and moderate democrats to scare inner city white residents and threaten to minorities in high crime areas. Any change will make you unsafe. It works like a charm and makes a great headline. Benjamin Riggs sums that up perfectly. Nobody serious about governing and finding a real solution uses the phrase. It is misleading for anyone else to do so.
As for other points in the article, it is hard to draw a line on misogyny. It may be at play, but Omar’s team should be smarter than to pull that card when it is not the clear motivation for his statements. There are plenty of instances where it is clearly warranted and it diminishes those conversations to direct it at any and all criticism.
I would also like to note that while I do not agree with all things Omar says and do find some of the progressive movement grating and worry it could alienate some democratic voters, I believe they have their place. Sometimes the outside arguments become the starting point of a conversation that otherwise would not have happened. I’m not sure we would have had Obamacare if Bernie had not been calling for single payer. While Obamacare is not the end of the solution, it is something and we can now talk about single payer without being accused of Communism. So maybe “Defunding the Police” gets us back to something like Edward proposes when we can finally get our Question 2 game plan together.
I think I’ll find myself nodding at a lot of your comments, May Lin. Welcome to the comments section.
As a fierce feminist for decades, I take issue with Omar supporters who claim, falsely and to divert our attention, that every criticism of this Congressperson is misogyny.
In my case, when I see her repeatedly cast votes that contradict what I sense is the view of her Fifth District constituents (of which I am one), I will call her out and ask that her supporters finally get to defending the essence of her stances on things, rather than continue to put up ad hominem defenses for her that attack the persons of her critics rather than their reasoning.
Omar is increasingly showing herself not to be a good thinker. Does that matter in a
Congressperson? You bet it does!
I used to excuse her logical failings by guessing that some of that was due to her originally being a Somali speaker, rather than a native English speaker, and that some English stuff just went by her (the sociocultural nuances of her “It’s all about the Benjamins” comment, for horrid example). But she seems unable to perceive any nuance, as Don Samuels has correctly pointed out. She gets one idea, usually fairly rhetorically simple, and just goes with that, no matter the factual context, no matter how twisty and turny her explanations have to be to justify her position.
The simplistic “defund the police” position she took in 2020 has been disastrous, not just for Democrats nationally (the GOP used the phrase as a anti-Dem banner), but for police reform efforts; she lost credibility and thus the chance to help.
We can understand why The Squad and other Congressional progressives voted against the infrastructure bill because the larger bill they’d been promised was withdrawn from immediate consideration. But how do we explain Omar’s increasingly out-of-step positions, positions that are pure theory opposed to any concrete reality?
Many of us are honestly appalled at Omar’s refusal–against her entire party including The Squad–to effectively support Ukraine in its self-defense against Russia’s attack? Her claim that she supports Ukraine does not correspond, rationally, with her worries about sanctions hurting the Russian people, her worries that the U.S. supplying Ukraine even with small arms and ammo [sic!] will aid some kind of Ukrainian “insurgency” aided by international volunteers against Russia? In the middle of Russian slaughter of Ukraine, Ilhan Omar decides to question our country’s support of Ukraine against Russia because the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, and “what about the Green New Deal”?
Please! There are many reasons we should consider a solid Democratic opponent to Omar in 2022, one who can imagine contexts and contingencies and even an opposing argument, like her predecessors in the Fifth Congressional District seat. Minneapolis and its surrounding area can do much, much better than Omar in the office.
You are honestly saying you think she is dumb? How do you expect people to react to that?
I’m saying that she does not seem to be good at thinking things through, and that shes not a good thinker.
She’s an ide0logue with soundbites that she sometimes strings together in strange ways (as with Russia’s unprovoked war on Ukraine). Not the same thing as smart or dumb.
Thank you, Constance. Well said.
every criticism of this Congressperson is misogyny.
You’re right, a good portion is anti-Islamic prejudice, and another good portion is xenophobic anti-Somali bigotry. Along with the usual conservative gibberish. But go-ahead with the incrementalists, after all, the status quo has been just fine for most comfortable, white, Minneapolis liberals, and comfort IS what’s really important in the end, after all.
It is simplistic, and typical of those who really don’t know feminist theory, to suggest that any criticism of a female member of Congress is misogyny. Or that any criticism of a Somali-American is anti-Somali or anti-immigrant or anti-whatever. Or that any criticism of a woman is misogynist.
A basic definition of misogyny is: fear and hatred of women. (I don’t hate or fear myself, thank you.)
Sometimes we are just strongly disagreeing with a policy position that Congressperson has taken. Or more than one position she takes. Sometimes we have actually seen better Congressional representation for our District, and want that back again.
Are we not permitted to do that, when it comes to Ilhan Omar? No criticism. Really?
Criticize all you like, but when all you have is criticism (which in no small way is identical in both word and tone with those who ARE bigoted, misogynistic, and xenophobic, she doesn’t “think well”, really?), and support those holding policy positions that reek with the stench of decades of inaction, or which actually demand WORSE solutions to racial strife, don’t be surprised when the motivations for such actions are called into question.
Mr. Haas, you are mistaken. There is not a shred of misogyny in Ms. Sullivan’s fine letter. Let’s not go there and find what is not there. It isn’t there.
I’m confused, could you point out the part where I accused Ms. Sullivan of misogyny? I simply noted that she was correct, all criticism of Rep. Omar isn’t misogynistic, a great deal is racist, xenophobic, and political as well. I then noted that her phrasing and tone made it very easy to think that her criticism could fall into several of those OTHER categories.
You stated.all. criticism. Is misogyny
So you accused her of misogyny.
I’ve been a Facebook Friend of Don and Sondra Samuels for two years, and have seen their posts on Facebook. Don and I have corresponded with one another and I find him to be highly tactful, balanced and respectful to others — and has an open mind and explores multiple angles to problems instead of living with a one-track mind. I have also seen how Don adores his wife and takes her seriously and encourages her.
There is always an element in the Democratic Party which claims that a man speaking out against a woman whose lack of refinement, intelligence and maturity is, in their minds alone, considered as misogynistic. I am hoping that our community can come together and defeat that mindset.
Don has a lot of experience and has raised several very interesting and intelligent kids, including a young man who came to live with their family due to concerns that he was not able to have a good role model in his family. He did exceptionally well at my alma mater: De La Salle High School, which is known for turning out some of the best students and professionals in Minnesota.
Don Samuels has a stable and unbroken family. He is not a hothead, as compared to Ms. Omar’s combative style. Ms. Omar has an element of charisma, and I assisted in protecting her from a physical assault several years ago at Brian Coyle Community Center in Minneapolis during a precinct event at which I was a VIP on the night when several Somali women attacked her and sent her to the hospital with a contusion and other injuries; yet, I am supporting the far more advanced and capable Don Samuels for Congress in the upcoming election.
While Ilhan’s interest in protecting people in the Middle East and Israel from violence is noble and moving, and with which I agree and have joined her in protesting against continued bloodshed in Yemen and Palestine; there comes a point at which we have to ask whether those in office are serving with gravitas and wisdom.
I support more older, mature and intelligent women and men getting involved in the political world. A recent study on productivity and creativity found that women and men from age 60-80 years are at the highest rate of productivity and creativity as any generational cohort in contrast. Ageism and racism, and also ableism, have no place in our community. Don has proven himself as a leader for many years in both politics and in international business, and in a sound and unbroken family with responsible and respectable leadership.
I strongly support both Don and Sondra Samuels as leaders who will use sound and diplomatic and persuasive language to bring about better policies amid our nation’s and state’s communities. Don is an exceptionally pleasant and straightforward man, is most certainly not a misogynist, and will surround himself with others who do not lack maturity or high ethical and political acumen. Please go online to find out about him. He and Sondra are an incredible couple and will bring dignity, intelligence and capability to Washington, D.C.
I have faith in Don and Sondra, a team worthy of our consideration for Congress in the next voting cycle.
I have very little faith in the judgement of a man who let a 6-year-old child in his care swim in the Mississippi and drown. Not a leader I can respect.
The area of the river where they waded was not marked as unsafe. There were no OFF LIMITS ropes, as there are on area lake beaches. Bringing this up may be news, but both the families of the young boy and the Samuels have bore a tragedy. The City of Minneapolis, Hennepin County and/or State of Minnesota were negligent in not providing guidance and restrictions.
I was trained as a YMCA lifeguard and aquatics director, as well as a CPR and Basic First Aid instructor by both the YMCA and the American Red Cross. That Sondra Samuels made a heroic effort to save the boys life until she, herself, began to drown indicates both responsibility and and goodwill.
This is hardly compared to the Chappaquiddick Incident in which young Ted Kennedy was involved. The drop-off where the child became endangered and began to drown was an unknown hazard on a beautiful summer day. Were you involved in that tragedy, would you like to have someone demonize you? I hope not.
Evidently ageism only goes one way in your world? Boomers have had your turn, the world is on the brink of annihilation, again. Thanks, but no thanks, I’ll be voting youth from here on out.
Then Royce White is your man in CD 5: A full 10 years younger than Omar.
I can’t speak for Matt, but am definitely on the no-boomer bandwagon. Having said that, Jacob Frey demonstrates the inverse risk – the guy had basically no relevant experience & his mayoral record shows the results.
Omar would never win an election if her constituency wasn’t Somalian. That’s the only reason they vote for her. It certainly is not her intellect, nor her ability to work with the Democratic Party. She is a single issue candidate.Herself. Minnesotans deserved better.
Hey Constance, does this count as feminism? Sure looks like bigotry to me.
“Omar would never win an election if her constituency wasn’t Somalian.” Might want to check out the 5th District. Also who votes and in what numbers. Well-off Minneapolis liberals dwarf what you see (rather insultingly) as “her constituency”.
Minneapolis politics is very complicated, and it’s not very well covered. Outsiders are warned off. If they get too close or show signs of not playing the game, they are labelled, in this case as misogynists.
Back in the day, there used to be journalists who perhaps went a little closer to capturing the spirit of a city. Mike Royko or Andy Logan or Pete Hamill or Jimmy Bresklingcome to mind. In Minneapolis, maybe somebody like Jim Klobuchar. Some of them got in trouble, especially as journalism standards changed and desk editors developed a much narrower sense of what is truth.
One could only imagine the comments and criticisms of Don Samuels if he wasn’t Black.
Live by the identity politics sword, die by the identity politics sword.
My own feeling in politics is that if people aren’t calling things, I am not doing them right. Name calling is what some folks do instead of policy.
Ilhan is a pain in many ways. She is vain and self absorbed. She is high maintenance. She doesn’t seem to like us very much. Her supporters are very judgmental, and I wonder if part of the problem is that I don’t quite come up to their standards.. They accept my vote grudgingly. I sometimes feel treated by them, the way many Republicans seem to feel they are treated by me. It’s a learning and a humbling experience. But like Trumpers, I get over it and get past it and I confine my weeping over it to late nights after double shots of “The West Wing” and a peanut butter sandwich.
What are we…two weeks into the campaign and Samuels already resorts to the misogynistic “difficult woman” trope against Ilhan? Even more surprising, many posters here seek to justify and gaslight the misogyny.
Progressives need to watch very carefully and seriously ask themselves if they have a place in a party which will deploy whatever conservative bigoted attack line they can find to stifle any kind of change. The mainstream Dems reify and validate discrimination when it serves their political ends, and I for one have decided this is not the party I can get behind (obviously the GOP is out of the question).
Progressives need to draw a line in the sand: we can disagree on issues, but using racial/gender/etc. stereotypes and therefore reinforcing them must be an absolute NO if the DFL wants our votes.
Ilhan is a difficult person. So is Joe Manchin. I don’t think their difficulty in either case is linked to their gender. Some politicians choose to be difficult, and sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn’t. Difficulty in politics is a morally neutral term.
Concerning accusations of misogyny. In a political context, I would just ask, “Is someone who accuses me of misogyny more likely or less likely to get my vote?”
Sounds like pretty thin soup from Samuels, given that “policing” hasn’t traditionally been much of a federal issue, other than appropriating money for more cops. That leaves the infrastructure vote as a stated “concern”. That was a bill which passed (by the way), and I strongly suspect that if Pelosi had really needed the votes of the five progressive women for passage she would have gotten them. It’s surely not a decisive reason to challenge an incumbent congressperson of your own party. And indeed the Squad’s ultimate concern, that Build Back Better wouldn’t pass unless yoked to infrastructure, turned out to be correct and prescient. So the nation’s progressives (and the climate) were screwed, again.
But in any event, I think we can start to discern a pattern in Omar’s reelection campaigns…..
” “policing” hasn’t traditionally been much of a federal issue,” perhaps Omar should have kept her nose out of it rather than supplying major political backing of the, De-fund the police issue, the same could be said for our AG, fair enough?
I don’t think we are hearing anything close to the whole story. There are lots of reasons why people might run against Ilhan, but that’s not the same as knowing why I specific person is running against her. That story in this case remains untold. Maybe Don was feeling especially misogynistic that morning.
More to the point, replacing Omar with Samuels will have a net zero effect on which bills pass Congress. Instead, we’d lose a couple terms worth of seniority on committee assignments with a 72 year old freshman. I think the relationships and expertise Samuels has developed over his long career can most effectively be applied locally – not in DC.
In 2020, voters of the seventh Congressional District were in striking distance of achieving what was for them, the ultimate goal in congressional seniority. Their incumbent congressman, Colin Peterson, had he been reelected, would have assumed chairmanship of the Agriculture Committee during a Democratic administration. Instead, the elected Michelle Fischbach, a fringe figure, who could be expected to have no influence on public policy ever.
I was taught a certain political model. I grew up in a time where the politics was very conventional, where both parties were accustomed to working together to get things done. Where gentlemanly concepts like seniority, like waiting for your turn, were universally accepted. Those times are over.
“I grew up in a time where the politics was very conventional … Where gentlemanly concepts like seniority, like waiting for your turn, were universally accepted. Those times are over.”
As did Don Samuels. What chance would he have of accomplishing anything in Congress today?
I wonder if the fact that Don Samuels worked with the Upper Midwest Law Center to file his lawsuits will change any minds? According to the UMLC site:
“Until UMLC was formed, citizens and businesses wronged by governmental agency overreach, public union corruption and misconduct by special interests relied upon private parties or pass-the-hat techniques to support their cases…Our lawsuits are vetted by our Lawyers Advisory Board, with some of the best legal minds in Minnesota. UMLC works cooperatively with Center of the American Experiment, “Minnesota’s Think Tank,” which offices just downstairs.”
Looking at their site, they take anti-vax, anti-union, anti-LGBT, pro-racist cases pretty much exclusively. This is who Samuels has been working with. Perhaps a few more people will wise up to the grift.
Samuels, in a completely consistent move, sued the city to add more cops on the street. The UMLC joined in on the suit.
Samuels lives on the near North side, where crime is highest, and he expresses his opinion:
“It would be nice to have a few more cops around here”
And that is the rational offered why we should oppose his run for congress.
The grifter in this race is the person who slid a million bucks to her husband in campaign dollars.
Hi Theo!
I’m interested in more about Don’s lawsuits and the law center you mentioned. Can you elucidate on these, and on your position regarding Mr. Samuels?
Thanks!
Don Samuels is running for Congress in the 5th District because he needs a new grift now that he and his All of Minneapolis buddies got Jacob Frey re-elected.
72? I appreciate this Mr Samuels many years of service. Let’s let younger generations have their chance to lead.
Umm… ageism.
Yup, and I’m guilty too. It’s idiotic to send a 72 year old to Congress as a freshman. And probably as an incumbent.
In that vein, I think term limits are dumb, but I’d support a mandatory retirement age for SCOTUS, POTUS & all of Congress.
In my opinion, Biden, Pelosi, McConnell, Trump, Thomas, and myriad others should be thanked for their service & encouraged to enjoy retirement.
I don’t understand these arguments made by this article. For example:
He criticizes progressives like Omar who believe that police departments are “beyond reform.” In his view, they lack vision and ambition that organizers/reformers of the civil rights movement had. But that doesn’t make sense. A reorganization of police as a public safety department IS a bold, ambitious reform. That is far more comparable to the vast systemic change that civil organizers demanded than simply changing police training or other more minor reforms.
Further, he criticized Omar for her “symbolic gesture” when she voted against the bipartisan infrastructure bill. But Omar’s thinking has been proven absolutely right since the bill passed. Omar never said she disagreed with the bill’s provisions. However, she disagreed with the party on strategy. In her view, Congressional democrats needed to wait until the Senate had approved Build Back Better before passing the Bipartisan bill to maintain some amount of leverage over moderates like Manchin and Sinema. By passing the Bipartisan bill first, the House democrats gave up any amount of leverage they had, and Manchin and Sinema were able to tank Build Back Better, the signature policy of the Biden and the Democrat’s 2020 platform. Criticizing Omar for this vote is criticizing her for being correct on strategy when democratic leadership was not. That does not make sense to me.
Early on I was willing to give Rep. Omar a chance. In aletter I compared her to Jackie Robinson, the first African-American Major League Baseball player. Dodgers Owner Branch Rickey in 1947 explained exactly what Robinson had to do: play great baseball and ignore the cruel and racist taunts that will surely come your way. It was not easy, but Robinson achieved immortality by showing racist America that a black man could be excellent and dignified, and that he could resolutely walk the high road.
Given a better performance, Omar could’ve done wonders as a model of a political public woman, as a woman of color, an articulate Somali-American.
I have often wished that Omar had had a Branch Rickey whispering in her ear.
Yes. She was once an exciting, alternative voice. Unfortunately, she regressed into a money grabbing, conventional politician.
Another regret I have with her, in addition to the golden opportunity she squandered as a Muslim woman of color speaking with intelligence and dignity, is that virtually no one else in public office is willing to call out Israel when it needs to be called out. Omar was the voice of conscience for the condition of the Palestinians, who have very few advocates among American elected officials. Now whatever she says lacks credibility, even if it factually correct and astute. She did not learn the important lessons of her position and that makes me very sad.
This article seems to be missing quite a big part of Samuels’s history: his lack of care for his own community, exemplified by letting a child drown on his watch, not showing any remorse, and some years later making jokes about what happened.
https://bringmethenews.com/minnesota-news/don-samuels-a-challenger-to-ilhan-omar-deletes-tweet-making-light-of-childs-drowning
Perhaps you should read the response above: Dated Mar 14 10:22 AM. Some of us folks can recognize mud-slinging when we see it. Maybe you should look at the original accusation against him in your link, seems a grain of truth has been turned into a beach of misinformation.
Congressional elections make me uncomfortable, particularly high profile elections like this. Because Omar is a national figure, she attracts national money to this election on both sides, and the fear is that money is mostly skimmed off by what I might call political entrepreneurs. This is a safe seat, among the safest in the country, and in practical terms that means who is running. Money spent in the Minnesota Fifth would be better spent elsewhere in the country where there is a possibility that the seat could change political parties.
Well perhaps a change from ultra left to moderate left is a change in political parties? You know we all aren’t shinning ultra blue or shinning ultra red on all issues. Isn’t the big problem in America political divisiveness, maybe the reasonable solution is more folks that aren’t so polar opposite and divisive, on both sides of the isle?
No, because that assumes a compromise position exists for every issue. Which core liberal issues are you willing to cede to the conservative position? Human rights? Environmental protection? Corporate interest vs. ordinary citizen interest? Sometimes there exists a right answer and a wrong one, presuming that in every example there exists some harmonious middle is relativistic nonsense, and simply an excuse for taking positions that are otherwise indefensible.
Well Matt, thank you, for making my point. Theoretically a compromise position exists for every issue. The simple analysis, there are ~ 400K voters in the 5th, suggesting there are ~ 400K points of view. Your suggestion is, there can be only 1 acceptable position.
Not at all, but if the position one chooses isn’t acceptable to enough people to win, one will have a hard time getting elected. Thus far, the incrementalist, “centrist” wing, has yet to come up a position that doesn’t drive a majority of their supposed constituency away. Perhaps because the majority of the resident voters in the 5th have no interest in “centrism” or its disdain for their chosen Representative? But by all means, continue insulting THEIR intelligence, by insulting Rep. Omar’s, I’m sure it’ll prove to be a very effective political strategy.
Lets just leave it at, there is more than 1 voter in the 5th therefor there is more than 1 perspective. Don’t think that is an arguable point. No disagreement, if not enough folks get behind a political POV that political POV (candidate won’t win) chance we all take in an election.
I’m genuinely curious to hear your “compromises” though, I suspect they’d be very revealing.
Divisiveness is something we talk about often but actually think about very little.
There is a lot of money in divisiveness. It’s very profitable for political entrepreneurs. Consider the Minnesota Fifth. In terms of actual politics, it is among the most unified districts in the country. In practical terms, it is hardly divided at all. Yet somehow it attracts huge amounts of cash from donors, money better spent, I would argue, in more competitive races around the country.
I was disturbed recently at the news that a controversial political commentator was being paid a hundred million dollars and possibly more by a streaming channel. What the channel wasn’t getting for it’s cash were powerful insights in the political and human condition that would change our lives forever. What they were paying for is pure division, a hot take on issues that they could sell to advertisers. Division is for sale, in our society, and those who produce it can make the big bucks.