Ward 3 Endorsement: Steve Fletcher

I saw Steve Fletcher compete for the DFL nomination earlier this spring. He won on the first ballot at the Ward 3 convention, as the candidate of the left. Before the emergence of Ginger Jentzen's campaign, it seemed like Fletcher would glide easily to an election victory in November.

Minneapolis politicians attend protest march comparing bikes to Nazis

"Nazi Lane" signs dripping with fake blood (photo: Shane Morin)

Minneapolis election season has collided with backlash to a pair of bike lanes recently installed on 26th and 28th streets. Previous negative reaction to those lanes has mainly consisted of Facebook posts, a never-ending thread of commentary on the Nextdoor website, and Jon Tevlin of the Star Tribune fanning the flames. Today the bikelash became an actual real-life protest with signs reading "Nazi Lanes," "Mafia Lanes," and "Suck It Lanes."

Downtown business interests pay for mailers supporting conservative city council members

[Post updated with additional waves of mailers sent on behalf of conservative city council members aligned with Barb Johnson. See this post to read how the group funding these mailers has aligned with the right-wing PAC that helped flip the Minnesota House and Senate from the DFL to Republicans. Minneapolis Works is supporting a slate of candidates that includes incumbents Lisa Goodman, Council President Barb Johnson, Blong Yang, Kevin Reich, John Quincy; and challengers Tim Bildsoe (an actual Republican), and Mohamed Farah.]

There's a political fund called "Minneapolis Works!" sending mailers supporting Ward 7 incumbent Lisa Goodman [and a bunch of other candidates, as indicated above]. On both sides of the mailer, a diverse collection of disembodied thumbs can be seen endorsing Lisa Goodman as the "proven progressive."

Conservative Minneapolis incumbents running scared from democracy

Blong Yang; Barb Johnson; Lisa Goodman

Wards 4 and 5 in Minneapolis are composed of 14 North Side neighborhoods where people of color are the majority. By a wide margin, these wards have the lowest turnout in Minneapolis municipal elections. These wards have also produced two of the most conservative members of the Minneapolis City Council, Barb Johnson and Blong Yang.

Ward 10 candidate forum overrun by zany, unprepared challengers

Ward 10 incumbent Lisa Bender puts hands to her face in disbelief

Tuesday night's Ward 10 forum got weird when Republican candidate Bruce Lundeen opened his mouth.

Lundeen said that non-profits are the "path to the urban plantation, which is basically what we keep up in north Minneapolis."

Lisa Goodman puts gum from her mouth into opponent's hand at Ward 7 forum

At some point, far into the future, when I give talks to classrooms full of aspiring journalists, I will tell them you miss 100% of the weird stories you don't show up for. That's why you go to all the neighborhood meetings, all the zoning hearings, and every candidate forum.

You go to a Ward 7 city council candidate forum at a big fancy church on Hennepin Avenue to break a once-in-a-lifetime story that a not-so-clever person might call Gumghazi.

(What you're about to read is the biggest Wedge LIVE scoop since Deflate-gate.)

Election 2017 Calendar

We're going to try to track Minneapolis candidate forums and other key election-related dates on this calendar. You'll also see a sidebar calendar on the desktop version of the site. I'm asking readers and campaigns to help track down anything we've missed: contact us via Twitter or send an email to newsroom@wedgelive.com.