Jeremiah Ellison’s strategy for holding onto his Minneapolis City Council seat in next week’s election hinges on boosting voter turnout in his ward.

That just isn’t an easy task. Ellison represents Ward 5, whose turnout rates have ranked at or near the underside of Minneapolis’ last 4 city elections. Ellison blames that trend on “historic disinvestment and disengagement” in essentially the most racially diverse ward in town. 

Ellison does have help. Last weekend, 4 of his City Council colleagues — who together often form the council’s left-wing voting bloc — gathered to canvass North Side neighborhoods on Ellison’s behalf. Even Ward 8 candidate Soren Stevenson, locked in his own tight race against more-moderate incumbent Andrea Jenkins, showed as much as knock on an inventory of doors for the Ward 5 incumbent.

“We all know what our opponents’ ceiling is,” Ellison told the group before they left on their routes. “But because a lot of our strategy has at all times been about turning out folks that don’t often get engaged, which means we don’t necessarily know what our floor is. We’ve at all times turned out individuals who have been ignored.”

Many political operatives take it as a provided that voter participation on Nov. 7 isn’t more likely to match 2021’s turnout. With a mayoral election and a number of other controversial ballot questions sparking citywide debate, 54% of registered voters turned out — the very best figure in a Minneapolis municipal election since 1979.

But only 33.8% of Ward 5 voters forged ballots in 2021.

With this in mind, Ellison and his best-funded challenger, Victor Martinez, each said maximizing turnout amongst their supporters can be crucial within the Ward 5 race. (A 3rd candidate, Phillip “OMac” Peterson, can be on the ballot.)

In a press release, Martinez said his campaign has been “doorknocking vigorously for the last six months.”

“For the following week,” Martinez wrote, “we'll proceed to hearken to the voices of our community, share our vision for Ward 5, and get people out to vote to make sure that our ward elects a pacesetter who will fight to make our ward a greater place to live each and every single day.”

A clash of ideologies

Stevenson, plus three of the 4 incumbents who knocked on doors for Ellison last Saturday — Jason Chavez (Ward 9), Aisha Chughtai (Ward 10) and Robin Wonsley (Ward 2) — were all endorsed by the Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America.

Martinez’s statement took aim at this gathering of Ellison’s “DSA friends on the City Council and other DSA aligned candidates from around town.”

“North Minneapolis has already denied the acute views of DSA-endorsed, and DSA-aligned policies greater than once, and can proceed to achieve this,” wrote Martinez.

If elected, Martinez would arguably change into the City Council’s most conservative member. He’s voiced opposition to abortion rights, as Sahan Journal previously reported. In his responses to MinnPost’s candidate questionnaire, Martinez said he opposes “more defunding” of traditional police or proposals to finish homeless encampment clearings or create a municipal sidewalk-plowing program.

Meanwhile, Ellison himself notes his personal views skew further left than those of many residents of Ward 5, which has historically elected way more centrist (or arguably even conservative) representatives to the City Council. He favors limiting encampment sweeps, latest spending on alternatives to traditional police and latest rights and protections for renters.

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“The ward has historically been pretty center, center-right in its politics,” Ellison said. “So whenever you're anyone who's anticipating a low voter turnout, you would possibly calculate that that is bad for me, right? Because my politics possibly don't match the legacy of the ward.”

“But that is why we construct relationships,” Ellison added, saying many supporters might disagree with him about hot-button issues — like his support for a rent control policy — but vote for him because he showed as much as their door.

“They'll vote for me because they'd a conversation with me,” Ellison said. “They'll vote for me because they understand what my track record is about. They’ll vote for me because I feel accessible. That is true for me — and that is true for my opponents as well. It’s a turnout race.”

Ideological clashes just like the one in Ward 5 are playing out in several corners of Minneapolis. Candidates and political interest groups have spent tons of of 1000's on ads and voter outreach — all in hopes of altering the balance of power on the City Council.

That spending formed a backdrop for the weekend’s doorknocking. The left-leaning, DSA-allied PAC Minneapolis for the Many has backed Ellison.

Meanwhile, a bunch called Minneapolis Forward has entered the fray in Ward 5 in support of Martinez. The group is an offshoot of a PAC called Safer Hennepin, which supported the unsuccessful candidacy of Martha Holton Dimick in last 12 months’s county attorney race. Now, the committee has launched an ad campaign supporting Martinez and attacking Ellison’s track record. (It’s also backing Ward 10 challenger Bruce Dachis and Ward 12 candidates Nancy Ford and Luther Ranheim.)

“Yard signs don't vote,” because the old political truism goes. Still, if the yard signs are to be believed, Martinez could make this race close: Martinez signs are throughout Ward 5 — though along Penn Avenue, his name on a number of the vivid orange placards had been X-ed out by black spraypaint.

Ellison said a whole lot of the perception that the race was close was indeed “tied up within the signs,” but “I don’t think it’s unfaithful.”

“Considered one of the things I believe quite a bit about for Minneapolis politics is the difference between people and money,” said Elliott Payne, the Ward 1 incumbent council member, who also showed as much as doorknock for Ellison last weekend. “There's a whole lot of money on this town. And the method to counteract those interests is to point out up with people force.”

If turnout is low, who advantages? 

If turnout within the council election is lower, research is mixed about whether this is best for Minneapolis’ more-centrist or more-leftist candidates.

In a 2019 research review, George Washington University political scientist Christopher Warshaw wrote “some evidence” shows that local elections “are likely to underrepresent the poor and racial minorities” — which might suggest a low-turnout election would favor more conservative interests.

That said, other studies show that “low-turnout elections empower interest groups and other high demanders, comparable to public worker unions” — which might suggest a low-turnout election would favor candidates aligned with the more-liberal labor interests and other activist groups.

In Ward 5, Ellison argued that previous council members “identified that their probabilities of winning bank on low turnout.”

When two-term Ward 5 council member Don Samuels won re-election in 2009, turnout within the ward was 17%. Ellison’s immediate predecessor, Blong Yang, won the seat in 2013 when Ward 5’s turnout rate was 23%. When Ellison defeated Yang in 2017, turnout hit 27%.

However, when Ward 5 turnout climbed even higher in 2021 — to almost 34% — Ellison nearly lost reelection. He held on by just 93 votes.

Driving turnout within the race is a component of why Chavez, Chughtai, Payne, Stevenson and Wonsley all showed up on Saturday.

“There is a little bit of camaraderie,” Ellison said, “and there is an understanding … that council is the one thing on the ballot this 12 months. There’s nothing else driving people out. Persons are helping one another out.”