A coalition of Minneapolis candidates fueled by left-wing energy and skepticism of the established order at City Hall was cautiously optimistic about their possibilities that they’d secured a majority on the City Council in Tuesday’s municipal elections.

A second day of counting can be crucial to definitively determine whether voters shifted the balance of power on the 13-member council. Nevertheless, not less than one member of that left-wing coalition – Aurin Chowdhury, who had the backing of each the DFL party and native Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) chapter – decisively won her race for the open seat in Ward 12.

“I feel really longing for the long run of Minneapolis. I feel electric. I feel we did something really vital tonight,” said Chowdhury, who fended off well-funded challenges by Luther Ranheim and Nancy Ford within the race for the southeast Minneapolis seat.

Political groups that support Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey had hoped so as to add recent allies to the ideologically-fragmented council, outraising their opponents by perhaps a 4-to-1 margin in hopes of swaying a number of key toss-up races with final finance reports still to come back.

Despite the financial mismatch, candidates aligned with that left-wing coalition greater than held their very own – and a victory in either of the 2 closest remaining races would give them the seventh seat they need for a council majority.

In Ward 8, Soren Stevenson won each the DFL and DSA endorsements this spring over Andrea Jenkins, the incumbent council president. Just a little greater than 44% of voters picked Stevenson as their first alternative; 43% ranked Jenkins first. With no candidate attending to required 50.1% on the primary ballot, the race now hinges on who received second-choice rankings from voters who initially picked certainly one of the 2 other candidates within the race, Terry White and Bob Sullentrop.

“Irrespective of what happens, we have now proved that on this city, it’s the folks that make it occur,” Stevenson told supporters at his election night party. “Irrespective of how much money they spend, we’re still going to rise up and say we will have a kinder, safer city.”

An identical story is playing out in Ward 7, where Katie Cashman won 48% of the first-choice vote to Scott Graham’s 47% – with only 61 votes between them. That race now comes all the way down to the second preferences of the 289 voters who ranked Kenneth Foxworth first.

(Incidentally, this past Friday, Foxworth issued a public statement accusing Graham of creating “hurtful” remarks about his campaign – and while MinnPost hasn’t independently reported on whether the allegations are true, the kerfuffle could impact the final result.)

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A victory in either ward would deal a setback to Frey’s allies on the council – most of whom sailed to comfortable victories in their very own races Tuesday. Nevertheless, the mayor’s veto power continues to be more likely to carry weight: His closest ideological counterparts still control enough seats to likely deny the left-wing bloc a veto-proof majority of nine votes on a protracted list of issues.

“There’s left, and there’s further-left. That’s Minneapolis,” Frey told MinnPost in an interview well before final results were public. “I would like to work with a gaggle of pragmatic progressives that wish to work together, that want to search out areas of unity to maneuver town forward.”

There could also be differences between the ideological leanings of the groups backing these recent council members, and the council members themselves.

For example, Chowdhury supports passing a rent control policy – but doesn’t support a no-exceptions cap on annual rent increases that the DSA has championed. She doesn’t support enacting a multi-million-dollar municipal sidewalk shoveling program, but does imagine smaller-scale, “targeted” shoveling programs could make a difference.

In an interview, Chowdhury called for a consensus-building approach to governance at City Hall, saying she hoped to “to vary our politics to 1 that is admittedly about community constructing and coming together.”

“That appears like having the hard conversations on public safety, police accountability, housing … and taking time to know that being pragmatic doesn’t mean saying no – it’s an eagerness to search out common ground, and an answer,” Chowdhury said.

Similarly, Jeremiah Ellison won re-election to his seat representing Ward 5, essentially the most racially diverse district of Minneapolis’ council seats – despite ideological leanings that, by Ellison’s own admission, skew to the left of the common resident in his ward. He credited his victory to outreach within the ward, and his voters’ willingness to reward him for sticking to his convictions.

“I feel that that’s really vital for Northsiders … It may possibly be a fairly conservative base on the Northside. People know that I’m left leaning. People know that I’m a leftist. But they see that I’m also very collaborative, they see that I’m listener and I feel they respect it.”

“It’s a testament to Northsiders,” Ellison said, “whether or not they agree with you or not, they need to know that you just’re firm in your beliefs.”

In one other too-close-to-call race – where neither the left-wing PAC or the Frey-allied PAC endorsed a candidate – incumbent Jamal Osman emerged within the four-way Ward 6 race with 44% of first-choice votes, with Kayseh Magan (30%) and Tiger Worku (21%) trailing.

But in most of Tuesday’s races, incumbents easily prevailed within the low-turnout contests (around one-third of registered Minneapolis voters solid ballots Monday.

Elliott Payne (Ward 1), Michael Rainville (Ward 3), LaTrisha Vetaw (Ward 4), Jason Chavez (Ward 9), Aisha Chughtai (Ward 10), Emily Koski (Ward 11) and Linea Palmisano (Ward 13) all secured recent two-year terms.

Robin Wonsley (Ward 2) also won easily with no opponent difficult her on the ballot. Nevertheless, one write-in candidate – likely Michael Baskins, who mounted a last-minute challenge to the outspoken Wonsley – did garner roughly 33% of the vote.

A race everyone’s (still) watching

The race in Ward 8 – a set of south Minneapolis neighborhoods straddling I-35 that features parts of George Floyd Square – encapsulated lots of the dynamics of the citywide election.

When Jenkins first won the seat in 2017, she became the primary Black, trans woman elected to public office anywhere within the U.S. – and her victory helped reinforce Minneapolis’ vision of itself as a progressive place.

RELATED: St. Paul voters pass sales tax hike

Jenkins was also a consummate insider, having worked since 2001 as an aide to 2 predecessors on the council. Jenkins pointed to those years toiling within the background at City Hall as proof of her ability to get things done.

“I like that form of leadership: not a one who licks her finger, puts her hand within the air, attempting to determine where the wind blows – but really, how do you discover responsible public policy, responsible strategies that truly get the job done?” said Sharon Sayles Belton, a former Minneapolis mayor and Ward 8 council member, at Jenkins’ election night party. “That’s why I support Andrea and that’s why I’ve supported her over time.”

“I fear that if we get right into a situation where a gaggle of people that’ve been endorsed by the DSA wish to impede progress since it’s not progressive enough we’re not going to have the opportunity to attain the things that town must have the opportunity to proceed moving forward,” said Leah Buck, who volunteered for Jenkins’ campaign. (Buck previously mounted a campaign for U.S. House in northeastern Minnesota’s eighth District.)

But Jenkins’ critics got here to see her as among the many City Council incumbents too unwilling to challenge Frey, or the orthodoxies of town bureaucracy.

Her top challenger, Stevenson, who was blinded in a single eye during a 2020 protest against Minneapolis Police, counted Jenkins amongst the numerous elected officials who’d done too little to rein in police officer misconduct or push for culture change inside the department. His surrogates also contended she had fallen out of step together with her ward on issues starting from rent control, which Jenkins generally supports, though with much more reservations than Stevenson, to town’s homelessness response.

“Within the last two years, we have now seen the extent of cruelty just increase,” said Aisha Chughtai, the Ward 10 City Council incumbent, who volunteered to help Stevenson’s campaign. “The audacity with which that cruelty is carried out has increased, too – as increasingly encampments have been swept, as increasingly fencing goes up everywhere in the south side.”

Stevenson decided to run during an intense period after his injury, during which he grappled with “what it means to be a white man shot within the struggle for Black liberation.” Without placing specific blame on Jenkins, Stevenson has also spoken out concerning the persistence of systemic racism at City Hall. Jenkins objects to this critique and argued there was a component of colorblindness to Stevenson’s challenge to her progressive credentials.

“I’m not supporting a candidate who’s constantly running around and says ‘I would like to finish racism’ against the Black, transgender candidate,” said Latonya Reeves, an activist in Minneapolis DFL politics who volunteered for Jenkins (and can be Black). “It’s disingenuous. (Stevenson) desires to get the Black vote – the minority vote – in a way that’s a slap within the face to the problems we have now on this community.”

The campaign’s biggest fundraisers? Mayor Frey’s allies

While Frey’s name was not on the ballot Tuesday, his allies and antagonists spent a whole bunch of hundreds on the race, hoping to either strengthen or weaken the mayor’s hand on the City Council.

All of Mpls – a center-left political motion committee that supports Frey – likely raised near $1 million to support candidates who’ve been more open to working with the mayor. The PAC had reeled in $709,000 as of Oct. 23, the last day before the election that political groups must report their complete financial position.

After that deadline, the Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce chipped in one other $150,000 to support All of Mpls, adding to late contributions from, amongst others, the Pohlad family, which owns the Minnesota Twins ($40,000 total), the Minnesota Multi Housing Association, which represents residential landlords ($30,000) and the Washington, D.C.-based LGBTQ Victory Fund ($10,000).

The fundraising haul paid for ad campaigns, text messages and voter outreach to bolster three candidates particularly:

• Andrea Jenkins (Ward 8): $99,294 in independent expenditure support
• Luther Ranheim (Ward 12): $99,294 in independent expenditure support
• Scott Graham (Ward 7): $98,218 in independent expenditure support

All of Mpls also endorsed Michael Rainville (Ward 3), LaTrisha Vetaw (Ward 4), Emily Koski (Ward 11), Linea Palmisano (Ward 13) and, much later within the race, Ward 10 candidate Bruce Dachis. (After the fundraising deadline, screenshots of text messages apparently sponsored by All of Mpls began bouncing around social media.

All of Mpls’ organizers believed these eight candidates would help Frey “hold the road on public safety, reasonably priced housing, and more against the DSA” – a reference to the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America.

For supporters, the excellence between All of Mpls’ endorsed candidates and their rivals further to the left was as much about differences in policymaking style as concerning the substance of any ideological disagreements between them.

Take Jenkins: This 12 months, the Ward 8 incumbent voted to proceed debate on a rent control ordinance and to enact job protections for rideshare drivers – two stances on high-profile issues that Frey opposed. But Jenkins has also attempted to portray herself as a dealmaker with the pragmatic experience crucial to enact policy and forge compromise – and her best-funded Ward 8 opponent, Soren Stevenson, as a “sloganeer” more focused on “proving a political point” than enacting policy.

“I don’t see the socialists as wanting to manipulate,” said Jeff Schneider, a retired City Hall staffer and volunteer for Jenkins’ campaign.

A self-described “old lefty,” he said he’s sympathetic to lots of the DSA’s policy positions – particularly around economic inequality. Nevertheless, Schneider added, “what I actually have no patience for … is individuals who just wish to throw flames and make statements.”

Also big spenders? Frey’s critics – but they raised less

Minneapolis for the Many – a PAC allied with the DSA, but backed by a much wider coalition of Frey’s critics – couldn’t match their rivals’ pace of fundraising. Minneapolis for the Many reported $203,000 in contributions as of Oct. 23.

Critics objected to Minneapolis for the Many’s reliance on funds based outside Minnesota.

Minneapolis for the Many’s largest single contributor was Movement Voter PAC Minnesota, which is officially registered to Massachusetts and bundles contributions from across the nation to support causes and candidates on the left in local or state-level races. (A representative for the PAC said a whole bunch of its donors are from Minneapolis.)

As well as, Minneapolis for the Many also received money from Faith in Minnesota, the political arm of interfaith organizing powerhouse ISAIAH. Faith in Minnesota gave the PAC $30,000 – including a $10,000 contribution on Sept. 26, just days after a Faith in Minnesota received $25,000 from D.C-based advocacy group.

Nevertheless, Minneapolis for the Many’s allies retorted with criticism of All of Mpls for accepting large sums from wealthy suburbanites – and organizers said their opponents’ large fundraising haul fortified their view that, as one fundraising email put it, “Frey and his allies have continually cozied as much as the rich few, whether or not it’s developers or lobbyists.”

Attempting to act as a counterweight to All of Mpls’ financial advantage, Minneapolis for the Many spent hundreds on behalf of their slate of candidates:

• Aurin Chowdhury (Ward 12): $16,575 in independent expenditures
• Katie Cashman (Ward 7): $16,168 in independent expenditures
• Soren Stevenson (Ward 8): $15,032 in independent expenditures
• Aisha Chughtai (Ward 10): $4,215 in independent expenditures
• Jeremiah Ellison (Ward 5): $4,118 in independent expenditures

Minneapolis for the Many also reported spending $3,000 on negative ads about Jenkins within the Ward 8 race. The MinnPost-Minneapolis Voices campaign ad tracker shows the group also sent a mailer attacking Ranheim in Ward 12, though this expenditure likely took place after the deadline for the Oct. 23 spending report.

Independent expenditures corresponding to these can’t be legally coordinated with any candidate campaigns. Still, the contrasts drawn in these ads reflect critics’ broader views about Frey and his allies on the City Council: that they’re too reticent to challenge a established order at City Hall that has led to police misconduct and heavy-handed responses to homeless encampments.

“Those are issues which might be squarely within the hands of the [city’s] executive branch – and we mainly have a council without delay, that just isn’t a check on that power,” said state Rep. Aisha Gomez (DFL-Minneapolis), who represents parts of Ward 8 within the Minnesota Legislature.

“We all know that our community wants a check on that power,” said Gomez, talking to fellow volunteers for Stevenson’s campaign as they prepared to go out to knock on doors on Saturday. “That’s overwhelmingly what I’m hearing.”

In Ward 8, many Stevenson supporters see Jenkins as certainly one of those Frey allies.

MinnPost reporter Ava Kian contributed to this story.