Minneapolis voters (who are 80-90% Democrats) face a Hobson’s choice next month at the ballot box. They could opt for the gradual (though accelerating) decline offered by two-term incumbent Democrat Mayor Jacob Frey. Or they could take the offer of a quick coup de grâce from sitting state Sen. Omar Fateh, another Democrat.
In this odd-year election for mayor and city council, few voters will actually turn up to make any choice. A low-turnout environment favors the challenger Fateh, whose base of support exhibits a far greater appetite for destruction.
For reasons I am unable to fathom, the city’s newspaper, The Star Tribune, is out today with its umpteenth puff piece on the youngish (age 35) state senator. The headline,
The fierce urgency of Omar Fateh
Reporter Deena Winter writes,
Over the past five years, the democratic socialist has gone from political unknown to standard bearer for Minneapolis’ ascendant progressive coalition, harnessing disaffection with more moderate Democrats — and with the political process itself — to rack up a series of electoral and legislative wins.
As far as I can determine, the only thing that the two of us have in common is that we are both former residents of adjacent Northern Virginia suburbs. Since early 2022, I have carved out something of a second career documenting Fateh’s innumerable political scandals, which include voter fraud.
As I’ve moved in and out of politics over the past few years, I have been able to observe Fateh both up close and from a distance. His charisma escapes me.
Winter hints at the controversies here,
Along the way, Fateh, who would be Minneapolis’ first Somali American mayor if elected, has cemented a reputation for being a highly effective advocate for his priorities. But he has also repeatedly faced questions over his tactics, his ethics and his willingness to flout his own party to get what he wants.
Winter goes on to list several of the scandals later in her profile.
A democratic socialist, it is entirely fair to describe Fateh as “the Mamdani of Minneapolis,” after Zohran Mamdani, the apparent next mayor of New York City.
What would life be like in Minneapolis under a Fateh administration? Let’s extrapolate from the candidate’s platform. Fateh says that he will fight Donald Trump on immigration enforcement. On housing, Fateh will begin with rent control and transition to the abolition of private property.
On policing, there will be none. But a lingering problem will be that many public institutions (universities, sports stadia, government offices, hospitals) are located within the city limits. County. state, and (the hated) federal authorities will need to fill the vacuum to protect these buildings in Fort Apache, the Bronx-style.
All the rest–retail, dining, entertainment, office, worship–will continue to transition to the suburbs and exurbs beyond the blast radius.
The untaxed, “informal” economy will flourish within the city, Robocop-style, but without the cop. “Good business is where you find it.”
On labor, his efforts to raise the minimum wage will be moot as there will be no private-sector “on-the-books” jobs.
He vows to raise many taxes (local income tax, carbon fees, vacancy tax, a “land-value” tax). But the problem here is that you have to tax something, some object (property value, sales, income, wealth, people), of which there soon will be nothing.
But Fateh has a fierce urgency to spend. In his platform, the word “invest” appears 18 times, “expand” appears 7.
Here’s the conundrum: once Fateh takes office, the existing cash in the city’s treasury will soon vanish through fraud and scams. His ability to raise new revenue will be stymied by a lack of anything taxable to latch onto. He will then be left pleading for a county/state/federal bailout.
That’s the fatal flaw with socialism: sooner or later you run out of other people’s money.
