Minnesota

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares99 Views

      in US Politics

      Biden calls for ‘pause’ in Israel-Hamas war during Minnesota event

      by

      Joe Biden called for a “pause” in the Israel-Hamas war on Wednesday, in response to a call from the crowd during remarks in Minneapolis.A rabbi, who later identified herself as Jessica Rosenberg, called out: “Mr President, if you care about Jewish people, as a rabbi, I need you to call for a ceasefire.”Biden said: “I think we need a pause. A pause means giv[ing] time to get the prisoners out.”Israel says more than 1,400 people were killed, and more than 5,400 injured, after Hamas launched surprise attacks on 7 October. More than 240 hostages were taken.Israeli strikes in response, predominantly in Gaza but also in the West Bank, have killed more than 9,000, according to the Gaza health ministry, which is run by Hamas. The same source says nearly 24,000 Palestinians have been injured.Israel says 16 of its soldiers have been killed.Biden has been under pressure to call for a ceasefire or a meaningful humanitarian pause in Israel’s campaign.On Wednesday, Rosenberg was escorted out of the event in Minnesota, singing “ceasefire now”.White House sources told media outlets that Biden was referring to pauses in which aid could be sent into Gaza and hostages taken out.Biden said: “I’m the guy that convinced Bibi [the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu] to call for a ceasefire to let the prisoners out. I’m the guy that talked to Sisi [the Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi] to convince him to open the door,” to let humanitarian aid enter Gaza and allow some people to leave, American citizens among them.White House sources told news outlets Biden was referring to the case of Judith and Natalie Raanan, from Illinois, a mother and daughter released by Hamas last month during a pause in hostilities that lasted “a few hours” to facilitate the transfer.“This is incredibly complicated for the Israelis,” Biden said. “It’s incredibly complicated for the Muslim world as well … I supported a two-state solution, I have from the very beginning.“The fact of the matter is that Hamas is a terrorist organisation. A flat-out terrorist organisation.”Biden’s main remarks in Minnesota concerned the US economy, as the president ratchets up his re-election campaign.The event drew protesters, carrying flags and signs saying “Stop Bombing Children” and “Ceasefire Now”. More

    • 125 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Minnesota supreme court to hear case challenging Trump’s 2024 eligibility

      by

      Attorneys at the Minnesota supreme court will argue on Thursday that former President Donald Trump should not be allowed to appear on the state’s ballots for president because of his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and role in the insurrection.A group of voters wants the courts to weigh a clause in the 14th amendment, which disqualifies an “officer of the United States” who has taken an oath to defend the constitution from holding office if they have “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the country. In dozens of pages in their initial court filing, they cite examples of Trump’s election interference, from the fake electors scheme to his comments to rioters on 6 January 2021.“Despite having sworn an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, Trump ‘engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or [gave] aid or comfort to the enemies thereof,’” the voters argue.The lawsuit is one of several the former president faces in his bid to return to the White House, not to mention the various criminal and civil actions he is currently defending against. A similar petition is the subject of a trial in Colorado this week. Legal experts say the Reconstruction-era clause is ripe for the courts, though it has never been used to forestall a presidential candidate in this way.Free Speech for People, a left-leaning group, represents the voters in the case, who include the former Minnesota secretary of state Joan Growe and the former Minnesota supreme court justice Paul H Anderson.Trump’s attorneys and the Republican party have fought back against the suit, claiming the matter is a political question instead of a legal one. Trump’s campaign also claims there’s “no evidence that President Trump intended or supported any violent or unlawful activity seeking to overthrow the government of the United States, either on January 6 or at any other time.“This request is manifestly inappropriate,” Trump’s team wrote in a brief. “Both the federal Constitution and Minnesota law place the resolution of this political issue where it belongs: the democratic process, in the hands of either Congress or the people of the United States.”The Trump campaign fundraised off the 14th amendment cases this week, pointing to the Colorado trial and calling it the “next desperate attempt by Crooked Joe and the Radical Democrats to slow down our campaign”.The Minnesota secretary of state, Steve Simon, a Democrat, has supported the idea of the courts deciding the question, though has not weighed in on whether Trump should be on the ballot in the state’s March 2024 primary.Groups have sought to bar politicians from the ballot for their roles in the insurrection before, though the arguments haven’t been successful. It’s expected that one of the cases involving Trump could be taken to the conservative US supreme court.The cases challenging Trump’s eligibility popped off after an article from two law professors argued the former president would be excluded from seeking the high office again because of a clause in the 14th Amendment. One of the professors, Michael Stokes Paulsen, teaches at Minnesota’s University of St Thomas School of Law. More

    • 113 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Biden to Travel to Minnesota to Highlight Rural Investments

      by

      The president’s push to focus attention on the domestic economy comes as his administration has been dealing with events overseas after the terrorist attacks in Israel.The White House on Wednesday will announce more than $5 billion in funding for agriculture, broadband and clean energy needs in sparsely populated parts of the country as President Biden travels to Minnesota to kick off an administration-wide tour of rural communities.The president’s efforts to focus attention on the domestic economy ahead of next year’s campaign come after three weeks in which his administration has been seized by events overseas following the terrorist attacks in Israel and the state’s subsequent military action in Gaza.The trip will take place as Mr. Biden is urging Congress to quickly pass a $105 billion funding package that includes emergency aid to Israel and Ukraine, two conflicts he has described as threats to democracy around the globe.But the president and his aides are well aware that his hopes for a second term are likely to be determined closer to home. Rural voters like the ones he will address at a corn, soybean and hog farm south of Minneapolis are increasingly voting Republican. A recent poll showed that most voters had heard little or nothing about a health care and clean energy law that is the cornerstone of Mr. Biden’s economic agenda. And the president even faces a challenge within his own party, from Representative Dean Phillips of Minnesota, who announced his long-shot presidential bid last week.Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, declined on Tuesday to speak about campaign issues, citing the Hatch Act, which limits political activity by federal officials, but said that Mr. Biden “loves Minnesota.” Administration officials have said Mr. Biden’s trip was planned before Mr. Phillips announced his candidacy.The White House has called the next two weeks of events the “Investing in Rural America Event Series.” It includes more than a dozen trips by Mr. Biden as well as cabinet secretaries and other senior administration officials. The White House said in a statement that the tour would highlight federal investments that “are bringing new revenue to farms, increased economic development in rural towns and communities, and more opportunity throughout the country.”Mr. Biden will be joined on Wednesday by Tom Vilsack, the agriculture secretary. Against the backdrop of a family farm that uses techniques to make crops more resilient to climate change, they will announce $1.7 billion for farmers nationwide to adopt so-called climate-smart agriculture practices.Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will join President Biden in Minnesota and later travel to Indiana, Wyoming and Colorado.Haiyun Jiang for The New York TimesOther funding announcements include $1.1 billion in loans and grants to upgrade infrastructure in rural communities; $2 billion in investments as part of a program that helps rural governments work more closely with federal agencies on economic development projects; $274 million to expand high-speed internet infrastructure; and $145 million to expand access to wind, solar and other renewable energy, according to a White House fact sheet.“Young people in rural communities shouldn’t have to leave home to find opportunity,” Neera Tanden, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, said Tuesday on a call with reporters.She said federal investments were creating “a pathway for the next generation to keep their roots in rural America.”Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, a Democrat, said he expected Mr. Biden to face serious headwinds in rural communities, in large part because of inflation levels.“It is a little challenging, there’s no denying, when prices go up,” Mr. Walz said. “The politics have gotten a little angrier. I think folks are feeling a little behind.”But Mr. Walz also praised Mr. Biden for spending time in rural communities. “Democrats need to show up,” he said.Kenan Fikri, the director of research at the Economic Innovation Group, a Washington think tank, said the Biden administration had made sizable investments over the past two and a half years in agriculture, broadband and other rural priorities.“The administration has a lot to show for its economic development efforts in rural communities,” he said, but “whether voters will credit Biden for a strong economic performance is another question.”Later in the week Mr. Vilsack will travel to Indiana, Wyoming and Colorado to speak with agricultural leaders and discuss land conservation. Deb Haaland, the interior secretary, will go to her home state of New Mexico to highlight water infrastructure investments.Energy Secretary Jennifer M. Granholm will be in Arizona to talk about the electricity grid and renewable energy investment in the rural Southwest.The veterans affairs secretary, Denis McDonough, plans to visit Iowa to discuss improving access to medical care for veterans in rural areas. Isabel Guzman, who leads the Small Business Administration, will travel to Georgia to talk about loans for rural small businesses.Miguel A. Cardona, the education secretary, will go to New Hampshire to promote how community colleges help students from rural areas. Xavier Becerra, the secretary of health and human services, will be in North Carolina to talk about health care access in rural areas. More

    • 125 Shares119 Views

      in US Politics

      Congressman Dean Phillips to launch Democratic primary bid against Biden

      by

      Dean Phillips, a Democratic congressman from Minnesota who is relatively unknown on the national US stage, is set to launch a long-shot campaign to primary Joe Biden in New Hampshire on Friday.The New Hampshire secretary of state’s office confirmed Phillips is scheduled to file paperwork to get on the ballot there on Friday morning.The Phillips campaign did not respond to a request for comment on his impending announcement.Phillips, who has represented western suburbs of Minneapolis since 2019 in Congress, has pointed to the US president’s age in discussing his potential primary run, saying the next generation of leaders should step up. Biden is 80 years old; Phillips is 54.The congressman is the heir of the Phillips Distilling Company and co-owned Talenti gelato. His run in 2018 for Minnesota’s third congressional district flipped the seat from Republican control. With a slogan of “everyone’s invited”, Phillips calls himself an “eternal optimist” and “bipartisan believer”.There’s little difference between Phillips and Biden on policy: Phillips has voted with Biden’s legislative agenda nearly 100% of the time, the White House pointed out.While Phillips has not officially announced his run, he has teased it for months. In recent days, a campaign bus was spotted en route to New Hampshire, and a campaign van was seen in the state. The vehicles carried a campaign website, dean24.com, which has been parked but not publicly set up yet.Earlier this month, Phillips stepped down from leadership roles in the caucus, saying: “It’s clear my convictions about 2024 are incongruent with the position of my colleagues and that was causing discomfort.”Phillips’s plan to primary an incumbent president has largely been met with confusion and derision, both from his colleagues and his constituents. He has also drawn a primary challenger in his district.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionA spokesperson for the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor party confirmed the state party will be supporting Biden in the primary and general elections in 2024.Separately, Biden is set to visit Minnesota next week. More

    • 138 Shares159 Views

      in US Politics

      Minnesota’s cannabis head resigns after reports she sold illegal weed products

      by

      The recently appointed director of Minnesota’s new marijuana regulatory agency, Erin Dupree, has resigned amid reports that she sold illegal cannabis products in the state.Dupree ran a business that sold products exceeding state limits on THC potency, owed money to former associates and accumulated tens of thousands of dollars in tax liens, Minnesota Public Radio reported.Loonacy Cannabis Co – the business Dupree founded in Apple Valley, Minnesota, last year – posted on its now-deactivated TikTok account about its edible products containing 10 milligrams of THC per serving and 150 milligrams per package, although state law only allows hemp-derived edibles to contain up to 5 milligrams of THC per serving and 50 milligrams per package, the Star Tribune reported.“I have never knowingly sold any noncompliant product, and when I became aware of them I removed the products from inventory,” Dupree said in a statement on Friday.“However, it has become clear that I have become a distraction that would stand in the way of the important work that needs to be done,” she added.Her role as the state’s first director of the office of cannabis management would have begun on 2 October.“One of the responsibilities, and I take it and the buck stops with me, is the appointments of literally thousands of people,” Minnesota’s governor, Tim Walz, said on Saturday. “In this case, the process did not work and we got this wrong.”Walz said in a Friday statement that the interim director of the cannabis office, Charlene Briner, would remain in an interim role, according to Minnesota Public Radio.Minnesota’s legalization of recreational marijuana went into effect in August, allowing people 21 and older to legally possess and grow their own marijuana for recreational purposes, subject to limits as the state establishes a legal cannabis industry in the coming months and years.The midwestern state is the 23rd in the country to legalize recreational marijuana. Surrounding states – including Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota and North Dakota – have not yet legalized it. More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in US Politics

      Minnesota lawsuit seeks to bar Trump from ballot under 14th amendment

      by

      A group of Minnesota voters filed a lawsuit on Tuesday seeking to remove Donald Trump from the ballot in their state, escalating the effort to disqualify the former president from running based on untested constitutional language that prohibits anyone who has “engaged in insurrection” from holding office.The voters are being represented by Free Speech for People, a left-leaning group that has aggressively been pushing to remove Trump from the ballot in several states. A similar lawsuit was filed in Colorado last week by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, another watchdog group.The petition, filed with the Minnesota supreme court, argues that Trump’s activities to overturn the election, including those on 6 January, amounted to engaging in insurrection. Section 3 of the 14th amendment says that anyone who takes an oath to the United States and then subsequently engages in “insurrection or rebellion against the same” is disqualified from holding public office.“The events of January 6, 2021 amounted to an insurrection or a rebellion under Section 3: a violent, coordinated effort to storm the Capitol to obstruct and prevent the Vice President of the United States and the United States Congress from fulfilling their constitutional roles by certifying President Biden’s victory, and to illegally extend then-President Trump’s tenure in office,” the petition says.The push to disqualify Trump under the 14th amendment gained steam after two prominent conservative legal scholars concluded he was disqualified under the language. The push for disqualification also picked up momentum after Trump was criminally charged, both by the justice department and in Georgia over his efforts to overturn the election. A conviction, however, is not required to disqualify him from running.“Donald Trump violated his oath of office and incited a violent insurrection that attacked the US Capitol, threatened the assassination of the vice-president and congressional leaders, and disrupted the peaceful transfer of power for the first time in our nation’s history,” Ron Fein, Free Speech for People’s Legal director, said in a statement. “Our predecessors understood that oath-breaking insurrectionists will do it again, and worse, if allowed back into power, so they enacted the Insurrectionist Disqualification Clause to protect the republic from people like Trump. Trump is legally barred from the ballot and election officials must follow this constitutional mandate.”Still, there is not widespread consensus on whether the challenges will be successful. Some scholars have questioned whether Trump’s conduct legally amount to insurrection (the justice department did not charge him specifically with that crime). It’s also unclear what the proper process and mechanism for disqualification is, or if one even exists at all.In Minnesota, Free Speech for People previously sent a letter to secretary of state Steve Simon, a Democrat, asking him to use his authority as the state’s top election official to disqualify Trump from the ballot. Simon responded by saying that his office didn’t have the power to investigate Trump’s eligibility, but that state law allowed for voters to bring legal challenges to a candidate’s qualifications in court.Trump is already taking action to try and head off the disqualification efforts. In Colorado, he is fighting to have the case removed from state to federal court. Trump’s campaign also publicized a letter on Tuesday from New Hampshire state legislatures urging the state’s top election official not to remove Trump from the ballot.“There is no legal basis for these claims to hold up in any legitimate court of law. The opinions of those perpetuating this fraud against the will of the people are nothing more than a blatant attempt to affront democracy and disenfranchise all voters and the former President,” the letter says.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe New Hampshire secretary of state has faced harassment as he weighs how to address issues around Trump’s eligibility. He has one of the most pressing deadlines because it will hold one of the first Republican primaries next year.
      Join us for a livestreamed event on 26 September, Democracy and Distrust: Overcoming threats to the 2024 election More

    • 150 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Into the Bright Sunshine: how Hubert Humphrey joined the civil rights fight

      by

      Seventy-five years ago this month, at a fractious Philadelphia convention, Hubert Humphrey delivered a famous challenge: “The time has arrived in America for the Democratic party to get out of the shadows of states’ rights and to walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights.”In a new book, Into the Bright Sunshine: Young Hubert Humphrey and the Fight for Civil Rights, Samuel G Freedman helps explain the influences and experiences that led Humphrey, then a 37-year-old midwestern mayor, to take on segregationists in his own party.Humphrey won passage of a bold civil rights platform, triggering southern delegates to nominate Strom Thurmond as a “Dixiecrat” candidate for president. The same year, Humphrey won a race for Senate from Minnesota, launching a national career that culminated in his nomination for president, and defeat by Richard Nixon, in 1968.Freedman describes how Humphrey, who was born in South Dakota, saw Jim Crow up close as a graduate student at Louisiana State University.“Given the deliberate and scrupulous erasure of Black people from LSU, it required not flagrant bigotry but mere passivity for a white student to accept segregation as something like natural law,” Freedman writes. “Humphrey’s eyes were already too open for such obliviousness.”A sociology professor and German émigré, Rudolf Heberle, had a particularly important role in shaping Humphrey’s outlook. As Freedman recounts: “The Nazis’ regime of murderous extremism came to power, in Heberle’s analysis, not by a coup from the armed fringe but thanks to ‘mass support … from middle layers of society’. Reasonable people were entirely capable of acting in morally unreasonable ways and rationalizing away their actions. Heberle had seen and heard it during his fieldwork.”Heberle was suggesting that “the Jew in Germany was the Black in America”.After LSU, Humphrey returned to Minneapolis, where two locals – one Jewish, one Black – helped stiffen his resolve: Sam Scheiner, an attorney who led the Minnesota Jewish Council, and Cecil Newman, founder of the Minneapolis Spokesman newspaper.“There were people from throughout [Humphrey’s] life who recognized something in him – skills, yes, but something larger, a kind of destiny – more than he recognized it in himself,” Freedman writes. “He was their vessel and their voice, the vessel in which to pour their passion for a more just America and the voice to amplify that passion insistently enough to affect a nation whose soul was very much at stake.”Minneapolis’s track record on race has been in the news again. Last month, the US justice department said the 2020 police murder of George Floyd was part of a “pattern or practice” of excessive force and unlawful discrimination against African Americans.Nearly 80 years earlier, Humphrey tried to combat racism and antisemitism in the city.Minneapolis was infamous for antisemitism. In the 1930s, Freedman points out, a homegrown fascist group, the Silver Legion of America, called for “returning American Blacks to slavery and disenfranchising, segregating and finally sterilizing American Jews”. In 1946, the editor of the Nation, Carey McWilliams, called the city “the capital of antisemites”.After running for mayor in 1943, Humphrey mounted another run in 1945. In the year American soldiers defeated Hitler’s forces in Europe, gangs attacked and robbed Jews in Minneapolis, sometimes yelling “Heil, Hitler!” Local leaders were ineffective. But Humphrey, Freedman writes, “plainly shared the Jewish community’s belief that the problem went way deeper than mere hoodlums. For the first time in Minneapolis’s decades-long history of racism and antisemitism, a political candidate was placing those issues at the center of a campaign.”Humphrey offered a five-point plan, including the creation of an organization to combat bigotry. He won. Two months into his term, he was confronted with the wrongful arrest of two Black women. Newman, the Black newspaper publisher, called Humphrey at home. The mayor ordered the women released and the charges dropped.Later, Humphrey won passage of an anti-discrimination law and established a council on human relations, to investigate discrimination against racial and religious minorities. For his efforts, he faced an assassination attempt and threats from Nazis. But Humphrey turned the city around.“Minneapolis stood as virtually the only city in America where a wronged job applicant could count on the government as an ally,” Freedman writes.Humphrey used such work as a springboard, championing civil rights for the nation.“My friends, to those who say that we are rushing this issue of civil rights, I say to them we are 172 years late,” he said at the 1948 convention, adding: “This is the issue of the 20th century.”In a 2010 documentary, Hubert H Humphrey: The Art of the Possible, former president Jimmy Carter, who was 23 when Humphrey spoke in Philadelphia, called the speech “earth-shattering, expressing condemnation of the racial segregation that had been in existence ever since the end of the civil war. And he was the only one that was courageous enough to do so”.When Humphrey got to Washington, he found himself ostracized by southern Democrats who dominated the Senate. As he recalled, “After all, I had been the destroyer of the Democratic party, the enemy of the south. Hubert Humphrey, the [N-word] lover.’ … I never felt so lonesome and so unwanted in all my life as I did in those first few weeks and months.”But he continued to champion equal rights, an effort that culminated, as majority whip, with breaking a southern filibuster to help win passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.Humphrey became vice-president, to Lyndon Johnson, then ran for president himself. But “for the rest of his life,” Freedman writes, he “kept the tally sheet on which he had marked the senators’ vote on cloture, the procedure that ended the filibuster and brought the bill to its successful enactment.”
      Into the Bright Sunshine is published in the US by Oxford University Press
      Frederic J Frommer is the author of books including You Gotta Have Heart: Washington Baseball from Walter Johnson to the 2019 World Series Champion Nationals More

    • 163 Shares109 Views

      in US Politics

      Minnesota Muslims vow to continue call to prayer despite rise in mosque attacks

      by

      Muslims in Minnesota have vowed not to stop answering the call to prayer, despite a series of attacks on mosques some believe to be a backlash to a new rule that permits the Adhan to be broadcast at any time of the day or night.In April, Minneapolis made history when it became the first major city in the US to allow mosques to broadcast the call to prayer using loudspeakers at any time. Before the change to a city noise ordinance, it had only been permitted to be put out between 7am to 10pm.Depending on the time of year, this prevented the first and last prayers being broadcast, as is demanded by Muslim tradition. The first prayer, the Fajr, is called before the sun rises. The last, the Isha, is said when darkness falls.Members of the Muslim community and their supporters celebrated the move, which was passed unanimously by the city council. Yet since the city started talking about the measure earlier this year, there have been up to six attacks on mosques and community centers in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul.While Muslims in the city have long had to battle Islamophobia, some believe the change in the law was, in part, responsible.“This has increased the worry, and the fear of Islamophobia, with a lot of congregation saying this is because of the Adhan,” said Wali Dirie, executive director of the Islamic Civic Society of America and the Dar Al-Hijrah Mosque, in the Minneapolis’s Cedar-Riverside neighborhood.Three years ago, his mosque was the first to obtain permission for the broadcast of all five calls to prayer during Ramadan, a move that paved the way for April’s city-wide change.“We tell them ‘we don’t know 100%’ … We also tell them this is not new. We tell them we are not going to stop, and that we’re going to continue, and that we’ll work with law enforcement,” he says.During a recent morning prayer, 70-year Sareedo Abdi said she was sad the attacks had taken place and frightened her mosque could be targeted too: “We feel it’s Islamophobia.”Dirie said members of the community met with the office of the Democratic governor, Tim Walz, the mayors of Minneapolis and St Paul, and different police departments. They have asked different agencies for advice on how to improve security, and install cameras. They have also spoken to the state attorney general, Keith Ellison, himself a Muslim, who has vowed to act against hate crimes.The Twin Cities, long a Democratic party stronghold, is home to one of the largest Somali-American populations, with upwards of 70,000, according to a non-profit, Minnesota Compass. The community says it has about 30 mosques, with 22 of them located in Minneapolis. The Minneapolis city council, which unanimously passed the amendment during the month of Ramadan, has three Muslims among its 13 members.In 2018, Ilhan Omar became the first Somali-American elected to Congress, and with Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, was one of the first two Muslim women to take office. Omar and others have often been the target of abuse and Islamophobic attacks. In 2019, then-president Donald Trump earned applause from his supporters at a rally in Minneapolis when he repeated false conspiracy theories about Omar from a rightwing blog, and declared: “Congresswoman Omar is an American-hating socialist. How do you have such a person representing you in Minnesota?”In April, there was outcry over a cartoon about the new rule permitting the call to prayer published by the Star-Tribune. The cartoonist claimed his intention was to show support for the move. It was later condemned by several state legislators, who also denounced the attacks on the mosques.“Globally, many Muslims report not being respected by those in the west, and this cartoon adds to that sentiment right here in Minnesota,” the lawmakers said in a statement.The newspaper’s publisher and CEO, Steve Grove, went on to apologize for publishing the cartoon.Aisha Chughtai, 25, was elected to the council in 2021. She is both a Muslim and its youngest ever member. She cautions those who link the attacks on the mosques to the change in law, which may appear to be a form of “victim blaming”. She attributed the cause to an increase in white supremacist beliefs.Growing up after 9/11, Chughtai said Muslims in the city had routinely been victims of hate crimes and abuse.“Attacks on mosques in Minnesota are shockingly common,” she said in an interview.“Being Muslim in this country, being Jewish in this country, being Black in this country, being a person of colour in this country, being an immigrant in this country, means that you experience discrimination, racism and violence in all aspects of life.”Earlier this spring, data released by the FBI showed hate crimes in America in 2021 increased by 12% on the previous year. In Minnesota, the number of incidents reported rose from 196 to 274, an increase of almost 40%.Chughtai, a Democrat, was elected to represent Ward 10, a downtown neighborhood. The previous representative was Lisa Bender, who five years ago was elected chair of the council but did not seek re-election in 2021. In the aftermath of the 2020 murder of George Floyd by then police officer Derek Chauvin, Bender led calls to defund the Minneapolis police department (MPD), a controversial move that ultimately did not get voted on.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionEarlier this month, a damning Department of Justice (DoJ) investigation into the MPD found it engaged in a history of excessive force and discrimination against Black and Native American residents of the city. It said the pattern of behavior “made what happened to George Floyd possible”.“The patterns and practices of conduct the justice department observed during our investigation are deeply disturbing,” said the US attorney general, Merrick Garland.In a statement issued after the justice department report, the Minneapolis police chief, Brian O’Hara, vowed to rebuild trust with the community. “These findings are a major step in reforming this department into one that provides a level of service that will be a model for law enforcement agencies across the country.”Chughtai believes people of colour in the city have suffered from underinvestment in basic services and been forced to contend with a greater level of violence.“It’s really devastating and terrifying when the people who are supposed to serve and protect you are the ones furthering harm,” she added. “The responsibility of city leaders right now and the administration, is figuring out [how to address] these deep systemic issues so that our communities are safer.”The attacks on the mosques have been detailed by groups such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (Cair). They include someone breaking into the Oromo American Tawhid Islamic Center before that facility was destroyed in an arson attack in May. An arrest has been made in that case.In April, authorities arrested and charged 36-year-old Jackie Rahm Little with two arson attacks on mosques in Minneapolis. He was also accused of spraying graffiti on Representative Omar’s city office and damaging a police vehicle assigned to a Somali-American officer.Mohamed Ibrahim, the deputy director of Cair Minnesota, said the community was asking for more help.“People are wary of sending their kids to the mosque,” said Ibrahim. “But we also have a strong portion of the community also saying we will not allow this to stop us from attending the mosque. So, a lot of community members are showing resiliency.”Minneapolis’s mayor, Jacob Frey, said he spoke to mosque leaders, and police dispatched extra units when the incidents happened.“Places of worship in Minneapolis are places of peace and are sacred for those who visit them – we intend to keep it that way,” he said. “To our Muslim community: we have your back, and we will show it in our actions. These crimes won’t be tolerated in our city, and we will continue to hold perpetrators accountable.”Ellison said in a statement that he traveled across the state to different communities to gather ideas on how to counter hate crimes and vowed to “do everything in my power as attorney general to ensure every Minnesotan lives with dignity, safety, and respect”.At the Dar Al-Hijrah Mosque, people said they were offering help and support to those who had been attacked.Dirie said some mosques in the region decided to hold off broadcasting the call to prayer until they had done more outreach to the community, in an effort to avoid more violence. In the meantime, he said people were invited to attend his mosque.Ahmed Jamal, 52, was one of those who delivered the call to prayer. He said he did not feel frightened and added: “When I am calling, it makes me feel so happy.” More