Omar Fateh

In the heartland of America, an inflection point has come to pass. Minneapolis was once immortalized in the 1970s television series The Mary Tyler Moore Show, when Mary Richards made her bright-eyed and optimistic journey there in search of opportunity and a new life. But now it is a relic; worn away, gritty and unwelcoming – with more empty storefronts than warm smiles. Of course, the decay didn’t happen overnight. The failed policies of a series of Democratic leaders and a progressive city council have left the biggest city in the Minnesota Nice State a shadow of its former self. Minneapolis has had a Democrat mayor (Democrat-Farmer-Labor in this neck of the woods) every term since 1976 and hasn’t had a Republican mayor since Richard Erdall served one day on December 31, 1973.

Americans head to the polls today, with gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey and mayoral elections in New York City and Minneapolis. The races are being talked of as an early test for Trump, a bellwether for the public mood after a breakneck ten months back in the Oval. A qualifying remark. Each of these races are taking place in traditionally blue cities and states – Virginia has not voted for a GOP presidential candidate since 2004; New Jersey since 1988; Minnesota since 1972. Still, these places – even New York – trended strongly purple at the last election; in this sense, today’s elections will be a test of the so-called “vibe-shift" and its extent.

American politics is often reactionary. Barack Obama rode the dip of the 2007-2008 financial crash, but after eight years of neoliberal slog Middle America chose Donald Trump to extract the globalist cancer from their venerated land. The Democrats staged a counterattack in the 2018 midterms, thrusting names like Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez into the spotlight. A reaction to a reaction to a reaction. And right on time, now that Trump has returned to office, a new breed of even more radical young Democrats is on the ascent. Democratic New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is committed to radical socialism and will likely be enthroned as America’s most powerful local executive in November thanks to a tide of support from the young, wealthy and highly educated.

It’s not fair that all the Great American mayoral discussion revolves around the coasts. Sure, Los Angeles has the one who oversaw the burning down of the nation’s second most populous city from halfway across the world. And New York City has been bleeding money as if it were the star of a sequel to “Brewster’s Millions,” but without the promise of a massive payday at the end. Right in the middle of the nation, tucked into the banks and headwaters of the mighty Mississippi River, is Minneapolis: the little city that could, chugging its way full speed ahead – right off the cliff of Midwest sensibility, prudence and normalcy. Woke came to town, and it’s got a bone to pick with common sense.