8% Does Not A Mandate Make
I’ve long criticized cities and school districts for holding their elections and tax increase requests on off years. Especially in major cities like Minneapolis and St. Paul. In St. Paul, the so-called winner got a whopping 8% of the public to come vote for him.
St. Paul’s population is approximately 273000. Source: US Census
About 34,000 people actually voted for St. Paul mayor yesterday. Source: MN SOS results
That’s about 12% of the total population deciding who will run the city (into the ground) for another 4 years.
Coleman won 68% to 30%. Meaning only about 8% of the public voted for Chris Coleman.
But you wouldn’t get that impression from his (ahem) victory speech last night.
“I’m very happy with the affirmation from voters that they like what we’ve done for the last four years and that they want that work to continue,” Coleman said from his victory party at the St. Paul Hotel. Source: Strib
Again, 8% bothered to show up an approve of his out of control spending and tax increases.
Folks, this should tell you a whole lot about how bad things are in Minnesota politically right now. (emphasis mine)
With all 104 precincts reporting, Coleman received nearly 67 percent of the vote. Ng (pronounced “ing”) had 31 percent, according to unofficial results. With about 34,000 votes cast, turnout was the lowest for a city in a mayoral election since at least 1993. Since then, no race has fallen below 59,000 voters. Source: PiPress
Across the River in Minneapolis it was a little more interesting with their brand spanking new ‘anyone can run that way there is no real debate between the serious candidates and the voters have no chance to see any contrast, not to mention that anyone slightly to the right of Chairman Mao will never even come close to public office’ voting system. But in the end, only 12% of the population bothered to show up there too.
They had 45,112 people vote for Mayor. Source: MN SOS results
They have a population of approximately 372,833 people. Source: US Census
That would be an equally disappointing level of 12% being civicly involved.
Neither Rybak or Coleman should be proud of their victories. They were not given a mandate, their agendas were not affirmed, in fact, with such low turnout, I’d say they were rejected, in silent protest. They got lucky. Period.
Oh and it also does not bold well for the Republican Party of Minnesota. Now that there will be IRV in both cities, removing the primary, you can forget not having a marxist win. If this was the first test of the new MNGOP leadership to see if things have changed, well, just look at the results.
Yes I know this was in St. Paul and Minneapolis, the heart of Marxism in Southern Minnesota, I don’t think anyone – I know I wasn’t – was expecting GOP victories in the sustainable urban utopia, but with such low turnout, it should have been easier to make the numbers look better or closer. I hope there was some internal GOTV results and processes that got tested or rolled out, so this was a useful process at least, and not just a huge waste of money on a losing cause.
And now RT Rybak gets to go back to running for Governor. Congrats Minneapolis!
His statement thanks the VOTERS not, all citizens for supporting him. Regardless of turnout, Democrats in St Paul run that town with anywhere from 60-70% of the vote. Every elected office in St Paul is held by a DFLer. Its not one election or one group that controls this- it is a DFL town. Period.
Good for them. There are plenty of all Republican burbs.