Mary Kiffmeyer

Updated: Shortly after the Star Tribune reported that the faith-based Riverview Community Bank had been shut down by the state, we — like others — noticed that the paper’s online report deleted a reference to Mary Kiffmeyer, the former Secretary of State and current state representative who has close ties to the bank.

In 2000, evangelist Chuck Ripka says he had a vision from God: He was to start a faith-based bank in Otsego, and with the backing of the Lord his Riverview Community Bank could not fail. In fact, God told Ripka that he would create such an “acceleration” in the bank’s success that Ripka would be [...]

A flurry of candidate filings on deadline day brought to 22 the number of city races that could, in theory, be decided by instant-runoff voting (IRV). Last-minute filers included John Malone, a plaintiff in an anti-IRV lawsuit that the state Supreme Court rejected in June.

Riverview Community Bank in Otsego, Minn., has been cited by the FDIC in connection with “unsafe and unsound banking practices.” Former Secretary of State and current Rep. Mary Kiffmeyer, R-Big Lake, is an owner and director of the bank — an institution that founders say was inspired by the hand of God.

Minnesota’s secretaries of state traditionally hold the post a long time, and even after they leave office they like to stay in the game. DFLer Joan Growe writes in the Pioneer Press today that former Republican U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman has gotten a fair post-election shake. Mary Kiffmeyer, now a GOP state representative, sought a probe [...]

A proposed bill that would make Minnesota’s voter requirements among the strictest in the nation was voted down in the House State and Local Government Operations Reform, Technology and Elections Committee on Thursday.

To stamp out voter fraud, GOP legislators have offered a proposal that would make Minnesota’s voter-ID laws the most restrictive in the country. But according to their own party, no actual cases of voter fraud have been reported here.

Left to right: Kiffmeyer, Day, Ritchie

Voters who have trouble filling in an oval on a ballot get no sympathy from state Sen. Dick Day and state Rep. Mary Kiffmeyer, leaving Kiffmeyer’s successor as Secretary of State, Mark Ritchie, to preach love, constitutional protection and enfranchisement for tremorous or otherwise-impaired citizens. For all three the [...]

Sometimes when the news leaves you seeing floaters before your eyes, all you have to do is wait a day or two for things to come into focus. On Friday, former Secretary of State (and freshly elected state representative) Mary Kiffmeyer found a range of faults with the Senate election recount between Al Franken and [...]

Minneapolis Precinct 1, Ward 3 is now the latest and greatest Ground Zero of messed-up election practices to be exposed during Minnesota’s statewide recount in the U.S. Senate contest between Democrat Al Franken and Republican incumbent Norm Coleman. It’s there, in the Dinkytown neighborhood on the edge of the University of Minnesota campus, that poll workers recorded 133 more votes than they have ballots to show for it. It’s also there that students trying to vote via Minnesota’s same-day registration process last month were turned away — in a re-run of a major snafu at another campus polling place during the last general election two years ago.