It’s part of a strong push, including grassroots campaigning, by Kelliher, who has consistently trailed former Sen. Mark Dayton in the polls.

The video prominently features praise for her by U.S. Sen. Al Franken and other DFL luminaries like Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak, who was bested by Kelliher’s campaign for the DFL endorsement.

In a campaign where wonky solutions to the expected $6 billion deficit next biennium have loomed large in the DFL debate, the video focuses on the historical nature of Kelliher’s candidacy as the first woman to gain the DFL endorsement for governor, and the possibility that she’d be the first female governor (and first DFL governor in two-and-a-half decades).

Margaret Anderson Kelliher. Photo: Mary Hanson Photography

Coming into the DFL State Convention, it was hyped that a progressive group called reNEW Minnesota would throw its weight behind one DFL gubernatorial candidate to push them over the top. But the group couldn’t choose between their three supported candidates and opted not to vote together. Instead an old-school political force showed its strength, as labor supporters facing the choice between labor-friendly Margaret Anderson Kelliher and R.T. Rybak, who has taken heat for his relations with Minneapolis unions, flocked to Kelliher to win her the DFL endorsement.

The labor focus at the convention was partly due to Iron Ranger and state Rep. Tom Rukavina. During his opening speech at the convention, he made his labor sympathies clear.

“I promise my union friends this — I’m not going to rub elbows in the corporate halls but I will rub elbows in the unions halls,” he said. “And I’ll walk a fine line, but I’ll walk the picket line when you need me.”

For an underdog candidate, Rukavina garnered passionate support from a statewide union, locals and members of unions that didn’t officially endorse a candidate, even snagging a late endorsement from former Minnesota AFL-CIO President David Roe.

“I think I got a huge percentage of the truly uncommitted delegates, a lot of whom were labor,” Rukavina told the Minnesota Independent. “Organized labor, like the building trades and the teachers in particular, just let their people decide how to vote and I got a lot of those votes.”

The Communication Workers of America (CWA) Minnesota State Council endorsed Rukavina in January. Minnesota CWA President Tim Lovaasen told the Minnesota Independent that the convention pretty much came down to Rukavina’s endorsement of state House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher when he dropped out.

“When Rukavina pulled out and threw his support to Margaret, well that’s when [union delegates] all said, ‘OK, we’ll go that way then,” Lovaasen said. “Tommy doing what he did gave Margaret this tremendous momentum — no one was going to catch her after that.”

Rukavina said an unprecedented number of his delegates threw their support behind Kelliher after he dropped out and endorsed her: 82 percent of Rukavina supporters shifted to Kelliher’s side, according to delegate ballots.

“She understands the ‘F’ in Farmer and the ‘L’ in Labor a little better,” Rukavina said of Kelliher and her relationship to the DFL acronym. “They’ve trusted me and trusted in who I considered was the best candidate — and most of them went with her.”

The impetus to flock to Kelliher also came partly in reaction to strong distrust of Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak after unions tangled with the mayor as he sought to cut back Minneapolis spending. Rybak only received the endorsement of Teamsters Local 120, but opposition on the convention floor to Rybak by union affiliated delegates was tangible.

“Those unions and people sympathetic to those unions within the labor movement were going to go with Margaret and not R.T,” Lovaasen said.

One out of every four chairs at the DFL State Convention this weekend was filled by delegates affiliated with organized labor.

“I think we made up a good chunk of it, we weren’t a majority, but we were definitely a factor out there, just like we’re a factor in the general election,” said Lovaasen, who attended the convention. “Even with waning membership there’s a lot of people who are sympathetic with what the labor movement has done, has stood for, and tried to do for working people.”

Even with the convention’s strong labor support backing her, Kelliher now heads into a potentially bruising August primary against well-financed opponents, former US Sen. Mark Dayton and Matt Entenza, both of whom skipped the DFL endorsement. Dayton also has strong labor support, including AFSCME Council 5.

Lovaasen said it’s likely that many unions who endorsed candidates like Rukavina will stay out of the primary fight.

“We’ll see what comes out of that and whoever that candidate is after the primary, I would suspect that the whole labor movement is going to get behind that primary,” Lovaasen said. “It would be better if we didn’t have three strong candidates — two of them have got money and the other one has got the endorsement.”

Photo: Minnesota Independent

Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak is running for governor. The development comes as no surprise. Political observers predicted it for months. Rybak hardly hid his interest in seeking the state’s top office. He even garnered a union endorsement for the office that he wasn’t officially seeking. So the announcement Thursday that he had filed papers to form a gubernatorial campaign committee was hardly even newsworthy.

But Rybak’s political gamesmanship — running for re-election as mayor, while coyly hinting at a 2010 bid for the state’s top office — could prove too clever for his own good. Today the state’s Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board issued a ruling that the Democrat wrongly utilized funds from his mayoral committee to pursue his gubernatorial ambitions.

In particular, the board faulted Rybak’s campaign for a poll commissioned in May that quizzed citizens outside of Minneapolis on questions that clearly seemed designed to test the waters for 2010. The watchdog agency ordered Rybak’s gubernatorial campaign committee to reimburse his mayoral committee $26,500 in order to cover the costs of the poll.

The Republican Party of Minnesota, which initially filed the complaint against Rybak’s campaign with the board, reacted gleefully to the ruling.

“Today’s ruling holding R.T. Rybak accountable for his deliberate attempt to circumvent our state’s campaign finance laws is to be commended,” said state GOP chairman Tony Sutton in a statement. “Rybak campaigned for governor across Minnesota for months without lawfully establishing a campaign committee and recording his expenditures. It appears that the sole purpose of his campaign for mayor was to provide a slush fund for gubernatorial ambitions.”

Rybak’s campaign countered with its own statement taking issue with the board’s findings. “Mayor R.T. Rybak has been honest and forthcoming regarding his consideration of a run for governor, and our campaign has been careful to not raise contributions or make expenditures for the purpose of influencing a campaign for governor until a formal decision was made,” it said. “The Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board has found that certain expenses incurred by the mayor’s campaign should be counted as expenses related to a governor’s campaign. Although we disagree with the basis, we will accept the board’s finding and take action to account for these expenses and reimburse the mayor’s campaign for them.”

Rybak’s flirtation with a gubernatorial run failed to have any negative repercussions on Tuesday’s mayoral contest. He romped to a third term with more than 70 percent of the vote. But will the campaign finance board’s ruling have any detrimental impact on his political viability for 2010?

David Schultz, a political science and law professor at Hamline University, doesn’t believe it will prove significant. “Does he have a scarlet A on his forehead? I doubt it,” Schultz says. “Except for some insiders most people aren’t going to care about this issue.”

Indeed, candidates have been rebuked by the campaign finance board in the past for infractions and not suffered electoral consequences. In 2002, for instance, then-state Rep. Tim Pawlenty’s gubernatorial campaign was fined $100,000 for improperly coordinating efforts with the Minnesota GOP. Of course, he’s now serving his second term in the state’s top office and eyeing a national presidential bid.

Schultz does believe, however, that the Rybak snafu highlights the need for changes to the state’s campaign finance laws in order to increase transparency and accountability. In particular, he thinks there should be more frequent disclosure requirements for political contributions and expedited hearings on potential violations of campaign statutes.

“We still have this incredible opaqueness and lack of transparency in terms of our campaigns,” Schultz says. “This is the kind of thing that should have been caught, policed and dealt with months ago.”

He notes that the mayoral contest was already decided by the time the campaign finance board ruling was issued, meaning voters weren’t aware of the violation when they cast their ballots. “Maybe this might have made a difference to some people in the mayor’s race,” Schultz says. “I don’t know if it would have put him under 50 percent, but it might have made a difference.”

The “Draft Bob Fletcher for MN Governor in 2010″ Facebook page currently has 334 friends. The “DraftFletcher” Twitter feed has attracted 44 followers.

But unlike recent campaigns to entice R.T. Rybak and John Choi into political contests, the sincerity of the effort to woo Ramsey County’s top cop seems a bit questionable.

The most recent tweet, for instance, declares Fletcher “the only candidate who is honest about their corruption!” The Facebook page lists his title at the Ramsey County Sheriff’s office as “supreme leader.” Then there are the pictures of the young woman being blasted in the face with pepper spray by a cop during last year’s Republican National Convention.

Not exactly the image most politicians seek to convey.

It’s unclear who’s behind the mock campaign. An email to the Facebook account received no immediate response.

But Fletcher earned the enduring enmity of protesters for his department’s heavy-handed tactics leading up to the Republican National Convention. More recently he’s been criticized for failing to provide proper oversight of the beleaguered (and now defunct) Metro Gang Strike Force.

Elsewhere in Minnesota news this morning …

MINNEAPOLIS: A Mill City effort to oust Michele Bachmann. City residents (and noted DFLers) Al Franken, Margaret Anderson Kelliher and R.T. Rybak will host a fundraiser for state Sen. Tarryl Clark’s Sixth District congressional campaign. [Polinaut]

SAUK RAPIDS: GOP guv-candidates try “speed-dating.” OK, now that’s connecting with voters. Get a room big tent!  [St. Cloud Times]

ST. PAUL: The Petters affair. Not his alleged Ponzi scheme, but the revelation at Tom Petters’ trial about his “intimate” relationship with employee-turned-prosecution-witness Deanna Coleman [WCCO-TV; Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal]

MOOSE LAKE: Gov. Pawlenty to punish purchasers of TVs for sex offenders. Lock them up and throw away the key, with no big TV? Works for sex offenders. [Associated Press]

NEW ULM: Taunters punished. Parents protested suspensions and other penalties after an entire spectator section was ejected from a high school football game, part of a rash of bad behavior at local athletic events. [New Ulm Journal]

CARVER COUNTY: Talkin’ crap. On review, Pawlenty’s Pollution Control Agency decides to put the freedom to speak about septic systems first. [Star Tribune]

]]> http://minnesotaindependent.com/48391/am-mn-vote-for-referendums-yes-and-no-say-newspapers/feed 1 http://minnesotaindependent.com/48016/afscme-backs-dayton-for-governor http://minnesotaindependent.com/48016/afscme-backs-dayton-for-governor#comments Sun, 25 Oct 2009 16:06:20 +0000 Paul Demko http://minnesotaindependent.com/?p=48016

Mark Dayton

AFSCME Council 5, the state’s largest union for public employees, has endorsed former U.S. Sen. Mark Dayton for governor.

“Mark Dayton has won statewide elections — twice,” said Eliot Seide, director of AFSCME Council 5, in a press release announcing the endorsement. “Minnesotans know and like Mark. That’s because he listens more than any other candidate. He wears his heart on his sleeve and it’s obvious that he cares about people.”

Dayton was elected to the Senate in 2000, but did not seek a second term. He also won a single term as state auditor in 1990. In addition, Dayton ran unsuccessfully for the Senate in 1982 and was defeated in a gubernatorial primary in 1998. He has stated that he will run in a primary election even if he does not receive the DFL endorsement.

According to the AFSCME Council 5, it spent nearly $1 million on the 2006 gubernatorial contest. In addition, the union mobilized more than 1,000 volunteers and 70 percent of its 43,000 members voted for the AFSCME-backed candidate. Nearly half of the union’s members are state employees.

The endorsement is another sign that organized labor will be divided about who to back in the crowded DFL field. The North Central States Regional Council of Carpenters kicked off the endorsement sweepstakes in May by backing state Sen. Tom Bakk. Teamsters Local 120 then announced in September that it’s backing Minneapolis mayor R.T. Rybak — even though he’s not officially a candidate for the post. Earlier this month state Rep. Paul Thissen earned the support of the Minnesota Nurses Association.

Photo: MnIndy

Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak isn’t officially running for governor, but he’s already secured his first endorsement. Teamsters Local 120 is backing Rybak for the state’s top post. The union is the largest Teamsters local in the state and the fifth largest in the country.

In a statement announcing the move, Local 120 president Brad A. Slawson, Jr., said it  wasn’t an easy decision. “Some of our oldest friends and most trusted allies have thrown their hats in the ring,” he noted. “Bottom line, we are most confident in Rybak’s prospects for winning a statewide election and moving Minnesota forward. We’re not content merely drafting R.T. to run, we’re beginning work to elect him Governor.”

Rybak is currently seeking a third term as mayor of Minneapolis, but is also seriously considering a bid for governor in 2010. Rybak and St. Paul mayor Chris Coleman are both participating in a gubernatorial forum today at Arlington Senior High School sponsored by TakeAction Minnesota.

The mock election was held at three locations in Minneapolis Tuesday, the day a primary election would’ve taken place were it not for the inaugural use of IRV this fall. It was open to anyone, whether a DFLer, a resident of Minneapolis or none of the above.

The tally after the first round of ballot-counting:

Margaret Anderson Kelliher, 34 percent
R.T. Rybak, 30 percent
John Marty, 12 percent
Paul Thissen, 10 percent
and eight other candidates at or below 3 percent each, plus write-ins

In the next step of IRV ballot-counting, all candidates but Rybak and Kelliher were eliminated, with the lower-ranked votes on ballots favoring those candidates transferred to the top two.  Marty, a state senator from Roseville, and Thissen, a state representative from Minneapolis, were last to be eliminated, and so effectively took third and fourth place, respectively. The final round results:

Kelliher, 55 percent
Rybak, 45 percent

The total number of ballots cast was 271, spokesperson Kelly O’Brien tells the Minnesota Independent, with a rough breakdown of 136 at a Lyn-Lake location and 80 in the Longfellow neighborhood of South Minneapolis, and 55 at a North Minneapolis site.

“I’m pleased that our campaign is on track,” Rybak said in a statement announcing the fundraising figures. “Part of putting together a strong campaign means raising enough resources to get out your message and mobilizing your supporters.”

Rybak faces ten challengers in the November election, the first in which Minneapolis will utilize instant-runoff voting. In 2005 he won re-election with 61 percent of the vote. The Democrat is also mulling a 2010 bid for governor. He cannot, however, use any leftover cash from his mayoral campaign for a statewide contest.