Joel Sipress On Duluth Mayoral Race: ‘State DFL’s Hit Job On Roger Cost Emily Votes’

DULUTH, Minn. – It’s been a week since one of the most contentious mayoral races in Duluth’s history came to an end with Roger Reinert defeating incumbent Emily Larson. And now, leaders in the DFL Party who backed Larson are analyzing what went right and what went wrong.

One of those people is Joel Sipress, former Duluth city councilor of eight years and current chair of the Senate Dist. 8 DFL Party.

Sipress took to social media after the election to make 10 observations about the mayoral race, “even if some of them may be uncomfortable.”

Sipress clarified that ideologically, Larson and Reinert are very similar – “both middle of the road Amy Klobuchar/Tim Walz style Democrats.”

Be he said, Larson’s approach became too “out of touch,” including what he described as “annoying” “liberal sounding buzzwords.”

 “I don’t think she was as successful as mayor as her biggest cheerleaders claimed, and I don’t think she was as terrible a Mayor as her biggest detractors claimed. But one thing I can say is that we’ve got a lot of struggles as a community. There are a lot of individuals who are struggling economically, and we’ve got big, big challenges in terms of infrastructure, property taxes, economic inequality, homelessness. And I think sometimes Mayor Larson had a tendency to paint too rosy a picture of where we’re at as a community. And I do think that that contributed to the impression that she was out of touch. And the impression that she’s out of touch, I believe, was the main reason she lost the election,” Sipress said.

Reinert holds one of the state DFL attack mailers

Sipress said another blow to Larson’s campaign was the “hit job” attack mailers against Roger Reinert from the Minnesota DFL Party (not the local DFL).  He said that type of negative outside politics has never worked in Duluth.

“It backfired in the way that almost anybody who’s active in local politics here would have predicted its backfire because people don’t like big outside money coming in and doing that. And ironically, I think those mailings actually helped Roger Reinert,” Sipress said.

And while Sipress said Reinert effectively focused his campaign on exactly the issues affecting Duluthians, he warned that the issues are bigger than Duluth, bigger than the mayor, and those campaign promises to fix the issues may very well fall short. 

“Roger has set a very high bar for himself. In order to be elected mayor, he made the claim that Mayor Larson was a failed mayor because she failed to address these big problems we face and now I think all eyes are going to be on Roger Reinert to see whether he can deliver the goods, and it’s going to a big challenge. And it’s unclear whether he can deliver on that promise he ran on.”

And finally, one of Sipress’ biggest concerns that he says voters should be worried about is the amount of unregulated big money that flooded into the mayoral race on behalf of both candidates.

Sipress pointed to one local businessman who contributed $40,000 to the pro-Roger PAC. Sipress said that power and wealth of a single donor can cause political corruption. And as for Larson, Sipress is concerned with the thousands of dollars from “rich Twin Cities liberals” that was spent by the Minnesota DFL Party on behalf of Larson.

Below is the full post from Sipress on his 10 observations:

“Warning – long post with my thoughts on the Duluth mayoral election.

First, I want to congratulate Roger Reinert on his victory and wish him well on his mayoral administration. And I want to thank Emily Larson for her service to the city. Running for mayor is grueling, and if you are elected, it is a difficult and often thankless job. Those who put themselves forward deserve our thanks.

Now, in sharing my thoughts I will be blunt. As a former city councilor and current leader in the local DFL party, there are things I get to see. And I think there is value sharing these observations with the public, even if some of them may be uncomfortable. So here it goes:

1. All the talk about how this was a left vs right election is off-base. Ideologically, Emily Larson and Roger Reinert are very similar. They are both middle of the road Amy Klobuchar/Tim Walz style Democrats. Emily tries to position herself more to the left by spouting liberal sounding buzzwords. Roger tries to position himself more to the right with his “purple caucus” talk. But, in fact, they are both centrist Democrats. As mayor, Roger won’t spout liberal sounding buzzwords. And for those who find liberal buzzwords annoying (as I do), that may provide a sense of relief. But don’t expect any big changes in the ideological orientation of the city administration.

2. Emily Larson had some significant failings as mayor and some significant accomplishments. Her supporters who portrayed her as some sort of second coming and her detractors who portrayed her as the worst thing ever to happen to Duluth were both exaggerating. And I found them equally annoying.

3. Emily Larson was subjected to horrific misogyny in this campaign, not from Roger’s campaign but from a lot of his supporters. This introduced a highly toxic tone to the campaign that should not be minimized. And she was also subjected to toxic conspiracy theories about her not really living in Duluth that were based on absolutely nothing. And unlike the misogynistic attacks, which I don’t think affected the election results, the conspiracy mongering about her not really living in Duluth definitely hurt her campaign.

4. The slash-and-burn negative campaign waged against Roger, organized and financed by the Minnesota DFL Party (NOT the local DFL) was full of bogus out-of-context charges. A few of the charges were legitimate. Roger did vote against the AICHO housing development project downtown in the old YWCA, and that may be the single worst vote he has cast in his service as an elected official. But all the talk about how he cut city services and jacked up property taxes is bogus. In 2008, the global economy crashed and wrecked the city of Duluth’s finances. To keep the city solvent, hard decisions had to be made. Then Mayor Don Ness brought a series of very difficult budget cuts and tax increases to the city council, and the council (at Don’s urging) approved the proposals. If this makes Roger some sort of right-wing anti-government type, then it also makes Don Ness some sort of right-wing anti-government type.

5. The state DFL’s hit job on Roger cost Emily votes. Duluth voters hate this kind of crap, especially when it is funded by outside interests. Some local DFL leaders warned the state party not to do it. Roger and his supporters should thank the state DFL leadership for doing it anyway, because it helped him.

6. The amount of unregulated PAC money that flooded into this campaign on behalf of both candidates is appalling and we should be very concerned about this. One local businessman contributed $40,000 to the pro-Roger PAC. This is not good. Thousands of dollars from rich Twin Cities liberals were spent by the state DFL on behalf of Emily. This is also not good. During the campaign, supporters of both candidates took the position that MY candidate’s unregulated big money is good but YOUR candidate’s unregulated big money is bad. Now that it is over, can’t we all agree that it is all bad?

7. Speaking of which, I can solve the mystery of why state DFL leaders were so obsessed with trying to save Emily. For a number of years, the party mucketymucks in the Cities have been touting Emily as the next big thing in DFL politics. Her thrashing in the primary left them with egg on their faces. So they spent $50,000 on behalf of Emily in a desperate attempt to remove the egg from their faces. Only to end up with more egg on their faces. We should all shed one tiny little tear for them.

8. I’ve been door knocking and lit dropping Duluth neighborhoods for many years. This year, in lower middle-income neighborhoods, I saw more homes in various states of disrepair than I’ve even seen. This, to me, is a sign of just how much financial stress so many people in this community are experiencing. Emily Larson is not responsible for this, of course, but I do believe that the “happy talk” that has characterized her administration and her re-election campaign, especially pre-primary, are at odds with this reality and are big part of why she was seen as so out of touch. And the feeling that she’s out of touch is why she lost the election.

9. It is true that the most serious challenges that Duluth faces (soaring housing costs, growing homelessness, a struggling downtown, failing infrastructure, economic inequality, rising property taxes) are a result of things that are outside the control of Duluth’s mayor. But it also true that it is the obligation of our city government to respond to these challenges as best it can, and it is totally legitimate to criticize a mayor for their response to these challenges (as I often did as a city councilor). Two things can be true at the same time – that these problems are bigger than Duluth and that Duluth’s city government can do a better job wrestling with these issues. But it is also true that electing a new mayor is not going to magically solve these problems.

10. Which brings me to my final observation – Roger has made big promises. He’s promised to improve city services and address failing infrastructure while holding the line on property taxes. To make the case that Emily has failed as mayor, he’s promised that he can fix problems that no mayor can fully and truly fix without changes at the state and federal level. He’s set the bar very high for himself. Are there things the city can do better? Of course. Can Roger reach the lofty goals he’s set for himself? Probably not. So the folks who convinced themselves that everything is Emily’s fault and all we need to do to fix it is elect a new mayor are likely to be disappointed. Except, of course, for the ones who’ll give him a pass because he’s a guy. And the ones who give him a pass because they are relieved to not have to listen to vacuous liberal buzzwords come out of their mayor’s mouth.”