Letter to the Editor: In Response to Robin Wonsley Commentary

Editor’s Note: Robin Wonsley wrote a commentary that we published about the concerns she had about changes being made by the DFL Minneapolis party to the  upcoming May 3 convention date. In response to that commentary, we received this commentary from women in the local DFL party, that we also are publishing as another perspective.

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As women with long histories in the DFL, who are committed to DFL principles of diversity and inclusion, we respond to Robin Wonsley’s April 22 Commentary, at womenspress.com, and to an incendiary letter she also distributed on April 19. Repeated on X, Wonsley declared: “A handful of local DFL leaders are attempting to use Republican-style voter disenfranchisement measures in our community to exclude student voters.”  Three days later she wrote, “Conservative power players have backed challengers seeking the DFL endorsement in an attempt to prevent me from being elected.” 

Let us clarify what is happening. Ms. Wonsley proudly proclaims she is a Socialist, independent from the DFL, and declines to seek DFL endorsement. In DFL-dominated Minneapolis, DFL-endorsed candidates for local offices almost always win, so Wonsley’s choice placed her at electoral risk. To mitigate that risk, Ms. Wonsley recruited students to participate in our endorsement proceedings, and trained them to prevent the DFL from endorsing a competitor to her.

In Minneapolis, our endorsement proceedings are governed by the Minneapolis DFL Constitution, which vests responsibility for caucuses and conventions in each Ward Committee. Committees are open to anyone holding a DFL office within the ward, and to candidates seeking our endorsement in that ward. They are established well before proceedings begin. Weeks before the April 8 caucuses, Ward Committees across the city had secured sites and dates for their conventions, based on location, availability, cost, and capacity. On April 8, the Ward 2 (W2) caucuses elected an unexpectedly large number of convention delegates, which exceeded the capacity of the originally secured convention site. The W2 Committee could not find an alternative in W2 during May, within budget constraints.  Thus the Committee, in consultation with the Minneapolis DFL Chair, rescheduled the W2 convention for June 7, and then rescheduled again for June 1 to avoid a potential conflict with a Muslim holiday.

Ms. Wonsley decried this as “Republican-style voter disenfranchisement measures.” It was nothing of the sort. It was an attempt by DFL volunteers to respond to unforeseen logistical difficulties while running the party’s endorsement proceedings. 

Ms. Wonsley wrote, “I’m insisting that the DFL preserve its original convention date.” As she insists on separating herself from the DFL, she has no standing from which to insist on how we conduct our internal affairs.

A spirited debate within the DFL has been underway for several years about whether our party should endorse candidates for Minneapolis municipal seats. Some believe we should not, because we know that in DFL-dominated Minneapolis, our endorsement can determine the election’s outcome. Especially now, as we struggle to define our most effective response to Trump, we need input from all Minneapolis voters, not just the small number of activists involved in endorsement proceedings. But this debate is underway among DFL members, who care about the party and its future. 

Ms. Wonsley excluded herself from our debate by separating herself from the DFL. Her political home is the Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America (TCDSA), from which she has sought and received endorsement, and within which she is a thought leader. That organization’s platform differs from the DFL in important domains. We welcome its competition, as we are not the same, just as we would welcome competition from Republicans. We believe that voters should have clear choices among platforms and candidates.

As voters, as active participants in local elections, and as longtime DFL activists, we support two of Ms. Wonsley’s opponents who seek DFL endorsement:  Michael Baskins and Shelley Madore. We support them not because we are “conservative power brokers” trying to “drag the city to the right.”  We support them because we believe that they possess the desired qualities of public officials: Truthfulness, integrity, decorum, respect. We believe that they have the experience, maturity, and wisdom to grapple with the city’s many complex problems responsibly — by listening to and responding to all stakeholders, knowing that cities only thrive when all needs are met.  

Ms. Wonsley has been on the Council for nearly 3.5 years and in that time, we have observed her demonstrate the opposite. Without evidence, she publicly accused the Mayor of threatening to withhold services from her ward. When the city elicited input from residents and business owners near George Floyd Square, and proposed a reopening plan embraced by those most directly impacted, Ms. Wonsley derided it as “White Supremacy at its Finest” and demanded that her idea be considered instead. So when Ms. Wonsley accused unnamed “DFL Leaders” of intentionally disenfranchising students, in our view, she demonstrated that she willfully undermines public trust, and thus is unfit for the office she holds.

We support her opponents because we believe they would instill the trust necessary for democracy to thrive, and because we believe they would make wiser and better informed decisions that would help Minneapolis thrive. We repudiate Ms. Wonsley’s attempt to intervene in our party’s endorsement processes, even as we debate its value amongst ourselves. Wonsley chose to distance herself from the DFL, and from that distance has flung baseless accusations against us. She is in no position to dictate how we conduct our affairs.  

• Martha Holton Dimick, North Minneapolis
• Viviana Salazar, North Minneapolis
• Jessica Shaten, Longfellow in South Minneapolis
• Julie Wicklund, Southwest Minneapolis