By James Nord and Briana Bierschbach

The DFL caucus that ended in a brawl and sent a woman to the hospital earlier this month is at the center of allegations that threats and bullying were used to disrupt the political process and that some people were paid to attend the caucus.

Further, Minneapolis City Council Member Abdi Warsame’s involvement in a contentious state House race that prompted the caucus fight has swept up City Hall and fractured the East African political community.

MinnPost has learned that the day before the Cedar-Riverside caucus, Warsame told another council member, Andrew Johnson, that he should warn his aide to stay away from the caucus or there could be trouble for her.

Warsame is supporting longtime incumbent DFL Rep. Phyllis Kahn; Johnson’s aide, Somali activist Ilhan Omar, is widely believed to be supporting the challenger, fellow Somali Mohamud Noor, though she says she’s neutral in the race.

Omar did attend the caucus, and ended up in the hospital with a concussion.

This description of the Feb. 4 caucus and events leading up to the gathering is based on interviews with Somali political activists who attended the caucus, City Hall officials, DFL political operatives, a non-political caucus attendee and the observations of a MinnPost reporter who attended the caucus.

These sources detailed threats and behind-the-scenes political attacks in the state House contest between Kahn and Noor. Kahn is facing one of the toughest endorsement battles in her 42 years in the Legislature.

The simmering divisions were on open display at two DFL precinct caucus meetings in Somali neighborhoods of Minneapolis. Both caucuses erupted in chaos and violence.

One caucus, in the Seward neighborhood, was able to finish its work. But the other caucus, in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, abruptly ended after Omar, Johnson’s aide who was allegedly warned not to attend, was injured during a fight and Minneapolis police shut down the scene.

“That’s not a good reason you should be beaten up … just [for] supporting somebody,” Abdi Mohamed, a Noor supporter who worked at the event, later said during an interview. “That’s un-American. That’s not why we came here. If we wanted violence, we could have stayed in Somalia. There’s plenty of violence every day.”

Officials in the city of Minneapolis human resources department are investigating possible workplace misconduct over actions that occurred in City Hall during the runup to the caucus. A city spokesman confirmed there is an open complaint against Warsame, but couldn’t provide additional details including whether the complaint and investigation are related.

“That’s really something I don’t want to talk about,” Warsame said when asked about the initial comment that Omar stay home. In a later interview, Warsame said that he has not been contacted about any possible city investigation, declining to say more.

Warsame also denied that he or any of his associates were involved in the caucus disturbance. “Like I said, I wasn’t involved in it,” he said. “My office was not involved in it.”

Minneapolis police spokesman John Elder said the department’s First Precinct is investigating the caucus fight, but Johnson and other City Hall officials have been critical of those efforts so far.

“I would like to see a better response,” Blong Yang, who chairs the City Council’s Public Safety Committee, said in an interview. “In this case, I think folks can just say, ‘If this is a Somali person and she works for Andrew Johnson and our police department won’t even take her statement and won’t even look at her case, how can anybody have faith?’ ”

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Source:MinnPost