Live from the Fifth District [Update: Time for Ilhan]

I am at the special Fifth District endorsing convention. It will be called to order in the next few minutes. Erin Golden previews the convention and coming primary contest here in today’s Star Tribune.

DFL Vice Chair Keith Ellison is the incumbent congressman, but he is contending for the DFL nomination for Minnesota Attorney General. Has any major party candidate ever run for such an office with a record of support for cop killers and cop killer wannabes, as Ellison has throughout his career? Joanne Chesimard a/k/a Assata Shakur is probably the most prominent of his cop killer causes. She is the first woman to make the FBI’s Most Wanted list. But I digress.

Observing the delegates gather, I can see that the contest for the convention endorsement seems to have come down to state representative Ilhan Omar and state senator Patricia Torres Ray. If I were a betting man, I’d bet that it’s Time for Ilhan, as the title of the new documentary has it. She is the first first-term state legislator ever to achieve international renown. I will update this post with the convention result later this afternoon.

We have just received word that a tornado watch is in effect until 9:00 p.m. (Central) tonight. Nothing symbolic about that.

UPDATE: The contest at the convention had in fact boiled down to two candidates, Torres and Omar. The convention endorsed Omar on the second ballot. All the candidates proceed to the multicandidate DFL primary on August 14. I don’t understand the DFL, but I’m pretty sure that Omar has to be considered the strong favorite to emerge as their candidate for Congress in this strongly Democratic district.

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