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Election 2023
Kyre Johnson

Here's where Minneapolis and St. Paul elections stand with ranked choice voting

A Machine Shop polling place voter
A Machine Shop polling place voter fills out their ballot on Tuesday.
Courtesy of Liam Gill-Sutton

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Several key city council races in St. Paul and Minneapolis are still too close to call as of the morning after election night.  

Because of ranked choice voting, additional ballot tabulations will be happening for Ward 6, Ward 7 and Ward 8 in Minneapolis. Results in Ward 1 and Ward 7 in St. Paul are also up in the air, but it is clear the proposed sales tax question on the ballot has been approved by voters with at least 60 percent of the vote.

St. Paul City Council

So where are there two races that still haven’t been called in St. Paul? 

In a ranked choice voting system, candidates must break 50 percent of first-choice votes. None of the candidates in Ward 1 and Ward 7 were able to do that definitively last night, Frederick Melo of the Pioneer Press told MPR News host Cathy Wurzer on Morning Edition.

In Ward 1, Anika Bowie came the closest with nearly to 40 percent of first choice votes, followed by James Lo with almost 20 percent of first-choice votes, and lastly Omar Syed with close to 19 percent.

In Ward 7, there were six candidates. Melo told MPR News that despite Cheniqua Johnson coming in first on election night with a little more than 41 percent of first-choice votes, she may lose as tabulation continues to second choice votes and beyond. There was about a 300-vote difference between Johnson and her closest competitor Pa Der Vang who neared 36 percent of first choice votes.

Melo says that even though final counts may not come in until Friday — as votes must be hand-counted and reallocated — St. Paul will likely welcome a left-leaning, all-female city council.

Ward 4 incumbent Mitra Jalali won her race with 80 percent of first-choice votes and is well-positioned to run for city council president. 

Minneapolis City Council

Minneapolis also runs its elections under the ranked choice voting system, and three key races did not have a candidate that managed to secure the majority last night.

In Ward 8, Andrea Jenkins is the unofficial winner as of late Wednesday morning.

MPR News reporter Jon Collins said on Morning Edition that Jenkins celebrated an optimistic early win at her election party, “even when they told the crowd that neither candidate had won outright on the ballot.”

The Jenkins party had a younger crowd than Stevenson’s, but Collins says he “told his supporters that his campaign proved that people can stand up and fight back even when a lot of money is thrown at them.”

Other races that haven’t been called include Ward 7, which was left with an open seat after long-time former council member Lisa Goodman decided not to run for reelection. Neither of the leading candidates, Katie Cashman or Scott Graham, was able to secure 50 percent of first-choice votes, either.

Ward 6 also had a tight race between incumbent Jamal Osman and challengers Kayseh Magan and Tiger Worku.

The city will likely start counting second-choice votes this morning, eliminating the candidate with the least amount of first choice votes.