State Sen. Omar Fateh says he has received a constant stream of threats and abuse since announcing his candidacy for mayor of Minneapolis last December. But the one message that sticks in his mind came earlier this month.
Following U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar’s announcement on Oct. 12 that she was endorsing him, Fateh said his campaign received a message that read, “two bullets to the head, done.” It was punctuated by a checkmark emoji.
“That is not only a direct threat, but, like, direct plans,” Fateh told Sahan Journal. “Like ‘I’m going to literally come over there and come to you myself.”
A few weeks earlier, Fateh’s campaign headquarters in the predominantly East African neighborhood of Cedar-Riverside was defaced with graffiti that read “Somali Muslim — this warning is no joke” in black marker.
Political violence is increasing nationwide as the partisan divide widens. In the past few months alone, Minnesota House DFL leader Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark were assassinated, and Sen. John Hoffman and his wife Yvette, were wounded. In Utah, rightwing political commentator Charlie Kirk was shot and killed in September.
A Pew Research survey released Friday found that 85% of respondents, people across the political spectrum, agreed that politically motivated violence is on the rise.
“Part of it is polarization itself, another part of it is copycat behavior, and the third part of it is just the availability of guns,” said Howard Lavine, a political science professor at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. “In a society that’s polarized, and at the same time is flooded with guns, you’re going to see more political violence.”
The vitriol aimed at Fateh highlights Islamophobic abuse endured by Muslim candidates for elected office. Several candidates for local office say they’ve experienced similar treatment, and they are concerned it will discourage younger people from running for office.
Fateh, a two-term state senator who represents much of south Minneapolis, is facing off against incumbent Mayor Jacob Frey, who is seeking a third term, in the Nov. 4 election. Fateh is challenging Frey from the political left, criticizing the current mayor for not taking enough action to end homelessness and reform the Minneapolis Police Department, among other issues.
Fateh said he has received an “ongoing and pretty consistent” stream of racist, Islamophobic rhetoric via social media posts and messages, voice mails and emails since being elected to the Minnesota Senate in 2020, but the direct threats of violence began when he launched his mayoral campaign.
Fateh’s campaign, as well as the state Senate’s Sergeant at Arms, monitor and inform Fateh of threats against him. Local law enforcement and the FBI may become involved, depending on the severity of the threat.
“I would like to say it’s every day, because they’ve told me from the sergeant at arms’ perspective that it’s pretty frequent … and they’ve been saying that there’s been an alarming amount,” Fateh said. “The ones that are the most pointed and most direct, like ‘We’re going to do this,’ are the ones that they notify me of.”
‘People are starting to normalize it’
In the decade after the Sept. 11 attacks, rising Islamophobia prompted an average of 138 bias-motivated crimes per year against Muslims between 2002 and 2013, according to FBI statistics. Incidents ebbed and flowed the following decade, until recently. Last year, the Council on American-Islamic Relations reported a spike in hate crimes against Muslims in 2023, with 607 incidents nationwide — a significant increase from 117 incidents reported in 2022. The organization also received more than 8,000 complaints of discrimination, the highest in its 30-year history.
Though the spotlight is currently on Fateh’s campaign, other local Muslim politicians and candidates for elected office say they endure the same type of treatment.
Minneapolis Council Member Aurin Chowdhury, who is running for re-election in Ward 12, recalled an instance when a former supporter removed a Chowdhury lawn sign after learning she was a Muslim, and that she was endorsed by Congresswoman Omar, another Muslim woman.
“I asked them about it and they were like ‘I could never support someone like you, and definitely not someone endorsed by her,’ referring to Ilhan,” Chowdhury told Sahan Journal. “That ‘someone like you’ carried a lot of weight, and I could just kind of read between the lines.”
This month, she said, another constituent who she met while door-knocking spit on her after yelling and pointing his finger in her face.
State Sen. Zaynab Mohamed of Minneapolis said she hasn’t experienced direct threats on her life since she was sworn in in 2023, but she receives racist, Islamophobic comments on social media every time she posts.
“I don’t think I can ever post without getting 20 to 30 comments that are just nasty, Islamophobic, anti-immigrant, all of the rhetoric you can think of,” she said. “I often will look at my colleagues in the Senate who are white and what they post, and the fact that they don’t get what I get. It’s fascinating.”
The online abuse has been more intense this year, she said, since the inauguration of President Donald Trump, whom she accuses of fueling the rhetoric. Citing Fateh as well as New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, who is also Muslim, Mohamed said she’s concerned Islamophobia is becoming a fixture in political races run by Muslims.
“I can see how comfortable our society has become with it and … I feel that people are starting to normalize it,” she said.
Effects on candidates and their campaigns
The number of threats means Fateh’s campaign must set aside more time before events and community engagements to take safety precautions, and divert funds from other priorities to pay for security.
In the wake of Hortman’s assassination, the Legislature will now cover costs for upgraded home security for any lawmaker who requests it. That is in addition to $3,000 lawmakers can pull from their campaign funds to cover security costs.
Hiring security is costly, said co-campaign manager Akhilesh Menawat, with estimates in the thousands of dollars for just a few hours. Menawat said this has complicated the campaign’s budget priorities, as well as when and where they feel it’s safe for Fateh to be, putting their campaign at a disadvantage.
“The mayor is driven around 24/7 by MPD — he has security all the time, so even if he was getting threats like this, he’s protected by the city’s police department,” Menawat said. “It is definitely an undue burden for us compared to the mayor. Most campaigns don’t have to think about this.”
A broader effect of the vitriol aimed at Muslim politicians and candidates may be that fewer Muslims run for elected office in the future. More than a dozen local, state and federal elected seats in Minnesota are held by Muslims. Five members of the Minnesota Legislature and four members of the Minneapolis City Council also are Muslims.
Chowdhury said younger people of color are disillusioned with politicians and elected office, and less likely to run. Many tell her “‘I don’t know how you do it,’” or “’Politics isn’t for me,’” she said.
But that doesn’t mean they aren’t engaged, she said, and that gives her hope. Their efforts to raise awareness about issues important to them and increase voter turnout are stronger than ever, she said.
“These are young people who do not hold an elected office, who do not hold a big title,” she said. “They’re just doing it out of their own advocacy and activism. They’re still doing the work of turning out their peers to vote in a local election.”
Mohamed said her job has taken a toll on her. She was diagnosed earlier this year with chronic migraines. She said she recognizes that the goal of those who hurl the racist and threatening comments at her and her Muslim colleagues is to get them not to run again. Instead, it motivates her to keep going.
“It also kind of puts a fire under your ass,” Mohamed said. “It’s not going to make me walk away – I’m going to be here, and my existence in this position is going to continue to make you uncomfortable.”
