RT Running Again

by Sean Broom | 12 Comments

I’ve been told that Mayor Rybak is running again for Mayor of Minneapolis.  This probably puts the kibosh on him running for Governor as his funders probably wouldn’t be up to pay for two campaigns in two years.

More on this later.

December 9, 2008, 1:11 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: .

12 Responses to “RT Running Again”

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  • Jeremy Hanson
    December 9, 2008 at 3:37 pm

    Until you hear otherwise from the Mayor himself about what he plans to do in the future, I would not put much credence into speculation. As his official spokesperson, I’m pretty sure that Mayor Rybak has not made a decision on whether he will seek a third term.

  • Sean Broom
    December 9, 2008 at 4:25 pm

    Well thank you for your comment Jeremy — I look forward to another when the mayor makes his intentions know.

  • Dyna
    December 9, 2008 at 6:37 pm

    RT, you really need to become a “Fed”. Instead of that cheesy Minnesota 401k plan for elected officials and high deductable city health plan you’re stuck with, as a fed you’d get real health insurance and be vested for a pension in 5 years. Then you can retire and keep that health insurance for peanuts. And don’t worry about us here in the Mill City- we’ve got plenty of folks hankerin’ to take your place in city hall.

    p.s.: You can’t take the city’s Prius to D.C. though. But once you become a fed and pass the defensive driving course and road test they’ll let you sign out a Flex-Fuel Taurus- for government business only.

  • Karl
    December 9, 2008 at 8:48 pm

    Well. I hope your wrong Sean. Unless Tim Walz gets in R.T. is far and away our best candidate (IMHO) and I know that I and many others would be strongly behind him.

  • tom a.
    December 9, 2008 at 9:29 pm

    Need to be in office to run for office, that way most trips and such are paid for. “Funders lacking money”? Surely you jest. He’s a DFLer…

  • Eva Young
    December 9, 2008 at 11:04 pm

    The one good thing about RT running for governor, is that he would no longer be Mayor of Minneapolis. Under his watch, we lost our library system.

  • Another Chris
    December 10, 2008 at 1:18 am

    Norm Coleman ran for Governor in ‘98 just after being reelected Mayor of St. Paul. George Latimer did the same in 1986.

    Rybak looks good on TV and can be very charming and conversant on a lot of issues. White upscale liberals have orgasms over him. He is, after all, one of them. But when you scratch beneath the surface, you’ll see that he broke just about every promise he made when he first ran: Lower property taxes, more diversity in the police force, more affordable housing, more funding for NRP, no public money for stadiums, 24-hour snowplowing, no fundraisers in off-years. The blithe indifference with which Rybak threw all(!) those commitments overboard after his election was a little frightening.

    Here’s a great example of Rybak’s penchant for spin over substance: Rybak charged Sharon Sayles-Belton with being “too eager to always go to the property-tax-payers” and posing himself as a fiscal conservative. A few months into Rybak’s term, he announced with much fanfare a “long-term budget planning document” that would limit the city to a maximum of 8 percent-a-year property tax increases. He heralded this as a great step forward in fiscal discipline. The only problem was, 8 percent was more than Sayles-Belton had ever raised property taxes in any year. He wasn’t pledging to do anything that SSB hadn’t already done. And sure enough, Rybak’s budgets have increased the city’s portion of property taxes by the maximum 8 percent every single year he’s been in office, (and that 8 percent is a city-wide average figure that doesn’t take valuation increases into account, so many homes have seen increases much larger than 8 percent a year) vastly outstripping the previous administration he had criticized as profligate.

    Rybak’s excuse is that the legislature changed the property tax formula in 2001 and that he’s had to govern in tougher economic times than SSB. But the change in the tax formula and the coming economic slowdown were both obvious in 2001, and were acknowledged by then-candidate Rybak. His glib answer at the time was, “We’ll just have to do more with less.” His actual record has been raising regressive taxes faster while cutting back on services.

    When Rybak ran again in 2005, all he had to talk about were, 1) he had completed some projects that had been started under the prior administration, 2) that he had hired the McKinsey firm to move some lines and boxes around in the city bureaucracy, and 3) Peter McLaughlin couldn’t have done any better given the economic climate. Even if Rybak was right on the last point, that’s hardly an advertisement for his reelection.

    So yeah, Rybak’s a pretty slick guy. But I trust his promises about as much as I trust Norm Coleman pledging to “change the tone” in Washington.

  • Rough Rider
    December 10, 2008 at 8:11 am

    I would echo most of the sentiment. RT would have a very difficult time winning the 2010 race because everyone outside of Minneapolis and parts of St. Paul sees him as the ultra-liberal, big-city mayor. The perception may be right or wrong, but it most certainly is the perception. RT should run for Mayor again and wait his turn to be plucked for a DC position in a few years.

  • Rick
    December 10, 2008 at 10:20 am

    Jeremy Hanson, In case you didn’t notice, MN Publius is a political blog, speculation is their stock in trade. It’s what they do. That’s why we read it.

  • amuseinc
    December 10, 2008 at 10:54 am

    Just a thought, I think Rybak would have a very tough time in the the out state. As is those in greater Minnesota feel they get shortchanged versus the Cities… how would they view a Minneapolis Mayor as Governor? This is the same for St. Paul’s unfortunately named Coleman. To me the prime candidate would by Rep. Tim Walz but then we have to find an equally qualified candidate for Tropical Minnesota’s Congressional District. It should be an interesting election cycle… Who will slay the Gimmicky Timmy Dragon?

  • Dan
    December 10, 2008 at 12:42 pm

    Yeah Sean, maybe you shouldn’t report something until you get the official word from his spokesperson. LOL.

    If Rybak runs for higher office, the first thing he should do is get an official spokesperson who isn’t a nitwit.

  • Andrew
    December 10, 2008 at 7:29 pm

    He told me he was either going to run for mayor in 2009 or governor in 2010 when I asked what he was planning on.

    If it were a more wide open field I’d say he would probably run for both but what will most likely be a crowded DFL field, kind of taxing to run for both.

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