Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Rep. Emmer Lets RNC Know What's on His Large, Empty Mind
"Little" Marco Rubio, Ron "DeSanctimonious," and Ted "Dad May Have Helped Assassinate JFK" Cruz were just some of the people former President Donald Trump once mocked who were smooching the 45th president's ass as the Republican National Convention kicked off this week in Milwaukee. Hell, the man's VP pick once compared him to Hitler! Joining the cavalcade of once-shit-upon sycophants was Minnesota Rep. Tom Emmer, who took his groveling RNC turn Tuesday. During his speech, the U.S. House majority whip predicted voters will "turn Minnesota red for the first time in 50 years," while heaping praise on the Trump-JD Vance ticket. And today, local water-carrying grievance mill Alpha News published a conversation with Emmer, in which the third-ranking Republican described Trump as a "one in 100-year leader. You only get a personality like this, if you’re lucky, once a century."
Jeez, how'd we get so lucky? In any case, Emmer's embarrassing lack of self-respect regarding Trump always bears repeating. On January 6, 2021, Emmer voted to certify the 2020 election results, no doubt enraging that election's persistent loser. By late 2023, as Emmer was nominated to be Speaker of the House, Trump called the congressman “totally out-of-touch with Republican Voters” and a “Globalist RINO"; the ex-president reportedly told advisors, “[Emmer]'s done. It’s over. I killed him.” Sure enough, a browbeaten Emmer dropped out and Mike Johnson got the job. Emmer spent the subsequent months polishing apples for Trump, leading to his March appointment as the Minnesota chair of Trump's presidential campaign and, yesterday, the spineless display you saw in Milwaukee (click here for a full recap of Emmer's RNC).
Somali-American Ex-Investigator Explains 'Why You’re Hearing About Fraud in My Community'
With a guest commentary post from Kayseh Magan, the Minnesota Reformer broached a very sensitive subject today: Why are so many people associated with recent high-profile fraud scandals related to Medicaid and Feeding Our Future from Minnesota's Somali community? Magan, a former investigator with the Attorney General’s Office and a onetime Minneapolis City Council candidate, grapples with that "uncomfortable" question with surplus thoughtfulness, offering political, cultural, and socioeconomic explanations as a member of that community. He writes that the problem boils down to desire ("a significant number of Somalis are the sole providers for extended family members who live back home, where the annual per capita GDP is about $600") meeting opportunity ("Minnesota’s public programs don’t adequately guard against organized fraud").
"Fraud in government programs leaves taxpayers feeling resentful, and rightfully so," Magan concludes, adding that he believes some fraudsters have leveraged "race and religion to avoid accountability" from DFLers. "Rampant fraud in these programs erodes public support for them and in the long run hurts our community and those who rely on them... But the responsibility for preventing the fraud rests with our elected leaders. Let’s hope they get to work."
Earlier this month, Reformer commentary contributor Eric Harris Bernstein pointed his finger at another potential culprit: "Privatizing government is a win for greedy middlemen, fraudsters." Bingo.
Did SD, in Cahoots with the Feds, Annex Southwestern MN?
We know seditionist inclinations bubble throughout far-western Minnesota—who could forget MN GOP's deeply serious Dakotas annexation bill? But not even the most paranoid among you could have predicted this: Earlier this year the federal government expanded the Sioux Falls metro area into Minnesota! According to Sioux Falls Business, the U.S. Office of Management & Budget now considers the 10,000-ish souls occupying Rock County, Minnesota, as part of the so-called Sioux Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area. Worse yet, the captive Minnesotans in question aren't succumbing to the knee-jerk provincialism that's currently gripping Racket.
“We’ve always considered Sioux Falls our regional center, our regional hub, and you knew as Sioux Falls continued to grow the ring would come out farther, and we happened to catch the ring now,” says Rock County Administrator Kyle Oldre. “It’s good for us. It’s been collectively our primary business center for a long time, and this validates it through the Census Bureau.”
Folks, we've lost Luverne! Luverne. Has been. Captured!!! Or has it? Jodi Schwan at SF Biz writes that this dramatic bookkeeping landgrab isn't a threat to Minnesota sovereignty; the state line remains unbreached. "Mostly," she writes, “[it means] new data." OK, we're breathing... we're breathing...
Racket-Stoked Zorbaz Discourses Dominates Internet
Well, a couple corners of the internet. Over on the wonderful Facebook account Quirky Minnesota Places, followers rattled off 200+ comments about Zorbaz, many of which dwelled on whether the northern Minnesota party-bar chain deserved global props in the New York Times. (And to be clear, I'm aware that the Times article was a compendium of reader suggestions and not a direct editorial decree.) "I haven't ever had good pizza at a restaurant in Minnesota, y'all are not to be trusted!" wrote Nick Brown, who's not exactly wrong about our state's overall pizza quality.
Elsewhere, statewide Redditors grappled with the Zorbaz question, most of them declaring that, while the menu isn't amazing, the beachy, North Woods atmosphere is. "Zorbaz is one of those things in life that doesn’t need the internet or the NYT sticking their noses into it," wrote one user. "It’s Minnesota’s. We don’t need the world to understand or approve it. We love it for what it is and we forgive it for what it’s not. That’s good enough for us." Another user had the nerve to accuse Racket of "being a bit hipster and contrary," though they ultimately agreed with our findings—pizza is mid, cultural importance is worth celebrating.
If you wanna get in the Zorbaz mud (a word I used to describe their peanut butter-tomato sauce), consult the article that started all this trouble.
