How Minnesota Become the Center of a Political Crisis

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Karen Hunter is demonstrating how Minnesota’s political history shows a long pattern of choosing what she called “humanity” over fear-based politics, even as much of the country has moved in the opposite direction.

On a recent broadcast of The Karen Hunter Show, Hunter rejected popular rhetoric about racism and power. “I think we need to move away from that language,” she said. “What this really is is inhumanity. What this really is is horribleness.” She argued that racial categories in the United States were constructed to justify cruelty and control. “White is a created construct to make sure you know who to be horrible to,” she said.

Hunter traced modern policing to slavery-era patrols. “The patty rollers turned into the patrollers and then into the police force,” she said. “They just gave the overseer a badge and a gun.” She added that brutality did not disappear with time. “That history never left. It just changed uniforms.”

She then described Minnesota as a refuge for people seeking opportunity and safety. “Minnesota has kind of been that place,” Hunter said. “If you’re a refugee, Minnesota was like, ‘Come on. We have programs to help you.’” She noted that the state’s voting record has often stood apart from national trends. “Minnesota has voted for humanity when the rest of the country chose something else,” she said.

Hunter acknowledged the killings of Philando Castile and George Floyd but said they should not define the state’s entire political culture. “Those were tragedies, but they were not the rule for Minnesota,” she said, before connecting the state’s present to its past, pointing to early support for Abraham Lincoln and later leaders such as Hubert Humphrey. “Parties twist and change,” Hunter said. “But what shouldn’t change are people.”

Hunter also warns that racial conflict distracts from a deeper struggle over power and resources. “This is not a fight between white and Black. That’s the illusion,” she said. “Once we start denying rights and resources to one group, it is only a matter of time before those denials reach you, no matter what you think protects you.”

Voting, she said, should be about collective responsibility. “You don’t vote your preferences,” Hunter noted. “You vote for rights and resources so the majority can move freely.” Minnesota’s record, she argued, shows what that choice can look like over generations.