The Republican Party of Minnesota announced Wednesday that it has hired off-duty police officers to provide security at its state fair booth. That announcement comes as concerns about safety at the Minnesota State Fair have increased in recent days.
“Because of the increase in political violence and the potential threat from rival gangs at the State Fair, the Minnesota Republican Party has hired off-duty law enforcement officers to protect our staff, volunteers, candidates, and everyone who visits our booth,” Minnesota GOP Chairman Alex Plechash said in a statement.
Plechash’s mention of rival gangs at the state fair was presumably a reference to concerns that Somali gangs will be present at the state fair grounds in Ramsey County.
Last week, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and Ramsey County Attorney John Choi signed an agreement with alleged members of Somali gangs where those individuals said they would stay away from the state fair this year.
The individuals who signed those agreements denied that they belonged to Somali gangs.
Additionally, Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher sent hundreds of letters to people who are believed to associate with gang members. Those letters warned recipients that if they attend the fair with gang members, their association could result in future prosecution.
Fletcher himself went viral earlier this week for saying, “We’ve had gangs coming to the Minnesota State Fair for 30, 40 years, but they’ve always agreed the fair is neutral ground, and ‘let’s all go have fun and respect the fair grounds.'”
“But we’ve never had threats of violence like we’re having from the Somali gangs. We will have Karen gangs, we’ll have some Hmong gangs here, we’ll have some extremists on the right here, but none of them are promising chaos except for the Somali gangs,” he added.
Today is the first day of the Minnesota State Fair, which will run through Labor Day, Sept. 7.
The Minnesota GOP’s state fair booth was the site of a public safety response last year. In that incident, a male was reported as disorderly in front of the booth and later arrested.
Earlier this morning, the Minnesota GOP reported that Tom Evanstad, a convicted rapist and former candidate for governor, was detained outside of a state fair booth belonging to a Republican candidate.
An accompanying photo from the Minnesota GOP indicated that Evanstad was detained in front of the booth belonging to Republican gubernatorial nominee Lisa Demuth.
Luke Sprinkel
Luke Sprinkel previously worked as a Legislative Assistant at the Minnesota House of Representatives. He grew up as a Missionary Kid (MK) living in England, Thailand, Tanzania, and the Middle East. Luke graduated from Regent University in 2018.
