Mpls Musings

By Heather Silsbee & Sara Kasten

Ahead of the latest campaign finance reporting deadline last week, ward 7 city council candidate Elizabeth Shaffer sent a campaign email titled “Campaign Finance Report #2.” In the email, Shaffer says,

Last Thursday at our final Ward 7 forum, I was accused of being heavily supported by corporate PAC’s, which isn’t remotely true, with Council Member Cashman also stating that we can’t let billionaire oligarchs direct our local politics, as has been happening at the federal level (Kenwood forum, 10/16/25. 1:01). News flash: they don’t. The most anyone can donate to a city council campaign is $600. 

This claim is misleading, at best. 

If you’re a millennial like us, you may have also been educated on PACs (or “political action committees”) by Stephen Colbert while he was still hosting his first show, The Colbert Report. Colbert, by creating and disbanding his own Super PAC (an even more powerful form of a PAC) on the show, taught us that while PACs cannot legally support candidates directly, they can spend unlimited funds on independent mailers, ads, polling, etc., that just happen to support certain candidates.

Independent journalist Taylor Dahlin has been leading this year’s local reporting on the shocking number of PACs spending money on our municipal elections. One PAC, called Minneapolis for the Many, is currently supporting left-leaning or progressive mayoral and city council candidates. Meanwhile, 6 PACs are funding the campaigns of Mayor Frey and/or city council candidates running in the right-leaning or moderate lanes: All of Mpls, Thrive Mpls, Minneapolis Forward, We Can Do Better Minneapolis, Safer Hennepin, and We Love Mpls (which was active during the DFL caucus process and then disbanded).

Of these PACs, Minneapolis for the Many has supported Cashman this year, while We Love Minneapolis and All of Mpls have supported Shaffer.

If Shaffer meant to say that she’s not directly working with any of these PACs, that’s great. It would be illegal for her to do so, so I hope that’s the case. But, whether these PACs exist, and whether some of them are supporting her, isn’t up for debate.

Let’s now turn to the $600 point. It’s true that, per state law, the maximum donation any individual can give to a city council campaign is $600. The thing is, for the average Minneapolis resident, $600 is an incredible amount to give to any political campaign. Most people simply could not afford it. Yet, Shaffer frequently mentions this number in her campaign emails, such as an October 14th email that said, “For those of you who haven’t donated or donated to the max ($600) it is not too late.” Continuing to harp on this number just makes Shaffer seem out of touch with the average voter.

Looking deeper into Shaffer’s campaign finances provides more evidence that she may not have the average working ward 7 resident top of mind. Shaffer has raised $248,377.66 for her campaign, which is the highest total of any city council candidate by far.

When we compared Shaffer’s donations to the 2025 donations to Cashman’s campaign, by our calculations:

• Approximately 12% of donations to Cashman were for the maximum amount while 45% of Shaffers’ were
• Breaking it down by individual donors, about 36% of Cashman’s donors have donated the maximum amount (either all at once or over time), while 53% of Shaffer’s have

So, it seems pretty clear that Shaffer’s donor base is wealthier than Cashman’s by a substantial margin.

And as far as corporations go, McDonald’s is a pretty recognizable one, right? No, the McDonald’s corporation itself is not funding Shaffer’s campaign. However, 15 individual donors, who all gave the maximum donation to Shaffer’s campaign, list McDonald’s as their employer. A quick Google search of these individuals shows that most of them own McDonald’s franchise locations in the greater Twin Cities area. So, not your average restaurant workers.

The only Minneapolis resident among the 15 is Tim Baylor, a former NFL player and recent opponent of the City Council’s attempt to create a Labor Standards Board, which was vetoed by Mayor Frey. Notably, the proposed Labor Standards Board would have been an advisory body, with the power to make recommendations about labor policy to the Mayor and City Council, but not actually make any policy changes themselves.

One of the most notable of the McDonald’s crowd is Richard Lommen, a resident of La Crosse, WI, who has a decades-long record of donations to both State and Federal Republican candidates, including Scott Walker, Ron Johnson, and Donald Trump.

A candidate can’t control everyone who donates to them. But, wealthy donors, like most voters, tend to financially support candidates who they think will support their own interests. So, if you’re wondering whose interests Shaffer would support as a council member, just look at her donor base.

Thanks to my amazing partner, Sara Kasten, for the data analysis for this piece. Cover photo shows protesters advocating for a $15 minimum wage outside the Dinkytown McDonald’s in 2015, by Fibonacci Blue.