Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey has had to wear a bullet-proof vest on several occasions, as he says there has been a dramatic increase in the number of threats made against him and his family.
Frey joined News Talk 830 WCCO’s Chad Hartman on Thursday, discussing the threats towards him and other city leaders.
Recently, there have been several Minneapolis City Council members who have been the target of threats and violence by activists. Frey is calling for the violence to stop.
“There are more mornings than I care to count, where I, or my wife, will walk down the stairs from our apartment, or just look out the kitchen window and it says ‘Kill the mayor’ in spray paint on our home,” Frey said.
Even though Frey says this type of behavior has become part of the job, he stressed that we shouldn’t get comfortable with it because it’s “unacceptable.”
“People should be able to govern, and councilmembers should be able to vote, without the fear that their family or they will be targeted with threats and violence,” Frey said. “It’s getting out of hand.”
Frey says that if things like this continue, good people are not going to want to run for office and try to help impact their communities because it may put themselves or their families at risk.
Even though the mayor doesn’t always agree with how some leaders vote, he says he still respects the “sacred nature of democracy.”
“You can’t have a bunch of people bombard a council meeting and prevent [councilmembers] physically or audibly from voting,” Frey said about recent incidents at city council meetings. “It doesn’t matter what side of the spectrum, I don’t care if you’re Republican or Democrat, we should all be standing up for this.”
When it comes to his own security now, compared to when he entered office in 2018, Frey says that threats have caused him to make changes.
“There were very active threats, and again, it’s not unique to one side,” Frey said, explaining that while it doesn’t “happen very often,” he has had to wear “bullet-proof vests” on several occasions.
The mayor has also had times when he’s needed to increase security because of threats to his family coming more frequently than before.
“We shouldn’t get comfortable with this because it’s not okay,” Frey said.
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