On a crisp fall morning, Rep. Anquam Mahamoud, DFL-Minneapolis, was getting fitted for a mountain bike and a helmet.
She was giddy.
“I had biking out here on my to-do list,” she said. “So, I was very excited when Cal proposed this. I was like, ‘Yes, let's do it.'”
‘Cal’ is Rep. Cal Warwas, R-Eveleth. He represents a swath of the Iron Range in the heart of mining country, which includes a former taconite-mine-turned-mountain-bike-park near Chisholm.
Warwas was excited, too — even though he’s been biking there a lot.
"This will be amazing,” he reassured Mahamoud.
For the next hour-and-a-half, Warwas and Mahamoud biked through the woods just as the fall colors were starting to emerge.
This excursion is part of a new legislative swap. It’s like a foreign exchange program, but for the adults elected to serve in the state Legislature. It’s sponsored by the Citizens League, a St. Paul nonprofit that promotes civility in politics and public policy.
It’s among the first such programs in the nation, said Citizens League Executive Director Jake Loesch. So far, four pairs of legislators have participated, and more are signed up for next year.
“We have an incredible group of committed elected officials who are going to St. Paul all session long to try and govern effectively,” said Loesch. “But that can be difficult when you know political polarization and distrust is growing in every aspect of life.”
Loesch said part of the solution is abandoning physical and political silos, even if it’s just for a few days.
“Unless legislators on opposite sides of the aisle serve on a committee together, there’s just very limited opportunity for them to get to know each other,” he said. “I think it’s a symptom — or a cause, depending on how you look at it — of some of the polarization and division that we feel.”
‘Real stories’
Even before heading off on their biking excursion, Warwas and Mahamoud had a packed schedule. The night before, Warwas had taken Mahamoud to the Hockey Hall of Fame in Eveleth. They toured an iron mine.
Here, mining has traditionally been a source of financial stability, though the industry increasingly faces pushback from environmentalists.
Warwas works in the mining industry. It's part of his identity.
"I grew up in a very rural area, in an area where there's more mining than anywhere else in the country. That’s just natural for me. But for people who aren't from here, it's a very foreign thing,” he said.
Many of her experiences in Warwas’s conservative region were brand new for Mahamoud, who represents a liberal urban district of Minneapolis.
Mahamoud said that the tour of the iron mine and a dinner she’d had the night before with local officials and long-time miners were illuminating. They helped her understand better why mining is such an important part of the Iron Range culture and identity.
“They’re real stories, and it's coming from the person living that experience,” said Mahamoud. “And so, you have this window into understanding — like, why they fight so passionately. Because these are personal to them."
‘Now I get it’
Mahamoud and Warwas were both elected last year to an evenly divided Minnesota House. It was a rocky start of their first legislative session. Democrats boycotted the Capitol as House leaders fought over who was rightfully in charge. The dispute went to court.
After the dust settled, legislators were forced to work together and wrapped up their work in a special session. But just days later, tragedy struck with the politically motivated assassination of former House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark.
Sen. John Hoffman, DFL-Champlin, and his wife Yvette were shot the same night but survived.
Both Mahamoud and Warwas said the fact that voters sent such a narrowly divided electorate to Saint Paul is a sign that they’re tired of political division.
Relationships are central to the program, said Jonathan Perman, who came up with the idea in 2018 when he started pairing up members of Congress for district swaps.
“It’s about building relationships, which are fundamental to being able to work together,” he said.
Perman brought the idea to Minnesota in part because the state is so evenly divided at the Legislature. The idea is to pair lawmakers who seemingly have nothing in common politically or geographically, because politicians tend to keep their attention focused on the issues and culture of the place where they live, Perman said.
“We try to give them these opportunities and these experiences that they can then take back [to the Capitol]. And then, when they get back and now start working with that colleague, they can think to themselves, ‘Well, now I get it. Now I see why.’"
Finding common ground
A few weeks after her trip to the Iron Range, Mahamoud said issues that stuck with her were challenges around rural health care. Mahamoud’s career has been working to expand health care access. And even though she’s based in the Twin Cities, she sees similar access challenges in rural communities.
“We also talked about rural hospitals closing, which we are all very concerned about here at the Legislature,” she said. “This is not an us-versus-them issue. Both sides of the aisle care about this."
Mahamoud is already brainstorming legislation that would give rural hospitals better access to discounted ambulances. She said health care policy is one area where she and Warwas overlap.
On the trip, they also discovered something else they have in common: They both love to eat.
She said Warwas can expect a bit of a culinary tour when he visits her culturally diverse district later this year.
"We have a lot of international cuisine,” she said. “I told him and his wife to come hungry."