Meet Elliott Payne, the new Minneapolis City Council president

Earlier this month, members of the Minneapolis City Council elected Elliott Payne, a relatively low-profile member in his second term, as the new council president.

Payne's election reflects a leftward shift of the council following November's election of a progressive majority. While he pledged to seek consensus and work with Mayor Jacob Frey, Payne's support comes from the council's most outspoken critics of the mayor — and he's made it clear the new council will be a check on the administration.

First elected in 2021 on a message of racial and economic justice in the wake of George Floyd's murder, Payne, 42, serves Ward 1, encompassing northeast Minneapolis. He is the first Black man to serve as council president.

Aisha Chughtai, a second-term council member who represents Uptown and the surrounding neighborhoods of Ward 10, was elected vice president.

Payne's first test came minutes after being elected, when he wielded the gavel for the first time to restore order amid chants from a crowd of Palestinian supporters.

It was the kind of dilemma frequently faced by his predecessor, Andrea Jenkins, in an era when activists don't hesitate to disrupt a meeting: Too aggressive on the gavel could antagonize some in the crowd; too timid could enable them, leading to a collapse of decorum in which the council can't function.

Payne allowed a few activists to briefly hold the floor, but he ultimately kept the room in check with a combination of pleas and raps of the gavel, as well as entreaties from council members friendly to the crowd's arguments. Still, at least one council member has demanded he apologize for not being more forceful.

"Part of it is just trying to find that right balance of hearing out the voices of the community," Payne said after the meeting, "but also wanting to maintain some clarity so that we can actually do the business of the body, and I think that's going to always be a tension in this role."

With a demeanor more cerebral than firebrand, Payne won the support of a majority of his peers (the vote was 10-3) with a message of unifying the council — or at least finding consensus for what he described in his first speech as "progressive and commonsense policy."

Council Member Jason Chavez said it was Payne's studious and respectful nature that helped him garner support from his colleagues.

"I've noticed how hard he works, and we needed someone who works hard to bring the council together on a set of issues and be bold in bringing the council along on some of the most challenging things facing our residents," Chavez said in an interview.

In a newsletter to constituents days after being elected president, Payne wrote: "I look forward to unifying my Council colleagues and the Mayor around our shared priorities."

While Frey had expressed a similar sentiment minutes before Payne was elected, tension between Payne's council and the mayor is expected.

Payne listed general priorities that nearly all council members consider important: overseeing police reform, responding to climate change with an eye toward social justice, and increasing the supply of affordable housing. But he also made it clear where he envisions the current council on the spectrum of Minneapolis politics, describing "a council that acts as a strong counterweight to the administration."

Payne noted that the council is still finding its footing under the new "strong mayor" form of government approved by voters in 2021.

In his previous term, Payne was allied with the progressive wing of the council, which criticized Frey for not moving boldly enough on police reform and racial justice, for being too aggressive in clearing homeless encampments, and for failing to act on a host priorities of those to the ideological left of Frey and his allies, ranging from rent control to municipal sidewalk shoveling.

But Payne doesn't buy the left-vs.-farther-left narrative often ascribed to the council.

"I reject the framing," he said in response to a reporter's question. "I think really what it's about is who you're responsive to, who your constituency is, and who you're accountable to."

Born to a Black father and white mother, Payne identifies as African American. In addition to being the first Black man to serve as council president, he's also the first man to hold the role since December 2005, when the position was held by Paul Ostrow. Barb Johnson was elected president the following month, ushering in nearly two decades of women presiding over the council.

Raised in Milwaukee, Payne arrived in Minneapolis in 2000 to attend the University of Minnesota. He initially worked as a mechanical engineer, but his "winding road of a career" then took him back to the U to earn an MBA. He started his own consulting company, which inked several contracts with the city related to police reform, including early models of behavioral crisis response and 311 service.

"A lot of the things I was working on drove me to run for City Council because we had started that work long before 2020 and the murder of George Floyd," he said.

Despite his ascent into one of the most influential roles in the city, Payne said he has no aspirations for higher office.

"I am a nerdy engineer," he said. "I am not a cool guy who wants to have his face on buses and billboards ... what you need to become mayor."