Poll: Crime no longer a top issue in Minnesota; huge partisan divide on Twin Cities safety

While violent crime has diminished as a priority for Minnesotans in recent years, a stark divide between voters’ political affiliations and their perception of safety in the Twin Cities persists, according to a new MinnPost-Embold Research poll.

Only about a quarter of 1,616 likely voters across the state surveyed between Sept. 4-8 had violent crime as one of their top four priorities, which is down from 31% in last year’s poll and 42% in 2022. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 2.8 percentage points.

Public safety has fallen as a prominent election issue when compared to the past two major elections in 2020 and 2022. The 2020 murder of George Floyd by then-Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was fresh in voters’ minds, and many Democrats called for law enforcement reform while many Republicans expressed unwavering support for police. Spikes in violent crime during the coronavirus pandemic that ebbed and flowed in the years that followed also played a role in how voters cast their ballots, but issues like the rising costs of goods and the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court appear to be more important for voters this time around.

“Crime, particularly violent crime, is not a top issue. I mean it gets a lot of attention and Republicans in particular talk about it a lot, but we’ve got a whole lot of other issues that are getting far more attention,” University of Minnesota political science professor Larry Jacobs said in an interview. “For Democrats who might have been worried about crime, and particularly Minneapolis, it’s not appearing on the list for top concerns among Minnesotans.”

Respondents of color were more likely to be concerned about violent crime and have the issue as a top priority this election at 32% compared to just 22% of white respondents, with Black and Hispanic respondents much more likely to be concerned at 40% and 39%, respectively. Those percentages dipped to 26% among college-educated respondents of color.

The number of women of color who had violent crime as a priority was much higher at 37% when compared to white women at 19%, whereas the numbers for white men and men of color were nearly identical at 26% and 27%, respectively.

A third of respondents who voted for former President Donald Trump in 2020 called violent crime a top issue for them, while only 16% of President Joe Biden voters concurred. The figures were nearly identical along party lines. Respondents who identified as independents matched GOP respondents at 32%.

When compared to last year’s poll, which had 40% of Republican and 23% of Democratic respondents list violent crime as a priority, the political divide remains, but the decline in the issue as a motivator for voters in the 2024 election is still reflected. Even among Republicans, both polls showed issues including rising costs, illegal immigration, taxes and election security as bigger priorities than violent crime.

Perception of safety

When asked how safe they feel in different regions, about half of all respondents said they feel very safe or somewhat in the Twin Cities at 49%, but figures varied wildly based on respondents’ political affiliations. While respondents who identified as Democrats and Republicans both said they feel very safe or somewhat safe in the neighborhoods where they live – 95% and 89%, respectively – only 12% of GOP respondents said they feel very safe or somewhat safe in the Twin Cities compared to 87% of Democratic respondents.

Jacobs, who said he has researched and interviewed rural Minnesotans about the topic, said the cause seems to be a lack of familiarity with the cities, but also a suspicion of them as well that is driven by partisanship.

“A number of Republican politicians have been quite critical of Minneapolis after the George Floyd (protests) and I think if you spend time in rural Minnesota, you pick up quite a bit of animosity towards the urban areas,” he said.

Though the differences aren’t as stark, Embold Research pollster Jessica Mason said the regions in which respondents live also played a role in their perceptions of safety. 

Respondents who lived in the Twin Cities reported lower rates of feeling very safe or somewhat safe in their own neighborhoods at 82% when compared to their counterparts in the suburbs and Greater Minnesota at 94% and 96%, respectively. However, when asked how safe they feel in the Twin Cities specifically, Twin Cities respondents saw a small change, with 76% responding favorably, whereas there was a considerable drop-off with suburban respondents at 48% and an even steeper decline with Greater Minnesota respondents at 31%.

“Although there is a high likelihood that partisanship does come into play here, we do see that geography is a factor,” she said.

There was also a divide between older and younger respondents. Two-thirds of respondents between the ages of 18 and 34 said they feel safe in the Twin Cities, but that number starts to decline with the older age groups. Less than half of respondents in the 35-plus range said they feel safe in Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Editor’s note: Mohamed Ibrahim wrote this story for MinnPost.com. Ibrahim is MinnPost’s environment and public safety reporter.

This article first appeared on MinnPost and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

MinnPost is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization whose mission is to provide high-quality journalism for people who care about Minnesota.