Somali filmmaker Abderazak Ali launches self-financed bid for Hopkins mayor

A Refugee-Turned-Filmmaker Takes a $200 Shot at Leading a Minnesota Suburb

HOPKINS, Minn. — On a recent weeknight in this compact Minneapolis suburb, a small group moved down a quiet block, knocking on doors and introducing a new name to voters. No yard signs, no slick mailers, no consultants. Just a filmmaker in a windbreaker, clutching a stack of home-printed flyers and a promise to listen.

“Winning is not guaranteed,” said Abderazak Ali, a 40-year-old Somali-born filmmaker and first-time candidate running for mayor of Hopkins. “I’m stepping up not to challenge the current mayor, but to give my community a second choice.”

Ali’s campaign, if it can be called that in the professionalized sense, operates on a shoestring. He has spent just $200 of his own money so far, relying on 17 volunteers and long conversations on doorsteps. He faces an incumbent who has raised more than $10,000, a business owner, and a retiree. In a race where even modest budgets go to targeted ads and polling, Ali is betting on something older: face-to-face politics.

From a broken boat to a ballot line

Ali’s path to the ballot began long before he ever set foot in Minnesota. As a teenager fleeing Somalia’s civil war, he boarded a boat bound for Yemen with hopes of making it to Europe. The engine failed in open water. For eight days, 179 people were stranded. Not all survived. “That moment stays with you,” he said quietly. “It shapes everything you do.”

He spent more than 15 years in refugee camps across Yemen, Sudan, and Tunisia. In Choucha Camp in Tunisia, he picked up a camera. The work, a musical drama about displacement, caught the attention of Time magazine and propelled him toward a new identity: filmmaker, storyteller, cultural bridge.

Ali resettled in the United States in 2012, studied film production in California, and moved to Hopkins in 2018. He now runs a small media company and hosts “Somaliyey Maqal,” a Somali-language talk show followed by tens of thousands on YouTube and Facebook. He also serves as head of community engagement at People in Action, a St. Paul-based nonprofit. “He’s fearless and a true people’s person,” said Ayanle Farah, the group’s art director. “He brings communities together through empathy and storytelling.”

A shoestring operation with neighbors as staff

Ali has no donors, no fundraising committees. Just neighbors willing to canvass, a borrowed office table, and a handwritten schedule pinned above his desk. “For an election of this scope, the expenses are very low, so I decided to cover whatever I need out of pocket,” he said.

He’s challenging Mayor Patrick Hanlon, who has drawn more traditional financial support, as well as business owner Lynn Bialick and retiree Robert Ivers. The field has not been without turbulence: Ivers was arrested in September on allegations of threatening a federal judge. Ali said he heard rumors that Ivers had made threats against him as well, but emphasized he has no evidence to confirm them. “I try to keep the campaign focused on what matters to people,” Ali said. “Safety, housing, parks, the future of our streets.”

What Hopkins voters keep bringing up

When Ali knocks doors, he says the conversations are often the same: people want to feel safe, to trust that their kids can walk home from school under working streetlights, to be able to afford a rent increase without moving. He promises to prioritize basic city services and neighborhood infrastructure: upgrading street lighting, revitalizing aging parks, and adding affordable housing. “Every conversation is a chance to listen and understand,” he said. “That’s what public service should be.”

He’s closely watching the long-awaited light-rail line planned to run through the west metro. Ali favors transit that helps seniors, workers, and students move around the region, but worries about long-time residents being priced out. “We can expand mobility without displacement,” he said — a topic that resonates in many corners of a fast-changing metro area.

A broader story of Somali American civic life

Ali’s candidacy arrives at a time when Somali Americans — many settled in Minnesota during the past three decades — have moved from the margins to the center of local politics. Minnesota is home to one of the largest Somali diasporas in the United States, and their civic footprint has steadily grown: from neighborhood associations to school boards to the state legislature and Congress. Rep. Ilhan Omar’s rise from a Minneapolis school board advocate to Congress remains a touchstone; so too does last year’s election of Nadia Mohamed as mayor of St. Louis Park, making her Minnesota’s first Somali and Muslim mayor.

If elected, Ali would be the first Somali mayor of Hopkins and only the second Somali to lead a Twin Cities suburb — another marker in a generational shift that’s reshaping political life across the Midwest. The issues he’s running on — public safety, housing, infrastructure — are not new. But who gets to frame those issues and deliver solutions is changing.

Like other Muslim candidates, Ali acknowledges he’s encountered skepticism and misinformation about his background and beliefs. “Some people still struggle to see beyond labels,” he said. “Once voters realize that I’m an independent, unaffiliated with any party, and solely dedicated to the well-being of Hopkins residents, I believe they’ll see the issues we face impact us all equally.”

Headwinds and steady steps

Running a micro-budget campaign in a city of about 19,000 is a test of endurance and faith. Hopkins, known for its tight-knit neighborhoods and its summer Raspberry Festival, is the kind of place where a candidate can still make a difference by standing on porches and asking for a minute of time. It’s also a place where incumbents tend to have the advantage: name recognition, partnerships in city hall, and a fundraising network that can flood mailboxes.

Ali isn’t pretending otherwise. He says this race is about building something larger than a single contest — a culture of participation. He wants residents who rarely vote in city elections to see a candidate who looks like them or has walked through similar struggles. He hopes to show that local office can be about service, not a stepping stone. When he tells the story of his boat drifting for days in the Gulf of Aden, he’s not looking for pity. He’s explaining why he believes small acts — a vote, a conversation, a working streetlight — matter.

What matters at the ballot box

There’s a question at the heart of this race: In an era of polarizing national politics, can local campaigns built on conversations still shape a city’s future? Across the country, communities are grappling with the same bundle of issues: how to keep streets safe without eroding trust, how to add housing without pushing out neighbors, how to expand transit in ways that connect rather than divide. Hopkins, with its new development and enduring small-town feel, is a test case in miniature.

Ali’s answer is to be present. He lingers on stoops and listens in hallways after community meetings. He brings the filmmaker’s instinct — letting other people tell the story — to the awkward, old-fashioned work of politics. And because his campaign is tiny, he makes the pitch himself.

“Hopkins deserves leadership that listens,” he said. “I’m running to serve the people who call this city home.”

Whether a $200 grassroots effort can overcome an incumbent and better-funded opponents is a political question. But in Hopkins, where an immigrant filmmaker is asking longtime residents what keeps them up at night, it doubles as a civic one: Who gets to belong — and who gets to lead — in the American suburb in 2025?

By Ali Musa
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.