Your monthly support provides voters the knowledge they need to make confident decisions at the polls. Donate today.
Cam Gordon
Cam Gordon was a member of the Minneapolis City Council in Minnesota, representing Ward 2. He assumed office in 2006. He left office on January 3, 2022.
Gordon (Green Party) ran for re-election to the Minneapolis City Council to represent Ward 2 in Minnesota. He lost in the general election on November 2, 2021.
Gordon completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2021. Click here to read the survey answers.
Elections in Minneapolis are officially nonpartisan, but the Minneapolis City Charter allows mayoral and city council candidates to choose a party label to appear below their name on the official ballot. Ballotpedia includes candidates' party or principle to best reflect what voters will see on their ballot.[1]
Biography
Cam Gordon was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He earned a B.S. in education from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities in 1977 and completed graduate coursework in early childhood development and Montessori education.[2][3]
Gordon's professional experience includes being the owner and operator of a child care program and children's music company, working as the associate editor of Public School Montessorian, and being the author of an introductory guide to Montessori education. He has also served as a co-founder of the Minnesota Green Party, the chair of the board of the Seward Neighborhood, and a board member for Common Cause Minnesota, FairVote Minnesota, and the Minneapolis Center for Neighborhoods.[4]
Elections
2021
See also: City elections in Minneapolis, Minnesota (2021)
General election
General election for Minneapolis City Council Ward 2
The ranked-choice voting election was won by Robin Wonsley in round 3 . The results of Round are displayed below. To see the results of other rounds, use the dropdown menu above to select a round and the table will update.
|
Total votes: 9,527 |
|||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
2017
Minneapolis, Minnesota, held a general election for mayor, all 13 seats on the city council, both elected members of the board of estimate and taxation, and all nine members of the park and recreation board on November 7, 2017. The filing deadline for candidates who wished to run in this election was August 15, 2017.
Incumbents ran for re-election to all but two of the city council seats. Ward 3 Councilman Jacob Frey filed to run for mayor instead, and Ward 8 Councilwoman Elizabeth Glidden opted not to run for re-election.[5] Incumbent Cam Gordon ran unopposed in the general election for the Ward 2 seat on the Minneapolis City Council.[6]
| Minneapolis City Council, Ward 2 General Election, 2017 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Candidate | Vote % | Votes |
 Cam Gordon Incumbent (unopposed) |
97.27% | 5,912 |
| Write-in votes | 2.73% | 166 |
| Total Votes | 6,078 | |
| Source: Minneapolis Elections & Voter Services, "2017 Minneapolis Election Results," accessed November 22, 2017 | ||
Campaign themes
2021
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Cam Gordon completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2021. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Gordon's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
| Collapse all
Cam has lived in Minneapolis all his life, including in the Cedar Riverside, Longfellow and Seward neighborhoods. He has worked as a teacher, a small business owner, a community organizer, an author, a journalist, and a musician. Cam helped found the Green Party of Minnesota. He served as co-chair of the Seward Neighborhood Group, and on the boards of directors of FairVote Minnesota, Common Cause Minnesota, the Minneapolis Center for Neighborhoods. Cam graduated from the University of Minnesota with a B. S. in Secondary Education, and completed graduate programs in Montessori teaching at the College of St. Catherine. As a Council Member he is most often recognized for the leadership he has provided to promote racial equity, affordable housing, public health, environmental sustainability, clean energy, violence prevention, youth development, local foods and grassroots democracy.
Cam is a proven, collaborative champion with a clear vision and values working for a city where each of us can reach our full potential while caring for one another, improving our environment and promoting social well being. He uses the core values of social and economic justice, ecological wisdom, nonviolence and grassroots democracy to guide both what he works on and how he works.
Cam is an effective listener, who cares deeply about his constituents and respects diversity, including a diversity of perspectives and opinions. He knows that rcognizing and respecting differences can help lead to better solutions. He is ready and able to help solve there problems and address their concerns and work with everyone to help forge consensus to an effective representative and ensure the we move forward together.
- Cam is focused not only on addressing our immediate needs, but also on teh future we want for our children and for generations to come.
I support a comprehensive and multi-disciplinary approach to public safety that includes better trained and better-supervised law enforcement.
This was reflected in last year’s budget where I supported the Mayor and Chief's proposal to fund and hire 3 more "classes" of new police officers and the staffing level of 776 officers that they recommended. I think that we need to maintain an appropriate level of officers as well as adding nonpolice resources to help lift the load off some of the officers who spend time working on things where there may be better alternatives, like getting help for homeless people, responding to a mental health crisis where there is no danger or dealing with minor traffic violations.
Currently our city, along with most cities in our country, is being hit by a wave of violence and criminal behavior. Some of the causes are clearly the COVID pandemic and its economic and social effects, and a reaction to the killings of George Floyd and other BIPOC people around our country. To address this, in the short term I strongly support both greater interventions in upstream violence prevention efforts, to keep young people – most of them young men – from becoming perpetrators and/or victims of violence and the continued provision of both patrol and investigative law enforcement services. I want to see us looking at how we prevent crime and violence on the front, intervene effectively when it is occurring and restore and repair damage after it has occurred. And along that continuum I see a critical role for law enforcement and am open to increase police patrols and investigations where needed.
In the longer term I think there are three many areas where we need to work to remove obstacles to improving our safety system and making meaningful reform to improve policing. They include the Charter, state law, and collective bargaining rules.
I've advocated for the City to take a strong stand on the second two issues, which are outside of the enterprise's control. I had some hope that we'd see some meaningful changes to state law (for example: allowing civilian review authorities in Minnesota to make findings of fact, giving them subpoena power, even giving them direct authority to discipline and fire, all of which are currently prohibited by state law). The fact that the Republicans kept the Minnesota Senate makes that much less hopeful.
We can push for a better contract with the Police Federation, but there is limited power there, too. The Federation ultimately has the power to not agree to anything they object to, and the City can't compel them to accept it. If there's an impasse, the only real effect is that the existing contract stays in place. State law and case law make it very difficult for employers (especially the public sector) to exert that kind of power over employee unions. We have added some provisions to our official state legislative agenda that calls for Arbitration Reform to remove barriers for jurisdictions to discipline or fire officers and not have those decisions over turned and amending the MN Data Privacy Act to make the status of complaints against a peace officer accessible to the public.
Then there is the City Charter. That's the one of these obstacles that we can, as a community, fix. That's why I fought to put a Charter amendment question forward in 2018 and again in 2020, and why I support the Department of Public Safety amendment this year.
If the Charter is amended to create a new Department of Public Safety, I think it will lead to better leadership, oversight, and guidance of the department. It will also bring greater transparency and accountability to residents of Minneapolis, more opportunity for community members to influence City policy on policing, more confidence in our police and a safer City for everyone.
The current arrangement is outdated and unwisely authoritarian. Unlike any other City department, according to the Charter, “the mayor has complete power over the establishment, maintenance, and command of the police department.” It is this arrangement that has made it particularly difficult for Council Members, and through them community members, to fully engage and influence how we manage and assist our police officers. The Council cannot direct staff, set policy about police behavior or institute promising management practices when the Charter gives the Council no authority over the department, except to approve the appointment of the police chief and the department’s budget.
In case you are interested, here are some more details about why I believe this Charter provision should be changed:
- It currently limits the authority of the Council over matters of police department policy and procedures. This has real consequences. One of the first issues I worked on as a Council Member, back in 2006, was a community-driven update of the rules for police use of Tasers. This policy was “passed” with a lot of fanfare as a recommendation by the Council, but quietly rescinded just a few months later by the police department without any notice to anyone. I didn’t think that was right, and I continue to think it’s not right that the Council can’t help set reasonable limits for our police officers’ use of force – or tackle any other policy question related to policing.
- It makes the police department unique among all City departments. It is the only department for which the Charter makes any one policymaker solely responsible. It also creates confusion and complexity for residents and others who do not expect different departments to be governed over so differently.
- It creates confusion among the public. Especially in the wake of serious events like a police officer killing someone, our constituents look to us as their Council Members to help prevent similar future tragedies. They call on us to provide guidance and set better-policing policies. It is time we take on that responsibility.
- It leaves the Council with only the power over the police budget as a way to attempt to alter police policy and behavior. There are voices right now advocating for the Council to use that “power of the purse” to effect change, essentially as a threat. I don’t think that’s the right way to govern. But it is a reasonable reaction to the unreasonable limitation on the Council’s authority, and I understand why people advocate for that course of action.
Our approach to public safety needs to be radically reimagined. Cam has worked alongside community to fight for reform and invest in safety beyond policing. The work isn’t done – let’s do more together.
Housing
Everyone has the right to a safe and dignified home that they can afford. Cam has led on building and preserving affordable housing, defending public housing, and protecting renters. The work isn’t done – let’s do more together.
Economic Justice
The City needs to focus on helping the least advantaged residents and workers, not wealthy and powerful businesses. Working with advocates for low-income workers and small businesses, Cam has stood up for the least powerful, and stood up to the most powerful. The work isn’t done – let’s do more together.
Health
Everyone deserves to live a healthy life. Cam has worked with health advocates to improve health and reduce racial disparities. He's strengthened the public health department, and increased access to healthy local food. .
Fighting racism
Our society is built on hundreds of years of systemic racism and white supremacy. Cam has worked with BIPOC community activists to fight institutional racism.
Protecting our Environment
-----at least I strive to be these things.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
Note: Community Questions were submitted by the public and chosen for inclusion by a volunteer advisory board. The chosen questions were modified by staff to adhere to Ballotpedia’s neutrality standards. To learn more about Ballotpedia’s Candidate Connection Expansion Project, click here.
Campaign website
- Click here to view an archived version of Gordon's campaign website.
2017
Gordon's campaign website listed the following priorities:
| “ |
Fight climate change while sustaining our environment, creating green jobs and cleaning up our soil, water and air. Dismantle institutional racism and close the racial and economic disparities in health, housing, education, wealth, employment, and the criminal justice system. Forge a more just and durable local economy that supports small, independent and cooperative businesses, enhances human dignity and promotes the common good by providing people with meaningful work, economic security, fair compensation, decent working conditions and the right to organize in the workplace. Make Minneapolis a safe and healthy city where we prioritize people’s well-being and make sure that our public spaces, housing, institutions and transportation system work for all people of all ages. Establish an empowering and equitable civic participation system that enfranchises everyone and builds people’s long- term capacity to organize to improve their lives and neighborhoods. Support and guide growth and development that provides real community benefits and serves the present and future housing, educational, employment, recreational and cultural needs of our people while protecting what is best about our communities and improving our natural and built public assets. Reject the politics of division, bigotry, hate, and fear, reaffirm our commitment to be a sanctuary city, and fight for the rights, freedoms and interests of all members of our community, no matter our color, ethnicity, gender, religion, nationality, sexual orientation, or status as a refugee, citizen or immigrant.[7] |
” |
| —Cam Gordon's campaign website, (2017)[8] | ||
Endorsements
2017
Gordon received endorsements from the following in 2017:[9]
- 5th District Green Party
- AFSCME Council 5
- Minneapolis Regional Labor Federation
- Minnesota Nurses Association
- Our Revolution Minnesota
- SEIU Minnesota State Council
- TakeAction Minnesota
See also
2021 Elections
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ City of Minneapolis, "Common questions about filing for office," accessed September 10, 2025
- ↑ Cam Gordon for Ward 2, "About Cam," accessed November 3, 2017
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on October 7, 2021
- ↑ Minneapolis City Council, "Cam Gordon," accessed November 3, 2017
- ↑ Minneapolis Star Tribune, "Elizabeth Glidden Won't Seek Re-election to Minneapolis City Council," December 12, 2016
- ↑ Minneapolis Elections & Voter Services, "Candidate Filings - 2017," accessed August 16, 2017
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Cam Gordon for Ward 2, "Priorities," accessed November 3, 2017
- ↑ Cam Gordon for Ward 2, "Endorsements," accessed November 3, 2017
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by - |
Minneapolis City Council Ward 2 2006-2022 |
Succeeded by Robin Wonsley |
| |||||||||
