Bill would give $1 million to nonprofit run by violence interrupter whose Minneapolis contract was pulled after shootout, threats

The president of the Minnesota Senate has introduced a bill that would give $1 million to a nonprofit run by a pastor who recently had a $650,000 city contract pulled after he threatened Minneapolis City Council members and two of his violence interruption workers were charged with felonies in connection with a March shootout.

The Rev. Jerry McAfee made headlines in February when he interrupted a Minneapolis City Council committee meeting and went on a 5-minute rant when the council considered temporarily moving some violence prevention programs to Hennepin County. Some council members viewed his comments as threatening and homophobic.

A few weeks later, council members were stunned when the city’s Neighborhood Safety Department recommended that his other nonprofit, Salem, Inc., get a nearly $650,000 one-year contract to interrupt violence. But it was pulled for “review” hours after two of McAfee’s violence interrupter workers were charged in connection with a north Minneapolis shootout.

McAfee is pastor of New Salem Missionary Baptist Church and operates nonprofits that have done violence prevention work for decades. His church and two nonprofits have won about a dozen violence prevention contracts totaling $1.6 million in recent years, city records show.

That pales in comparison to the $3 million his group called 21 Days of Peace received from the state in 2023 for violence prevention work. Now, 21 Days of Peace would get another $1 million grant in 2026-2027 for “social equity building and community engagement activities” under a bill introduced by state Senate President Bobby Joe Champion, DFL-Minneapolis.

Testifying for the bill Wednesday, McAfee touted the recent news that north Minneapolis is at a decade low in shootings. Last year, the North Side recorded a 21% reduction in gunshot victims compared to the prior year, as well as a dramatic decline in Shotspotter activations and reports of automatic gunfire.

Sen. Carla Nelson, R-Rochester, asked Champion and McAfee why Salem’s contract was pulled.

Champion, who chairs the Senate jobs committee considering the bill, said McAfee felt he was being ignored by council members and was “very animated and very forward about what he thought.”

McAfee said the Salem contract has been tabled until the city finishes an investigation. Regarding the shootout, he said his violence interruption worker had just gotten off work when 30 shots were fired, so he got his gun from his car and shot back. McAfee noted that the worker, Kashmir Khaliffa McReynolds, was struck in his neck, back and shoulder. McAfee says that illustrates the danger of the job, since violence interrupters aren’t allowed to carry weapons.

The bill was laid over for possible inclusion in a larger bill later this session.

Champion has sponsored numerous bills directing funds to nonprofits in his north Minneapolis district, including many that were part of a $1.1 billion package that lawmakers sent to hundreds of nonprofits in 2023. As chair of the jobs committee in 2023, when the DFL controlled the Legislature and governor’s office, Champion oversaw more than $300 million in direct allocations to nonprofits.

Rather than go through the typical process of competing for state grants, nonprofits were directly named in budget bills in what are called legislatively named grants.

It won’t be easy to get the bill passed this year, with the House evenly split between Democrats and Republicans and Democrats in control of the Senate by just two seats. Some lawmakers recently called for an end to such earmarks, saying they don’t have enough oversight.

Both competitive and legislatively named grants are supposed to get the same state oversight, but the Office of the Legislative Auditor has found that agencies are more lax in their oversight of legislatively named grants.

Legislative Auditor Judy Randall recently said her office has recommended that lawmakers stop using legislatively named grants since 2007, but they have continued, according to the Minnesota Reformer.

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