ST. PAUL, Minn. — On a Saturday afternoon in early May, with the Minnesota Wild locked in a tense showdown with the Colorado Avalanche during game three of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her stopped by a crowded, high-energy block party along West Seventh Street eager to promote the team and the Grand Casino Arena.

Watch party organizer John King, host of the Wild on 7th hockey podcast, was happily surprised to see Her in a rollicking mood. With a suited security detail in tow, the mayor took him by the arm and belted out the lyrics to the hit Fountains of Wayne song “Stacy’s Mom” in time with the overheard speakers: “Stacy’s mom has got it goin’ on, Stacy’s mom has got it goin’ on…”

“She’s grabbing my arm and just wailing it with me. I’m like, who is this woman?” said King on his podcast the next day. “The all-time move, I said who’s your favorite player on the Wild? She takes off her little glasses, turns them upside down, and just goes ‘Brock Faber.’ And the crowd lost their mind.”

Then out came the hard liquor. “She said, ‘I don’t like beer, but I’ll do a shot,'” he recalled with a chuckle. “It was like, who are you?”

Seven months into her first term as mayor of Minnesota’s capital city, Her has put her untempered social flare to use forging connections across St. Paul while attempting to elevate its nooks and crannies. She captures her daily appearances on social media, using Facebook and Instagram to promote a small boba tea shop on the East Side or showcase herself — and the city’s new asphalt-recycling machine — filling potholes in the North End.

Statement from mayor, more allegations

More than once, that same energy has drawn legal scrutiny and formal complaints that the mayor has been too unfiltered, crossing personal or sexual boundaries that have put some would-be allies on edge, if not set them against her.

A Thursday request for an interview with the mayor to address the allegations was not granted.

However, the mayor did release this statement on Thursday:

“The way this is being portrayed in the media does not reflect what I understood to be mutual communication. I am disappointed that I was invited and brought into (St. Paul police) space and culture and now this is the outcome. As I stated yesterday, I respect the investigative process and believe it is important to allow it to reach its conclusion. I remain confident that the full facts will come to light, and I will continue to focus on serving the people of St. Paul with integrity and dedication.”

A now-retired deputy police chief told her attorney that Her displayed her breasts to her and commented on the deputy chief’s breasts in a locker room at the police department.

“It wasn’t like bawdy humor with a friend you have a very close relationship with,” said Joe Thompson, the former acting U.S. Attorney for Minnesota who is now in private practice and representing the deputy chief, on Thursday. Part of her decision to retire was because of what happened.

In an interview this week, a former City Hall staffer recalled how, on numerous occasions, Her — who was then a City Hall employee — would approach him at public events, grab him by the glutes and simultaneously announce to others around him that she had once grabbed him by the glutes.

The incidents unfolded in front of his friends and family, and appeared to be her way of sliding into group conversations he was in. “‘Oh, did he tell you about the time I grabbed (this guy’s) butt?’,” he recalled her saying to the group. “I never felt unsafe about it, but it was bizarre.”

Investigation underway

That type of behavior has continued since her election as mayor last November, according to recent allegations.

In the locker room of the gym at police headquarters on one occasion, the female deputy chief was changing and Her was on the other side of the room, Thompson said.

“The mayor walked over to her and displayed her breasts” and Her asked whether own breasts were “too big,” Thompson said of what the long-time officer told him. Her then commented on the deputy chief’s breasts, saying along the lines that the deputy chief was “so lucky because of the size of her breasts.”

During the incident, Her “got up really close” to the deputy chief, who didn’t know her well and the situation made her uncomfortable, said Thompson. The woman doesn’t want her name publicly released because she was a victim of harassment, according to Thompson.

The deputy chief also told Thompson that, on another day, Her was making sexualized noises or moans in the police department gym. It was “not like the grunts you do when you’re trying to lift heavy weights,” Thompson said.

At St. Paul police headquarters, Her placed photos of herself over photographs of police leaders, Thompson said in describing a picture that the former deputy chief shared with him. The deputy chief found it “disrespectful and upsetting,” he said.

Her also put up a photo of mixed martial arts fighters with championship belts and added faces of St. Paul officers, including Henry, over the fighters’ faces, according to Thompson.

Litigation ‘reasonably foreseeable’

On April 1, an attorney for St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry informed the city that Her had sent “inappropriate and … unlawful text messages” to a city employee, and that litigation is “reasonably foreseeable.”

Henry’s attorney, Chris Madel, maintained that the mayor’s inappropriate conduct has “extended beyond isolated incidents.”

The city’s human resources department has responded by hiring an outside law firm to conduct a sexual harassment investigation, which the mayor’s office has described as a typical process when a complaint is made.

The deputy chief has talked to the people conducting the investigation, Thompson said.

Madel’s April 1 letter included a copy of the mayor’s text, which contained an established Internet meme, or cartoon-like image, that the mayor had purportedly shared with a city employee showing a grown man swaddled in a baby blanket. “When she wraps you up in her blanket after you gave her a good weinering,” reads the caption, as written by an online comedic personality.

Madel has maintained that the meme was doctored so the comedian’s face in the original image was replaced with that of a member of the mayor’s security detail, though that part of the image was obscured in his letter.

Public reaction and the mayor’s statement

The mayor had shared the meme while bowing out of “Weiner Wednesday,” a tradition in which some police department staff bring in hot dogs to share on certain Wednesdays. The mayor issued a written statement through her spokesperson on Tuesday saying she has “deep respect for city employees and regrets any unintended impact her actions may have had.”

She later added: “I recognize that some of my attempts at humor fell short of the standard I expect of myself. … I respect the investigative process and believe it is important to allow it to reach its conclusion.”

News of the flap broke Tuesday evening, drawing citywide scrutiny and strong reaction on all sides. On social media, a Midway bar promoted half-off “all fancy wieners” the next day, with the caption: “Wake up babe, it’s Wiener Wednesday!”

An advocate for the homeless quickly called on Her to resign. “If a man did this, he would be dismissed immediately,” said another social media user.

Others downplayed the incident. “I’m sure all the cops’ texts to each other are all squeaky clean,” said a Facebook reader, sarcastically.

Petition for restraining order dismissed

Critics have noted that the “Weiner Wednesday” meme wasn’t the first time the mayor’s unfiltered approach toward friends and colleagues had triggered some level of legal response.

In January, a legal referee dismissed a petition for an emergency restraining order filed by one of Her’s former friends. The woman had accused the mayor of asking intrusive questions about her sex life with state Rep. Ethan Cha, whom Her had introduced her to, as well as oversharing about her personal life and texting her at all hours.

As their friendship dissolved, the woman criticized the mayor — then still on the campaign trail — at length on social media. Her had questioned the woman’s sanity and said in a text message she worried the woman might need to be psychiatrically committed. In rejecting the petition, the legal referee said the text did not rise to the level of an explicit threat.

Cha testified at the time he felt Her had escalated the situation, but that he also had concerns about the other woman’s mental stability.

Court documents show Her and her former husband Kong Her legally divorced in 2021 but chose to continue living together with their then-17-year-old child. On Wednesday, a spokesperson for the mayor’s office said the two had remarried in December of that same year.

Police budget, Metro Surge, homeless encampments are flashpoints

Her and the police chief have waded through difficult months together as Operation Metro Surge bore down on the Twin Cities, forcing tough conversations about the role of municipal police during federal immigration enforcement sweeps. The two have barely been seen together in months, even as the mayor has announced that the city’s major homeless encampments will soon be cleared.

Weeks after a Nov. 25 clash between St. Paul Police and anti-ICE protesters on Rose Avenue turned violent, Her tearfully explained to attendees at a public forum last January that Henry could not attend the discussion in person because the Rose Avenue incident was still under investigation.

“When I sit with the chief, I don’t just want to know the timeline of what has happened, but I also want to know what we’re going to do differently,” the mayor said at the time.

Money matters also loom large in the relationship between the mayor’s office and the police department. In preparation for the unveiling of her 2027 budget proposal on Aug. 13, the mayor has been studying city finances at length, including that of the police department, which relies heavily on overtime spending.

“Mayor Her continues to do the job voters elected her to do irrespective of where the chips fall, whether it’s making tough budget decisions or taking the heat for the planned closing of encampments,” said Rich Ginsberg, a longtime St. Paul resident who lives in the mayor’s neighborhood, in a brief interview.

“She reaches out to a vast variety of communities within St. Paul, whether they agree with her or not,” Ginsberg said. “I just think she’s getting unmercifully tarred and feathered without knowing more about what’s going on. I don’t quite get how this rises to the level of a scandal.”

The mayor on Wednesday said she remains focused on the day-to-day work of the city. Despite heavy pushback from some advocates for the homeless, the city will begin clearing homeless encampments on a rolling basis starting Aug. 5. The mayor’s first budget address is scheduled for Aug. 13 at Allianz Field, and it’s widely expected to include a mix of budget cuts, property tax increases and potential staff layoffs.

Email from police chief

Henry sent an email to all police department staff Thursday, referencing the news stories of the past two days.

“We know better than any other city employees that the sanctity and importance of complete investigations, whether criminal or civil, are a crucial element to finding the truth and maintaining the trust of those we serve,” he wrote. “Whenever there is an active investigation, it is important that we respect that process and refrain from speculation until all the facts are gathered and reviewed properly.

“News stories can sometimes create confusion, mistrust, or uncertainty, and those are not emotions our city needs right now,” Henry’s email to staff continued. “Our public needs our very best service and response. As one of the most visible representatives of our city, you are out in the community every day and every night. Please continue to be the compassionate leaders our community members know you to be.”

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(Tyler Quattrin contributed to this report.)

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