Star Tribune
Minnesota National Guard sends 550 soldiers to Middle East in one of state’s largest recent deployments
In his four decades in the Minnesota National Guard, Sgt. Maj. Chris Schlukebier has deployed overseas three times. Each came at a different phase in the Rosemount man’s life and to a different global hot spot: First to Bosnia in 2003 when his children were young, then to Iraq in 2009 — the most difficult deployment, because Iraq was especially dangerous and his three daughters were teenagers — and then to Kuwait in 2018.
On Thursday morning, Schlukebier, now a 57-year-old grandfather, strode into the Grace Church auditorium in Eden Prairie to report for overseas duty one more time, his last before retirement. He joined some 550 fellow soldiers in the 34th Infantry Division — mostly from Minnesota but also from bordering states — who were seated near the stage in military fatigues, awaiting their official ceremony to head to Kuwait. It was one of the largest deployments the Minnesota National Guard has seen in the past five years.
The circumstances around the group’s deployment darkened considerably over the past few months. The Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack in Israel sparked a brutal Israeli reprisal in Gaza, with fears the war may spread throughout the region. On Sunday, an Iran-backed militia launched an attack on an American military base in Jordan, killing three American soldiers and injuring more than 40. President Joe Biden has vowed a strong response.
“It’ll be a little more tense than last time, but being in Kuwait, less tense than other parts of the area,” said Schlukebier, who attended the ceremony with his wife, Lynda. He will serve as the oldest soldier in the group. “I’m going somewhere familiar. And I’m going with a lot of the same guys as five years ago.”
Members of the 34th Infantry Division, known as the Red Bulls, have known for a year that this regularly scheduled 10-month deployment was coming. After Thursday’s departure ceremony, the soldiers headed to the armory in Arden Hills for a couple days before a month of training at Fort Cavazos in Texas, formerly Fort Hood. The soldiers ought to land in Kuwait in March with the goal of being home by Christmas.
More than half the 550 soldiers have been on overseas deployments before; four of them were marking their sixth deployment.
The mission, centered in Kuwait but with soldiers fanning out to other Middle East countries, has two prongs: Operation Spartan Shield, which aims to promote regional self-reliance and increased security among partner countries in the Middle East such as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, and Operation Inherent Resolve, which aims to defeat ISIS.
Gov. Tim Walz, who served 24 years in the Minnesota National Guard, sent the soldiers off by telling them they represent America’s finest ideals as a world power, projecting democracy and stability across the world.
“It’s a chaotic world,” Walz said. “It’s a world where at times it seems everybody is trying to figure out ways to divide us. But when you walk into these spaces, there’s a sense of family. There’s a sense of purpose. There’s a sense of community. This is what unifies us.”
With the Middle East thrown into the chaos of the past several months, leaders have no real idea where the deployment will end up.
Brig. Gen. Joe Sharkey, an assistant division commander, brought his unit to attention at the end of the ceremony. Babies cried in the crowd of 3,000. The soldiers stood.
“Red Bulls!” he shouted.
“ATTACK!” they responded.
Afterward, Sharkey, who served twice in the Middle East at the beginning of the Iraq War, said he’s looking forward to the upcoming deployment. He’s most sad to be missing his son’s spring graduation from St. John’s University and commissioning as a second lieutenant; he had missed his daughter’s birth while on a previous deployment.
The Hamas attack in Israel came when the soldiers were in the midst of training. A professor of Middle East studies flew in to give senior leaders a cultural overview of the region.
“It got real then,” Sharkey said. “Fast-forward to today: over 160 attacks in the region. We’ll have soldiers assigned in Jordan. When you have three service members pass away, scores of others injured, we just have to remain calm for the soldiers. We are going into harm’s way. But our main focus is force protection, not only for our allies but for ourselves.”
Star Tribune
Long Prairie, MN school board dismisses its superintendent, the latest controversy in this small town
LONG PRAIRIE, MINN. — The school district superintendent dressed up as the school mascot, Thor, on football nights. He read the graduation address in both English and Spanish. He even set up office hours in the cafeteria, granting easier approachability to students.
But now, two months into the school year, Daniel Ludvigson is gone. Or, rather, “on special assignment,” according to the terminology of the Long Prairie-Grey Eagle School Board, which voted 4-3 earlier this month to remove him as superintendent. The move came weeks after voting to not renew his contract, which expires at the end of the school year in June.
Four board members — two of whom voted to oust Ludvigson, including Board Chair Kelly Lemke — are up for re-election next week.
The dismissal is the latest blow in this central Minnesota community on the edge of the prairie. Over the last nine months, the town of 3,400 residents and seat of Todd County has lost its mayor, a city manager, two school board members, and now its superintendent.
Students walked out earlier this month in support of Ludvigson. Signs in support of Ludvigson can be seen across town on the lawns of apparent Democrats and Republicans alike. And last week, hundreds packed the American Legion off Hwy. 71 to eat beef sandwiches and sign support letters for Ludvigson, who only swung by to pick up his child for hockey practice.
In a time of great divide in America, this fight has nothing to do with politics.
“You’ve got Harris buttons and Trump hats side-by-side, arm-in-arm,” said Amanda Hinson, a former local newspaper reporter who is concerned the board is not being upfront about why they placed Ludvigson on special assignment. “We want transparency in our government.”
Lawn signs around Long Prairie, Minn., now include people weighing in on the dismissal of Superintendent Daniel Ludvigson by the school board. (Christopher Vondracek)
School board members say Ludvigson has repeatedly shown he is not ready for the prime time of a school district bigger than the one in central North Dakota he arrived from two years ago. They have twice disciplined Ludvigson, but did not state the reason for placing him on “special assignment,” beyond insinuating that staff are fearful to raise official complaints.
Rain and potentially heavy snow are on tap Thursday around the Twin Cities, just before families set out for Halloween trick-or-treating.
Temperatures were expected to drop throughout the day, creating conditions for flurries. A winter weather advisory is in effect from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. covering the Twin Cities metro area and parts of south-central Minnesota. Steady rain drenched the Twin Cities on Thursday, making for a soggy morning commute.
“As colder air begins to move in this morning, the rain will transition to heavy snow from west to east with snowfall rates of an inch per hour at times into early afternoon,” the National Weather Service in Chanhassen said in a weather advisory.
The Twin Cities and surrounding areas could get between 2 and 4 inches of snow, according to the weather service. The winter weather advisory is expected to affect Anoka, Chisago, Hennepin, Ramsey, Scott, Washington and Le Sueur counties.
It’s unclear how much of the snow will actually stick, with warm surface temperatures likely leading to melting on contact in many areas.
“Exact totals will depend on snowfall rate, surface temperatures, and melting — which increases uncertainty with the snow forecast,” the weather service said in an early Thursday briefing.
“Thundersnow possible!” the weather service emphasized.
The good news for Halloween revelers is that the snow and rain are expected to wrap up in time for trick-or-treating, though temperatures will remain in the 30s with a sharp windchill.
An off-duty Washington County sheriff’s deputy caused a head-on crash while under the influence of alcohol and injured a couple in the other vehicle, officials said.
The crash occurred about 10:40 a.m. Sunday in Afton on Hwy. 95 at Scenic Lane, the Minnesota State Patrol said.
Campbell Johnston Blair, 58, of Hastings, was heading north in his Subaru Crosstrek, crossed into the opposite lane and collided with a southbound Ford Expedition, the patrol said.
Blair and the other vehicle’s occupants, 38-year-old Erik Robert Sward and 36-year-old Heather Lynn Sward, both of Lake Elmo, were taken to Regions Hospital with non-critical injuries, according to the patrol.
The patrol noted the alcohol use by Blair was involved in the crash.
Blair, who was driving a private vehicle at the time of the crash while off-duty, has been a deputy with the Sheriff’s Office since 2020 and is currently assigned to our Court Security Unit.
The Sheriff’s Office has been asked for reaction to the crash involving one of its deputies.