The Minnesota DFL is looking for a way to move forward after chaos erupted at a convention in Minneapolis on Saturday afternoon.

In Minneapolis, a fight broke out during a Ward 10 DFL Convention at the Ella Baker Center, sending elected officials running to safety.

DFL Chair Ken Martin is calling an emergency meeting later this week to address what happened and propose laws to stop incidents like this in the future.

“There started to be some scuffles, and I was trying to deescalate to the best of my ability, and that’s when really things broke out into chaos,” said Quentin Wathum-Ocama, DFL co-sergeant at arms volunteer.

He said it all happened when incumbent City Council Member Aisha Chughtai was about to address the crowd on stage, but supporters of challenger Nasri Warsame took the stage instead.

“We want people to be passionate about our party and about our process, but there’s a line,” Wathum-Ocama said. “What happened there is folks started shoving and using physical intimidation and accusing folks, and it just evolved.”

Minneapolis police said multiple people were injured.

When officers got to the scene, they said no one was fighting at the time. No one was arrested.

Wathum-Ocama has been doing this work for over a decade, but he said seeing this was a first.

“I was talking to the councilwoman saying, ‘I need you to get off stage. I need you to go out this door so I can bar the door behind you,’” he said. “At that point, I was concerned for the safety of our elected officials.”

Martin released a statement saying after learning more about the incident, “It is clear that the conflict was instigated by supporters of city council candidate Nasi Warsame.”

Martin went on to say Warsame’s team escalated the situation and encouraged conflict.

Ward 10 challenger Warsame took to Facebook to address the incident, writing, “I do not condone violence and I do not condone yesterday’s events.”

Warsame explained he requested for people to stop the violence, but they went unanswered.

He also called on DFL leaders to bring in extra security in the future.

Wathum-Ocama said the DFL party can agree the behavior will not be tolerated.

“I think a lot of us are committed to making sure that does not happen again and that people are not incentivized to do this kind of, frankly, disgusting behavior to get the result that they want,” Wathum-Ocama said.

In a statement, Chughtai called what happened “horrifying and unacceptable.”