Minnesota Sen. Mark Koran called for abolishing the Metropolitan Council, whose members are entirely unelected, in response to a damning new report issued Wednesday by the legislative auditor.
The report into the Met Council’s mismanagement of the Southwest light rail project found that the council was not transparent with the public, committed itself to spending more money than it had available, and knew that its initial estimates were incomplete.
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Minnesota is poised to become just the third state in the nation to provide free school meals for all students. But it will come at a taxpayer cost of about $200 million a year, regardless of whether a family has any trouble at all paying for their kids’ breakfast and lunch — which amounts to about $6 a day.
On Tuesday four Republicans joined 34 DFLers as the Minnesota Senate voted 38-26 to pass a universal school meals bill that Gov. Tim Walz has said he’ll sign when it reaches his desk. Last month the House passed the bill by a 70-54 vote. No Republicans in the House supported the measure.
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U.S. Attorney Andy Luger announced charges against 10 additional Minnesotans in the $250 million Feeding Our Future scandal Monday, bringing the total number of defendants to 60.
One of the new defendants, Sharon Ross, was the executive director of a nonprofit called House of Refuge Twin Cities. According to an October Fox 9 report, DFL Sen. Sandy Pappas from St. Paul personally intervened to help Ross’ nonprofit receive funding through Feeding Our Future in the spring of 2021.
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Half of Minnesota’s students can’t read at grade level.
At a recent press conference, legislative Republicans said this is because the education establishment bought into the “whole language” and “balanced literacy” approaches to reading.
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USA Powerlifting will be forced to allow biological males to compete against women thanks to a ruling from Ramsey County Judge Patrick Diamond.
April Hutchinson, a female powerlifter for Team Canada, spoke out against the ruling on Tucker Carlson Tonight Wednesday.
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A proposal to bar colleges that require a statement of faith from participating in the Postsecondary Enrollment Options (PSEO) program is buried within Gov. Tim Walz’s education policy bill.
The Postsecondary Enrollment Options Act allows Minnesota high school students to earn both high school and college credits for free, since the schools are reimbursed by the state.
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Two more counties have joined the list of Second Amendment “sanctuaries” in Minnesota, expressing their opposition to several gun-control bills moving through the legislature.
The Itasca County Board of Commissioners unanimously approved its “Second Amendment Dedicated County” resolution at a Feb. 21 meeting.
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Minnesota Democrats have introduced a $100 million reparations bill that would require the state to issue a formal apology to the family of George Floyd and acknowledge the “systemic racism in the state.”
Introduced by Rep. Samakab Hussein, DFL-St.Paul, the “Minnesota Migration Act” begins with a list of “findings.”
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“If abortions arnt safe neither r u [sic].”
That was just one of the phrases scrawled across a Christian pro-life pregnancy resource center in Minneapolis over the weekend where windows were also shattered by vandals.
Police were flagged down just after 1 a.m. Saturday by a Metro Transit bus driver who had witnessed suspects causing damage to property on a building at 2015 Chicago Avenue in the Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis, according to dispatch audio.
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Despite the fact that few people attended a ranked choice voting press conference at the Minnesota Capitol on Thursday, DFL legislators and paid RCV advocates expressed enthusiasm about the prospect of passing a bill that would implement their favored system of determining representation in the legislature and for statewide office.
State Sen. Kelly Morrison, DFL-Deephaven, and State Rep. Cedrick Frazier, DFL-New Hope, have introduced a bill they’re calling the “Protect and Advance Democracy Act” that would make Minnesota a ranked choice voting state by 2026.
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Political candidates may soon be allowed to conceal their home address from the public on their election filing statements without having to file a police report or order for protection, according to a bill that’s receiving bipartisan support and set to hit the House floor.
Rep. Jamie Becker-Finn, DFL-Roseville, said she has colleagues in the legislature this session who receive threats to their personal safety regularly. She also said that in the recent past there have been incidents where “armed crowds of people (were) showing up unannounced at personal homes of some people we serve with.”
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Minnesota GOP Chairman David Hann condemned Rep. Heather Keeler’s comments about “white Christians” adopting Native American children, calling it a “racist rant”.
“I’m sick of white Christians adopting our babies and rejoicing. It’s a really sad day when that happens. It means the genocide continues,” Keeler, a Democrat from Moorhead, said in a recent Facebook post.
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At least 10 elementary and high schools in the Minneapolis Public School District and St. Paul Public School District in Minnesota, did not have a single student meet grade level expectations in math during the 2021-2022 school year, according to a Wednesday report by the Center of the American Experiment, an organization focused on state public policy.
State wide, 19 school districts did not have one student test proficient in math on the 2022 Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment, a standardized test used to determine what students have learned, according to a Center of the American Experiment report. Of elementary schools in the Minneapolis and St. Paul school districts, seven did not have a single student meeting grade level expectations in math.
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A Democratic Minnesota legislator said it is a form of “genocide” for “white Christians” to adopt Native American children.
“I’m sick of white Christians adopting our babies and rejoicing. It’s a really sad day when that happens. It means the genocide continues,” Rep. Heather Keeler, DFL-Moorhead, said on Facebook.
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A bill making its way through the Minnesota Legislature with broad Democratic support would require all public school graduates to complete an ethnic studies course.
Authored by Rep. Samantha Sencer-Mura, DFL-Minneapolis, the bill defines ethnic studies as “the critical and interdisciplinary study of race, ethnicity, and indigeneity with a focus on the experiences and perspectives of people of color within and beyond the United States.”
“Ethnic studies analyzes the ways in which race and racism have been and continue to be powerful social, cultural, and political forces, and the connection of race to other groups of stratification, including gender, class, sexuality, religion, and legal status,” it says.
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A war of words between the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners and Sheriff Bob Fletcher boiled over Friday as the board accused the sheriff of an “act of racism.”
The dispute began Tuesday when the board voted to increase oversight of Fletcher’s spending, which the sheriff welcomed.
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The Golden Valley Police Department is experiencing “unprecedented and dangerously low staffing levels,” according to a union leader, who said the city is down 61% from its budgeted force.
“The radical agenda of Golden Valley’s city leaders and their lack of support to the staff within the police department is having an effect on its residents and visitors to the community. It has caused unprecedented and dangerously low staffing levels as well as morale issues, as police officers are leaving in droves for employment with surrounding agencies,” said Jim Mortenson, executive director of Law Enforcement Labor Services.
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A major election reform bill that DFL members in the House and Senate are carrying for Secretary of State Steve Simon continues to progress through the legislature despite criticism its several sweeping provisions have received from Republicans in recent committee hearings.
HF3/SF3, coined the “Democracy for the People Act” by its sponsors, aims to implement automatic voter registration, pre-registration for 16- and 17-year olds, add new voter intimidation laws and related penalties, and require more disclosures of who is funding campaign ads, among several other provisions.
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Public school enrollment in Minnesota has declined for a third consecutive year, according to data released this week by the Department of Education.
MDE said enrollment dropped by about 2,427 students during the 2022-23 academic year, a roughly 0.3% decrease.
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The Minnesota DFL’s abortion agenda could be in jeopardy, Democratic legislators revealed during a “reproductive freedom” rally at the Capitol Tuesday.
“We absolutely cannot stop with the PRO Act,” said Sen. Jen McEwen, DFL-Duluth, referring to the Protect Reproductive Options Act.
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The question of whether health care providers should be allowed to administer gender transition-related medical care to children — such as puberty blockers, mastectomies or hormone replacement therapy — became a flashpoint for debate in the Minnesota House of Representatives on Monday.
So much so that one DFL legislator, who appeared to defend such medical care being administered to minors, attempted to analogize it to infants and toddlers getting their ears pierced.
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Minnesota Democrats are pushing a bill that would require public schools to provide “climate justice instruction.”
The bill says this type of instruction “views the effects of climate change as interconnected with forms of oppression connecting climate change to social and economic justice issues.”
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Democrats in the Minnesota Legislature are sponsoring a bill to allow terminally ill adults to end their lives by assisted suicide.
On Thursday both HF 1930 and its companion SF 1813 were introduced in the Minnesota House of Representatives and Senate, respectively. If passed, the legislation would permit adults with a terminal illness (6 months or fewer left to live) to request “medical aid in dying” medication.
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The Star Tribune, one of the largest daily newspapers in America, has named Steve Grove — a former Google executive, consistent donor to Democrat politicians and often the right-hand man to Gov. Tim Walz — as its new publisher.
The Star Tribune, which announced the hiring on Tuesday, joins The Washington Post as the only two traditional print media outlets among the nation’s top 25 (measured by circulation) whose publisher or CEO has past political ties, according to a background search conduct
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Two Twin Cities lawmakers have introduced bills to ban the sale of new gas-powered lawn mowers and Zambonis in Minnesota.
Reps. Jerry Newton, DFL-Coon Rapids, and Heather Edelson, DFL-Edina, introduced HF 1715 and 1716 this week. The first would require all new lawn and garden equipment sold or distributed in Minnesota after Jan. 1, 2025, to be powered solely by electricity. This would apply to lawn mowers, leaf blowers, hedge clippers, chainsaws, lawn edgers, string trimmers, and brush cutters.
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On Monday the Minnesota House of Representatives voted to pass a bill raising reimbursement rates for a child care program once at the center of a fraud investigation.
The Democrat-controlled chamber passed HF 13, which will fund increased reimbursement rates for providers who participate in the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP), by a 69-59 vote. The program exists to help low-income families afford child care, which is more expensive in Minnesota than most states.
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Border Patrol agents in Minnesota and North Dakota continue to apprehend foreign nationals brought in by human smugglers in the dead of winter and illegally crossing the northern border from Canada.
Instead of flying from Mexico and other countries to Canada to enter legally through ports of entry, border agents say foreign nationals are flying to Canada to enter the U.S. illegally between ports of entry while intentionally seeking to evade capture by law enforcement. But they do so at their own peril as temperatures reach double digits below zero and heavy snow is prohibitive for travel on foot and by car.
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Psychiatrists are expressing their concerns over a proposed bill in the Minnesota House of Representatives that would legalize recreational marijuana for adults 21 and up.
Letters submitted to members of the House Human Services Policy Committee, two from licensed psychiatrists and one from a licensed alcohol and drug counselor, argued that HF 100 fails to take into account the effects of cannabis on younger people’s brains.
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More than 100 homeschool advocates filled an overflow room during a Minnesota House of Representatives committee hearing this week on Gov. Tim Walz’s education policy bill.
Students and their parent educators were in attendance seeking answers as to why the bill, HF1269, included a provision that would require homeschool providers to submit their students’ standardized test scores to local school districts.
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Two liberal arts schools six minutes from each other in St. Paul, Minn., have explicitly subordinated Islam-related academic and artistic freedom to the feelings of Muslim students in recent months, alarming faculty both nationwide and closer to home.
Macalester College temporarily shut down and then added curtains to an art exhibit depicting partially exposed figures in hijabs and niqabs “to prevent unintentional or non-consensual viewing” after Muslim students complained, the administration said in an email Feb. 6 excerpted by Minnesota immigrant news nonprofit Sahan Journal.
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A St. Paul public school is displaying a poster in its hallways that accuses police of hating minorities.
An image obtained by Alpha News of a poster from Johnson Senior High School depicts a fist breaking a law enforcement badge and reads, “No more police hatred toward minorities.”
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Pregnancy resource centers across Minnesota are defending their work as their funding is about to take a severe cut.
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The Minnesota Supreme Court ordered the lower courts Wednesday to address the question of whether Gov. Tim Walz had the authority to declare a peacetime emergency in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The high court called this question an “important issue of statewide significance that should be decided immediately.”
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Members of the controversial Minnesota Freedom Fund (MFF) have announced the launch of a sister organization that will lobby for legislation and endorse political candidates to help end the state’s cash bail system.
In a Tuesday livestream, four high-ranking members of Minnesota Freedom Fund Action (MFF Action) explained the purpose of the new advocacy group, doubling down on their opposition to pre-trial detention and the current immigration detention system.
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As DFL legislators appear poised to pass a bill that would have Minnesota on its way to flying a newly-redesigned state flag by the end of this year, one Republican senator is floating an idea for what that flag should look like.
Sen. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, believes a rendition of the logo of the former Minnesota North Stars professional hockey franchise could serve as the unifying symbol that proponents of a new state flag claim they are looking for.
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Minnesota Democrats want to join just a handful of states where felons never lose their right to vote.
This was revealed during a House floor debate Thursday night, which saw the passage of State Rep. Cedrick Frazier’s, DFL-New Hope, bill to restore voting rights to felons once they are released from incarceration. Under current law, felons are not allowed to vote until they complete their entire sentence, including probation and parole.
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by Anthony Gockowski Democrats have introduced a bill that would make illegal immigrants eligible for MinnesotaCare, a state-subsidized health insurance program. The bill, sponsored by State Rep. Esther Agbaje, DFL-Minneapolis, and State Sen. Alice Mann, DFL-Edina, would allow “undocumented noncitizens” to qualify for the program. Lawfully present noncitizens are already…
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Minnesota issues an average of $514 million in state-funded grants to nonprofits each year but demonstrates “pervasive noncompliance” with oversight measures, according to a new report published Thursday.
The report from the Office of the Legislative Auditor (OLA) specifically looked at whether the Minnesota Department of Education and the Department of Public Safety’s Office of Justice Programs are complying with grants management policies.
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At a time when fare revenue and passenger trips have plummeted, the Minneapolis transit system has given its employees pay increases.
Top administrators at Metro Transit saw significant pay increases by as much as $55,000 in case from 2020 to 2022. Also, one bus driver made $201,853 and another bus driver made $195,717 last year. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median hourly wage for bus drivers in the United States is $23.37 which equates to $48,600 for a 40-hour a week position.
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A Hopkins principal accused Libs of TikTok of spreading “false and hateful claims towards LGBTQ youth” after a report from the popular Twitter account said the school is offering chest binders to students without parental knowledge.
The Libs of TikTok report begins with a picture of a flier that is hanging in a hallway at Hopkins West Junior High School. The flier includes the contact information for the school’s “health mentor,” Caroline Hickey, who offers to talk with students about “gender norms,” “gender and identity,” and “circles of sexuality.”
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Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D) signed legislation Tuesday that has been condemned by the pro-life community as the most extreme abortion measure in the nation, one that creates a “fundamental right” to abortion at any time during pregnancy, and denies parents the right to know if their minor daughter undergoes an abortion.
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Democrats just passed the Protect Reproductive Options Act, which critics are calling the most radical abortion law in the nation, if not the world. But they’re not done yet.
Next on the Minnesota DFL’s agenda is HF 91/SF70, which would essentially repeal what remains of Minnesota’s regulations on the abortion industry, including medical protections for infants who survive abortions and a ban on using public funds for the procedure under MinnesotaCare.
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U.S. Rep. Michelle Fischbach of Minnesota introduced two pro-life bills in the U.S. House of Representatives this month.
The Republican congresswoman’s proposed pieces of legislation include the Defund Planned Parenthood Act (H.R. 371) and the Protecting Life and Taxpayers Act (H.R. 372), according to a press release.
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Minnesota’s top marginal corporate tax rate, 9.8%, is the second-highest the nation, according to an analysis the Tax Foundation released Tuesday.
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The Minnesota House passed legislation after seven hours of debate late Thursday night that would require the state’s electricity grid to be 100% carbon-free in 17 years.
This is an unrealistic timeline that could endanger the lives of Minnesotans if it fails while causing their electricity bills to skyrocket, Republicans argued throughout the night.
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A universal school lunch bill that’s fast-tracking its way through the Minnesota Legislature received an official price tag this week.
HF5/SF123 would ensure all K-12 students are served free breakfast and lunch in public schools, regardless of family income. It would also cost the state $387 million over the next two years and nearly $419 million in the subsequent two-year budget cycle. That’s according a non-partisan fiscal analysis provided to legislators in the House Education Finance Committee on Wednesday.
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The Minnesota Court of Appeals has ruled that a college instructor is not entitled to unemployment benefits after he was fired for refusing “to abide by his employer’s COVID-19 vaccination and testing policy.”
Three appeals court judges agreed last Tuesday that Michael Larson, an English teacher for Minnesota State College Southeast-Winona (MSCS), committed employee misconduct by failing to follow its COVID vaccine and testing requirements, which means he is not eligible for unemployment benefits per state law.
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California recently announced a ban on all gas-powered vehicles by 2035. This is a decision that will have wide ranging negative implications for Minnesotans.
Residents in the Gopher state may be curious how an administrative decision made halfway across the country will affect them, but the answer is relatively simple: last year Governor Tim Walz and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) unilaterally finalized a rule to cede their regulatory authority over automobile emissions to regulators in the Golden State.
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Residents in a Twin Cities suburb are voicing concerns about the vulgar language and sexually explicit content in pro-LGBT and “anti-racist” school library books.
During the open forum portion of the Eastern Carver County School Board meeting in Chaska Monday evening, community members requested more transparency and input about the books that children and teenagers in the district can get their hands on.
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The CEO of Minnesota’s largest abortion provider is also a sitting legislator who is sponsoring and voting on bills to expand abortion access.
Rep. Ruth Richardson, DFL-Mendota Heights, voted in favor of the “Protect Reproductive Options (PRO) Act” last week, a bill that would enshrine the “fundamental right” to abortion in Minnesota law.
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