2024 election, Minnesota Legislature: The view of Senate DFLers

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If you hear an echo lately, it’s not in your head. The laws we passed in Minnesota really are catching on.

On issue after issue, the DFL majority’s priorities are becoming a road map for other states and the Harris-Walz campaign.

The examples of this happening seem to grow every day:

• Legislative protection for reproductive rights.

• Direct support for first-time homebuyers.

• A child tax credit for parents and direct investment in child care cost reduction.

• Alleviating burdens from student loans and medical debt.

• Anti-price-gouging protections.

• Investing in the care economy to support seniors and their caregivers.

• One-click rules that make it easy to unsubscribe to consumer services.

• Legalizing cannabis and putting those harmed by prohibition in line for opportunity.

• Red flag extreme risk protections to prevent gun violence.

Two’s a coincidence, three’s a pattern. This many shared ideas is a statement of values.

The voters and constituents wrote our to-do list, and that’s why our platform is not just sound policy — it’s also popular. Teachers and parents, nurses and patients, workers and small business owners told us what they needed. We listened.

We still are. In Senate District 45, candidate Ann Johnson Stewart met a woman who had never missed an election in her life; her parents fled Soviet persecution, and she knows the value of freedom. Democrats do, too, and continue to take steps to strengthen our inclusive democracy.

Republican candidates do the opposite, projecting fear, doubt and division. We’ve met a lot of voters who are switching parties this year out of a sense of duty to their democracy.

Republican leaders will tell you we need to restore “balance” in Minnesota. They’re hoping you forgot. Under their recent leadership, the GOP was the party of “no,” with little interest in real solutions. They existed to obstruct the process and oppose Gov. Tim Walz. As several GOP members positioned themselves to run for governor themselves, they left good ideas — theirs and ours — on the table.

That’s not balance, it’s chaos, and it left behind the families scrapping to make ends meet. In 2022, Minnesota voters grew tired of gridlock and elected the DFL to make improvements in our communities, households and workplaces.

Real balance is working with environmental advocates to pass the plan for 100% clean energy by 2040, then working with the business community on permitting reform to make that goal a reality.

Real bipartisanship is taking dozens of GOP-authored amendments on the legal cannabis law, passing $300 million for nursing homes and $2.3 billion for infrastructure, including 161 projects in greater Minnesota — and 143 in Republican-led districts.

This summer I visited Sen. Rob Kupec in Moorhead for a tour of the rapidly changing downtown. State, local and private investment are remaking that community, as are support for public safety and local aid (nearly $3 million for Moorhead alone). That example of forging partnerships is one we have, can and will replicate throughout Minnesota.

More than 150 million free school meals and tuition-free college for almost 17,000 college students are putting money back in Minnesotans’ pockets.

We’re on the way to making Minnesota the best state for workers. That means paid leave, sick and safe time, better pay for caregivers and better conditions for laborers in countless industries.

There’s a lot left to do. Students need more resources. Workers need a seat at the table, and consumers need a voice against corporate power. Parents need child care. Patients need solutions in a health care system that denies them care.

Sound ambitious? It is, but that’s what the people of Minnesota have asked us to do. Join us, and let’s keep showing America what’s possible.

Erin Murphy, DFL-St. Paul, is the Minnesota Senate majority leader.