‘As bad as I’ve ever seen it’: Partisan dysfunction worsens in Minnesota Legislature

Minnesota legislators are heading back to the Capitol so bitterly divided that half of the state House members are threatening to not show up.

It’s a foreboding sign of dysfunction for the 2025 Legislature, which starts Tuesday and must pass a two-year state budget by late May to avoid a government shutdown. The standoff in the House could stall business for at least two weeks as Democrats say they’ll boycott the start of session if Republicans don’t agree to share power.

“It’s gotten as bad as I’ve ever seen it, and it isn’t getting any better,” said former state Rep. Gene Pelowski, a Winona Democrat who retired from the Legislature last year. “There was a time when there would be Republicans and Democrats who were moderates and who could come together ... and get things done or stop things that shouldn’t happen. That really doesn’t exist anymore.”

House Republicans will hold a 67-66 edge until a Jan. 28 special election to fill a likely blue Roseville area seat. They want to use their momentary advantage to elect a speaker, take control of committees and likely refuse to seat a DFL legislator whose election victory they contested in court.

Democrats called the move a power grab and said Republicans should work with them since the chamber will likely be tied again soon.

For lawmakers to consider such moves before the session even starts suggests a hangover of the rancor from the past two years of full DFL control that culminated in a chaotic end to the 2024 Legislature. In the final hour of that session, after a GOP filibuster, Democrats cut off debate and passed a 1,400-page omnibus bill, prompting Republicans in both the House and Senate to scream into their microphones in protest.

Hamline University political science professor David Schultz said the discord has been building for 25 years. He cited acrimony and dysfunction that has festered since the turn of the century, noting the high number of special sessions during the stretch when the Legislature couldn’t finish its work on time.

In recent years, the DFL has largely been in control and unaccustomed to compromise, Schultz said. After being largely shut out, Republicans now have pent-up demand for a modicum of power, he said. “Poof, that’s what we have right now,” Schultz said.

In addition, he said, the Legislature is relatively young with many new members and a lack of negotiating experience or prowess.

In the past two sessions, especially in 2023, the DFL used its power to pass a litany of progressive policies, spurning GOP attempts to moderate the proposals. “The Democrats played winner-take-all politics; you could argue Republicans would have done the same thing,” Schultz said.

“Now both sides are playing winner-take-all, take-no-prisoners politics,” he said.

Difficult negotiations usually come at the end of legislative sessions as lawmakers try to pass big policy bills and a two-year state budget. This year, the acrimony arrived early and risks upending the entire session.

It wasn’t expected to go this way. The House was set to be tied 67-67 after the November election, and both parties were discussing how to amicably share power. But Republicans backed away from negotiations after a judge ruled in December that newly elected Democrat Curtis Johnson didn’t live in his Roseville-area House district and was ineligible to take office. As a result, the seat was left vacant.

Now Republicans feel emboldened to press their fleeting one-seat advantage.

“It is at the fault of the Democrat candidate that ran and really caused this whole situation to happen,” said House GOP Leader Lisa Demuth. “So for the rest of the Democrats to say, ‘we’re not going to show up to work,’ it’s absolutely irresponsible.”

“There is no reason why taxpayers should be on the hook for paying for people that are not going to be at their jobs,” added the Cold Spring lawmaker, who’s suggested Democrats could face recall petitions.

For Democrats, it isn’t just a matter of power sharing. They’re also trying to protect one of their own. House Republicans have indicated they’d likely use their one-vote advantage to refuse to seat DFL Rep. Brad Tabke, whose 14-vote election victory was contested in court after Scott County elections officials lost 20 absentee ballots in one precinct.

Demuth told a conservative podcast host last week that Republicans won’t seat Tabke regardless of how the court rules.

“That is outrageous. That has never been done in Minnesota history,” House DFL Leader Melissa Hortman said of the potential GOP maneuver. She and House Democrats are prepared to boycott the session until after the Roseville-area vacancy is filled, a move that would deny Republicans the quorum needed to conduct business.

In the meantime, the Brooklyn Park lawmaker said, Democrats would still meet with constituents and work with staff to draft bills.

Hortman said she expects House Democrats would return to the Capitol with their 67th member on Feb. 3. Asked about the blowback Democrats could face for skipping the opening days of the session, Hortman appeared unworried. She said denying a quorum is a “legitimate legislative strategy” and no worse than last year’s GOP filibuster.

“For three weeks, essentially, they weren’t showing up to work, either. They were talking about hamburgers on the House floor instead of the legislation that was in front of us,” Hortman said. “So you could ask the average voter, what’s more disrespectful to the institution?”

In the Senate, Democrats and Republicans must also figure out how to temporarily share power after the December death of Sen. Kari Dziedzic, DFL-Minneapolis, brought the chamber to a tie. Democrats would not regain their one-seat majority until after a Jan. 28 special election to fill Dziedzic’s safely blue seat.

Senate Minority Leader Mark Johnson, R-East Grand Forks, considers this the most divisive beginning to a session he’s seen in nine years. He noted the overall split of the Legislature is as close as ever with 100 Republicans and 99 DFLers.

Johnson blames the DFL’s one-sided approach to governance over the past two years: ”They have burnt the bridges of trust amongst their colleagues on the other side of the aisle, to a point now where it’s very difficult to operate and work in a trusting relationship.”

Further complicating the divide is another unprecedented situation: the upcoming felony burglary trial of DFL Sen. Nicole Mitchell. The Woodbury lawmaker is accused of breaking into her stepmother’s house last year and is the target of a pending Republican ethics complaint.

Mitchell’s lawyers filed a motion Friday seeking to postpone her trial until late May after the legislative session ends. If she continues serving in the Senate and Dziedzic’s seat is filled by another Democrat, the DFL would hold a 34-33 advantage.

Republicans could push for their own investigation or censure, a process that could derail or disrupt the session. Johnson said in a statement Friday that Mitchell’s motion to postpone the trial “further delays an orderly Senate session as she continues to bring the reputation of the Senate into disrepute.”

“Senate Republicans stand by our previous votes to not allow her to vote, to not count her vote and to remove her from the body,” he said.

Power-sharing negotiations between Johnson and DFL Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy of St. Paul were ongoing as of Friday afternoon.

“We’re making progress and working in good faith,” Murphy said.

In normal years, the parties would be presenting their proposals for the coming session, but those have been buried under the rubble of the power struggle.

House and Senate Republicans said that rooting out fraud and waste in state government programs will be a centerpiece of their agenda. They’ve also indicated they want to roll back some taxes and government mandates.

Murphy said she hopes legislators can unite to pass a bonding bill that would pay for infrastructure projects across the state. And Hortman said House Democrats want to find ways to make child care, housing and health care more affordable.

Everything will be subject to bipartisan negotiation in the two closely divided chambers. DFL Gov. Tim Walz and legislators also must figure out how to head off a projected future budget deficit of $5.1 billion.

Legislative food fights are familiar to former Republican Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch, who is now a lobbyist. Her advice to lawmakers: Keep trying to work it out.

“How do you wrestle a porcupine? Very carefully,” Koch said. “Eventually this will shake out.”

Demuth said she’s still confident legislators will pass a two-year budget on time. Hortman agreed.

“This is kind of, I think, par for the course for the Legislature, which is, we do the right thing, but not until we’ve tried everything else,” Hortman said. “We never get along until we have the dueling press conferences and, ‘We’re going to take it to a shutdown, and we’re going to deny quorum.’ You’ve got to have the most extreme options on the table before everybody’s like, ‘OK, well, shucks, I guess we have to get along.’”