DFLer Brad Tabke’s victory stands in Shakopee-area race, judge rules

DFL Rep. Brad Tabke remains the winner of a Shakopee-area House race, a judge ruled Tuesday, dealing a blow to a GOP challenger who filed a lawsuit contesting the result.

Dakota County Judge Tracy Perzel’s ruling, issued on the first day of the 2025 legislative session, denies Republican Aaron Paul’s request to hold a special election for the seat that Tabke won by 14 votes. Paul’s argument centered around the fact that 20 absentee ballots remained missing from one precinct.

“Aaron Paul has not proven his three election contest grounds by the greater weight of the evidence,” Perzel wrote in the 47-page ruling.

Paul can appeal Perzel’s ruling to the state Supreme Court. Attempts to reach Paul on Tuesday were unsuccessful; in a statement, Tabke said the “clear and decisive” order indicates “there’s no reason to doubt” he won the election.

“The judge has reconfirmed I am a member of this Legislature,“ he said. “I’m ready to get to work today for Shakopee and for Minnesota.”

The 20 missing absentee ballots from Shakopee’s 10th Precinct were at the heart of the controversy over Tabke’s win to represent District 54A in Scott County.

A preliminary investigation determined officials likely threw away those ballots inside their secrecy envelopes before tabulating them. (Staff chose not to look into a missing absentee ballot from Precinct 12A after noting it’s not uncommon for one voter to check in but not vote.)

Those uncounted votes prompted Paul to file an election contest lawsuit alleging Scott County election officials engaged in “deliberate, serious, and material violations” of state election law when they lost the ballots yet declared Tabke the winner.

Paul asked the court to declare a vacancy for Tabke’s seat, giving voters the chance to decide a winner in a special election.

Democrats lost three seats in the state House in the fall election, leaving the chamber tied 67-67. But Republicans successfully challenged in court the residency of a Democrat who won a Roseville-area seat, leaving the chamber with a 67-66 GOP edge pending a Jan. 28 special election.

House Republicans had indicated they would likely use their momentary advantage to refuse to seat Tabke, and that was still a point of contention Tuesday as the session began.

The House and Senate have the constitutional power to decide whether to seat their own members.

In a Tuesday statement, DFL Chair Ken Martin said the party wouldn’t tolerate a “partisan vote by Republican legislators to overturn this election.”

“The voters and the courts have both spoken, and it is time for Republicans to accept that they lost this election,” Martin said in the statement. “Defying the courts and the voters to overturn an election would be an outrageous and illegitimate abuse of power. House Republicans should come back from the brink and abandon this outrageous partisan power grab.”

Minnesota DFL legislators held a private ceremony Sunday to swear in members, including Tabke — a move criticized by Republicans.

House GOP Leader Lisa Demuth said in a statement Tuesday that the party will “evaluate this lengthy ruling and consider options in the coming days.”

Demuth, a Cold Spring Republican, slammed Perzel’s decision, contending it’s unclear if several people who testified at the December hearing that they cast missing absentee ballots for Tabke were correctly identified. At the trial, six people, identified through Scott County and Minnesota Secretary of State records, said they cast those ballots for Tabke — enough for the DFLer to widen his lead to the point where Paul couldn’t possibly overtake him.

“Allowing this decision to stand … may increase the likelihood of bad actors choosing to destroy certain sets of ballots in tight races,” Demuth wrote.

Testimony from the December hearing didn’t indicate that missing ballots in Shakopee’s 10th Precinct were intentionally destroyed.