The Minnesota Supreme Court has tossed out more than two dozen Republican-led petitions attempting to recall House DFL members who boycotted the first weeks of the 2025 legislative session.
Minnesota Supreme Court tosses out GOP recall petitions against DFLers for House boycott
The court found the petition didn’t meet a “serious malfeasance or nonfeasance” standard in law.
The Minnesota Star Tribune
March 17, 2025 at 10:25PM
The decision released Monday dismissed 29 petitions against DFL members all at once, saying their actions didn’t meet a “serious malfeasance or nonfeasance” standard that’s needed to initiate a recall election.
Sixty-six Democrats boycotted the first weeks of the session to prevent Republicans from getting the 68 votes needed for a quorum in the chamber, which would have allowed them to take over the speakership and committees in the House.
The House returned to a 67-67 tie on Monday, but for weeks Republicans had a one-vote advantage in the chamber after a judge ruled DFLer Curtis Johnson didn’t live in the district he was elected to represent.
Republicans walked away from negotiations with DFLers after the Johnson ruling, triggering the power struggle between the two parties.
State Republican leaders initiated the recall petitions to put pressure on DFLers to return to the Capitol, alleging that their failure to show up “caused the House to be unable to transact business” and the members “failed to perform the basic requirements of [their] office.”
The party initially missed a self-imposed deadline to turn in the petitions to the Secretary of State’s Office due to misfiled paperwork. The secretary of state turned the petitions over to the Minnesota Supreme Court, which must determine if there are valid grounds for recall.
Democrats and Republicans eventually struck a deal to share power in the chamber and all members returned to the House floor on Feb. 6.
“This allegation as to the seriousness of any nonfeasance is conceded to no longer exist; a quorum has been created, and the legislative process is currently operating,” read the ruling signed by Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson.
DFL Leader Melissa Hortman said Hudson “made the right decision in dismissing Republicans’ frivolous recall petitions.”
“Now that the Minnesota House is tied 67-67 and operating under a power-sharing agreement, we hope Republicans will finally abandon their political games and work with us on a bipartisan basis to do the work voters sent us here to do,” she said.
State GOP Chair Alex Plechash said in a statement: “The DFL may have escaped consequences in the short term, but Minnesota voters will have the final say on whether skipping work, shutting down the legislative process, and demanding to be paid for it is worthy of re-election.”
The state Legislative Reference Library has no record of a Minnesota legislator ever being subject to a recall election. The Minnesota Supreme Court has dismissed previous recall petitions.
If the Supreme Court had allowed the petitions to proceed, Republicans would have still faced a lengthy process to recall members.
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer is postponing several scheduled events this week to promote his new book, '' Antisemitism in America: A Warning,'' after some liberal groups had planned to stage protests.
