Gun restrictions, aid-in-dying bill among others arrive at legislative crossroads this week
Minnesota lawmakers are on course to surpass 10,000 bills submitted since this two-year run of the Legislature began, setting a record for the most proposals offered up in that cycle.
Most of them will fall by the wayside this week as a Friday deadline funnels out policy proposals that haven’t been teed up for a floor vote in time.
“I think on Monday, we’re gonna cross 5,000 bills introduced into the House, and of those 5,000, there are probably 4,500 that I would not want to make deadline and they won’t,” Rep. Zack Stephenson, DFL-Coon Rapids, joked last week.
That means proposed restrictions on firearms, allowing terminally ill patients to take medication that could end their lives and returning state land to Indigenous tribes in Minnesota could be sidelined.
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The cutoff isn’t final. Bills that miss the deadline can move forward if they move through additional hearings of special rules panels. Lawmakers say a proposal to update the state adult-use cannabis law will need that path to buy some extra time.
The deadline essentially trims down what legislators will focus on during the back half of the legislative session.
“We have limited funding this year for bills that are financial priorities, and then we have limited time for policy priorities. And that’s just the nature of our work up here. So I know that members are hustling to try to get in their bills,” House Majority Leader Jamie Long, DFL-Minneapolis, said. “But certainly this is the time when some things get left on the cutting room floor.”
With slim majorities in both chambers, legislative leaders last week said that firearm bills that have moved through committees in the House but not the Senate could have a difficult path this year. The “medical aid in dying” act and others could also fall away this week without advancing through Senate panels.
Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy, DFL-St. Paul, said that while she supports the measures, they might take more time. And that means they could become the work of a future Legislature.
“Big ideas, things that challenge us often take time,” Murphy told reporters last week. “I think there is support on the part of Minnesotans for something like safe storage [of firearms]. I know that there are members of our caucus that are working on that issue. We have not had a caucus-wide discussion yet.”
Events outside the Capitol could also reset priorities for what lawmakers need to take up quickly. Last week, legislative leaders said they would aim to pass a statewide measure addressing rideshare driver pay and protections in an effort to prevent Uber and Lyft from halting service in the Twin Cities metro area in May. Gov. Tim Walz has also said the legislation is a priority.
And after a federal grand jury last week indicted the girlfriend of a man who fatally shot three first responders of purchasing the guns used in that shooting, Republicans are pressing for tougher state penalties for people convicted of straw purchasing — buying firearms for people who can’t legally have them.
“Our three victims might very well been alive today had this bill passed five years ago,” Rep. Peggy Scott, R-Andover, said Thursday as she tried to bring the proposal for a floor vote. “It’s time to quit with the excuses.”
DFL leaders in the House said the measure would likely come up for a committee hearing this week.
House Minority Leader Lisa Demuth, R-Cold Spring, said she hopes another measure falls by the wayside.
“A bill that was heard in committee yesterday, creating a full-time Legislature, that is the most ridiculous and worst idea for the people of Minnesota,” Demuth said. “Making us more of a Washington-style would not be a great direction for us.”
The DFL proposal would put a constitutional amendment on the ballot that would create an independent redistricting commission and allow the Legislature to meet for longer each year. It was still moving through committees last week.
The governor this week is also expected to release his supplemental budget proposal. Walz told MPR News the plan would include additional funding for schools to implement universal school meals and help rural emergency medical service providers. But otherwise, he’s keeping it lean. He also said that proposals with budget ties — like a MinnesotaCare public option — will have to wait.
“You can go back to the forecast, see where the numbers are, and extrapolate from that, that we’re not going to ask for a lot,” he said last week.