Minnesota

Minnesota Supreme Court sides with city in voter roster debate | Sarah Ritter/The Minnesota Star Tribune

The city of Oak Grove is allowed to use paper voter rosters in the upcoming November election despite serious objections from Anoka County, the Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled. The state’s highest court on Friday decided that the northern suburb has the authority to choose whether to check in voters with paper rosters during the general election. Anoka County switched over to tablets in 2018, and argued that all precincts within its jurisdiction must use the electronic poll pads. “This is a major victory for local election authority and the rule of law,” said Doug Seaton, founder of the Upper Midwest Law Center, a conservative legal group that represented the city at no cost. “Oak Grove made a lawful decision for its own precincts, and the Minnesota Supreme Court confirmed that state and county officials cannot rewrite the statute simply because they prefer a different system.” Read Article

Minnesota city urges state Supreme Court to allow return to paper voter rosters | Ryan LuetkemeyerCourthouse News

Whether an outer-ring municipality in the Twin Cities metro area can reject electronic voter books and return to paper rosters for the upcoming election came before the Minnesota Supreme Court Tuesday. At issue is whether individual municipalities like the city of Oak Grove retain statutory authority to choose their poll book formats for statewide elections, or whether county and state attempts at electronic uniformity override local decisions. Oak Grove contends that, because cities bear the primary responsibility for operating polling places in their precincts, they hold final say over voter roster formats, while state and county officials argue authority goes to the county auditor for federal, state and countywide elections. Read Article

Minnesota’s top court rejects Mike Lindell’s bid for primary recount | Kyeland Jackson/The Minnesota Star Tribune

Minnesota Supreme Court justices denied requests for a primary election recount by MyPillow founder Mike Lindell, effectively confirming his loss to Lisa Demuth as the Republican nominee for Minnesota governor. Chief Justice Natalie Hudson on Saturday signed the order denying Lindell’s request. Hudson wrote that Lindell had declined to cover the $825,000 needed to fund a recount, and he missed an Aug. 24 deadline to file assurances that he could cover those costs. “Lindell instead sent documentation to the Secretary of State to reflect wire transfer readiness, and he filed this section 204B.44 petition,” Hudson’s order read. Read Article

Minnesota election officials: Mike Lindell recount request too late, warn of ballot delays | MPR News

Minnesota's Secretary of State's Office warns that it's too late to start a recount of the governor's race primary and complete it before ballots need to be prepared for the general election. A filing Wednesday with the state Supreme Court seeks dismissal of Republican candidate Mike Lindell's bid for a hand recount. Lindell failed to formally request and pay for a recount by a Monday deadline. He went to the high court to seek a more-expansive recount than a state-approved plan. He objected to the structure in which only votes for him and Lisa Demuth would be counted by name and all others would be combined in a third pile. The brief on behalf of the Secretary of State’s Office and the Canvassing Board said the ballot printing process begins Sept. 3 for early voting that starts on Sept. 18. If the court grants Lindell what he wants, the recount might not start immediately because new procedures would need to be finalized and new cost estimates would be required, the state argues. Read Article

Minnesota: Mike Lindell says he’ll pay for recount in 45,000-vote primary loss | Walker Orenstein/The Minnesota Star Tribune

MyPillow founder Mike Lindell is challenging the results of the Minnesota Republican primary for governor and says he will pay for a recount despite losing by more than 45,000 votes. The recount is Lindell’s latest effort to cast doubt on the security of elections after he became one of the country’s most prominent supporters of President Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Minnesota’s Secretary of State has not received an official request for a recount, said office spokesman Peter Bartz-Gallagher. Lindell would need to make that request, along with a bond, cash, or surety for the full estimated cost of $825,000 by Monday. Read Article

Feds leave Minnesota to fend for itself on election security | Briana Bierschbach/The Minnesota Star Tribune

By this point in a typical election year, federal intelligence officials would have briefed Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon and other election officials on emerging threats to the November election. Simon would have joined federal agencies in rehearsing responses to worst-case scenarios, from foreign cyberattacks and bomb threats to severe weather on Election Day. Instead, with four months until voters head to the polls, Simon said those briefings and trainings never happened. Now, some of the worst-case scenarios election officials are preparing for involve the Trump administration. “The federal government itself is now the potential obstacle — or even the instigator,” Simon said. “That’s what’s different this time.” Read Article

Minnesota Gov. Walz appears unimpressed by Pam Bondi’s demands | Colin Wood/StateScoop

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Monday confirmed to the press that he received a letter from Attorney General Pam Bondi over the weekend demanding that the state better cooperate with federal immigration authorities and that it hand over its voter registration lists and safety-net benefits data. Whether the nation’s chief law enforcement officer should expect the governor to bend to her demands was perhaps made clear by his rejoinder: “There’s two million documents in the Epstein files we’re still waiting on. Go ahead and work on those.” Bondi’s letter on Saturday described Operation Metro Surge, the name Immigration and Customs Enforcement gives its Minnesota activities, as an urgent effort “to protect Americans from the dangers presented by unchecked illegal immigration, including violent crime,” but that has received scant support from local law enforcement, detention centers, officials or residents. She recalled that Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told ICE during a recent press conference that it should “get the fuck out of Minneapolis.” Read Article

Minnesota: A Month After Shootings, We’re Normalizing Political Violence | Joshua A. Douglas/Washington Monthly

It’s been a month since the assassinations, yet hardly anyone seems to remember they occurred. On June 14, an assassin murdered the leader of the Minnesota House Democratic Caucus, Melissa Hortman, and her husband in the middle of the night at their home in suburban Minneapolis. The perpetrator also shot and wounded State Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette. Thankfully, Hoffman is now out of the ICU, though he has a long recovery ahead of him. The murderer, Vance Boelter, had a “hit list” of 45 targets, all of whom were Democrats. The politically motivated attack, however, barely made a blip in the national consciousness. People expressed shock the day it happened, but the country swiftly moved on. Similarly, almost no one is still discussing the April break-in and arson of the Pennsylvania Governor’s mansion, with the perpetrator’s goal of beating Governor Josh Shapiro with a hammer. That attack echoed a 2022 incident in which an individual broke into the home of Nancy Pelosi and assaulted her husband with a hammer. In 2020, several men plotted to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer to start a civil war; two were convicted. Read Article

Minnesota assassination prompts many lawmakers to wonder: Is service worth the danger? | Alex Brown and Robbie Sequeira/Stateline

A year into her first term in office, New Jersey Assemblywoman Sadaf Jaffer decided not to run for reelection. The political world saw her as a rising star in 2023; Jaffer, a Democrat, previously served as the nation’s first female Muslim mayor. But rampant harassment from online commenters and other politicians about her religion, as well as high-profile acts of violence against other public officials, made her reconsider her political future. “I was concerned about my family,” Jaffer said in an interview. “They didn’t sign up for this. I didn’t want to put them in harm’s way.” In the wake of the assassination of Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, as well as the wounding of state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, more public officials across the country are taking stock of their safety. Some say death threats have become part of the job. They fear that violence — real attacks and constant threats — will scare potential candidates away from seeking public office. Read Article

‘I’m just so scared’: Lawmakers reckon with safety after Minnesota slayings | Patrick Marley, Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, Holly Bailey and Kyle Melnick/The Washington Post

Minnesota lawmakers, terrified by predawn attacks on two of their own, turned to each other on a group text for comfort. A colleague had been killed and another had been shot, and the accused gunman was still on the loose. The 20 Democrats grieved and shared prayers — and began exchanging safety tips as they learned some of them were on the suspect’s list of targets. “I’m hunkered down,” one wrote Saturday morning after learning that authorities said the suspect had assembled a list of dozens of Democratic targets across the Midwest. “Will stay put. But I feel so sick.” Read Article

Minnesota GOP asks state Supreme Court to halt special election in suburban House race | Rochelle Olson/The Minnesota Star Tribune

The state Republican Party and conservative Minnesota Voters Alliance have asked the state Supreme Court to void Gov. Tim Walz’s decision to hold a special election Jan. 28 for a DFL-held House seat. The legal challenge is among the unsettled issues that will determine which party controls the Legislature in the 2025 session, which starts in just more than a week. Republicans will begin the session with a 67-66 advantage in the House because the Roseville-area seat was left open after a court order voided a DFLer’s victory. Until the December court order, the DFL and GOP were to open the session tied at 67 members each and had been discussing a power-sharing agreement. But now Republicans say the 67-66 advantage will allow them to elect a speaker and control committee assignments. DFLers disagree; they say 68 votes are needed for any House action, including the election of a speaker. Read Article

Minnesota Republicans sue to force election rerun in tight House race where 20 ballots are missing | Steve Karnowski/Associated Press

Minnesota Republicans filed a lawsuit Monday to try to force a rerun of a state House race where the incumbent Democrat won by 14 votes — but in which investigators concluded that election workers probably destroyed 20 valid absentee ballots after failing to count them. It’s a race that could determine the balance of power in the Minnesota House, where leaders from both parties are working out the details of a power-sharing agreement that currently presumes a 67-67 tie when the Legislature convenes next month. A Republican victory in a special election could shift that balance to a two-vote, 68-66 GOP majority. Democrats have a one-vote majority in the state Senate. So regardless of the outcome in the disputed race, Minnesota will be returning to some degree of divided government in 2025 after two years of full Democratic control. Read Article

Minnesota: More than half of county election offices receive bomb threats since Nov. 8 | Elliot Hughes/The Minnesota Star Tribune

Election offices in more than half of Minnesota’s counties have been targeted with emailed bomb threats since Nov. 8, the Secretary of State’s Office said Tuesday. The threats come as election workers are still in the process of verifying the results of the 2024 election. In a statement, Secretary of State Steve Simon said his office is coordinating with local, state and federal partners to “ensure that our election officials can complete this important work and that those responsible for these threats are held accountable.” “Threats of violence against election workers, aimed at disrupting our democracy, are absolutely unacceptable,” he said. Read Article

Minnesota’s top elections official says ‘glitch’ in automatic voter registration system is fixed | Steve Karnowski/Associated Press

While there was a "glitch" in Minnesota’s new automatic voter registration system, Secretary of State Steve Simon said Thursday that nobody who was ineligible voted in the August primary as a result of the problem. That had been one of the questions that Minnesota Republicans last week said was still hanging after Simon and other state officials said they had made changes to the system after flagging around 1,000 potentially problematic registrations. Minnesota's new system went live in April. Residents who apply for state-issued IDs such as driver's licenses are now automatically registered to vote without having to opt in, assuming they're eligible to vote. And 16- and 17-year-olds can preregister to vote once they turn 18. Read Article

Minnesota: In Rice County, which backed Trump, officials have spent years battling groups over voting machines | Briana Bierschbach/Star Tribune

In Rice County, Minnesota, tensions run high as local officials grapple with distrust surrounding election procedures, intensified by conservative groups' efforts to challenge the use of electronic voting machines. Recent public voting equipment tests have drawn large crowds, with attendees voicing concerns and pressing for answers on issues like ballot record printing and modem usage. A lawsuit filed against Denise Anderson, head of the county's Property Tax and Elections Office, has further escalated tensions, highlighting broader anxieties over election integrity. Despite assertions of thorough testing and certification from the Office of the Secretary of State, the controversy persists, raising concerns about the retention of election staff and the future of electoral processes in the county. Read Article

Minnesota: “It’s a great front row seat to democracy”: What to know about election machine testing | Sam Woodward/USA Today

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon and local elections officials conducted a public accuracy test at the Scott County Government Center ahead of the presidential primary, emphasizing transparency and integrity in the election process. These tests, required before every election, aim to ensure that voting equipment accurately records ballots. Simon highlighted the importance of these tests amid past claims of election fraud, underscoring Minnesota's commitment to secure and accessible elections. The testing process involves examining Dominion Voting machines and assessing alternative voting methods, such as handheld devices for visually or audibly impaired voters. Read Article

Minnesota election officials express confidence about security on eve of Super Tuesday early voting | Steve Karnowski/Associated Press

Minnesota's Super Tuesday presidential primary begins early voting, and Secretary of State Steve Simon has highlighted the state's preparedness for challenges such as disinformation, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and threats to poll workers. Simon outlined multiple security measures, including new election security laws, layers of security for remote voting, public testing of voting machine accuracy, and a corps of volunteer election judges. Emphasizing the need to combat disinformation, Simon urged voters to seek reliable information from state and local election offices. He identified disinformation as a significant challenge in the 2024 election year. Read Article

Minnesota Secretary of State’s Office tests ES&S ExpressVote ballot marking devices with new ‘skinny’ ballots | Rochelle Olsen/Star Tribune

Minnesota's voting process underwent scrutiny as election officials from Secretary of State Steve Simon's office tested new voting machines in an open-door session. The machines, provided by Election Systems & Software (ES&S), are designed to allow voters to mark ballots using a touch screen and generate smaller ballots that are more accessible for people with disabilities. The certification process is public and subject to open meetings laws, aiming to inspire confidence in the election system. The results will be presented to Secretary Simon for approval, and if passed, cities and counties can purchase these machines for upcoming elections. Read Article

Minnesota just boosted protections for tens of thousands of election workers | Briana Bierschbach/Star Tribune

Minnesota has implemented a new law aimed at protecting election workers from intimidation, harassment, and threats. The law comes as a response to the increase in such incidents since the 2020 election, fueled by false claims of widespread voter fraud. Violators of the law could face civil penalties and fines of up to $1,000 per offense. Other states have also passed or are considering similar protections to ensure the safety of election administrators and poll workers. The law is part of a broader election agenda passed by Democrats in Minnesota, which includes measures like automatic voter registration and penalties for spreading false information intended to deter voting. Read Article

Minnesota’s 2022 Post-Election Review Final Report | Citizens for Election Integrity Minnesota

Minnesota's post-election review (PER) involves manually counting randomly selected paper ballots and comparing the results to the machine totals from Election Day. This process serves as a crucial check on the accuracy of voting machines, provides valuable information to enhance election procedures, and allows the public to witness the verification of elections. Minnesota has been conducting PERs since 2006 during general elections for congressional and statewide races. Citizens for Election Integrity Minnesota (CEIMN) has organized eight non-partisan observations of Minnesota's PERs, including a partnership with the League of Women Voters in 2022, where 40 volunteers observed the review in 11 counties. The observers' questionnaire indicated that the review was carried out transparently, efficiently, and professionally, instilling confidence in the accuracy and integrity of the PER. Read the Report (PDF)

Minnesota Governor signs “Democracy for the People Act” allowing automatic voter registration, pre-registration for teens | Caroline Cummings/CBS Minnesota

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has signed the "Democracy for the People Act" into law, a comprehensive bill aimed at expanding access to the polls. The legislation includes provisions for automatic voter registration, pre-registration for 16- and 17-year-olds, and a permanent absentee voter list that will send ballots automatically to those who sign up. The law also requires voting materials to be available in languages other than English and prohibits voter intimidation. Minnesota now joins 22 other states and Washington, D.C., with automatic voter registration. The bill passed along party lines, with Republicans criticizing the lack of bipartisan support. Read Article

Minnesota election bill would make it illegal to knowingly spread false information that impedes voting | Deena Winter/Minnesota Reformer

Despite a dozen hearings in the Minnesota House and Senate, lawmakers have scarcely mentioned a key provision of a major elections bill that would make it a crime to spread election misinformation to try to stop people from voting. The Democracy for the People Act, (HF3), includes a provision that would make it a gross misdemeanor — punishable by up to a year in jail and a $3,000 fine — to knowingly spread materially false information with the intent to impede or prevent people from voting. It would apply before 60 days an election. It would be illegal to spread false information about the “time, place or manner of holding an election,” qualifications for or restrictions on voter eligibility, and threats to physical safety associated with voting. Full Article: Election bill would make it illegal to knowingly spread false information that impedes voting - Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota Secretary of State recounts harassment of election workers; promotes protections in bill | Deena Winter/Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon said election officials were harassed, intimidated and threatened in Minnesota during the 2022 election, and the state needs a law protecting election workers. Simon supports a bill dubbed the Election Worker Protection Act (HF635) that would ban intimidation of election officials, interference with their work and tampering with election equipment. The bill also makes it a misdemeanor to tamper with or gain unauthorized entry into election equipment, the state voter registration system, ballot boxes or drop boxes; tamper with voter registration lists and polling place rosters; divulge personal information about election officials; or block access to polling places. Minnesota has had a “noticeable uptick” in abusive behavior toward election administrators, Simon said during a Tuesday hearing before a House elections committee. In order to keep recruiting some 30,000 people to serve as election judges every election, they need to be assured “it’s a safe and secure environment,” Simon said. Full Article: Secretary of state recounts harassment of election workers; promotes protections in bill   - Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota elections chief seeks to make voting even easier | Steve Karnowski/Associated Press

Minnesota’s chief elections officer called on state lawmakers Monday to make it easier for residents to vote while protecting elections officials from threats and intimidation. Key elements of Secretary of State Steve Simon’s agenda are included in an elections package that fellow Democrats in the state House and Senate introduced last week. Others will be covered in separate legislation. As legislatures convene across the country, lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle are bracing for new fights on election-related legislation amid the continued false claims by former President Donald Trump and his allies that the 2020 election was stolen. Republicans are eager to tighten election rules further, whereas Democrats are seeking to make it easier to vote. Simon — who won more votes than any other candidate on Minnesota’s statewide ballot as he fought off a GOP challenger who claimed the 2020 election was rigged — said Minnesota consistently has one of the highest turnouts in the country by promoting voter access while balancing it with security measures that keep fraud at “microscopic” levels. “Minnesotans agree: Democracy was on the ballot in 2022,” Simon said at a news conference. “The voters of Minnesota had a chance to make their voices heard on elections and voting issues. They spoke loudly and clearly.” Full Article: Minnesota elections chief seeks to make voting even easier | AP News

Minnesota lawsuit against county expands to challenge modems transmitting vote results | Kristine Goddrich/Faribault Daily News

A lawsuit over election records data requests in Rice County has expanded into a challenge of the use of modems in voting equipment. The Minnesota Attorney General’s Office has gotten involved and is joining the county in asking a judge to dismiss the lawsuit. Judge Carol Hanks indicated during a hearing this week she is unlikely to issue any ruling before Election Day. The lawsuit was filed in August in Rice County District Court against Denise Anderson, Rice County’s elections director. It was filed by Kathleen Hagen, who is a Lonsdale resident and a former election judge, and Matt Benda, an attorney from Albert Lea who was a Republican candidate for Congress. The lawsuit initially sought to force the county to release more documents about its elections equipment. The plaintiffs later expanded the scope of the lawsuit, asking Hanks to issue an order prohibiting the county from using modems to transmit election results to the Secretary of State. The modems are a threat to election integrity, Benda argues. Full Article: Lawsuit against county expands to challenge modems transmitting vote results | News | southernminn.com

Minnesota election administration explained: post-election checks | Max Hailperin/Minnesota Reformer

Election officials do their best to get results out on election night or the next morning, but always with a note that they are unofficial. Perhaps preliminary would be a better word than unofficial. These results do come from an official source, unlike news reports of estimates derived from exit polling. But they haven’t been through all the checks and revisions that occur following the election. Those post-election activities are essential to producing final, official, certified results that merit confidence. Nothing done quickly can have the same level of assurance. Turning the unofficial results of election night into the official results that allow a winner to receive their election certificate is called canvassing. In Minnesota, the canvass process includes administrative checks, formal board action, and a manual audit of randomly selected precincts. Election administrators in each jurisdiction produce a “canvass report” that tabulates the votes cast, as well as the number of voters, and Election Day and advance registrants. This largely repeats the information from election night. However, it reflects several kinds of cross-checking and the revision of any errors found through that checking. Most basically, the administrators check that the vote counts were correctly uploaded to the Election Reporting System. They do this by closing the loop back to the definitive source of information: the printouts from the tabulators. Full Article: Minnesota election administration explained: post-election checks - Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota: Olmsted County administrator: Data misinterpretation led to group’s 2020 election concerns | Randy Petersen/Rochester Post Bulletin

A group alleging the Olmsted County votes counted in 2020 outnumbered the county’s eligible voters appears to have added the wrong numbers. County Administrator Heidi Welsch said a report from the Olmsted County Elections Integrity Group appears to have added the number of registered voters prior to Election Day – 100,815 – and the number who registered on Election Day – 5,786 – with the assumption that they all voted. “There are two problems with this calculation,” she wrote in a letter sent Wednesday to the group’s chairman, Roger Mueller. “First, these numbers are registered voters, not actual votes cast. In other words, not everyone who is registered actually votes.” The actual number of ballots reported being cast in Olmsted County was 91,864, according to the Minnesota Secretary of State’s office. When the group compared what it represented as 106,601 ballots cast to a reported 104,234 registered voters on Dec. 20, 2020, it raised concerns, according to a report distributed to county commissioners by county resident Dave Sprenger. Full Article: Olmsted County administrator: Data misinterpretation led to group's 2020 election concerns - Post Bulletin | Rochester Minnesota news, weather, sports

Minnesota GOP activists lobby county officials to do hand counts of paper ballots | Deena Winter/Minnesota Reformer

Right-wing activists are pressuring county officials in Minnesota to change election procedures, hand counting paper ballots, which election administrators say would be an unwieldy nightmare. In recent weeks, the GOP activists have lobbied for changes in Carver and Sherburne counties. Minnesota Republicans, who haven’t won a statewide race since 2006, have also been pushing hard to recruit like-minded election judges in the hopes that more Republican eyes on the polls will foil perceived fraud and flip elections their way. Election judges — who are poll workers — greet voters, accept ballots and help voters at the polls. It’s all part of a nationwide Republican push to get more GOP watchers involved in elections, fueled by false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. A legally required post-election audit in Minnesota found few irregularities in 2020 — nowhere near enough to change the results. The activists accuse county boards of using antiquated voting systems. Instead of city and county workers, they want more partisan election judges on ballot boards, which decide whether or to accept or reject absentee ballots. They’re also urging counties to stop using absentee ballot drop boxes. The League of Women Voters of Minnesota has been showing up at county board meetings, too, urging commissioners not to buy into misinformation. Full Article: GOP activists lobby Carver, Sherburne county officials to do hand counts of paper ballots - Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota: Election security money going to counties ahead of 2022 vote | Stephen Montemayor/StarTribune

The Minnesota Secretary of State's Office is starting to distribute nearly $3 million in election cybersecurity money as counties prepare for another busy election season. This latest round of federal Help America Vote Act security dollars is another chapter in efforts to bolster cyber defenses statewide since Russian hackers tried to breach Minnesota's voting system in 2016. "We want to make sure counties are thinking about their overall cyber security – and specifically election security posture – not just in an election year but all the time," said Bill Ekblad, the office's election security cyber navigator.

Full Article: Election security money going to Minnesota counties ahead of 2022 vote - StarTribune.com

Minnesota Secretary of State rejects Crow Wing County request for 2020 election audit | Deena Winter/Minnesota Reformer

Minnesota’s secretary of state has flatly denied a request by the Crow Wing County Board for an audit of the 2020 election in that county, where activists have been dogging officials for months to look into unspecified claims of fraud. Convinced there was fraud to be found — and egged on by people like former President Donald Trump, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell and a cadre of right-wingers — a group of activists lobbied the central Minnesota county board for months to do more examinations of the election in the county, which Trump won by 30 points. After the county attorney said the board had no legal authority to audit the election, four of the five county board members passed a resolution on Jan. 4 asking the secretary of state’s office to “undertake a full forensic audit of all election material and data” of the 2020 election. The resolution said the board “continues to have faith in the 2020 election results as valid and reliable but it is equally troubling that there are citizens who still have a sincerely held belief that it was not.” Secretary of State Steve Simon responded to the county in a letter Monday, saying that while he appreciates the “delicate balancing act” the county has undergone in trying to address constituents’ concerns, his office will not do another review of the election. “Our office will not engage in a vague and impossibly broad search for unspecified misconduct based on anyone’s gut feeling, hunch, or belief — no matter how sincerely held,” Simon said. “The 2020 general election, which took place almost 15 months ago, was fundamentally fair, accurate, honest, and secure across Minnesota.” Full Article: Secretary of State rejects Crow Wing County request for 2020 election audit - Minnesota Reformer