The Minnesota State Capitol is shown on Friday, March 5, 2023, in St. Paul, Minn., as the Legislature negotiates the big budget bills of the session with only two full weeks left before the adjournment deadline of Monday, May 22. (AP Photo/Steve Karnowski)
Democrats in the Minnesota Legislature poised to pass contentious gun control measures
Democratic leaders in the Minnesota Senate expressed confidence that their one-vote majority would hold firm when the chamber took up the final version of a broad public safety budget bill that contains two contentious gun control measures
The Minnesota State Capitol is shown on Friday, March 5, 2023, in St. Paul, Minn., as the Legislature negotiates the big budget bills of the session with only two full weeks left before the adjournment deadline of Monday, May 22. (AP Photo/Steve Karnowski)
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Democratic leaders in the Minnesota Senate said they were confident that their one-vote majority would hold firm Friday when the chamber took up the final version of a broad public safety budget bill that contains two contentious gun control measures.
“What we are going to be providing — finally — is a path forward for families and law enforcement who know that someone's exhibiting signs of crisis and danger," said Democratic Sen. Rob Latz of St. Louis Park, chairman of the Senate public safety committee. "And it will give them lawful tools to separate people in crisis from the firearms that are around them.”
Some rural Democratic senators had long been on the fence. But a key moment came Wednesday when one of them, Sen. Grant Hauschild of Hermantown announced that he would support the overall bill. The two gun measures were not part of the public safety budget bill that the Senate passed earlier. But they were added Wednesday in a House-Senate conference committee that negotiated the final version, providing some political cover to holdouts by wrapping them into a much bigger public safety package.
Nineteen other states have some kind of red flag laws, Latz noted at a news conference, including several red states.
Across the country, a few cracks have been opening up in the pattern of Republican-controlled states loosening gun laws while Democratic states like Minnesota tighten them. GOP Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee wants to call a special session to pass what he has avoided calling a red flag law, calling it a “toxic political label.” And two Republicans in a Texas legislative committee broke ranks to back raising the age for buying semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21. But it’s far too soon to say the GOP is changing direction even amid a record-setting pace for mass killings in the U.S.
In Minnesota, the debate was expected to last well into Friday evening. Leaders of the Republican minority signaled ahead of time that they were upset with several non-firearms provisions that were added to the public safety bill in conference committee that weren't in the original Senate-passed version of the bill.
Democrats who have a more comfortable majority in the Minnesota House scheduled the package for debate late Friday night on the presumption that the Senate would pass it first. The House had already passed the gun measures as part of its original public safety bill. Democratic Gov. Tim Walz strongly supports the legislation.
The package also includes tougher restrictions on the use by police of no-knock warrants. While it stops short of a ban, it allows only very limited exceptions.
GOP leaders objected to how the final version of the 522-page bill wasn't posted until around 2:30 a.m. Friday. Members can vote only up or down on a conference committee report. They can't amend it. And Republicans were upset at their voices being shut out of shaping the final version, which they oppose on Second Amendment and other grounds.
“This bill is actually what bad legislating looks like,” Republican House Minority Leader Lisa Demuth of Cold Spring said at a separate news conference. “Democrats have full control, but a very small margin.”
The Minnesota Legislature is rushing to complete work on the major budget bills of the session before the May 22 adjournment deadline. Democratic House Speaker Melissa Hortman of Brooklyn Park told reporters Thursday that she wants to adjourn early — either next Thursday night or early next Friday morning. Senate Democratic leaders, however, have not agreed to that.
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Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
