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Dear Friends,
Only hours remain in the 2023 legislative session. While the majority of the budget bills have been passed, Democrats have yet to finalize their Taxes, Transportation, and Health bills. We expect to vote on the State Government and Human Services bills today.
The legislature should be focused on providing permanent, meaningful tax relief to all Minnesotans with our state’s historic $17.5 billion surplus. But this session Democrats have been on a spending spree. In the final days of session, instead of returning your surplus to you, they are looking for ways to increase taxes to pay for all of their pet projects. Keep reading for some of the spending highlights from the week.
Taxes Omnibus Bill
Although the final Tax language has still not been released, here are some of the tax changes that are thought to be included:
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Social Security tax relief. Despite nearly universal agreement among Democrat candidates to eliminate the unnecessary taxation on Social Security benefits for all of Minnesota’s senior citizens, talks of following through on that promise disappeared almost immediately after the Legislature gaveled into session in January. Recently, talks resumed on increasing the number of seniors who might qualify for taxation exemption, but a full elimination for all elderly residents is almost certainly dead.
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Baby products. Among the decisions the Democrat-controlled Taxes conference committee has made is to remove an overwhelmingly bipartisan provision that would eliminate sales taxes from baby products. This tax exemption provides meaningful support for all parents in Minnesota as they expand their families and is especially helpful for first-time parents who may be overwhelmed at the costs of bringing a baby home safely.
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Rebate checks. Governor Walz began session by stating that he wanted $2,000 rebates sent to married couples making $150,000 or less and $1,000 checks sent to single filers making $75,000 or less each year. As it stands today, legislative Democrats are only offering $520 for the same joint filers and $260 for singles. Could this amount decline even more or be eliminated altogether as the surplus well runs dry?
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Gas tax increase? The Democrats found plenty of taxes and fees to raise in the transportation arena – including a ¾ cent Metro Area sales tax and increases on license tab renewals and the motor vehicle sales tax, to name a few – but raising the gasoline tax in the face of a mammoth budget surplus was supposed to be off the table. Now, in the waning hours of session, Democrats won’t rule out having the gas tax tied to inflation, which would further financially devastate drivers who are currently paying nearly $4 per gallon.
Republicans and Democrats campaigned on tax relief for all Minnesotans. We should honor that promise and prioritize family budgets over new, unsustainable government spending.
Public Safety and Judiciary Omnibus Bill
This week the House approved the Public Safety and Judiciary Conference Committee Report. The report makes thousands of violent criminals eligible for early release, fails to protect children, infringes on the rights of law-abiding Minnesotans, and fails to give law enforcement the resources they need to keep communities safe.
Some of the Public Safety provisions include:
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Reducing Sentences for Violent Felons. This bill puts felons back on the streets by allowing criminals to serve only half of their prison sentence or probation if they complete Department of Corrections programming. This includes those convicted of violent crimes such as murder, manslaughter, rape, kidnapping, assault, or domestic assault. Limiting prison time for violent criminals puts all Minnesotans at risk.
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Anti-Law Enforcement. Instead of providing law enforcement with the resources they need to keep Minnesotans safe, this bill ties their hands and ignores their needs by further restricting no-knock warrants and fails to make any significant investments to recruit, train, and retain law enforcement professionals. This bill invests over $70 million in unproven nonprofits with little accountability on how the money is spent.
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Universal Background Checks. This proposal will create strict and impractical hurdles for law-abiding Minnesotans seeking to exercise their 2nd Amendment right instead of addressing the root cause of violent crime. Criminals looking to acquire firearms will not follow this new complex process. Efforts should be focused on enforcing the numerous laws we already have governing firearm transfers.
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Extreme Risk Protection Order. This proposal violates due process and does not address the alleged safety risk – the individual. If someone is a legitimate threat, simply seizing firearms will not prevent an individual from doing harm to themselves or others through other means. The seizure of property without a warrant and due process, especially property that is explicitly protected by the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution violates civil rights. Our efforts should be focused on providing support and care to those in crisis.
The Judiciary portion of the bill increases the Human Rights Department budget by 49% to weaponize the office to investigate discrimination against employers, housing providers, and education institutions. It also removes a Republican amendment that was previously added – unanimously – to ensure pedophiles are not a protected class under the Human Rights Act. This change was made by the members of the Conference Committee so there was no Republican input, and Republicans were shut out of good-faith efforts to work with Democrats to correct his issue.
I am deeply disappointed in the changes that were made to the Human Rights Act. Democrats have weakened the Human Rights Act with vague language that will be ripe for misinterpretation. By removing the Republican provision from the bill, Democrats are putting their extreme agenda ahead of kids.
Environment and Energy Omnibus Bill
Yesterday, the House approved the unaffordable, unreliable, and dangerous Environment and Energy omnibus bill. Some of the troubling provisions included:
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Mandates on taxpayers, homeowners, and housing providers: The bill imposes expensive mandates on utilities, with the costs borne by utility ratepayers, building owners, housing providers, and other businesses, resulting in increased costs in building construction and rent. These mandates will increase costs to taxpayers and ratepayers through an over-reliance on intermittent, unreliable, expensive sources of energy.
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Green-shaming businesses: The bill imposes energy benchmarking mandates on owners of commercial buildings with 50,000 or more square feet in the seven-county metro area and some cities of more than 50,000 residents. Property owners would be required to log the building’s energy use, with the Department of Commerce then required to publish online the address, total energy use, energy use intensity, greenhouse gas emissions, and an energy performance score.
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Electric vehicles for the rich: Democrats want to give millionaires in Minnesota $2,500 for purchasing an electric vehicle, and $500 for the lease or purchase of a used vehicle. We shouldn’t be subsidizing expensive vehicles for the rich.
Democrats are pushing a transition to alternative energy sources, but they are not thinking of the consequences 10, 20, or even 30 years from now. This bill does not include a stewardship program for wind, solar, and EV battery disposal or recycling. These products are made of hazardous, nonrecyclable materials. We have to address this issue before we push unreliable, unaffordable, and dangerous energy sources in Minnesota.
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