Posts Tagged ‘Minnesota’

From BusinessWeek.com:

A state Senate health care panel takes a look Monday at a bill that would bar Minnesota from participating in the federal health care overhaul.

The bill from Republican Sen. Sean Nienow of Cambridge challenges Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton’s stance on the health care law.

Dayton has embraced the health care overhaul, expanding the federal Medicaid program in Minnesota and seeking health care grants. He reversed his Republican predecessor, Tim Pawlenty, who had ordered state agencies to avoid discretionary participation in the law.

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From TwinCities.com:

If Democrats don’t defeat U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann at the ballot box this fall, they likely will try to draw her out of her seat after the election.

U.S. Reps. Betty McCollum and Keith Ellison are odds-on favorites to be re-elected next month. But if Republicans get a chance, they’re almost certain to create a single, new Minneapolis-St. Paul district and knock one of them off in 2012.

Those are some of the high-profile offices at stake when the next Minnesota Legislature tackles the once-in-a-decade process of redrawing the state’s political boundaries after new U.S. census figures are released early next year.

Though jobs, the economy and a state budget awash in red ink are the big issues in the current state campaigns, you can bet redistricting is in the back of every legislative and congressional candidate’s mind.

Under the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1964 “one person, one vote” ruling, the Legislature must draw new lines after each decennial census to ensure that Minnesota’s 201 legislative and eight U.S. House districts have equal populations. That job will fall to the 67 state senators and 134 state representatives who are elected Nov. 2.

For lawmakers, redistricting is intensely personal and can be fiercely partisan. Each legislator’s political career is at stake, as is control of the Legislature and the Minnesota congressional delegation for the next decade.

“This is really a 10-year election,” said Michael Brodkorb, deputy chairman of the state
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Republican Party.

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From TwinCities.com:

With national polls and prognosticators predicting a tidal wave running against congressional Democrats this fall, local Republican leaders say that surge could spill over into state legislative races. If it does, they think they have not only a good chance of winning a majority of state House seats but also an outside shot at taking control of the Senate for the first time in 38 years.

State Rep. Matt Dean of Dellwood, the House Republicans’ chief campaign strategist, said GOP legislative candidates are being buoyed by a wave of voter anxiety about the Democrats who control Washington. “We don’t know if it’s a regular wave, a tidal wave or a tsunami, but it’s coming,” he said last week.

Assistant Senate Minority Leader Amy Koch of Buffalo, who heads the Senate Republican election team, agreed.

“We will pick up seats, no question about that,” she said. “It’s just a question of how many.”

Democratic-Farmer-Labor legislative leaders expect to retain control of the Legislature but acknowledged some concern about a national Republican wave.

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From bemidjipioneer.com:

Aside from getting government out of the way, the House Republican agenda is to ask businesses how the state can help them prosper, says the House GOP leader.

“We’re going to ask how we can help the hybrid economy — not get more money from Washington that came from China that’s borrowed that we and our grandkids are going to have to pay back,” says House Minority Leader Kurt Zellers, R-Maple Grove.

“How can we stimulate the local economies and get the government out of the way, first and foremost, and how can we be of help?” Zellers said Wednesday evening in an interview.

Republicans will have a “God-honest respect for the tax dollars that we’re taking in,” he said.

Zellers was in Bemidji to push Bemidji Mayor Richard Lehmann, the Republican candidate opposing Rep. John Persell, DFL-Bemidji.

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From Post-Bulletin.com:

State Republican candidates will tour southeastern Minnesota today as part of the GOP’s statewide Freedom and Prosperity Bus Tour.

The three-day tour kicks off at 9 a.m. in Red Wing at the Central Park Band Shell. The bus will arrive in Winona at 11:15 a.m. at Jaycee’s Pavilion at Lake Park and in Rochester at 1 p.m. at the back patio at the Ramada Hotel and Conference Center.

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From winonadailynews.com:

Minnesota lawmakers balanced the state budget and erased a $3 billion deficit Monday, wrapping up their work for the year in a way that allowed Democrats and Republicans alike to claim some credit but also set the terms of the election debate to come.

The deal struck by Gov. Tim Pawlenty, presiding over his last legislative session, and DFL House and Senate leaders headed off what could have been a serious cash-flow problem and potential government shutdown within just a few weeks.

But the deal does little to address an even bigger deficit for lawmakers to tackle next year, with the DFL favoring new revenue sources and Republicans preferring more drastic spending cuts.

“It’s really easy to kick the can down the road like this,” said state Rep. Jim Abeler, R-Anoka, who voted against the compromise. The single biggest source of money to close the deficit is a delay in nearly $2 billion in state aid to school districts — money lawmakers have vowed to repay in the next budget cycle, though they are not legally bound to do so.

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