Remembering Melissa Hortman, Minnesota giant with humble beginning
State lawmakers reflect on Melissa Hortman's legacy
A State Capitol memorial is growing as lawmakers are paying their respects to the life of Melissa Hortman.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (FOX 9) - Melissa Hortman will always be remembered as a giant in Minnesota politics and she’ll live forever in the memories of thousands of people whose lives she touched.
Political giant
Most consequential:
The proof is scattered throughout a memorial in front of the House chamber. There are messages from all sorts of people, including those who served with her.
"You made the tough call so your colleagues didn’t have to," said one handwritten note on a Post-it. That about sums her up in the eyes of Democrats she worked alongside.
Memorial for Melissa Hortman grows at State Capitol
A memorial for Melissa Hortman continues to grow at the Minnesota State Capitol on Monday after the lawmaker was shot and killed early Saturday morning.
"There's no doubt she'll go down as the most consequential Speaker of the House, for sure, and her accomplishments are many," said Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin, who was previously the longtime DFL chair.
Tough start
First a failure, second too:
Melissa Hortman’s political rocket reached the stratosphere, but it almost never got off the ground.
"She ran in 2000 and lost," Martin said. "She decided to run again in 2002, lost again in a very terrible year in 2002."
Paul Wellstone died in a plane crash that October, and Hortman thought about getting out of politics.
But Ken Martin says he shared Wellstone’s words to change her mind.
"Paul said that the future does not belong to the cynic or those on the sidelines," Martin said. "The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams and the changemakers."
The speech worked and the rest is history.
She won in 2004, took office in 2005, and rose to minority leader and then Speaker in 2019.
Trifecta turn
Pull the power:
Ryan Winkler served as her right hand for her first two terms as the top Democrat in the House and watched from the sidelines as she led in a trifecta.
"I do think the legislative session of 2023 was hugely consequential and it would not have happened without Melissa Hortman," Winkler said.
He says she learned from a wishy-washy previous trifecta that they needed to pull the levers of power when they had a chance.
They passed laws on abortion rights, a red flag gun control law, paid family leave, a child tax credit, legalized recreational marijuana, and more.
In the tied House of 2025, Hortman took a step back in power, but avoided giving back almost anything with one exception.
"I agreed to compromise on behalf of my caucus because it’s more important to fund state government," she tearily told the press corps after the special session ended on June 9.
The tears she shed that night over her vote to cut undocumented adults from MN Care were rare.
Wicked sense of humor
Quick quips:
But her sense of humor was frequently on display.
"These were not my first choice for staying up all night clothes, but these might be the staying up on night clothes," she said in 2019 as another special session approached.
And she could turn bad jokes into slightly better ones, as she did after suggesting waterboarding for budget committee members who didn’t finish on time this year.
"There’s nothing actually funny about torture," she said in May. "So I think that maybe the word I should have used is colonoscopy. Proctological exam. I don't know, something uncomfortable and thorough."
Across the aisle
Widely respected:
Hortman was fiercely DFL, but earned the respect of her GOP counterparts, including the Speaker who assumed her office this year.
The adversaries became a negotiating team in Hortman’s final days and when they finished the job Monday night, a Fox 9 reporter captured a glimpse of what none of us suspected would be their last conversation.
"I was headed out and she was standing right by the chamber," said Speaker of the House Lisa Demuth, (R-Cold Spring). "And I started to walk and I literally walked past her and I said sorry but media can wait and I came back and I just said ‘we got it done.’"
Home life
Hobbies galore:
Away from the Capitol, Hortman loved baking, and cross-country skiing, and gardening, and spending time with her family as soon as the work at the Capitol was done.
She also trained service dogs, but she took in Gilbert in 2021 and friends say she chose to fail in his training.
They tell us Hortman would be really be upset to know the gunman killed Gilbert as well.
Friends and family members are planning funeral services, but nothing is quite finalized yet.