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Minnesota budget: Weekend work predicted for lawmakers to finish

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Published  June 4, 2025 4:55pm CDT
Politics
FOX 9
Special session expected for MN lawmakers

Special session expected for MN lawmakers

Minnesota’s governor and lawmakers could soon head into a special session to wrap up state budgets before workers are sent lay-off notices. FOX 9’s Corin Hoggard has the latest.

The Brief

    • Gov. Walz and legislative leaders are now predicting a special session soon, possibly as soon as Saturday.
    • They acknowledge a few high hurdles left to climb, including within bills that seemed already finished.
    • If they don't finish before Monday, tens of thousands of non-essential state workers will get layoff notices.

ST. PAUL, Minn. (FOX 9) - Gov. Tim Walz and legislative leaders have a new prediction for when Minnesota’s budget deal could be wrapped up.

Overtime goals

Minnesota lawmakers headed toward special session

Minnesota lawmakers headed toward special session

Minnesota’s governor and lawmakers could soon head into a special session to wrap up state budgets before workers are sent lay-off notices. FOX 9’s Corin Hoggard has the latest.

Stop at a hat trick?:

They're hoping not to hit a fourth week of overtime after finishing the regular session with a lot of work to do.

"I hope we've got some comfortable chairs down here for you in these times," Gov. Walz told the media gathered outside his office to get the latest word on negotiations.

"We are making progress," said Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy (DFL-St. Paul). "It is as slow as molasses, but molasses is good, and we are going to get done."

Moving molasses

New deadline:

They may be going slowly, but they have a new deadline in mind.

"We are urgently trying to get done before June 10 so that there are not additional layoff notices that have to go out," said Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman (DFL-Brooklyn Park). "I think somewhere between 750 and 950 nurses received notices that were sent to be received on June 1."

The hurdles

Hard stuff last:

Leaders also gave some insight into what's kept the negotiations bogged down.

"We have the closest split in any legislature, maybe ever, with a tie in the House and one vote in the Senate," said Gov. Walz. "Which means the details matter. And of course, the easy stuff gets done first, and the harder stuff gets done last."

"There are a lot of differences still, as you're hearing, you know, in different areas," said Speaker of the House Lisa Demuth (R-Cold Spring). "That taxes bill is being looked at. We do know that skinny down version has a lot of concerns with it. The transportation bill that came through, there were some concerns that have kind of bubbled up. On the health bill, just how things are going to travel with the undocumented piece, the insurance for undocumented people. If that would be broken out into a separate bill, there would have to be a guaranteed contingency that — save funding for MDH or whatever that might look like — a contingency that would be a guarantee that that bill would both be passed and enacted."

Several bills haven't even been fully written yet.

"So we're waiting for a few more bills to finish," said Hortman. "You can't ask people ‘will you vote for a bill?’ until the bill is done being drafted, and they can find all the things that they like and don't like about the bill."

Time is running out

What they're saying:

But leaders hope it's just a matter of days.

"I think that right now my money would be on Saturday for the special session," Hortman said.

"I would say special session should be called soon," said Demuth.

"I remain very, very optimistic," said Walz, who is the one to call a special session.

Of course, they’ve been optimistic before and still watched deadlines come and go several times.

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