Gov. Tim Walz said Friday he plans to end the emergency powers that he has used to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic on Aug. 1.
The powers, which the Democratic governor has wielded since March 2020, have been under fire from Republicans over the past year. GOP legislators say Walz has made unilateral decisions they oppose on issues like business regulations and school closures, and has cut lawmakers out of the process. Senate Republicans tried again Friday to end Walz's powers quickly.
However, most of the emergency orders the governor issued during the pandemic have already been lifted as COVID case numbers have dropped. Walz predicted the state would hit its goal of having 70% of Minnesotans age 16 and older vaccinated by next Friday.
"We have a handle on this. We have the long-term ability to be able to manage COVID," Walz said. "We'll end the emergency powers on the first of August."
"The Republican legislators may tell you they're super happy about that. I guarantee you I'm happier than they are," Walz added.
About three dozen states still have a state of emergency, Walz said, calling his plan "the responsible way to close this up." By waiting until Aug. 1, the state will have more time to quickly process unemployment claims and transition employees from COVID response back to their original jobs, state officials said.
Yet Senate Republicans added an amendment to the state government budget bill Friday that would end Walz's powers immediately.
"He's proposing Aug. 1, we're saying, look, 15 states have already done it, we don't need to wait any longer. This is time to close the chapter and move towards the future," Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka, R-East Gull Lake, said.
Senate Minority Leader Susan Kent, DFL-Woodbury, said the executive orders GOP lawmakers opposed have ended and they are down to "nuts and bolts" measures.
"We should be able to work together for one additional month so we can wind these down in a responsible, thoughtful way," Kent said.
The GOP amendment would need to get support from House Democrats, who have blocked past attempts to end the governor's powers. Gazelka said there is no agreement with House DFLers.
In a letter to lawmakers Friday, Joe Kelly, director of the state's Homeland Security Emergency Management division, highlighted a few lingering issues the state needs to address before ending the peacetime emergency.
The Minnesota Department of Health will transition staff who were deployed to address the pandemic. That affects about 500 people and will be completed throughout July, he said. An earlier termination of the emergency powers would hamstring the department's COVID-19 response on vaccination, testing and other tasks, Kelly said.
There are also executive orders that provide flexibility for the Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) to quickly process a huge number of unemployment insurance applications and recalculate employer tax rates to make sure they are paying the correct amount. Kelly stated that DEED can finish up these recalculations by Aug. 1.
Kelly also noted the state has been eligible for emergency Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits for more than a year because of the state of peacetime emergency. The food benefits have helped more than half a million people during the pandemic, he said. The federal government is funding the aid through Sept. 30 and allows a "phase-out" month for benefits.
"Therefore, extending the peacetime emergency into August would provide certainty that Minnesotans will continue to receive benefits in August and September. This amounts to $90 million in emergency SNAP benefits for the neediest Minnesotans," Kelly wrote.
Gazelka said he thinks there's a way to work around the SNAP benefit issue.
"The state of Minnesota received over $18 billion in federal money. And eventually you got to say, hey, this is more than enough. We got to figure out how to navigate away from emergency powers and back to the legislative branch working with the governor," Gazelka said.
Legislators would need to reconvene at the Capitol one more time in mid-July to extend the state of peacetime emergency. The governor's planned end to the powers would be effective at 12:01 a.m. Aug. 2.
Republicans also pushed Friday to roll back fines and penalties imposed on businesses that willfully violated executive orders issued during the pandemic. The GOP proposal would limit fines for such violations to $1,000 or less and would allow those who were fined more than that to be reimbursed the difference. Businesses that had their licenses revoked by the state due to executive order violations would have them reinstated under this measure, which would be retroactive to March 15, 2020.
"We had a governor that decided to send people all over the state to issue felonies, to issue fines," said Sen. Andrew Mathews, R-Princeton. "Not upon conviction, just upon issuance of a citation."
Sen. Jennifer McEwen, DFL-Duluth, countered that business owners who knowingly violated the law should not be given a pass when most others followed the rules despite suffering financially.
"I'm not OK with giving special treatment to certain businesses and people who were in denial and as a result put their neighbors and their communities at risk," said McEwen. "That is not OK."
Jessie Van Berkel • 651-925-5044
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