Good morning. Vote or don’t, it’s your choice. Polls are open until 8 p.m.
Today is Super Tuesday. We’ll have special live coverage from MPR News and NPR starting at 7 p.m. All over the state, Minnesotans can cast ballots for their preferred presidential nominee. We’ll know if Minnesota will follow the trends we’ve seen in other states, with former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden dominating their respective party’s primaries. We’ll be keeping an eye on the protest vote Biden faces over his handling of the crisis in Gaza; organizers of the campaign are urging Minnesotans to vote uncommitted in the Democratic primary if they don’t think his administration is doing enough to halt Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. Nikki Haley, who visited last week, is also out to prove that many GOP voters aren’t content with Trump.
Super Tuesday could solidify a November matchup that leaves some Minnesota voters cringing. Our Mark Zdechlik talked to Minnesotans who aren’t necessarily pumped for what is shaping up to be a November rematch between Trump and Biden. Polls show voters aren’t satisfied with the economy under Biden’s administration and they worry about his age. For Trump, his legal troubles, rhetoric many find divisive and his threats to exact revenge on political rivals have turned off voters. Nick Decker, a Bloomington resident, is backing Biden but is worried about the future of the Democratic Party. “I think he’s in danger of losing the base of his own party by not listening to the grassroots side… I think there’s a lot of interest in moderates.”
Donald Trump didn't win in Minnesota in the 2016 or 2020 general elections despite what he said in a radio interview yesterday. We'll leave it there.
About 42 percent of requested absentee and mail in ballots have been returned and prepped for counting, according to the Secretary of State’s office. More than 88,000 ballots are in so far from mail and absentee voters whose forms were submitted and marked accepted. That's out of roughly 207,500 ballots requested ahead of time. None of those votes will be officially counted before in-person polling places close at 8 pm tomorrow.
The Minnesota House has advanced changes to the school resource officer law. The House voted 124-8 Monday to exempt school resource officers from a law prohibiting school workers from using prone holds on students. Dana Ferguson reports the bill would require officers to take extra training and says that school resource officers can use the holds only in situations where a student poses a serious risk. Republican Rep. Jeff Witte, a former school resource officer, said he’s hopeful the change will bring more officers back to schools. “I’m hoping that we can get them all back into school with this fix today,” Witte said. Last year, when the law was passed as part of a broader education bill, some police departments pulled their officers out of school because they raised concerns about liability for officers. While the attorney general issued guidance outlining when officers could intervene and use the holds, the bill’s supporters said clearer guidelines need to be spelled out into law. The bill moves next to the Senate where it’s had a slower start. Gov. Tim Walz said he will sign it when it reaches his desk.
The U.S. Supreme Court restored Trump to the Colorado ballot after attempts to ban him from some state ballots over the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. The justices ruled that states, without action from Congress first, cannot invoke a post-Civil War constitutional provision to keep presidential candidates from appearing on ballots. The outcome ends efforts in Colorado, Illinois, Maine and elsewhere to kick Trump off their ballots. The case is the court’s most direct involvement in a presidential election since Bush v. Gore, a decision that effectively handed the 2000 election to Republican George W. Bush. The arguments in February were the first time the Supreme Court heard a case involving Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which is a two-sentence provision intended to keep some Confederates from holding office again. Minnesota’s Supreme Court had dismissed a bid to keep Trump off primary ballots here.
As an aside, there was an elusive local angle in the Supreme Court’s 9-0 holding that Trump should remain on the ballot. Justices in their per curiam opinion — by the entire court — cited an obscure 1914 case that originated in Minnesota. The case involved banking and tax law and whether a state could tax bonds of a territory. In that case, the justices said it was a power reserved by the federal government. As such, Minnesota’s tax was barred. The line today’s justices took from that opinion: “The entire independence of the general government from any control by the respective states” is paramount. The court says that’s true of presidential elections where one state’s court holdings could upend an entire election if federal officeholders or candidates are disqualified in the way Colorado tried to keep Trump at bay. | 