After months of partisan maneuvering and court cases, the Minnesota House is a 67-67 tie between Democratic-Farmer-Labor and Republican representatives.
Rep. David Gottfried, DFL-Shoreview, took the oath of office during a Monday floor session after winning a vacant suburban house seat in a special election for House District 40B last week.
It was widely expected the special election would return the House to a tie. Gottfried, 32, handily won in the heavily Democratic suburban district with 70% of the vote.
With the seat filled by a Democrat, Republicans no longer have a one-seat majority in the House, and committees will now be evenly split and co-chaired by the parties.
Republican Rep. Lisa Demuth, R- Cold Spring, will keep the speakership until the end of 2026, but all bills that move forward for votes of the full House must be the product of delicate bipartisan compromise as power on committees is evenly split.
Gottfried represents a district that includes Roseville and parts of Shoreview which had been empty since the beginning of the year.
The candidate who won the November election didn’t take the seat after a judge ruled in December he was ineligible due to residency issues. That gave Republicans a one-seat edge over the DFL, and they used that advantage to act as a majority.
But in January, House DFLers boycotted the session to deny a quorum, and a judge ruled that the 67 GOP representatives couldn’t conduct business without at least 68 members present.
Republicans got DFLers to return to the Capitol with a power-sharing deal where they pledged to seat another DFLer, Shakopee Rep. Brad Tabke, whose election they challenged in court.
As part of the deal, they could act as the majority, but they couldn’t pass bills without 68 members.
That will remain the case now that there are 67 DFLers and 67 Republicans, though with the committees evenly split there likely won’t be highly partisan measures on the House floor for the rest of session.
With election issues resolved, lawmakers will now turn their attention to crafting a two-year state budget in the tens of billions of dollars, which they must do by the end of June.
The last day of the legislative session is May 19, and if they can’t reach an agreement by then they will have to return for a special session to avoid a government shutdown.
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