The killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis five years ago led to action at the Capitol in St. Paul.
There were changes to what training officers receive, when they can use deadly force and the board that licenses officers in Minnesota.
State Rep. Cedrick Frazier, co-vice chair of the House Judiciary Finance and Civil Law committee, said laws and policies that were enacted were not new ideas, nor were the efforts to move them forward, but with Floyd’s death captured on video and widely shared, “the world was watching.”
“The civil unrest and protests we saw, not just in this country but around the world, was the energy and motivation to put some of these policies in place, to prevent some of these things and have some actual accountability,” said Frazier, DFL-New Hope. He said he sees what’s happened in the past five years as “incremental movement” and added, “I still think we have a long way to go.”
Paul Gazelka, then the Minnesota Senate majority leader, viewed the time as “intense pressure by some to defund the police or dismantle the police.” Gazelka, a Republican who represented a district in central Minnesota before he resigned to run for governor, said he worked “to find reforms that both sides could agree to.”
But he said he was “determined not to go too far as a knee-jerk reaction to the terrible moments — first the death of George Floyd and then the riots that followed.”
Here are nine laws and policy changes by the Minnesota Legislature and Gov. Tim Walz since Floyd’s death on May 25, 2020, and a look at one that didn’t pass:
Stricter threshold for using deadly force
Laura Stevens, center, of Charlotte, N.C., an aunt of George Floyd, sings a hymn during a remembrance of Floyd in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Before legislators revised state law, which went into effect in March 2021, Minnesota officers were allowed to use deadly force “to protect the peace officer or another from apparent death or great bodily harm.”
The revised statute dropped the word “apparent,” and added three requirements to justify the use of deadly force, saying the threat must be:
• “articulated with specificity”
• “reasonably likely to occur absent action by the law enforcement officer” and
• such that it had to be “addressed through the use of deadly force without unreasonable delay.”
The previous standard “really rested with the individual police officer’s state of mind at that time,” said Carlos Mariani Rosa, who at the time was chair of the House Public Safety and Criminal Justice Reform Finance and Policy Committee. “… I don’t think you can have enough accountability when it comes to having the ultimate power to take a life.”
Since the law changed, then-Brooklyn Park officer Kim Potter was convicted of manslaughter in the fatal shooting of Daunte Wright in April 2021. She said she mistook her Taser for her gun.
State Patrol trooper Ryan Londregan was charged with murder in the shooting of Ricky Cobb II during a traffic stop in July 2023. The charges were later dismissed.
POST Board changes
A memorial to George Floyd in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
The Legislature in 2020 expanded the Board of Peace Officer Standards and Training from 15 to 17 members, allowing the two members of the general public to be increased to four members.
The law also said that if the board formed a subcommittee to investigate actions against a peace officer’s license, it must have one voting member from the general public and three voting members who are current or former officers.
“The police licensing accountability system was very weak,” said Mariani Rosa, DFL-St. Paul, who was first elected in 1990 and didn’t run for re-election in 2022. “We thought there was no serious review and oversight over the behavior of state licensed individuals. That was left to local law enforcement, the agencies they worked for. We were looking for a modern accountability system with direct expectations of the POST Board.”
Kelly McCarthy, POST Board chair from 2019 to 2023 and Mendota Heights police chief, said the board underwent a detailed process to change its administrative rules. It was the largest rewriting of the board’s rules since the board was formed in the 1970s.
In the past, a person’s peace officer license would be automatically revoked if he or she was convicted of a felony.
Beginning in June 2023, changes to POST Board rules gave the board more authority to take action on an officer’s license for violations of standards of conduct — including in cases they aren’t charged in but that involve domestic assault, sexual harassment, theft, prostitution and drug offenses, among other types of cases.
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Officers can also face sanctions to their peace officer license for not interceding if they see another officer using force beyond what is “objectively reasonable” as defined by state law, if they “engage in unreasonable or excessive use of force, unauthorized use of force, or unauthorized use of deadly force,” if they “engage in discriminatory conduct,” or if they are a member of a hate or extremist group, the board’s rules state.
Previously, an officer might get a job at another department if a law enforcement agency disciplined them for misconduct or fired them because they’d still have their license. Now, those cases also go to the POST Board, which makes a finding about whether the officer violated standards of conduct and decides whether their license should stay in place or be suspended or revoked.
“It is, in my opinion, one of the more effective ways to hold officers accountable,” said Justin Terrell, Minnesota Justice Research Center executive director. He was appointed to the POST Board in 2021.
Ban on chokeholds
St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter lays a yellow rose at a memorial to George Floyd during a remembrance in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee on or close to Floyd’s neck for what prosecutors said was as long as 9½ minutes. That wasn’t allowed under Minneapolis policy, though Minnesota law had not previously addressed chokeholds.
The new law says officers cannot use chokeholds, including “any pressure to the neck, throat, or windpipe that may prevent or hinder breathing.”
They may use such restraints when state law allows the use of deadly force “to protect the peace officer or another from death or great bodily harm,” the statute also says.
The law codified what was already in practice for most law enforcement agencies in the state, said James Stuart, Minnesota Sheriffs’ Association executive director.
Stuart, who retired as the Anoka County sheriff, said when he was hired in Anoka County in 1994, “we were trained to stay away from the face or neck unless it was a deadly force situation.”
Communities United Against Police Brutality still gets hotline complaints about law enforcement using neck restraints, the group says.
Duty to intercede
Yellow roses are placed at a memorial to George Floyd in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Minneapolis police already had a “duty to intervene” policy when Floyd was killed. Three other officers were present with Chauvin and were also convicted.
New state law required the Minnesota Board of Peace Officer Standards and Training to “adopt an updated comprehensive written model policy on the use of force, including deadly force, by peace officers.” The law said every state and local law enforcement agency must update its policy to be “identical or substantially similar to the model policy ” by Dec. 15, 2020.
The law required that the policy include “a duty for peace officers to intercede when present and observing another peace officer using force that is clearly beyond what is objectively reasonable under the law and the particular circumstances of the case” and to report “illegal use of force” to the officer’s chief law enforcement officer.
Before Floyd’s death, St. Paul police had already been planning workshops in “moral courage” — the concept of doing what’s right in the face of fears or challenges, especially in the heat of the moment. Officers went through that training in 2020, along with a peer-intervention program.
St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry said they didn’t need to make major policy changes because the department had long focused on community policing.
“In parts of the country, George Floyd tore police and community apart, and for us … it sealed us even tighter and it made us appreciate both sides of the equation,” Henry said.
BCA creates Use of Force Investigations Unit
People lay yellow roses at a memorial to George Floyd in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
It was already the practice for local law enforcement agencies to request the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension conduct investigations when officers used deadly force. State law made it official and appropriated funds for the BCA “to establish and operate the independent Use of Force Investigations Unit.”
Community advocates said that still amounted to law enforcement reviewing themselves, Mariani Rosa said.
“The point was to have multiple measuring points and expectations spread across different parts of state government,” he said. In 2020, the Senate was controlled by Republicans and the House by Democrats, so much negotiation was needed in reaching consensus in all their work, Mariani Rosa added.
No ‘excited delirium’ or ‘warrior’ training
A sign at a memorial to George Floyd in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
The issue of the disputed term “excited delirium” — described as someone being in an agitated state and having extreme aggression — came up at trial in Floyd’s death. The term is not listed in the standard classification system for mental disorders.
A law enacted in 2024 says “a law enforcement agency may not provide, directly or through a third party, to a peace officer any course that includes training on the detection or use of excited delirium. This section does not prohibit peace officer training in responding to and the proper care of a person in crisis.”
In 2020, the Legislature banned “warrior-style training” for officers, which they said “dehumanizes people or encourages aggressive conduct by peace officers during encounters with others in a manner that deemphasizes the value of human life or constitutional rights, the result of which increases a peace officer’s likelihood or willingness to use deadly force.”
More power for civilian oversight of complaints against officers
A mural of George Floyd in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Complaints against officers could be taken up by local civilian review boards previously, though they didn’t have the power to make findings of fact.
“We got that undone and it now allows for having civilian review that actually can adjudicate these cases properly,” said Michelle Gross, president of Communities United Against Police Brutality.
The law, changed in 2023, says a civilian oversight council can retain an investigator for a misconduct review against an officer, may subpoena or compel testimony, may make a finding of misconduct and recommend discipline, and “must submit investigation reports that contain findings of peace officer misconduct to the chief law enforcement officer and the Peace Officer Standards and Training Board’s complaint committee.”
A chief law enforcement officer “is under no obligation to agree with individual recommendations of the council and may oppose a recommendation,” the law also says.
Crisis calls to mental health responders
A photograph of George Floyd is displayed with yellow roses as people gather to honor his legacy in Minneapolis on Friday, May 23, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Travis’ Law, passed in 2021, was named for Travis Jordan. Minneapolis officers fatally shot Jordan, who his mother says was “in the throes of a mental health crisis,” in 2018.
State law previously said a 911 system “may include a referral to mental health crisis teams, where available.” The word “may” was changed to “shall.”
“That’s really big,” Gross said of the change to getting mental health experts involved instead of defaulting to law enforcement when someone calls 911.
Though every county in Minnesota has a mental health crisis response team, Travis’ Law isn’t followed throughout the state, Gross said. “We are working hard to make the law become a reality,” she added.
No-knock warrants
Changes to state law in 2021 put regulations on the use of no-knock warrants. Communities United Against Police Brutality wanted more restrictions, but kept hearing: “We’ll study it,” Gross said.
After Amir Locke was shot and killed by a Minneapolis officer carrying out a no-knock warrant in a St. Paul homicide investigation in 2022, legislators further cracked down on such warrants in the 2023 session. The law now says a court “may not issue or approve a no-knock search warrant unless the judge determines that the applicant has articulated specific, objective facts that establish probable cause for belief that:
• “the search cannot be executed while the premises is unoccupied; and
• “the occupant or occupants in the premises present an imminent threat of death or great bodily harm to the officers executing the warrant or other persons.”
Officers don’t need individual insurance policies
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Police accountability groups have long wanted officers to be required to carry their own professional liability insurance.
“Municipalities could choose to pay for that insurance, but we want to ban the municipalities from paying for any overage in the premiums because of the officers’ history,” Gross said. “What that would do is it would create a consequence for bad behavior and an incentive to not engage in that bad behavior.”
Gazelka, who works as an insurance agent, said he opposed any move to require officers to have their own insurance policies.
“It would have been cost-prohibitive for them, rather than the city or county or state that provides that for them,” he said. “… Police were leaving the workforce in record numbers, and we didn’t want to create more of that.”
