State Sen. Nicole Mitchell says she won’t leave office over a felony burglary charge after officials in the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party called for her resignation.

Mitchell, a first-term DFL senator from Woodbury, was arrested in April after police found her inside her estranged mother’s Detroit Lakes, Minn., home. Her criminal case disrupted the final weeks of the legislative session, delaying votes and prompting ethics action from Senate Republicans.

Senate DFL leadership has stood by Mitchell, but the state party now publicly wants her to step down. In a statement released early Thursday, party chairman Ken Martin called for Mitchell’s resignation, saying the senator should be held accountable for her actions.

“While Sen. Mitchell is entitled to her day in court, her continued refusal to take responsibility for her actions is beneath her office and has become a distraction for her district and the Legislature,” he said. “Now that her constituents have had full representation through the end of the legislative session, it is time for her to resign to focus on the personal and legal challenges she faces.”

Mitchell still doesn’t plan to resign, her attorney said in a Thursday statement.

“Sen. Mitchell has heard from many in her community who support her work and believe in her right to due process under the law,” said Mitchell’s attorney Bruce Ringstrom Jr. “Therefore, until her criminal case is fully and finally adjudicated, Sen. Mitchell will continue to serve her constituents.”

April 22 arrest

It’s still not clear exactly what happened in the lead-up to Mitchell’s April 22 arrest in Detroit Lakes. But charges say Mitchell was found in her stepmother’s basement after a 911 call about a burglary. She allegedly told officers she was there to retrieve her father’s ashes after falling out of communication with her stepmother, and acknowledged she “did something bad.”

In a later statement on social media, Mitchell denied she was in the house to steal, claimed she was checking on her stepmother, who was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and made no mention of the ashes.

In interviews with the Associated Press and KSTP-TV, Mitchell’s stepmother has said she fears her stepdaughter. The stepmother acknowledged to KSTP that she was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, but that the disease has not progressed past its earliest stages.

Mitchell’s fellow Democrats say their colleague shouldn’t be ousted based on a charge and limited facts.

Republicans, on the other hand, want an expedited investigation into the senator and are calling for her to resign. They say she’s violated public trust and accuse her of changing her story about the incident.

The senator is next expected to appear in court in July.

Key vote in legislative session

Party leadership calling for Mitchell’s resignation comes a little week after the close of the 2024 legislative session, where her vote was key in getting partisan legislation through the Senate, where the DFL controls a one-seat majority over Republicans.

Senate Minority Leader Mark Johnson called Martin’s post-session call for Mitchell’s resignation “clear admission Democrats were so desperate to pass their highly partisan agenda they were willing to use votes of an alleged burglar to do it.”

Senate DFL leaders weren’t immediately available for comment Thursday. During session they removed Mitchell from committee assignments and private caucus meetings. But they stopped short of sacrificing their majority when her vote was still needed.

Republicans introduced measures to censure or remove Mitchell from the Senate, all that failed on party lines with Mitchell as the deciding vote. They also filed an ethics complaint that got heard at a May hearing, which didn’t result in any action.

If Mitchell steps down

If Mitchell were to step down, what happens after that depends on the timing. In most circumstances, state law requires the governor to call a special election within 35 days of vacancy in the Legislature.

So if Mitchell — or any other member of the Legislature for that matter — were to resign on or before June 8, the special election would fall on the normal election dates for the year.

In 2024, the state primary falls on Aug. 13 and the general on Nov. 5.

Another possible scenario is a vacancy after June 8, but more than 35 days before the primary. In that event, the governor could call a special election sometime in the summer.

But if a vacancy occurs too close to the primary, it could mean a delayed special election.

If a senator or representative were to step down on, say, July 31, it would mean the special election would happen after the November general election.

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Someone shot a man in St. Paul’s North End, causing him life-threatening injuries, police said.

Officers responded to the 800 block of Simcoe Street, off Atwater Street, about 2:30 a.m. Thursday. They found a vehicle crashed in a yard and the driver had gunshot injuries to his head and neck area, according to Alyssa Arcand, a St. Paul police spokeswoman.

St. Paul fire medics took the man to Regions Hospital “in very critical condition,” Arcand said.

Investigators are working to determine what happened. No one was under arrest as of Thursday morning.

There were 39 people injured in shootings in St. Paul as of Tuesday, compared with 61 non-fatal shooting victims last year during the same time, 92 in 2022 and 64 in 2021, according to police department data.

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Luis Rangel Morales of the Neighborhood Justice Center will fill a judicial vacancy in the south metro.

Rangel Morales has been appointed district judge in Minnesota’s 1st Judicial District, which serves Dakota, Carver, Goodhue, Le Sueur, McLeod, Scott and Sibley counties. He will replace Shawn Moynihan, who retired May 3 after 17 years on the bench, and be chambered in Hastings.

Luis Rangel Morales (Courtesy photo)

Rangel Morales is a staff attorney and director of community engagement for St. Paul-based Neighborhood Justice Center, where he represents low-income community members facing criminal charges in Dakota, Ramsey and Washington counties.

He also has served as defense counsel for the Ramsey County Veterans Treatment Court and the county’s DUI Court.

His community involvement includes serving as chair of the St. Paul Planning Commission and vice chair of the city’s Board of Zoning Appeals.

He received his B.A. from the University of St. Thomas and his J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School.

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By LINDSAY WHITEHURST (Associated Press)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday cleared the way for a National Rifle Association lawsuit against a former New York state official over claims she violated its free-speech rights.

The unanimous opinion reverses a lower-court decision tossing out the gun rights group’s lawsuit against ex-New York state Department of Financial Services Superintendent Maria Vullo. It does not, however, shield the NRA and other advocacy groups from regulation, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said.

“Ultimately, the critical takeaway is that the First Amendment prohibits government officials from wielding their power selectively to punish or suppress speech, directly or (as alleged here) through private intermediaries,” she wrote.

The NRA said Vullo pressured banks and insurance companies to blacklist it after the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 people dead in 2018. The group was represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, and the Biden administration argued some of its claims should go forward.

Vullo argued she rightly investigated NRA-endorsed insurance policies sometimes referred to as “murder insurance.” She said she did speak out about the risks of doing business with gun groups but didn’t exert any improper pressure on companies, many of which were distancing themselves from the NRA on their own at the time.

The NRA said Vullo leveraged a state investigation into the legality of NRA-endorsed insurance products to pressure insurance companies, saying she would go easier on them if they cut ties with the group. The NRA had been working with insurance companies to offer its members policies that covered losses caused by firearms, even when the insured person intentionally killed or hurt somebody.

The products clearly violated state law, Vullo said, including by covering intentional acts and criminal defense costs. The probe started before the Parkland massacre, and the insurance providers ultimately paid multimillion-dollar fines.

Vullo also sent out guidance letters to banks and insurance companies warning about the “reputational risks” of working with the NRA. The NRA said her words had significant sway because of her position and several companies cut ties with the group, costing it millions of dollars in revenue.

Vullo said the letters were evenhanded, and her attorney argued that letting the lawsuit go forward would improperly muzzle public officials.

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Associated Press writer Mark Sherman contributed to this story.

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