On August 12, 2020, the Minnesota Legislature convened in a special session to vote on whether to extend the state of emergency declared by Gov. Tim Walz in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Minnesota House of Representatives, controlled by Walz’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (Minnesota’s Democratic affiliate party), rejected a resolution ending the emergency, while the Republican-controlled Minnesota Senate voted in favor of the resolution. Without the House’s approval, the resolution to end the emergency failed and Walz retained his emergency powers.
Just minutes later, the Senate moved to consider the confirmation of Labor and Industry Commissioner Nancy Leppink, and by the end of the afternoon, had voted along party lines to reject her confirmation — thus removing her from her post. In a blatant admission of the GOP’s malicious intentions, Republican House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt tweeted during the confirmation vote, “Looks like the senate is executing a prisoner today.” With the House under DFL control and refusing to eliminate Walz’s emergency powers, the GOP-led Senate had decided to unilaterally punish Walz by going after his commissioners.
Walz’s cabinet consists of 24 commissioners, each of whom leads a state agency. Since a governor’s appointees can serve indefinitely pending confirmation, most gubernatorial appointees are never formally confirmed by the Senate. Indeed, only five of Walz’s commissioners have been formally confirmed, which means that the rest — most of whom have been serving since Walz took office in early 2019 — are still pending confirmation. Leppink had been serving in Walz’s cabinet as the head of the Department of Labor and Industry for over 18 months before the Senate voted to remove her.
Leppink’s removal marked the first time the Minnesota Senate had rejected the confirmation of a commissioner since 2012. DFL Party members immediately denounced the move, with Senate Minority Leader Susan Kent calling the vote “outrageous” and noting that no advance notice was given about the vote. Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka defended Leppink’s removal, asserting that “We need a DLI commissioner whose priority is being responsive, supportive and open to helping business, and not one who is interested in regulating, harassing or closing businesses — especially as we plan safe reopenings during COVID.”
On September 11, Walz and the DFL-controlled House extended the emergency for another 30 days, setting off yet another skirmish in the legislative chambers. This time, following the motion’s failure, the Minnesota Senate voted 33-31 to reject the confirmation of Commerce Commissioner Steve Kelley. With two state agency heads ousted in two months by the Senate, Minnesota DFL Party members cried foul again. In the words of one administration official: “We’re fighting a pandemic and the Senate is playing ‘Battleship’ with our commissioners.”
This was clearly an extraordinary — and aggressive — use of the Senate’s unilateral confirmation power. As Peter Gallaghan of MinnPost notes, “Senatorial advice and consent is usually meant to come shortly after an appointment to assure someone is qualified, not as a way to sanction an appointee who, in the case of Leppink, has been on the job for 19 months.” Kelley had also been serving for 20 months before his removal, having been appointed in January 2019.
Confirmation hearings are also seldom used to remove an appointee. Between 2008 and 2019, the Senate had only rejected two gubernatorial appointments for state agency heads. In only two months, the Senate Republicans have ousted two, and they look poised to continue their streak.
GOP Senate leaders claimed that Leppink was removed because she was too hostile to businesses, while they justified Kelley’s removal because of his involvement in a dispute regarding Enbridge Energy’s Line 3 project. However, the context surrounding the situation paints a much different picture, making clear the GOP’s intentions to punish the DFL-led House for its extension of Walz’s emergency powers.First, the secrecy surrounding the confirmation votes stands out as suspicious. Virtually no one outside of the Senate GOP caucus knew ahead of time that the vote would happen. Walz himself found out about the confirmation vote mere minutes in advance when he received a text message from Gazelka, informing him that the GOP had the votes to remove Leppink.
Next, the GOP’s public statements regarding the confirmation votes indicate that the Senate’s confirmation power is being wielded as a political weapon.Daudt described Leppink’s removal as “executing a prisoner,” and when Senate GOP spokeswoman Rachel Aplikowski was asked about any future confirmation hearings, she responded, “stay tuned!” Clearly, the confirmation votes were not an unfortunately necessary measure to censure a problematic commissioner, but an instrument used to systematically bring down Walz’s allies.
This is not “checks and balances.” Nor is this an appropriate use of the Senate’s confirmation power. Rather, Minnesota Republicans’ words and actions reveal that these are the actions of a vengeful Senate looking to retaliate for Walz’s retention of his emergency powers, rejecting confirmations to settle political scores.
Beyond that, beheading state agencies one by one in the middle of a pandemic and an economic crisis is simply irresponsible. Former Management and Budget Commissioner Myron Frans has said that the removal of key administration officials could make it problematic for the governor to recruit strong candidates, especially when private-sector positions often pay more, putting the state at a comparable disadvantage. And a lack of qualified officials could interfere with the administration’s ability to effectively navigate the ongoing crises facing Minnesota.
Walz’s actions hardly necessitate a crackdown, either. Far from being a rogue leader looking to avoid accountability, Walz has used his emergency powers to halt evictions, coordinate testing partnerships to increase the state’s testing capacity, close down schools and certain businesses, and enact a mask mandate. Walz’s emergency powers afford him more leeway to quickly respond to changes in the situation without having to obtain consent from the legislature for each new policy.
The Senate’s threat is clear: If Walz continues to retain his emergency powers, the Senate will continue to remove his commissioners. It is a legislative body gone rogue, willing to sabotage the state’s response to ongoing crises in order to exact revenge on a governor of the opposing party. That sentiment was further underscored by an email written by GOP State Rep. Jon Koznick that was accidentally sent to the House DFL caucus during the September 12 special session, which read, “A friendly, reminder (as discussed in caucus) to stay on message IF you speak today. … COVID issues are not our winning message. PUBLIC SAFETY is our ticket to the majority, let’s win with that.” Beyond removing administration officials who were spearheading a crisis response, the Minnesota GOP intentionally ignored discussion of a pandemic affecting millions of Minnesotans simply for political gain.
Republicans in the Minnesota Legislature are so hungry for political power that they have cast aside any pretense of working in the interest of the public good. They actively avoided discussing an ongoing pandemic for political advantage and have resorted to “executing” agency heads to obstruct the administration’s crisis response when stripping away Walz’s emergency powers was not feasible.
As citizens and voters, we must pay close attention to who and what our elected officials have in mind when they make decisions. And then vote accordingly.
Image by Bao Chau is licensed under the Unsplash License.