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Bliss




Dear Neighbor,

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It?s been a busy week at the Capitol and there are several issues that I?d like to discuss and keep on your radar:

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White Earth Permitting Issue

You may have heard about the land transfer bill regarding the White Earth State Forest, but there is another issue I want you to be aware of. Senator Green, Rep. Joy, and I wrote an Op-Ed this week on recent permitting issues that have emerged around and on the White Earth Reservation. Last year, the Tribal Council passed an ordinance that requires farmers with farms on, or up to five miles away from, the White Earth Reservation to apply for a $5000 irrigation permit in addition to the permits filed every year with the State.

I believe that this is an act of overreach by the Tribal Council. The three authors of the Op-Ed have personally called on Governor Walz to meet with us on this issue as we believe that the jurisdictional issues warrant state involvement, but unfortunately, we?ve been ignored at every step. I?m hopeful that we can find a swift and peaceful resolution for this issue, but for now please keep an eye out for our Op-Ed and consider reaching out to Governor Walz and asking him to meet with us.

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Emerging Religious Freedom Issue

Another issue that I want to highlight for you is an emerging religious freedom issue. In the past few weeks, the Majority in both the House and Senate have taken steps to undermine religious liberty in Minnesota.? They have rejected amendments that would reenact previously existing exemptions in the Human Rights statute for religious institutions to act in accordance with their sincerely held religious beliefs with respect to the gender identity provisions that were added last year. We learned in committee that these exemptions were intentionally removed last year when language concerning gender identity was added.

Rep. Harry Niska has been leading the effort to amend the statute to ensure religious liberty protections that already exist in law are also applied to gender identity, but unfortunately, the amendment failed on party-line votes in both the House and Senate Committees. We will continue to try to amend the statute to ensure religious freedom when the bill comes to the House and Senate floors later in the session.

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Deadline Week and Governor?s Budget

This week is deadline week in the Legislature which means that every policy proposal that has a chance of advancing must be heard in every needed policy committee in the bill?s body of origin by TODAY. Governor Walz also just released his budget this week which aims to spend what little money we currently have in the face of a looming deficit. The Governor?s budget shows a small amount of fiscal responsibility and doesn?t spend quite as much as we anticipated ? likely because he is aware of the looming deficit due to overspending last session.

We expect the DFL House and Senate to try to spend even more than the Governor asked for, so I will be sure to update you on that in the coming weeks.

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On the Radar

There are two bills that I?d like to bring to your attention that I will be keeping a close eye on ? gun control bills and the Red Lake land transfer bill. There has been little progress on the bill that would transfer a portion of the Upper Red Lake back to the tribe, but the gun bills are a different story.

Just today the firearm storage mandate was heard in the Senate and a few other bills have been heard in the House, the most concerning of which is a repeal of statewide firearms preemption which would allow local governments to create a patchwork of laws that are more restrictive than the statewide restrictions.






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/RepMattBliss





State Rep. Matt Bliss
311 State Office Building
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd
St. Paul, MN 55155
[email protected]
(651) 296-5516







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