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Dear Neighbor,
It’s been another productive week in the House, including a hearing for a bill (H.F. 768) I authored to forbid the Minnesota Department of Human Rights from creating a bias registry tracking protected speech – which they may or may not have actually done last term.
There's ambiguity on that point. An all-Democrat conference committee appeared to remove the proposed statewide bias speech registry from a final bill in 2023. But the final draft indeed provided funding to support staff and a database for creating the bias registry – but under a different name.
The upshot is that state officials say they haven’t spent the money they received for something they don’t want to call a bias registry. Taxpayers deserve to know what is happening.
This is an interesting subject on its own, but especially so in the context of other things that have happened this week. For instance, during Tuesday's Judiciary Committee meeting, we heard H.F. 7 related to public safety. The bill includes provisions creating vicarious liability for people who recruit support, train, hire other people to trespass upon or do damage to critical infrastructure such as bridges, railroads, airports, pipelines, etc. The argument we heard again and again from Democrat House members and testifiers is that this measure is somehow an attack on free speech – an attack on the right to protest – when, in actuality, it's holding people accountable for criminal activity and conspiracy to commit crime.
Now, compare that with the aforementioned bias registry, which quite literally is government monitoring speech that is not criminal and therefore has no compelling state interest to be monitored. The contrast couldn't be clearer: You've got House Democrats evoking free speech to justify criminal activity. Then, you've got House Republicans who are actually trying to uphold the First Amendment.
This contrast really does summarize the difference in seriousness between the two parties. Democrats are quite literally defending criminals every chance they get, but they also want to monitor your speech when you're not a criminal. I made that point abundantly clear during the hearing, pointing out just how out of touch Democrats are on this issue.
House Republicans will continue moving these bills through the process despite disingenuous Democrat objection.
Restoring electronic pull tabs
Remember back in 2023 when Democrats ended electronic pull tabs as we knew them, and House Republicans said this would deal a major blow to local charitable organizations?
Fast forward to today, just seven weeks after the Democrat changes were enforced Jan. 1 and charitable organizations already are suffering a massive decline in revenue. Veterans’ organizations, such as American Legions and VFW’s, have reported a dramatic reduction in revenue, ranging from 20% to 44% statewide. Even at a 30% decline, those relying on charitable proceeds in Minnesota – EMS groups, food shelves, youth sports teams and associations, Boys and Girl Scouts, and other local charities – could be looking at a $115 million annual loss due to the electronic pull tab change.
Here's the short of it: Democrats unnecessarily made electronic pull tabs less interesting. People aren’t playing them as much. Local charities – including those supporting children – have less revenue to do good work in our communities. There’s an easy fix. It’s called H.F. 733 and we need to pass it asap.
Girls in girls sports
In last week’s newsletter, I mentioned House Republicans have authored H.F. 12, which says: “Only students of the female sex may participate in an elementary or secondary school athletic team or sport that an educational institution has restricted on the basis of sex to women or girls.”
That bill had its first committee hearing this week and I look forward to it reaching the House floor so we can have this public discussion as a full body. As mentioned last time, polls show around 80 percent of people agree that biological sex should determine participation in sports.
Can’t wait to see if House Democrats stand with the 80 percent or continue catering to the radical extreme.
Sincerely,
Walter
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