On Thursday, the Minnesota Senate voted for an eighth time on a resolution to end Governor Tim Walz’s peacetime emergency powers relative to the COVID-19 pandemic. The vote aims to end the state’s longest peacetime emergency in history, which began when Gov. Walz first put the state under emergency powers more than a year ago, back on March 13, 2020.

“Minnesota is no longer at the beginning of the outbreak,” Senator Mark Koran (R-North Branch) said. “We know what we are dealing with, we’ve prepared our health care system, and Minnesotans know how to protect themselves and their loved ones.  Minnesota no longer needs emergency powers and one-man rule. Every step that Gov. Walz feels the state must take to address the coronavirus can be done by respecting our coequal branches of government. Czar-like rule simply doesn’t work. Minnesota needs to return to the approach of working together and reaching compromises so we can come up with solutions that fairly balances the need to address both the health crisis and the financial crisis Minnesotans are facing.”

The vote to end the peacetime emergency was passed with bipartisan support. The resolution now heads to the House, where it requires majority support before it can be adopted.

Earlier this week, the Senate passed bipartisan legislation that would reassert a fair balance of governing power between the legislative branch and the executive branch during future states of emergency. That bill would require the Governor to obtain legislative approval to extend any emergency declaration beyond 30 days instead of the current system where the legislature needs to vote to end powers.