The Realities of the Policies Passed in Minnesota
By Senator Jason Rarick

Often when we hear about bills being passed, they are touted as a positive. Throughout the past few years, the Democrat trifecta has passed a whole host of new bills that follow the same trend: they assign a feel-good name to the bill, speed through the legislative process, and as we saw at the end of Session, sometimes even fold multiple bills into other bills and then pass them through committee and the floor at a rapid speed. This is problematic for a number of reasons, but mainly because many people have no idea what is in the bills being passed. In fact, we often need to dig deep to understand the policies that are being pushed through.

The first bill that comes to mind is the controversial abortion bill that was passed last year, which Democrats called the PRO Act. As I’m sure many recall, this bill went far beyond legalizing abortion. It made all abortions legal at all stages of pregnancy with zero safeguards in place. Under this bill, in Minnesota, there is no point in pregnancy that is too late for an abortion. It was wide open language – not even a page long. It also failed to include protections for providing humane treatment to any babies that survive an abortion procedure.

Despite the “feel good” name that masks the bill, I truly believe the bill’s drastic overreach does not reflect the values of our state. We know that the vast majority of Minnesotans who believe abortion should be legal still believe safeguards should be in place. Yet due to how vague this bill was, Minnesota has zero safeguards. Democrats claim that this bill protects “abortion” and “reproductive rights,” but the bill didn’t bother to define what those words even mean. This bill does more than codify a right to an abortion – it legalizes abortions with no viability limits, requires no parental consent or notification, and opens up the possibility of sterilizations and sex changes for minors. This is not what Minnesotans had in mind when they requested the legislature to consider this issue.

A second bill that I know many haven’t forgotten about is HF-146, which made Minnesota a transgender refuge state. The bill, HF-146, inserts the Minnesota government in the middle of private family matters of those from other states. If an adult feels as though a child in another state needs help to transition or they need access to “gender affirming care,” Minnesota encourages them to come here. It allows our state to protect a non-custodial guardian by temporarily changing the custody order. Again, this is done under the guise of promoting “gender affirming care,” which is another nice title that glosses over the nuances of the bill. The government is asserting that it can parent minors better than parents can, and that raises serious concerns.

Minors are a protected class – you must be 18 to vote, get a tattoo, and gamble. But when it comes to potentially life-altering procedures, Minnesota Democrats believe children are capable of making these decisions for themselves. On the other side of this issue, we are seeing a number of traditionally “progressive” countries moving away from gender affirming care for minors because there have not been enough long-term studies to show that these procedures are safe for children to endure. If there is even any question that these procedures could be putting our kids at risk, we should not be supporting these policies, no matter how positive Democrats try to make them sound.

It is a shame the Governor approved and signed both of these bills into law despite how controversial they are, yet these are the policies that have been prioritized by the majority. They label these things with nice names that mask the details of the bills they’re passing. Minnesotans deserve transparency from their representatives and the legislation being passed.