ST. PAUL – House Democrats on Thursday ended their weeks-long shutdown of state government and the Minnesota House officially came to order.
House Democrats did not appear at the Capitol for the first day of the 2025 session on Jan. 14 and remained absent in the weeks since. Their arrival Thursday came after Republicans and Democrats announced they reached an organizational agreement Wednesday.
Republican Leader Lisa Demuth, of Cold Spring, will serve as the Speaker of the House for the next two years. In addition, Republicans will hold an operating majority in a brand-new Fraud and Agency Oversight Committee they created to investigate waste, fraud, and abuse in state government.
“This shutdown lasted far too long, and the best thing about it ending is we can finally start taking official steps toward addressing top issues to help the people of Minnesota,” said Rep. Scott Van Binsbergen, R-Montevideo. “We’ll have a nice head start because House Republicans have been at the Capitol throughout the House Democrat shutdown, continuing doing the work of the people and laying the groundwork for bills to make Minnesota a better place to live, work and raise a family.”
Demuth’s election as House Speaker elevates her to the second-most powerful elected position in state government. She is the first Republican Speaker of the House in six years.
“It’s great Rep. Demuth will be our House Speaker through 2026 because it will finally bring some balance back to Minnesota after two years of one party operating unchecked in our state,” Van Binsbergen said. “It also is good that House Republicans will be in charge of the committee on fraud because that is an issue we take very seriously, and we’ll do our best to clean up this massive problem in our state that is costing taxpayers dearly.”
Republicans will have full control of committee hearings and committee chairs for the next five weeks, until a March 11 special election takes place to resolve a vacancy in House District 40B.
If the special election in 40B returns the House to a 67-67 tie, committee structures will revert to the co-chair model that had been tentatively agreed upon in the weeks following the November election. That includes equal Democrat and Republican members on all committees, except for the committee on fraud remaining in Republican control, per the organizational agreement.
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