Dear Friends,
It is unconscionable that House Democrats refused to help Minnesota’s businesses this week by passing a bill to replenish the Unemployment Insurance (UI) Trust Fund. DEED Commissioner Steve Grove stated early in the pandemic that ‘We don’t want those businesses to be adversely affected by this crisis.’ Now, because of the unprecedented need for unemployment insurance as a result of those shutdowns, the state has a debt that we must repay. Job providers across Minnesota will now face an unnecessary massive multi-year tax increase when the government has a nearly $10 billion surplus. This situation was easily avoided – the Governor, Senate Republicans, Senate Democrats, and House Republicans all supported this bill – but the House DFL chose to make our businesses suffer the consequences because of their inaction.
You can watch my speech as I urged my colleagues to help our businesses here.
The BANE Act
Yesterday I unveiled the Bail Abatement Non-Profit Exclusion (BANE) Act (H.F. 4252) to crack down on non-profits, like the Minnesota Freedom Fund, from registering in the state of Minnesota for the purposes of providing payments to a person or state court to help criminals pay for bail.
Our state has a crime problem that is only being exasperated by organizations like the Minnesota Freedom Fund who seek to return violent criminals to our streets. The purpose of bail is to ensure the reappearance of the accused on their court date. By paying a defendant’s bail, the Minnesota Freedom Fund is literally handing these criminals a get out of jail free card. Many of these defendants go on to commit more heinous, violent crimes after their release. The BANE Act will stop organizations, like the Minnesota Freedom Fund, who support dangerous criminals so we can make our communities safer.”
The Minnesota Freedom Fund has a record of making bail payments for criminals who commit other crimes following their release. Crimes committed by these repeat offenders include murder, sexual assault, and assault. One criminal supported by the Minnesota Freedom Fund was an alleged domestic abuser who murdered a man following his release on bail.
I shared the stories of five different criminals who were bailed out of jail by the Minnesota Freedom Fund only to commit new offenses in my press conference which you can watch here. As you can see in the graphic below, these are dangerous criminals that the Minnesota Freedom Fund is responsible for putting back on the streets and they are ultimately responsible for the crimes they committed after their release.
