A new lawsuit was filed Tuesday that seeks to invalidate a “mega-omnibus bill” passed by the DFL trifecta in the final hours of the 2024 legislative session.
The Upper Midwest Law Center (UMLC) announced the lawsuit at a press conference alongside its client, the Minnesota Private Business Council.
“With a couple hours to go in the 2024 legislative session, leadership in the Minnesota House and Senate jammed basically their whole agenda into one 1,500-page bill, what appears to be the largest statute ever passed in Minnesota history,” said UMLC senior appellate counsel Nicholas Nelson.
Nelson explained that it appears legislators had to “guess what they were voting on based on word of mouth.”
The lawsuit specifically challenges portions of the bill related to earn sick and safe time, paid leave, and rules governing whether people should be classified as employees or independent contractors.
“Minnesota cannot continue down a path where major policy changes are bundled together and imposed on employers without clear accountability,” said Jim Schultz, president of the Minnesota Private Business Council. “Job creators deserve a fair process and policies that are considered on their merits. That is what this case seeks to restore.”
As the lawsuit explains, the Minnesota Constitution requires every bill passed by the legislature to have only one subject, known as the single subject clause.
“When the legislature and governor violate that requirement and enact a gargantuan law covering a vast array of subjects, the result is that Minnesota businesses are drowned in red tape, jobs and growth are squeezed out of our economy, government waste explodes, and costs and taxes spiral ever upward—all without the full and fair consideration by the people’s representatives that the Constitution promises,” the lawsuit says. “This case arises from just such a catastrophic violation.”
The 2024 omnibus bill combined nine previously-distinct omnibus bills into one “mega-omnibus bill.”
A Ramsey County judge struck down a ban on binary triggers last year that was included in the omnibus bill, ruling that the bill violated the single subject clause.
Judge Leonardo Castro opted to sever the binary trigger ban from the omnibus bill, rather than strike down the entire omnibus bill, out of respect for Minnesota Supreme Court precedent.
“But make no mistake, during the late hours of May 19, 2024, lawmaking did not ‘occur within the framework of the constitution,’” Castro wrote.
The lawsuit filed Tuesday asks the Ramsey County courts to declare the entire bill unconstitutional. Alternatively, it seeks a ruling declaring specific portions invalid.
“This is exactly the kind of law the Constitution was designed to prevent,” said Nelson. “When lawmakers bundle unrelated policies into one massive bill, it deprives both legislators and the public of meaningful review. The Constitution requires transparency and accountability—and this process failed on both fronts.”
Anthony Gockowski
Anthony Gockowski is Editor-in-Chief of Alpha News. He previously worked as an editor for The Minnesota Sun and Campus Reform, and wrote for the Daily Caller.