With the low-hanging fruit already picked, Capitol security focus moves to guns

The Minnesota Capitol security debate is about to become a gun control debate. 

At a hearing Wednesday, Aug. 20, of the Advisory Committee of Capitol Area Security, Sen. Bonnie Westlin, DFL-Plymouth, pivoted from kind words about Melissa and Mark Hortman and John and Yvette Hoffman to declare that, “No topic should be off the table. We need to fully explore every topic that impacts the security of the people who come to the building and that is going to include a conversation about weapons detection.”

Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson, a member of the committee, said that weapons screenings have bolstered security in the state’s courtrooms.

“The Minnesota Capitol is often called the people’s house and no one believes that more than I do, but I also believe that the time has come in 2025 to rethink how the people’s house operates,” Hudson said. 

Meanwhile, over 95% of the more than 200 statements of written testimony came from people who do not want guns banned at the Capitol. 

“I am opposed to disarming peaceable Minnesotans with permits to carry at the state Capitol complex,” stated Minnesota resident Gary Roteguard. “Gun free zones are easy targets for mass murderers.”

The debate over Capitol security is coming into focus two months after former House Speaker Hortman and her husband died from gunfire and Sen. Hoffman and his wife were severely wounded. Here is what to know about the meeting and what comes next. 

What is this Advisory Committee on Capitol Security?

Before this summer, the Advisory Committee on Capitol Security was not a household name even in its own members’ households. 

Those on the committee include Hudson, four lawmakers including Westlin, and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, who chairs the body. 

By statute, the committee is supposed to meet four times a year, but it only met twice last year and once this year before Wednesday. 

At the hearing, Flanagan and other members spared no opportunity to emphasize the “advisory” in the committee’s name. 

“We don’t have the power to appropriate funds or make direct changes to public safety or protocols, and the final decision on many measures does not rest with this committee,” Flanagan said.

Indeed, in its slim 2025 annual report, the committee requested that the Legislature take out $34 million in general obligation bonds and $6 million from the state general fund to complete security upgrades identified by Minneapolis architecture firm Miller Dunwiddie. But in its bonding bill, the Legislature doled out a grand total of $2 million. 

But that was before Hortman’s death as well as a Capitol break-in last month resulting in a burglary charge. 

Related: The threat of political violence is keeping parents out of elected office

Flanagan aims to capitalize on this attention to improve Capitol security. Instead of twice yearly meetings, she wants to do a hearing each month.

“The next meeting I think will be Sept. 22, a date I know because it’s my birthday,” Flanagan said in an interview before the hearing. “We’ll bring some cake and then we’ll meet again in October, November and then potentially December if we need an additional meeting.”

What does Flanagan seek to accomplish with these meetings?

“We are going to try to make some recommendations that are bipartisan in nature, because I want this group to come up with plans to bring to the Legislature that can get across the finish line,” Flanagan said.

But what are those bipartisan plans? Flanagan acknowledged that “some of the low-hanging fruit has already been picked,” such as the Department of Public Safety reducing the number of Capitol entry points from 14 to four.

(Other easy moves included the Secretary of State scrubbing lawmaker’s home addresses and cell phone numbers from their web pages.) 

A more controversial plan that could garner bipartisan support is Capitol security officers screening for weapons at the point of entry through wands or metal detectors, an action Flanagan wants to see happen. 

Where that proposal gets really controversial is confiscating guns that turn up in the screening.

What is the current gun law at the Capitol?

In 2015, Minnesota banned restrictions on guns at the Capitol, becoming one of 15 states to permit firearms in its main statehouse building. 

There is an exception to this rule. The Minnesota Supreme Court sometimes meets on the Capitol’s second floor and court chambers don’t allow guns. Also, the Judicial Center, which sits right by the Capitol building, bans guns. 

“The Minnesota Judicial Center is currently the only building on the Capitol complex with full-time weapons screening,” Hudson said. “Achieving that level of security was a lengthy process involving philosophical discussions.” 

The judicial statute exists, in part, because of threats made to judges. 

Hudson cited a 2024 Minnesota District Judges Association survey saying that 72% of judges have received threats and 37% bore witness to an actual or attempted physical attack on the job. 

Lawmakers also face threats. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, more than 40% of state legislators surveyed say they were threatened with violence over the last three years. 

However, some lawmakers have said that they carry guns to enhance their protection. 

The two Republicans on the advisory committee, Sen. Warren Limmer and Rep. Jim Nash, did not wade into the gun question. 

Limmer, instead, urged caution on recommendations. (“Any quick decision will give us a false sense of protection,” he said). Nash dinged the committee for not meeting often enough or securing needed money in the bonding bill. 

There was no oral testimony at the hearing, just pages of written testimony, many with the identical message: “I am opposed to disarming the peaceable Minnesotans with permits to carry at the state Capitol complex.”

Rob Doar, senior vice president of government affairs for the Minnesota Gun Owner’s Caucus, said his group sent out an action alert telling members to provide their written testimony. 

Besides guns, any other written testimony of note?

The Minnesota Government Relations Council, a lobbying group for lobbyists, sent a letter urging balance. Currently, some lobbyists have Capitol offices. And many rely on catching lawmakers before and after hearings or knocking on their office doors.

Amy Walstein, president of the Government Relations Council, asked the committee to “strike an appropriate balance between implementing meaningful, effective security measures and preserving the ability of registered lobbyists to maintain secure, efficient access to the building.”

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Editor’s note: This article first appeared on MinnPost and was written by Matthew Blake, state government reporter for MinnPost. It is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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