When Minnesota Management & Budget released its February 2026 Budget and Economic Forecast, I noted that “state government revenues are forecast to be less than state government spending: by $2.8 billion in 2026-2027 and $3.4 billion in 2028-2029 for a cumulative deficit of $6.2 billion over the entire period.”
Given this yawning budget deficit, with spending so heavily and consistently above revenues, state lawmakers should be looking for ways to cut their cloth accordingly. Not, apparently, among the DFL.
Back in July, the Minnesota House reported, “DFL legislators from the Minnesota House and Senate unveiled the Minnesota Values Project Policy Agenda 2027. The agenda is the result of input from Minnesotans across the state and will serve as the guiding vision for lawmakers when they return to the Capitol in 2027.”
The agenda is 16 pages of fresh spending commitments, some large, and all on top of a budget which is already in deficit. It promises:
Establish Universal Primary Care, because when everyone can go to the doctor
for a check-up, you avoid costly emergencies in the future.Expand access to public health care options like Minnesota Care, allowing more
Minnesotans to have health insurance outside of the profit-driven market.Low or no-cost child care access for every Minnesota family, as universal and in
as many towns in the state as we can make it. This will mean more investment
in public pre-K, Head Start, and community-based childcare in all corners of
the state.
And on and on. Its section on education, for example, is all about spending more money; there isn’t a single, solitary mention of actually boosting the state’s slithering educational outcomes.
All this new spending will be vastly expensive. By one estimate, providing free, universal childcare will cost the state government $10 billion in each biennium. Considering that the state is spending $71 billion in the current biennium, that is a 14% hike in state government spending before you even think about giving everyone free primary care and more access to Minnesota Care. We are looking at tens of billions of dollars in new spending, on top of budget deficits already totaling billions of dollars, just from these three proposals.
There are no prizes for guessing who is going to pay for this tidal wave of new spending: “the rich.” “We’re ready to close tax loopholes that the ultra-wealthy and corporations exploit with high-paid tax experts to avoid paying into the systems they’re benefitting from,” the agenda explains. “Those with the most should contribute more for our public goods and services. In the wealthiest country in the world, we can meet our collective needs – the big things we want to do for healthcare, housing, child care, and more – when people pay their fair share.”
If you think a handful of guys in North Oaks and Dellwood are going to fund upwards of $10 billion in new government spending, I have a bridge to sell you. If these schemes are enacted, they will be paid for by the average Minnesotan, the one who already hands over more of his or her income to this fraud riddled, spendthrift government than the average earner in 43 other states.
Don’t say you weren’t warned.