Weekend Reformer: Mail-in voting battle continues

Good morning, Reformers. 

President Trump got a small win in court Friday on his attempts to restrict voting by mail. A three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously halted a lower court ruling, which had blocked the U.S. Postal Service from restricting mail-in voting in states that refuse to hand over sensitive voter data. The proposed Postal Service policy stems from a March executive order. 

The policy is still blocked in a separate ruling from a federal judge in Massachusetts so can’t move forward yet. The Trump administration’s efforts to influence how state-run elections are run have been repeatedly blocked in courts. 

Also Friday, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened to prosecute election officials in states that don’t comply with administration directives to enhance security of voting machines and to share voter data with the federal government, States Newsroom’s Sam Gauntt reported. 

Trump gave a primetime speech on U.S. election vulnerabilities Thursday, alleging foreign interference and fraud in U.S. elections. 

Analyses of the files from multiple news outlets found that the files contain already public and some new information about vulnerabilities, but no evidence that those vulnerabilities were exploited in ways that would have changed the results in previous elections, including Trump’s 2020 loss.

Air pollution reached hazardous levels in much of Minnesota this week as smoke from wildfires in Canada and northern Minnesota traveled south. Air quality has improved in many regions, but a hazardous air quality alert is still in place in northeastern Minnesota. Ria reported on the agency’s Tuesday alert, and I made some charts illustrating how wildfires in recent years have reversed hard-earned improvements to air pollution. 

Minnesota prosecutors have obtained evidence they’ve been demanding for months from the federal government in the killings of two U.S. citizens — Renee Good and Alex Pretti — and the shooting of Venezuelan national Julio Sosa-Celis by federal immigration agents during Operation Metro Surge, Max Nesterak reported. 

Ramsey County officials are suing the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, seeking evidence related to potential crimes committed by federal agents against ChongLy “Scott” Thao, a U.S. citizen, during Operation Metro Surge, including kidnapping, false imprisonment and burglary, Madi McVan reported. 

Madi wrote about how immigration agents keep shooting people in cars, including Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, who was killed recently in Houston. Joan Sebastian Guerrero was killed last week in his car in Maine after we published the story. ICE agents were briefly ordered to pause vehicle stops after the two killings; that order was overturned after Trump made a Truth Social post hailing traffic stops. 

The Minneapolis City Council declined to sign a contract with Skydio, a California-based drone company, over concerns it sold its products to ICE, Ria Gupta reported. A few dozen demonstrators had gathered the day prior at the Federal Court Plaza to protest the proposed contract. 

Skeptics from labor unions filled a St. Paul church this week to voice concerns about the proposed joining of Allina Health and Sutter Health, I reported. The Office of the Minnesota Attorney General is reviewing the proposed acquisition of Allina by Sutter, a large California health system that’s been accused in two settled lawsuits of driving up costs through anti-competitive behavior. 

Trump endorsed MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell for governor, providing his campaign a boost in the face of lackluster campaign fundraising and his own personal financial problems, Michelle Griffith reported. Lindell was in a talkative mood when Michelle called him for his reaction; we published an edited transcript.  

Kendall Qualls, the Republican-endorsed candidate for governor, posted a photo of his wife in a Polaris Slingshot with a pair of disembodied arms floating next to her in an apparent bad photoshop job. The owner of the arms is a man with a lengthy and colorful driving and criminal record whose email signature until recently included a title as Qualls’ political director, Michelle Griffith reported. 

A legislative audit of a Minnesota water quality program for agriculture producers found the state Department of Agriculture is certifying producers that violate the program’s water quality standards, Claire Carlson reported.

Reformer editor Patrick Coolican wrote about what he said was one of the most compelling modern political documents that he’s read: a memo by Doran Schrantz, former executive director of Minnesota progressive ecumenical group ISAIAH, written for civil society groups that lays out how to prepare for federal intervention in the 2026 midterm elections. 

Sue Abderholden, the retired longtime executive director of the National Alliance of Mental Illness Minnesota, wrote that parents of children with serious mental illnesses often need to go through the child protection system — and, in some states, relinquish custody — even when there’s no problem with their parenting, and offered some potential solutions. 

Chuck Johnson, former deputy commissioner at the Minnesota Department of Human Services, examined how the state successfully rolled out its new paid leave program. 

In the wake of recent heat waves and wildfires, Satish Desai wrote that we have no time to lose on the speedy adoption of clean, renewable energy. 

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