The Minnesota legislature convened February 20 and went straight to work on the bonding or short year of the two-year session. The House and Senate quickly put a period on the end of the 2017 session by passing the Legislature’s 2018-19 budget that Gov. Mark Dayton vetoed last May. The 2018 legislative session was met with a new wrinkle when US Sen. Al Franken resigned in early January and Gov. Dayton appointed his Lt. Gov., Tina Smith, to fill out the US Senate term until the next election can fill the seat.
Because Lt. Gov. Smith is now Sen. Smith, the Minnesota Constitution clearly indicates that the President of the Minnesota Senate, in this case Sen. Michelle Fischbach, shall ascend to become the lieutenant governor when there is a vacancy. The Constitution is not so clear on whether the lieutenant governor can serve as a state senator at the same time. This question still remains. As of this update the lieutenant governor has acted in her capacity as both a state senator and the President of the Senate while being lieutenant governor for the past two and a half weeks.
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