Welcome

Welcome to the 2024 “The State of Bipartisanship” report produced by Majority in the Middle and powered by Plural Policy bill tracking software.

This report is designed to analyze bipartisan bill authorship as one important reflection of effective collaboration. This effort identifies where cooperation happens, elevating the people who are leading the way, and collecting replicable ideas to cultivate a healthier political environment -- in St. Paul and in state capitols across the country. 

Our first report in 2023 set the baseline and uncovered what we named hidden bipartisanship: the work being done across the aisle that doesn’t get a lot of attention, and that isn’t reflected in the outcome of large omnibus bills when final votes fall along party lines. 

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Executive Summary

Election years and unusual situations can often increase partisanship at the capitol. This year (the second in a trifecta that is outside the norm for Minnesota) was no exception. 

In 2024, an election year for the House; a change in leadership, an arrest, and a campaign for congress in the Senate, all added pressure to bipartisan efforts. Additionally, this report may have been of influence. 

But when the dust settled on the 2023-2024 biennium, here’s what we learned: if you look at topline results, it seems like bipartisanship went down year-to-year. But when you look at individual committees’ and members’ data, you’ll see effort being made. This report will celebrate that effort. 

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A sample of results from the report

Overall bipartisanship in the Minnesota legislature declined in 2024 compared to 2023. Yet, data shows that many committee chairs and individual legislators actually demonstrated more bipartisanship.
 

• The total percentage of minority-led bills getting a hearing went down from 36% to 31% in the Senate, and held steady in the House at 11%

• Bipartisan bills introduced in 2024 went down from 45% to 38% in the Senate, and 27% to 26% in the House

• The proportion of hearings given to minority-led bills went up in seven Senate and 11 House committees

• The proportion of hearings given to bipartisan bills went up in two Senate and 11 House committees

By the end of the biennium:

• all but two of the 134 House members had sponsored and/or co-sponsored bills with members of both parties

• all 67 Senators had sponsored AND co-sponsored bills with members of both parties

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Recommendations

This year we are also including recommendations on issues relevant to the subject of the report:

• Ensure sufficient time for discussion and amendments

• Members should be represented on committees substantially in proportion to their percentage representation in the full body

• Process as many stand-alone bills as possible

• Set reasonable limits on floor debate

 

We highly encourage members of both chambers to sit down together and hash out rules changes that everyone could live with – as members of the majority or the minority – BEFORE NOVEMBER, while control of the chambers is being determined by the voters. 
 

Why we should all care about bipartisanship

Bipartisanship is hard, messy, and subjective. It’s also essential.

 

We believe that political division in the United States is the overarching problem of our time. If you care about cost of living, mental health, immigration, democracy, climate change, school funding, or any other issues you should care about political division. Big topics of justice and freedom and liberty and safety – that we all need to tackle – are off the table if we don’t reverse this trend.

 

Issues don’t get solved when we’re divided. Instead, power and public policy swings back and forth on a pendulum, from one extreme to another.

 

Divisiveness means that issues that didn't used to be controversial are now partisan. Our culture and political system need to incentivize and reward compromise if we are going to make progress on challenging problems.