Grace Panetta

Melissa Hortman, a former Minnesota House speaker who championed the passage of ambitious progressive policies in the state, was assassinated early Saturday in what Gov. Tim Walz called “an act of targeted political violence.”  Hortman, 55, who was elected to the Minnesota House in 2004, became the speaker of the state’s House of Representatives in 2019 and, during her first few years, presided over the chamber under a divided government. In 2022, when the Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Party won full control of the state government, Hortman played a key role in shaping what legislation the chamber would prioritize, working closely with […]