Minnesota state Rep. John Thompson’s political career could be on the brink after less than a year in office.
Legally, the St. Paul Democrat has never been convicted of domestic abuse, but politically speaking, a string of separate past allegations of violence against women are effectively putting him on a different sort of trial.
It’s possible that Thompson could ultimately find himself testifying before fellow members of the House of Representatives, conceivably with a punishment of expulsion looming over him — although expulsion is such an extreme outcome that it’s never happened in the state’s modern history, if ever at all.
Here’s why this is even the topic of conversation among politcos in the state Capitol:
Over the weekend, some of the state’s most powerful Democrats, including Gov. Tim Walz, House Speaker Melissa Hortman, Senate Minority Leader Susan Kent, and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan all called on Thompson to resign after details contained in police reports from some of the allegations were reported in the local media.
In response, Thompson has refused to resign and challenged the “authenticity” of the reports, essentially volleying the issue back to Hortman and other House Democrats, who hold the majority of that chamber.
That standoff between the freshman DFL lawmaker and the top members of his Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party would seem to suggest that something’s gotta give.
Walz himself said as much Monday.
NO ‘GOOD ENDING’
“This situation just doesn’t have a good ending, and it’s sad,” Walz responded when reporters asked him. Walz declined to specify what he thought should happen if Thompson refuses to resign.
Hortman declined to comment on the matter Monday. A spokesman said she was planning to meet with House counsel to determine next steps.
The Thompson situation began as a July 4 traffic stop that resulted in him being cited for driving while his privileges were revoked. He drew attention when he accused police of racial profiling, became the focus of scrutiny after it was revealed he supplied a Wisconsin license, and exploded into calls for his resignation when details of the past domestic violence allegations were reported.
Walz noted the House “has procedures” and added, “I would just encourage them to follow through.”
Here are some of those procedures.
ETHICS COMPLAINT?
Elected officials aren’t like regular workers. They are essentially hired by voters for a specific term — two years for a House member — and they can’t easily be fired or even disciplined. There are no impeachment procedures for state House members, but there are procedures outline in the state Constitution, state law, and House rules that can lead to discipline or even removal from office.
The most commonly wielded is an ethics complaint, filed to the bipartisan House Ethics Committee, and it seems a likely route.
House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt on Saturday said Republicans had prepared “ethics complaints that will be filed Monday in the event Representative Thompson does not resign.” However, on Monday, Daudt, who has also called for Thomspon to resign, tapped the brakes on that plan, saying Republicans would move forward with their complaints “if Speaker Hortman declines to act.”
Daudt’s pivot can be read as both tactical — he keeps the pressure on Democrats — and practical: As the minority, Republicans can’t actually affect any discipline without Democrats’ support.
There’s also this: Republicans do not see much chance that a member of their party could win an election in District 67A, an overwhelmingly Democratic stronghold covering much of St. Paul’s East Side. In the meantime, a Rep. Thompson in office can serve as a fundraising foil to their law-and-order slogans — and indeed, such a fundraising letter already went out last week.
Whether a DFL-led ethics complaint was in the offing remained unclear Monday.
ETHICS TRIAL?
The Ethics Committee is equally composed of Democrats and Republicans, regardless of which party controls the chamber. Thus, for an ethics complaint to move forward with any impact, it must have bipartisan support among the four-member panel.
A detailed set of rules govern how the committee can operate in what amounts to a process similar to a public trial, including offering the accused the right to cross-examine witnesses and creating the possibility that a retired judge can advise the panel.
The Ethics Committee can recommend several forms of discipline that ultimately need to be voted on by the entire House:
Expulsion: This most severe sanction, outlined in the Minnesota Constitution, requires a vote by two-thirds of the House, now split between 70 Democrats (including Thompson) and 64 Republicans. Under the rules, expulsion is reserved “for conduct so abhorrent that it obliges the House to repudiate an elected representative of the people.”
Censure: A simple majority of the House is required to censure a member. It amounts to a formal condemnation, and can carry other practical effects, simply referred to as “other discipline,” if the House majority wants it to.
Reprimand: This formal scolding also requires a simple majority of the House. Like censure, it can carry other practical restrictions.
SPEAKER SANCTIONS
Hortman herself can wield internal sanctions against a member. She can strip a member of committee assignments or otherwise seek to mute their influence.
Hortman, DFL-Brooklyn Park, used this authority in 2019 to strip Rep. Matt Grossell, R-Clearbrook, of committee assignments after Grossell, described in police reports as “drunk” and “belligerent,” cursed at nurses and police and appeared to try to use his stature as a lawmaker to get out of being arrested following a brawl with a hotel security guard.
RECALL?
In Minnesota, a House member can be recalled from office by the very same voters who put him or her there.
But no one has ever been recalled in Minnesota since the state adopted a recall provision in the Constitution in 1996. It’s a process that starts with a voter petition whose grounds for recall is vetted by the Minnesota Supreme Court and ultimately requires the signatures of at least 25 percent of the total votes in the most recent election, as certified by the Secretary of State.
There’s also a time element. In Thompson’s case, all this would have to happen, including the recall election itself, before May 2022.
There’s another big catch for a recall: The Constitution allows a recall of a House member only for “serious malfeasance or nonfeasance during the term of office in the performance of the duties of the office or conviction during the term of office of a serious crime.” The violence Thompson was accused of allegedly happened years before he was elected.
WALZ SKEPTICAL OF ‘DOCTORED’ REPORTS
Thompson was arrested, charged, or listed as a suspect in six incidents involving alleged violence toward women between 2003 and 2011 in Wisconsin and Minnesota, according to public records located by the Pioneer Press. He has never been convicted of domestic assault in either state.
Of those six cases, four were domestic abuse allegations involving Thompson’s then-girlfriend, to whom he’s now married, and one her teenage daughter, according to police reports.
The sixth was a 2006 Woodbury case, in which Thompson was cited for disorderly conduct and assault, according to court records. He was working as a maintenance man and a resident told police she’d been having an “ongoing problem” with him and she talked to his children about swimming in the pool unsupervised, a police report said. He yelled and cursed at her, reached out as if he was going to push her and poked her in the neck, and spit on her car, she told police. He pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct.
In comments made over the weekend by his attorney, Jordan Kushner, Thompson “challenges the authenticity of the police reports that have been circulated to the press” and said Thompson was the victim of a smear campaign.
When asked to clarify, Kushner told the Pioneer Press: “We know that there were some incidents and one of them resulted in a disorderly conduct and the others were dismissed, but basically we think the police reports were doctored.”
He provided no evidence.
When a reporter asked Walz Monday about the notion that reports might have been doctored, the governor was skeptical.
“I think it would be very unusual for three different police departments stretching over a decade to fabricate information,” he said, apparently referring to cases in Superior, Wis., Eagan and St. Paul. “I believe the information that came out was requested in a legal way by our news media doing a job they’re supposed to do. … I guess time will tell, but my inclination is that I have not seen a case where that has happened, so I assume these are as they are presented to us.”
POLITICS OF RACE
One crucial variable into how this will all play out is race. Thompson is Black and rose to prominence as an activist following the police killing of his good friend, Philando Castile. Thompson was elected in November, his first run for public office, by a diverse East Side electorate that includes progressives energized by the cause of racial justice that was super-charged over the summer after the murder of George Floyd.
The People of Color and Indigenous Caucus at the Legislature, of which Thompson is a member, has become a formidable force within the DFL in both chambers. Thus far, no current member of the POCI Caucus has spoken publicly about Thompson’s situation. One of those members, Rep. Jamie Becker-Finn, DFL-Roseville, is a member of the Ethics Committee. Some members of Thompson’s activist circles have come to his defense. However, the situation has evolved rapidly, and on Monday it was impossible to try to paint any broad strokes on the Black community’s reaction.
Walz, Hortman, Senate Minority Leader Kent, and DFL Chairman Ken Martin — four prominent Democrats calling for his resignation — are all white.
Flanagan, who called for his resignation as well, is a member of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe and was a founding member of the PCOI Caucus when she served in the Legislature.
Mara H. Gottfried contributed to this report.
