Several DFL lawmakers of color loudly protested behind a closed door Thursday morning as Gov. Tim Walz and lawmakers announced that undocumented adults will no longer have access to a state health insurance program after this year.
“Don’t kill immigrants!” shouted lawmakers from the People of Color and Indigenous Caucus as they banged on the door to the governor’s reception room at the state Capitol.
Two of Walz’s aides held the doors shut as the governor continued to share remarks with the media.
“Don’t kill our neighbors!” the lawmakers yelled.
Faith leaders and immigrant advocates across Minnesota made a push over the last few days to preserve access to MinnesotaCare, which Walz noted in his remarks at a Thursday news conference.
Walz, who left the press conference in a route that allowed him to avoid the crowd, acknowledged in his comments that there was discord among some lawmakers in his party.
“You hear the passion on this,” Walz said. “I’m not going to sugarcoat how difficult this was … we didn’t expect everybody to be happy on this.”
The move will result in as many as 15,000 people losing health insurance coverage by the end of the year, according to the state Department of Human Services.
Walz and Minnesota legislative leaders announced the news as part of a larger compromise in the state budget for 2026-2027. Under the agreement, undocumented immigrants who are adults will no longer be eligible for the program known as MinnesotaCare. Undocumented children will remain eligible for coverage.
The agreement comes as Minnesota’s House of Representatives is split evenly between Democrats and Republicans, and as Democrats hold a single-seat majority in the Senate. The state is also facing future deficits.
Republican lawmakers argue that the move will save the state money.
State House of Representatives Speaker Lisa Demuth, a Republican, told reporters at the press conference that 20,000 people have signed up for MinnesotaCare since the state opened access to undocumented immigrants at the beginning of this year. This “exploding” enrollment went beyond the state’s projection of 5,700 undocumented clients, she said.
“Fiscally, that could not go on,” Demuth said, adding that children will still be eligible for the program and that undocumented adults still have access to private health insurance.
MinnesotaCare is a state-funded health care program operated by the Minnesota Department of Human Services that provides coverage to low-income residents. A bill passed in 2023 expanding the program to include undocumented immigrants starting this year, but Republican and Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota clashed over it against a national backdrop of polarizing immigration policies.
Lawmakers left in tears
As the press conference ended, some lawmakers and members of the public embraced each other and wept in Capitol hallways. Among them was Patricia Torres Ray, a former DFL state Senator and immigrant originally from Colombia.
“When politicians respond to the political message of the moment without thinking about the future of our people, it’s just incredibly sad,” she said. “I have gone through this many times, it’s just exhausting to see this.”
That emotion continued at a news conference held by the People of Color and Indigenous Caucus. Several lawmakers and immigrant advocates stood by the podium, many with tears in their eyes.
State Rep. Cedrick Frazier, DFL-Minneapolis, said he and his colleagues entered the session aiming to defend policies passed under the DFL trifecta in 2023 that “protected the most vulnerable.” The budget compromise, he said, will harm the most vulnerable.
“We’re talking about tens of thousands of individuals that will lose access to healthcare by the end of the year,” he said. “We’ve got individuals that are currently receiving cancer treatments, that are currently receiving dialysis care. Those individuals, at the end of the year, will lose access to that.”
Emilia Gonzalez Avalos, executive director of the immigrant advocacy group UNIDOS, said that undocumented people who access MinnesotaCare are “overemployed in the essential sectors of our economy.”
“Many make minimum wage and work as contractors,” she said, “and they’re offered very little benefits.”
Gonzalez Avalos added that private insurance is not the answer for undocumented people who will lose coverage, and if it was, “These longtime taxpaying Minnesotans would have already been covered.”
What do numbers show
The Department of Human Services reports that 20,187 undocumented residents were enrolled in MinnesotaCare as of April 25. About 24 percent of the enrollees are children.
Roughly 4,306 undocumented clients have made health claims for MinnesotaCare at a cost of $3.9 million, according to the department.
Advocates for immigrant health care argue that the number of undocumented claims is small compared to the state’s overall budget, which currently sits at $72 billion and will likely fall between $66 and $67 billion for the 2026-2027 biennium. They also argue that undocumented people on MinnesotaCare pay premiums, and that hospital visits by uninsured Minnesotans will cost the state more in the long run.
Faith leaders and immigrant advocates across Minnesota made a push over the last few days to preserve access to MinnesotaCare, which Walz noted in his remarks Thursday.
“The archbishop came down from the cathedral to make the case on the moral side of that, but we also understand there’s a fiscal part,” Walz said.
MinnesotaCare was established in 1992, and provides free or low-cost health insurance to residents who make too much money to qualify for Medicaid but still face financial limitations. The program covered 83,000 Minnesotans as of late 2024, according to the state.
MinnesotaCare covers a wide range of routine and preventative care such as eye and dental exams, x-rays, lab tests, regular physical exams, prescription costs, immunizations and pregnancy care, among many other services.
The program also helps enrollees pay for specialty care like surgeries, rehabilitation and gender-affirming care, in addition to ambulance services and visits to the emergency room.
Democrats compromise
House DFL Leader Melissa Hortman said it was hard for Democrats to agree to the compromise.
“They are Minnesotans,” Hortman said of undocumented immigrants. “They are deserving of care. They pay taxes, they contribute to our economy, and this health coverage that they have received has provided life-saving cancer treatment, life-saving diabetes care.”
Health care coverage for undocumented adults will end on December 31.
“We go into that with eyes wide open that this will change people’s lives,” Hortman said of the change.
