Demuth promises to end universal school meals if elected governor

Minnesota voters will decide in this week's election whether to continue a school feeding program that has provided more than 450 million meals since the 2023-24 academic year. Republican gubernatorial candidate Lisa Demuth has proposed ending the universal school meals program if she wins the governor's mansion.

Demuth made the proposal during an interview on The Jay Thomas Show on WDAY in Fargo. She stated that ending the program would address a fiscal imbalance in the state budget. The universal meal program was established under the administration of Governor Tim Walz.

"When you have families that have seven-figure incomes receiving free lunch on the backs of hardworking lower to middle-class Minnesotans as taxpayers," Demuth said, "it doesn’t make sense."

The program currently serves 820,000 K-12 students across the state. Demuth's campaign has focused on general statements about combatting fraud rather than detailed policy specifics. This interview marked one of her first clear articulations of her stance on this specific education initiative.

According to 2024 figures reported by the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journals, 13,000 Minnesota taxpayers reported earnings exceeding $1 million. Demuth cited these high earners as the group benefiting from the current structure of the school meal subsidy.

The Department of Justice plans to send 1,000 monitors to all 50 states to oversee the election process. Minnesota counties stated that these federal monitors will not be allowed to observe from inside polling places. They will be subject to the same access and distance requirements as other members of the public.

In a separate development, administration officials traveled to St. Cloud last week to discuss Medicaid fraud. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz, and FBI Director Kash Patel highlighted the arrests of four providers who intended to defraud the program of $41 million.

Bessent responded to a question about the federal government's purchase of the Appleton prison for nearly $500 million. The property had been offered to the state for $75 million the previous year. "Yeah, I don't know anything about that. What we are here to do is to prosecute criminal fraud," Bessent said.

A city council in Hermantown approved a proposed Google data center on Friday night despite public opposition. The facility is expected to use approximately 500 megawatts of power. This amount equals the electric power used by all homes in Minneapolis, St. Paul, Duluth, and Rochester combined. Three lawsuits challenging the project's environmental review remain pending.