By Katelyn Vue, Sahan Journal

For two decades, Mai Xiong’s family has greeted and served food to many travelers, Hmong families and schoolchildren on field trips to HmongTown Marketplace. Xiong and her husband operate Annie’s Restaurant, which they took over 10 years ago from her brother.

“I think everybody is pretty much rooted here,” she said of the vendors.

Several vendors who spoke to Sahan Journal called HmongTown Marketplace a landmark, an economic engine and a longtime gathering spot for elders to reconnect in the Hmong community. But HmongTown Marketplace could close after St. Cloud-based Stearns Bank sued owner Toua Xiong in mid-September, seeking $6.6 million in loans, interest and late fees.

“It’s the main source of income for a lot of us vendors,” Mai Xiong said of the marketplace. “It was really shocking.”

Toua Xiong opened HmongTown Marketplace at 217 Como Ave. in 2004 with more than 200 vendors. Originally a lumberyard, the complex took years to convert into a shopping center with air conditioning, heat and sprinklers, he told Sahan Journal.

At a visit to the market on Sept. 30, the earthy smell of Hmong herbal medicine filled the air. Hmong vendors carried fanny packs, ready to make cash transactions with customers. Traditional Hmong clothing adorned with beads and coins lined the walls.

Many Hmong people, including Xiong, immigrated to the United States after serving in the CIA-backed military during the Vietnam War. Xiong said he came to the United States as a young man with his wife, and built a new life from scratch.

He created HmongTown Marketplace because he wanted to help newly arrived Hmong Minnesotans start their own businesses and support their families. He also wanted to showcase Hmong culture and traditions to young people and those from different backgrounds.

“These vendors are the people representing our fathers and mothers who brought us here, and they didn’t have the opportunity to go to school to get educated,” Xiong said. “When their children would like to know what the Hmong life looked like in Laos, they come here, and see it.”

Stearns Bank filed a mortgage foreclosure of HmongTown Marketplace, and asked a judge to appoint a receiver to collect rent and sell the property. Stearns Bank alleges that Xiong failed to pay them back for loans on HmongTown Marketplace and the old Sears building in Maplewood, which both went into default sometime in 2025.

Xiong said Stearns Bank contacted him in October 2023, offering to help him buy and renovate the Sears property with a loan. He said the bank told him he would need to refinance HmongTown Marketplace to have the money to buy the Sears property. Xiong also said the bank gave him an interest reserve and funds to cover new architectural designs for the Sears property, promising they would later pay for the renovations.

The Sears property is listed as a defendant under the name “Hmongtown 2,” according to the lawsuit. Xiong and his wife, Nou Vang, and their other businesses are also listed as co-defendants in the lawsuit.

In Stearn Bank’s latest filing, on Oct. 1, Stearns Bank proposed the financial advisory firm Cordes & Co. to be the receiver of HmongTown Marketplace. If approved, the company has the power to hire or terminate employees, change the locks on the property, establish pay rates for employees and collect rent. A hearing is scheduled for Nov. 24 at 9 a.m. via Zoom for a Hennepin County judge to decide on the matter.

Stearns Bank’s Director of Marketing Sarah Cords and an attorney representing the bank, Andrew Steil, declined to comment.

Boiling point

Xiong filed counterclaims to the lawsuit on Oct. 6.

“We’re actively discussing ways to get out of the lawsuit without a trial,” said Tim Maher, the attorney representing Xiong.

“But banks don’t want to own property, they don’t want to be landlords, they want to lend money … If we find a way to resolve it, they’re not going to want HmongTown Marketplace,” Maher added.

Xiong alleges in the counterclaims that Stearns Bank defrauded him by promising a loan for construction to renovate the Sears property, demanded that he use his family’s house as collateral to acquire loans, and threatened to foreclose on HmongTown Marketplace if he didn’t agree to sign forbearance forms, acknowledging his loans went into default.

Xiong purchased the Sears property in November 2023 for $5.25 million. He said he agreed to build a Stearns Bank branch in HmongTown Marketplace, and included a branch in his plans for the Sears property. But he said he immediately hit roadblocks.

Xiong said he went to Stearns Bank three times with designs for the 181,500 square-feet Sears property, but the bank rejected all of them.

“They said you need to go back to your architecture people and your construction people to scale it down,” he said. “That was really much of 2024.”

Xiong said he attempted to lower the costs of renovations by hiring an independent contractor to conduct a feasibility study, and by taking out some of the design elements.

“I think they set me [up] for failure,” he told Sahan Journal. “They say they’re helping the Hmong community, but acting that way, they’re not supporting the Hmong community.”

“This is my life, my livelihood,” he said. “When we started this one, my wife and I were very young. We were in our early 30s.”

Xiong said he could no longer pay property taxes due to mounting financial pressure from the loans. Since May 2024, he owes Ramsey County more than $550,000 in property taxes, including interest and late fees.

The effort to keep the Sears property afloat is draining the development of HmongTown Marketplace. Starting in 2024, Xiong said, he had to start pulling money from HmongTown Marketplace to make payments on the Sears loan. Xiong said he had planned to replace wooden structures for the outdoors farmers’ market, resurface the parking lot and renovate the facade of the marketplace facing Como Avenue.

“Because of the cash flow that has been consumed over at the Sears [site], we’re not able to do anything,” he said. “We’re just trying to survive.”

Heart of the community

Yuepheng Xiong, who manages Hmong ABC, a small bookstore in the HmongTown Marketplace, said he has developed friendships with other vendors over the years. The bookstore has been at the marketplace since 2010, he added.

“I don’t know exactly how many vendors are here, but we don’t know where we would go. It’s a big community inside HmongTown here,” he said.

Yuepheng Xiong said he began to worry about HmongTown Marketplace after he heard about the Sears expansion project at Maplewood Mall.

“It’s no big surprise, but we’re sad about the news; it made us feel uneasy,” he said of reaction to the lawsuit. “Financially, we’re concerned that they’ve spread themselves too thin, between here and what they called Hmongtown 2. We’re concerned how they’ll manage two places, and still be able to maintain this building and support us here.”

Some of the vendors told Sahan Journal that they see some of the worn-out parts of the marketplace, but they also don’t want someone they don’t know to replace Xiong as the owner.

“We feel that it’s off from the heart of the community,” Yuepheng Xiong said of the Maplewood location. “I don’t see anybody moving from here to Maplewood.”

Pang Lee, a food vendor at the marketplace since 2018, said the loss of the center will harm the community, especially elders.

“If it closes down, it definitely will affect them,” because they won’t have a place where they can freely shop in Hmong without worrying about needing an interpreter, she said.

She also said there was a noticeable drop in customers immediately after the lawsuit was announced, and she saw online rumors spread that the marketplace was closing down.

“We’ve been here for so long, and so many people know about us — like the whole state of Minnesota,” she said. “I think just being the first place, that just makes us so much more special. When you think about the Hmong community, you think about HmongTown.”

Shoppers Xee Chang and her 17-year-old daughter Aryel Xiong told Sahan Journal that they come to the marketplace three or four times a month.

“I also think it’d be really weird to not have it, because there’s a lot of Hmong kids around our age, and older than us, who grew up coming here a lot for whatever is around here,” Aryel said. “So if they weren’t here, then basically our childhood is gone.”

Minneapolis is celebrating its third annual Latino Business Week through Oct. 11, with events for business owners, and for community members to come shop at their local Latino-owned stores.

At a kickoff event Monday, city leaders and business owners said it's especially needed after the federal immigration enforcement surge slowed down business this winter.

Rodrigo Cardoso owns a shipping and professional services business at Mercado Central, a Latino marketplace on Lake Street. He said recovery is underway — but for many businesses, it’s slow going.

“Some of them, thankfully, they have kind of recovered, although we have experienced, inside this building by itself, some losses of businesses that had to close, and some others are just trying to keep up,” Cardoso said.

And even before the immigration enforcement surge, those businesses were seeing drops in customers, dating back to the early days of President Donald Trump’s second term. Business owners cited fear over immigration enforcement in the community.

But the building’s food court was busy Monday morning. Between the bright murals on the walls, shoppers filled tables with platters of menudo, tacos and pupusas.

José Payan’s family owns Tortillería La Perla, with a restaurant location inside the building. Payan said he’s always glad to see more people find his restaurant – both to keep up the business income, and to keep up the vibe in the building.

“We have been a hub for the community itself. It's becoming a major point for news and any major communications that we need to make to our community,” Payan said.

Mayor Jacob Frey visited Mercado Central for the kickoff to the week.

“We should be supporting Latino-owned businesses every day of the week, every week throughout the year, but this week especially,” Frey said. “Support all of the amazing businesses that are up and down East Lake, up and down Central Avenue, up and down Nicollet.”

The week’s events are partly funded by relief money approved by Frey and the city council earlier this year, aimed at helping businesses recover from lost income during Operation Metro Surge.

Events this weekend will invite community members to check out their local businesses. A Latino business pop-up market is scheduled for Saturday along Historic Main Street. And Mercado Central will host a celebration on Sunday, inviting neighbors to come shop and participate in hands-on activities and demonstrations at the market’s restaurants.

More events throughout the week are geared towards business owners, with chances to network and learn skills.

From trade wars, to animal disease and high diesel prices, there is a lot going on in the agriculture world.

Minnesota's Department of Agriculture Commissioner Thom Petersen just returned from a conference where all of that was discussed with some of Minnesota's most important trade partners: Canada and Mexico.

Commissioner Petersen spoke to Minnesota Now host Nina Moini with more on what he learned 35th annual Tri National Agricultural Accord.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.

Subscribe to the Minnesota Now podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

We attempt to make transcripts for Minnesota Now available the next business day after a broadcast. When ready they will appear here.

The way we build careers and make money is changing. MPR News host Angela Davis talks with journalist Lee Hawkins about how people create businesses, move forward after career setbacks and make financial decisions — and what we can learn from their journeys to success.

Guest:

• Lee Hawkins is a contributor to American Public Media — a unit of American Public Media Group, the parent company of MPR News — and a Spencer Education Fellow at Columbia University. He is a Minnesota native and a journalist who spent 19 years at The Wall Street Journal. He is the host of “Must Be the Money,” a podcast produced by Marketplace, and author of the book, "I Am Nobody’s Slave: How Uncovering My Family's History Set Me Free.” He is also host of the podcasts, “What Happened in Alabama” and “Unlocking the Gates: How the North Led Housing Discrimination in America,” produced by APM Studios.

• Chris Farrell is a senior economics contributor for MPR News and Marketplace.

Subscribe to the MPR News with Angela Davis podcast on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify or RSS.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.

On Monday, the Rochester City Council will vote on a measure that would provide an infusion of funding to support businesses impacted by the years-long massive construction projects and Mayo Clinic’s expansion downtown. But after four businesses recently closed and others teeter on the brink, some business owners say it’s too little, too late.

Businesses on the once busy Second Street corridor in Rochester have been forced to operate for almost a year now amid cranes, backhoes, front loaders and other loud construction equipment that have blocked their storefronts and turned away traffic. The road is getting torn up and rebuilt for a new bus rapid transit line, which will eventually have a fleet of buses running up and down it every few minutes in a loop.

It’s a signature component of Rochester’s 20-year, $5.6 billion Destination Medical Center redevelopment project aimed at remaking the city to accommodate the city’s population growth and make it more attractive to patients, their families and other visitors who come to Mayo Clinic from all over the world.

But, the construction is hurting local businesses. Four shops and restaurants have closed so far this year on Second Street, two of them just this past week. And many more say they’re struggling to hang on. The bus rapid transit line isn’t scheduled to open until next August, leaving businesses with nearly another year to contend with the construction mess that is keeping many customers away.

“It’s really, really bad,” said Joy Loera, owner of Uni Uni Bubble Tea on Second Street. “When we signed the lease, we had no idea this [would] be going on.”

Jenna Bowman, Rochester’s Strategic Communications and Engagement Director, said the city is working hard to try to support these businesses, and she’s hoping that the continuation of the city’s Business Forward program with an extra infusion of $500,000 can help them ride out the construction-related downturn.

The fund that can be used on marketing and promotional efforts to support businesses impacted by the construction. In the first year, the city spent $231,000 on everything from signage to help people navigate the maze of construction to find a local restaurant to free professional photography for the local businesses.

Now, the Destination Medical Center board has approved spending an additional $500,000 on the assistance program. The Rochester City Council will vote on whether or not to co-sign the financial aid on Monday.

It’s unclear how the new funds will be spent if approved, but Bowman said the city intends to take what the business community wants into consideration, so they can continue what’s been working and revise what has not. And she acknowledged that the city is learning in real time.

“The [bus rapid transit system] is the largest public infrastructure project in Rochester history,” Bowman said. “This is new for all of us. Sometimes no one has all the answers, but collectively we hopefully can find some good answers. That is my hope with this next phase, if you will, is that there is an ability to find some wins here for everyone.”

However, the Business Forward fund does not allow for direct payments or loans to the impacted businesses, and business owners like Will Forsman of Cafe Steam said that’s what’s most needed.

“[We need] money. Cash," said Forsman who owns a small chain of coffee shops in downtown Rochester, including one on Second Street. “None of these businesses want to ask for a handout. It's incredibly embarrassing, and we don't take a lot of pride in it. But they're being forced to do this because they're left with no other option.”

There is some precedent for Minnesota municipalities supporting business more directly during massive construction projects. Back in 2011, when the light rail transit system was under construction across the Twin Cities, the cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis offered impacted small retail businesses and restaurants the ability to apply for $20,000, interest-free, forgivable loans to help them get through the downturn.

But the city of Rochester said that’s not currently a topic of conversation and that city government has strict requirements on how taxpayer dollars can be used.

Forsman said he’s concerned that the additional funding won’t really help because it’ll just be more of the same. He said for him and his neighbors, marketing isn’t usually the issue, it’s the fact that potential customers can’t find their shop or they choose to avoid going downtown all together due to the menace of traffic cones, detours and construction work.

“This program reads as a PR stunt,” Forsman said. “[The city wants to show] that the powers that be have listened to businesses that are struggling on that street and heard that they're having difficulty advertising or marketing themselves, which is perhaps not the issue. The issue is that people physically cannot get to these businesses. You can advertise them all you want, but it will do nothing to be able to allow for customers to actually access the businesses.”

And Forsman noted, it won’t do anything to help the businesses that have already closed their doors for good.

What’s cooler than being cool? Being the coolest. And four finalists have been chosen for the third annual Coolest Thing Made in Minnesota contest.

Run by the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, the competition helps highlight new and old products that are manufactured in the state.

The contest began with 64 products that have been whittled down to the top four by public voting. A winner will be chosen through a final round of voting and announced Tuesday.

The products weren’t necessarily invented by Minnesotans or in Minnesota. To qualify, the product must be manufactured in the state and the company must have existed for at least two years.

"These Minnesota-made products need to be spotlighted just because I think there's a big misnomer that a lot of these products or devices innovations have been offshored,” said Elizabeth Sherry, the director of development and strategic partnerships for the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce.

This year’s finalists range from life-saving to recreational products, and they’re made by a mix of small and big businesses.

“The glory of this contest is that we have a range of different products,” Sherry added. “It's brand new products that you might not have seen. … and then we also have seen products that have been around for 100 years.”

Two are finalists from last year: a teardrop trailer from Eagan-based Vistabule and an all-terrain wheelchair made by ATZ Manufacturing in Marshall.

“The wheelchair is actually a medical need, but they're used for recreational purposes,” Sherry said. “Their goal is to make sure that those folks that no longer are able to have those capabilities to go hunting, going on the beach, taking long hikes and walks have that ability to do that now with their wheelchair.”

Another finalist, the Fire Boss built by Wipaire, helped fight fires in Ely over the summer.

“These types of airplane systems, they are able to scoop water and dump water down on wildfires as they're in progress,” Sherry said. “So it saves time, it saves gas, and it can help mitigate fires faster.

The youngest company to be a finalist is Solventum, which spun out from 3M in 2024. Its Bair Hugger system is used in hospitals to keep patients warm.

Public voting ends on Tuesday, the same day the winner will be announced at the chamber’s 2026 Manufacturers’ Summit.

Revol Greens, which grows lettuce and other greens in a massive greenhouse near Owatonna and had planned to close this weekend, is now going to remain open for at least a few more weeks as it works to finalize a deal to stay in business.

The lettuce grower told state regulators in August that it planned to permanently close its facility Oct. 4 and lay off nearly 100 employees, but in a new filing with the state this week, the company said it is postponing the closure and that it hopes to continue operations.

“The postponement is due to ongoing efforts to close a transaction that may allow operations at the facility to continue,” Revol Greens Interim CFO Michaele Gobel wrote. “If those efforts are unsuccessful, the plant closing and related employment losses are expected to occur during the 14-day period beginning Oct. 15, 2026, and ending Oct. 29, 2026.”

Revol Greens has not yet responded to MPR News’ request for comment.

If the Medford-based company is able to close the deal, dozens of jobs could be saved. In August, Revol Greens said that it anticipated 89 employees would be laid off if the company did not secure financing or find a buyer for the business by October.

The Minnesota company, which grows its lettuce in a huge, climate-controlled, 10-acre greenhouse, opened in 2017 and has an additional greenhouse in Texas.

Its original decision to close came at a time when demand for lettuce and other greens slumped as many consumers across the country were avoiding lettuce because of a national outbreak of a parasitic infection linked to iceberg lettuce. While none of Revol Greens products were contaminated, Revol Greens vice president of operations explained in its August press release that the Cyclospora outbreak was one of the challenges the company was facing.

“While Revol Greens greenhouse-grown products have continued to meet rigorous food safety and quality standards and were not implicated in the outbreak, the resulting uncertainty in consumer demand has created challenges throughout the leafy greens sector and has impacted ongoing financing discussions for many companies serving the category,” Carkoski wrote when the planned closure was announced in August.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention has been investigating the multi-state outbreak of cyclospora infections linked to iceberg lettuce. Since May, it has identified nearly 20,000 cases of the gastrointestinal disease — and likely many more that have yet to be confirmed. At least one outbreak has been linked to Taylor Farms, which sells its products in grocery stores and to fast food restaurants and other eateries.

“Our leafy greens are grown year-round in our controlled-environment greenhouses in Minnesota and Texas, where every step of the growing process is designed with food safety in mind,” the company wrote on its Facebook page in mid July.

“From treated water and plant and mineral based fertilizers, to automated harvesting that minimizes human handling, our growing practices help us maintain a highly controlled environment from seed to harvest.”

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said he will veto an ordinance City Council passed Thursday that would require human safety monitors in driverless rideshare vehicles.

“Requiring a driver in a driverless car doesn’t make sense,” Frey said in a statement. “Minneapolis is open for business, open to innovative technology, and open to a variety of transportation options. Thoughtful regulation for safety is necessary, but not through a backdoor ban.”

The Minneapolis City Council narrowly approved the ordinance earlier on Thursday on a 7-6 vote, not enough support to overcome a mayoral veto. Proponents argue the measure is necessary to protect thousands of rideshare jobs.

The robotaxi industry is booming nationwide, and the most widely known driverless rideshare vehicle operator — Waymo — has already been testing its fleet in the Twin Cities.

Supporters of autonomous vehicles say welcoming the industry in Minnesota would boost the economy, provide greater consumer choice, prevent drivers from discriminating against disabled riders, and increase safety. Those advocates — and Waymo itself — argued that the city ordinance will stifle the service in Minneapolis.

“At the end of the day, this boils down to safety,” council member Jamison Whiting said before voting against the ordinance Thursday.

Whiting said the data is clear: his research convinced him that autonomous vehicles are far safer than human drivers.

Critics see the emerging industry as the latest Big Tech attack on labor — and worry driverless cars actually introduce new safety, public nuisance and privacy concerns.

“Immigrant workers have come to me and said that this is an existential threat to them,” council member Aurin Chowdhury said Thursday. A majority of rideshare drivers in Minnesota are immigrants, according to state data.

At the Minnesota Capitol this spring there was bipartisan agreement that statewide regulation was needed, but disagreement about the safety of the vehicles and their impact on the local economy ultimately tanked efforts to pass legislation. That has left cities in the lurch to deal with driverless cars themselves, but it’s unclear if local governments have the legal authority to do so.

Progressives on the Minneapolis City Council championed the ordinance now headed to the mayor’s desk, which would require human safety monitors in autonomous vehicles. Skeptics of that proposal have scoffed at the concept of drivers in driverless cars — but advocates argue without that requirement, thousands of rideshare drivers could be put out of work.

“Automation has a demonstrated track record of leading to job displacement,” council member Robin Wonsley said during a Tuesday committee meeting. “I would hope we all want to make sure workers are not displaced as a result of us making sure we’re making technological strides in our city.”

The ordinance would also require that the human safety monitor have a driver’s license and that the monitor be paid minimum wage. Supporters also argue the measure gives the city more time to study the issue of autonomous vehicles because — if passed — the ordinance wouldn’t go into effect until October 2027.

Council member Elizabeth Shaffer, who opposed the ordinance, said Thursday that it didn’t make sense to advance a proposal before the council receives a report from city legislative staff about the robotaxi industry and how it could impact Minneapolis. That report is due to the council’s zoning committee Monday.

A spokesperson for Frey said before Thursday’s vote that he considers the ordinance “a bait for the state to come in and pre-empt us.” Frey has pushed for the state to take the lead on autonomous vehicle regulation instead.

While Waymo continues test-driving its fleet in the Twin Cities — with humans behind the wheel, and not yet taking customers — it’s not clear when the company might launch its rideshare service here.

A spokesperson for Waymo previously said that the proposed Minneapolis ordinance goes too far, and would limit the company’s ability to operate in the city.

Another proposed health system merger is poised to further reshape Minnesota’s healthcare industry.

Bloomington-based HealthPartners and Duluth-based Essentia Health announced Tuesday that their respective boards of directors have approved a merger plan.

If approved by regulators, the merger of the two nonprofit health systems is set to be complete by the start of next year. The new organization would take the HealthPartners name and have about 45,000 employees staffing dozens of hospitals and clinics across Minnesota, Wisconsin and North Dakota. It would be one of the largest healthcare systems in the region.

“This combination is about doing more for the people and communities who count on us,” HealthPartners President and CEO Andrea Walsh said in a statement announcing the merger.

“HealthPartners and Essentia Health share a belief that everyone deserves access to high-quality care and coverage, close to home and centered on their needs,” Walsh said. “Together, we can build on the strengths of both organizations to improve health, expand access and create a stronger future for the communities we serve.”

Essentia Health CEO Dr. David Herman said the two organizations “share similar missions and values, deep roots in this region, and a focus on improving health and well-being.”

“As a combined nonprofit health system, we will be able to better innovate and grow our workforce. That strong foundation will make us even better partners for our patients, working together to help people live their healthiest lives, wherever they call home,” Herman said in a statement.

It’s the third major proposed merger involving Minnesota health systems in 2026.

North Memorial Health and South Dakota-based Sanford Health completed a merger earlier this year.

And a proposed merger of Allina Health and California-based Sutter Health remains under review by state regulators.

Speaking with reporters Tuesday afternoon, Walsh and Herman said the merger is needed to confront challenges facing the broader healthcare sector, including rising healthcare costs and health insurance premiums, lower reimbursements, and workforce shortages.

“What we believe is HealthPartners and Essentia together, coming together, we can combine complementary strengths to improve health experience affordability and quality, and to navigate some of the industry trends that are a challenge not only in Minnesota but across the nation,” Walsh said.

“That’s what other health systems are finding — that when you have complementary capabilities, you’re stronger together,” Herman said.

Herman described the proposed merger as the two systems leading, rather than reacting, to a healthcare environment he described as “dynamic” and even “chaotic.”

“We know that while we’re strong, our patients, our communities, and our colleagues depend upon us. And coming together when we’re strong, working on things that we know are important — like access, affordability, getting your best care and your best health wherever you choose to live — are the things that are important,” he said.

HealthPartners and Essentia Health said Tuesday that they have “complementary strengths in care delivery, health plan coverage, urban and rural community health, research, medical education and innovation.”

They said the merger would give patients access to more medical expertise and specialists and give employees more career pathways within the organization.

Walsh would lead the combined organization, with Herman serving as president of combined clinical care group operations.

HealthPartners and Essentia said their patients and members should not see any changes or interruptions to health care or insurance coverage. Walsh and Herman said there are no plans to close clinics or hospitals.

For now, Essentia Health facilities will retain that branding. Herman said the plan is to convert them to the HealthPartners name at some point in the future, once the two systems are fully combined.

The Minnesota Nurses Association issued a statement saying it has “serious concerns” about the merger plan — with the union also saying its members who are employed by both health systems had no advance notice of the proposal ahead of Tuesday’s public announcement.

“Minnesota has now seen three major back-to-back healthcare consolidation announcements, and nurses are deeply concerned about what that could mean for our patients and communities,” MNA President Chris Rubesch, a registered nurse at Essentia Health, said in a statement. “Every time control over healthcare is concentrated in fewer hands, we need to understand what patients and communities stand to gain, what they could lose and who will be accountable for those outcomes.”

In a statement following Tuesday’s merger announcement, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said his office will gather public comments on the planned merger, as it reviews the proposal.

“Proposed healthcare consolidation requires close scrutiny,” Ellison said in a news release. “As we have done several times now, we will conduct a thorough review of this potential acquisition to ensure it complies with the law and is in the public interest.”

HealthPartners operates nine hospitals — including Regions Hospital in St. Paul — as well as dozens of clinics. It also offers health and dental insurance plans covering more than a 1.5 million people.

Essentia Health operates 14 hospitals and dozens of clinics in central and northern Minnesota, Wisconsin and North Dakota.

In 2025, Essentia Health was part of a proposed health system alliance involving Fairview Health Services and the University of Minnesota — but that proposal did not move forward.

In 2022, Essentia had also explored a possible merger with Wisconsin’s Marshfield Clinic Health System but later ended those discussions. Marshfield later merged with Sanford Health.

This story was produced in partnership with Harvest Public Media, a collaboration of public media newsrooms in the Midwest and Great Plains. It reports on food systems, agriculture and rural issues.

Growing diesel costs have been a pain for farmers who need the fuel to run equipment in their fields. Now, as harvest approaches, farmers face yet another obstacle as railroads have raised their shipping costs.

Railroad fuel surcharges have more than doubled in the past year as diesel prices have reached over $6 a gallon. Railroads carry about 1.6 million carloads of grain each year, according to the Association of American Railroads. That makes up 24 percent of domestic grain movements.

It’s not uncommon for railroads to add fees due to changing fuel costs. However, when these surcharges happen, the cost often trickles down to farmers in the shape of lower crop prices. That’s according to Mike Steenhoek, executive director of the Soy Transportation Coalition.

“Agriculture is a very competitive industry, and so what will often happen is if [grain shippers] try to pass those costs on to an importer from another country, what that importer very likely will do is say, ‘Well, I guess I'm going to buy more soybeans from Brazil or Argentina if you're trying to pass these costs on to me,’” Steenhoek said.

The grain shipper also doesn’t want to absorb those costs, which means the hot potato lands in farmers' hands.

“Farmers have options where they can sell to; maybe an elevator close by or a processor further down the road,” Steenhoek said. “But there is kind of a limit to how many points of sale a farmer has access to. So a lot of times the farmer just simply has to absorb that cost.”

Too early to see significant price changes

Some local grain elevators where farmers sell their crops have started to see changes in crop prices. However, David Ripplinger, a bioenergy economist at North Dakota State University, said it’s difficult to separate how much of that change is due to fuel surcharges and how much is due to normal changes around harvest time.

“You already have low prices because you have all of the supply coming online,” Ripplinger said. “So parsing out the exact impact of high diesel prices would take a little bit of math that I haven't done. I don't know if anyone's done that yet.”

There’s also another pressure point on the horizon that could affect transportation costs. Major railway company Union Pacific is looking to buy fellow railway, Norfolk Southern. Proponents of the deal say the merger could help optimize grain transportation. But Steenhoek said it could also mean increased base costs for transporting grain.

“One of the things that we have seen throughout history is that when you limit the number of transportation providers competing for the business of a shipper, in agriculture, in this case, that often results in higher rail rates being assigned to that railroad customer,” Steenhoek said.

Steenhoek added there’s already skepticism surrounding railways. He said there’s a frustration among agriculture shippers who feel the transportation cost hike is also a way to increase profit and revenue.

“As a customer, you don't want all the power to be on the other side of the table,” Steenhoek said.

Farmers eye surcharges

For now, current fuel surcharges may take some time to affect prices. Todd Davis, Indiana Farm Bureau chief economist, said he hasn’t seen crop bids change significantly from typical harvest patterns. But then again, he said, harvest has just begun.

“So the question will be, as farmers harvest and that grain enters the marketing channels, and we have transportation costs paying higher fuel expense: What is that going to do to bids?” Davis said.

Illinois farmer Adam Henkel is no stranger to rail surcharges. He’s seen them before and felt their effect on his prices. He said it’s not something you see as a line item.

“I think most of our suppliers are going to tell us, ‘Hey, we had to get this fuel surcharge in there,’” Henkel said. “So they're going to tell us about it, but we won't physically see it listed separately as most companies or most businesses would.”

Still, even with a fuel surcharge, Henkel looks forward to selling his crops, which include corn and soybeans. Recent U.S. Department of Agriculture crop reports show corn and soybean yields are lower than expected. Less supply means each bushel is worth more than last season.

“I did not lose money this year, but I'm not gonna sit here and brag about having a record year,” Henkel said. “There won't be all new machinery sitting on the farm next year.”

President Donald Trump on Monday announced plans for a new $15 billion steel plant in eastern Iowa that would be one of the largest in the United States — and use iron ore mined in Minnesota.

The new mill in eastern Iowa will be built by Mesabi Metallics, a Minnesota-based company owned by India’s Essar Group, an industrial conglomerate. The White House said the plant will begin producing steel in 2030 and create more than 2,000 jobs in the United States. When it’s fully built out, it’s expected to produce 10 million tons of steel a year, more than any other in the U.S.

The steel plant will be supplied by the new $2.5 billion iron ore mine that Mesabi developed on Minnesota’s Iron Range and officially opened earlier this month. It’s the first new iron ore mine in the state in a half-century.

The resulting steel will be produced from start to finish in the United States, the White House said.

The president touted the 50 percent tariffs on steel imports that he imposed last year as the impetus for the steel plant.

“Our steel industry is roaring back to life. Everyone is building their plants here because they don’t want to pay tariffs,” Trump said in the Oval Office. “It’s really not that complicated.”

The Mesabi Metallics mine’s opening comes at a critical time in northeastern Minnesota, after closures last year at two of the region’s six taconite facilities.

Mesabi has hired more than 200 workers so far, out of a planned 350 full-time employees at the mine near Nashwauk.

But news that Mesabi plans to build a steel plant in Iowa — and not in Minnesota — was called a “gut punch” by Republican state Rep. Spencer Igo, who represents the portion of the Iron Range where the new mine is located.

Igo said the mine is a “big win” for the Range — but he said Mesabi’s next investment going to Iowa “should frustrate everyone who cares about the future of northern Minnesota.”

“We cannot keep watching billions of dollars in investment and thousands of good-paying jobs go elsewhere and pretend there is nothing we can do about it,” Igo wrote. “The people of the Iron Range want this opportunity, and we have the workers, the resources, and the communities ready to support these projects. State leaders need to start making Minnesota a place where companies want to build and create jobs, not a place they look to leave behind. The most important part of public policy is partnership, and the state of Minnesota is missing that.”

Mesabi Metallics said the new Iowa steel plant will “reshape American steelmaking with a supply chain that is 100 percent American: mined, melted and poured.”

Mesabi CEO Joe Broking said in a statement Monday that the steel plant announcement “bolsters the long-term economic strength of Mesabi Metallics’ mine and pellet plant in Nashwauk, Minnesota, by tying it to a low-cost steel facility.”

“Mesabi Metallics is looking forward to further investment in Minnesota, and we look forward to continuing our work with the state to expand the mine capacity and build an additional hot briquetted iron facility in Minnesota,” Broking said.

Hot briquetted iron is a purer form of iron is used to feed smaller steel mills known as electric arc furnaces.

Broking added: “We have greatly appreciated the support of Governor Walz and the work of the DNR and MPCA to successfully permit the first new iron mine in Minnesota in 50 years.”

Broking told Itasca County officials earlier this month that Mesabi Metallics plans to submit permits to the state of Minnesota for a new iron plant in Nashwauk by the end of the year.

But he also told commissioners that before making the investment, the company needs to see more efficient state permitting and more competitive incentives. He also said Mesabi would need to regain control of state mineral leases that were awarded to rival mining company Cleveland-Cliffs in 2023.

The White House is framing Monday’s steel plant announcement as part of Trump’s push to revitalize American steel.

It comes as Trump is trying to energize Republican voters as his party faces challenging midterm elections. Iowa has found itself with competitive races for the Senate and the governor’s mansion this year.

As artificial intelligence companies create increasingly powerful models, lawmakers are calling for rules to regulate the technology. MPR News host Angela Davis and her guests talk about the debate over AI regulation, who should oversee it and what the guardrails could be.

Guests:

• Daniel Schwarcz is a professor of law at the University of Minnesota.

• Chris Farrell is the senior economics contributor for MPR News and Marketplace.

Subscribe to the MPR News with Angela Davis podcast on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify or RSS.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.    

The longtime St. Paul factory behind Pearson’s Salted Nut Roll is shutting down for good Monday.

Pearson’s Candy Company said rising production costs and higher prices for ingredients like chocolate made operating the 67-year-old factory unsustainable. The company said it was laying off about 80 employees.

Pearson’s Candy Company declined to comment.

What are community members saying?

Ruth Markowitz and Gayle Winegar are both St. Paul residents and good friends. They both have fears of what business the city could lose next.

“I was really sad to hear that this is closing, really sad,” Markowitz said. “It just gave people jobs, it gave people pride, it gave people another thing from St. Paul.”

Markowitz, a St. Paul resident for over 27 years, said she would drive by the factory often.

“I would think, ‘That's amazing’ that like national nut roll is down the block from me, and it makes me so happy that it's a local thing, and it makes it real,” she said.

Winegar said it felt like a national disaster to her friend when the news broke, who asked her for a picture of the factory before it shut down for good.

The factory didn’t hold the same sentiment for Winegar, but she remembers getting a Nut Goodie from her local grocery store as a kid.

“I feel like I'm watching a body break. That's what it feels like to me, and it makes me sad,” Winegar said. “And I have hope for St. Paul, so I'm not going to say it's dead and buried, but it makes me sad.”

Anne Charlet is from South St. Paul but currently lives in France. She said one of the first things she does when visiting is grab a Salted Nut Roll.

“Peanuts are not a big thing in France,” Charlet said. "I just like the taste and flavor and the crunch. I just worry that the quality will go down, too.”

She understands the reason Pearson's gave for closing but has questions of her own.

"We’re old enough to have seen a lot of places close down, and you have to just have these little moments of grief," Charlet said. "And then there goes another one.”

When Joy Loera opened Uni Uni Bubble Tea in 2023 it seemed like the perfect location — smack dab on Rochester’s busy Second Street corridor and right across the street from Mayo Clinic’s St. Marys hospital.

But three years later her storefront is all but hidden by trucks, cranes, concrete barricades and a chain link fence. The road is getting torn up and rebuilt for a new bus rapid transit line, which will have a fleet of buses run up and down it every few minutes in a loop.

It’s a signature component of Rochester’s 20-year, $5.6 billion Destination Medical Center redevelopment project aimed at remaking the city to accommodate booming population growth and make it more attractive to patients, their families, and other visitors who come to Mayo Clinic from all over the world.

“It’s really, really bad,” Loera said. “When we signed the lease, we had no idea this [would] be going on. You have to work double or triple of your usual work time [to make less money.] But if you don’t work that hard, you get nothing.”

Cars cannot drive past her entrance. There’s a parking lot in the back, but you’d have to follow a confusing maze of detour signs to find it.

Loera said it’s been like this for a year, and she’s expecting at least another year of the same. The bus rapid transit line is scheduled to open August 2027.

The construction is taking a toll on many businesses. Loera isn’t the only one losing business. Two of Loera’s neighbors on Second Street recently closed their restaurants, and a third business announced it will close later this year, citing lost business due to the ongoing construction. And many of the remaining shops and restaurants say they are just barely hanging on.

“Each day, it feels like I’m waiting to hear about the next business that’s going to close,” said Will Forsman, who owns Cafe Steam, a small chain of coffee shops in downtown Rochester.

What Rochester is experiencing is not unique. Yingling Fan, an urban and regional planning professor at the University of Minnesota said she sees the same disruptions happening in the Twin Cities metropolitan area.

While big transportation infrastructure projects are typically worth it in the long run from an economic development perspective, Fan said that in the short-term, the construction can negatively impact business revenue. And some businesses have proven to be especially vulnerable, like small businesses with only one location and restaurants.

“The impact is not universal,” Fan said. “And it has an equity implication because typically the smaller business owners tend to be racial, ethnic minorities. If the city has a goal in terms of making sure the business community is diverse enough, it's really important to pay attention to the needs of the smaller businesses.”

‘No end in sight’

In late August, Jamphem “Pen” Seeley announced on social media that she was closing her restaurant, Thai-riffic, effective immediately:

“After two long years of navigating construction challenges and roadblocks, we have made the heartbreaking decision to close our front door permanently,” she wrote. “The detours and construction have made it increasingly hard for you to find us, and we deeply appreciate your unwavering support through it all.”

The brew pub Thesis Beer Project said in its closure announcement earlier that month that construction had cost it about 50 percent of its revenue. Tinn’s Grilled Philly Steak Subs, closed its Second Street Rochester shop and relocated to Northfield in March due to “construction challenges.”

Cindy Steinhauser, deputy city administrator for Rochester, said the city is trying its best to communicate frequently with businesses impacted by the construction.

She explained that the city maintains an interactive map on its website with construction timelines, it sends out a regular newsletter with updates on the bus rapid transit line, the city holds weekly virtual meetings that businesses can join to ask questions, and it has set up signage all over downtown to help people find businesses that might be hidden amid all of the construction.

“Our small businesses are the [lifeblood] of our community and our country,” Steinhauser said. “We want to try and support them to the best extent possible in the way that is most relevant for them.”

Will Forsman of Cafe Steam said, for him, the communication has been uneven at times, and he claims the city’s interactive website with the construction timelines isn’t always accurate.

“We were kind of blindsided by the construction itself,” Forsman said. “We were [given] assurances that construction was done for that segment of Second Street, only to have it resume like a month after we opened our location there.”

Forsman opened his newest location on Second Street in March. After a brief honeymoon period ended, he began to see an immediate downturn, with 30 to 40 percent fewer customers coming in than they had initially.

“People are just having a difficult time getting here,” said Forsman, whose location is blocked on the east and west by the construction. “And it feels like there’s really no end in sight as far as we can see.”

Wine Wednesdays, discounted coffees, and pop ups

In the meantime, some of the businesses on Second Street in Rochester are trying to make do by getting creative.

Spyhouse Coffee Roasters, another coffee shop along Second Street, has been suffering from construction since March 2025. It’s not only coping with the bus transit project — it’s also right across the street from Mayo Clinic’s massive hospital expansion.

Gil Paz, Spyhouse’s cafe manager, said the coffee shop has lost 30 percent of its business year over year. This location is a franchise and not a part of the Spyhouse chain of coffee shops in the Twin Cities, so it can’t rely on the other locations to stay afloat.

Paz said he knew he had to make changes, and fast.

Sometimes, the shop hosts live music or board game nights. They’ve tried hosting workshops on watercolor painting, cupcake decorating, and coffee tastings. Wine Wednesdays have become popular.

“We’re seeing 16 to 20 people show up,” Paz said. “They’re [crocheting] on the side or they’re working on puzzles over there. It’s just been really cool to see that community gathering space exists here.”

Paz said that these events have helped Spyhouse survive, but it’s still struggling.

“We know that at the end of [the construction,] it's going to be great, and we're going to be super thankful to have what is coming for the community,” Paz said. “It's just in the meantime, how do we navigate, adapt, and adjust to get us to the end of it?

Spyhouse’s neighbors are taking other approaches to make ends meet. While Thai-riffic no longer serves customers in its restaurant, it’s staying open as a catering business. Uni Uni, the bubble tea shop, has been doing pop ups across southeast Minnesota.

And Cafe Steam did a month-long partnership with Mayo Clinic, where hospital staff could get discounted coffees and Mayo Clinic footed the bill. Forsman said the incentive helped his daily sales a lot.

Moving forward

The University of Minnesota’s Fan explained that before big construction projects disrupt small businesses, it’s important for developers and the city to find ways to support those vulnerable shops and restaurants.

For example, she notes that back in 2011, when the light rail transit system was under construction across the Twin Cities, the cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis offered impacted small retail businesses and restaurants the ability to apply for $20,000, interest-free, forgivable loans to help them get through the downturn.

Paz of Spyhouse in Rochester said even if Mayo Clinic or the city was more intentional about ordering catered lunches or renting meeting spaces from businesses on Second St., that would be helpful.

“We're not asking for a handout, but we're your neighbors,” Paz said. “We're gonna help you if you need someone to help you mow your lawn, and we hope that you help us rake the leaves.”

Special thanks to Danger Boat Productions and the Minnesota Humanities Center for their Sketches of Minnesota events around the state that helped inform this report.

Minnesota farmers have been fending off highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) every year since the USDA detected the ongoing outbreak in 2022.

The disease came to Minnesota earlier this spring and was later eliminated for about a month and a half, according to Minnesota Board of Animal Health Assistant Director Shauna Voss.

That period of time was a breath of fresh air for her and her team.

“But we never completely just wash our hands of this and walk away,” said Voss. “We continue to prepare for the next thing.”

The team’s break ended on Sept. 1, when HPAI was confirmed in a Wright County commercial flock of 29,800 birds. Since then, seven commercial flocks and three backyard flocks have had confirmed cases. That’s more than 260,000 birds.

The fact that HPAI was detected in early September is disappointing, Voss said. Usually, the disease pops up in October. It’s unknown why HPAI is here so early this fall.

“That's the one constant thing about influenza viruses,” said Voss. “They're unpredictable, and they're always changing.”

How does HPAI work?

HPAI is a bird flu strain that’s deadly to poultry and can annihilate whole flocks in mere days.

The disease arrives here through migratory birds from Canada trying to reach warmer climates in the south. When they make pit stops in Minnesota, they mingle with healthy birds and spread the illness.

“It’s just like kids going back to school,” said Voss. “They have to share all of their things and all of their viruses, and so that is when we start to see cases because we’ve got a lot of activity happening through our flyway, right in the heart of where we have a lot of poultry production.”

Minnesota leads the nation in turkey production, with producers raising about 45 million birds annually. By the time migratory birds reach more southern states, Voss said the virus load decreases.

When HPAI is detected, the response often entails culling bird populations, cleaning the barn where they lived, completely disinfecting the site and waiting for weeks before restocking with new birds.

HPAI has been regularly detected in Minnesota over the past four years. Voss said it was unusual when the disease first appeared in the state. Now, while her team still treats disease responses seriously, it’s become much more routine.

“That doesn’t mean that it's not tiring for our response team, so making sure that all of our responders get a break and they can go back and do their regular work on top of it is a really important thing to monitor,” said Voss.

Developing a vaccine against HPAI is tricky because many countries with trade agreements with the U.S. don’t accept vaccinated birds.

That means Voss and her team are left to hope that at some point the virus will disperse from the wild bird population.

“At least for the near future, we should expect that we will have spring outbreaks and fall outbreaks,” said Voss. “I think until that virus really changes and hopefully at some point it dissipates out of our wild bird population, until we get there, I think we're in this for the long haul.”

Deep in the giant underground salt caverns of Louisiana and Texas, the U.S. government stores hundreds of millions of barrels of crude oil.

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is a special government oil stockpile that eventually gets refined into the things people rely on, like gasoline and diesel.

But now the reserve is low, threatening one of the few government levers to ease high gasoline prices.

Since the U.S. and Israel went to war with Iran in late February causing an oil shipping logjam, the Trump administration has tapped into the stockpile multiple times in an effort to boost the country's fuel supplies.

Gas prices are still high, diesel is at a record high, and the reserve has shrunk more than 30% in six months. While the reserve held around 415 million barrels of oil in February, it now holds less than 285 million barrels of oil — lower than it has been since the early 1980s.

These rapid drawdowns of oil threaten the salt caverns' structure, says Samantha Gross, director of the energy security and climate initiative at the Brookings Institution, a nonpartisan policy think tank. As the reserves get lower and lower, the physical facilities can get degraded, Gross says: " You can damage them by pumping too much out of them."

And there's an economic risk, too, as the war with Iran drags on, says Ben Cahill, who covers the global energy sector as a  non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, a nonpartisan think tank. Before the war, global oil stockpiles were high and there was lots of oil on ships across the world's oceans. Now that oil has been mostly used up. Should the U.S. want to replenish its reserves, there's a lot less to go around, he says. Brent crude, the global benchmark, remains over $100 a barrel — 47% higher than when the war began.

The Trump administration is now in a weaker position to use the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to lower gasoline prices, Cahill says. It's already made a few other moves to drive down prices, including temporarily waiving the Jones Act to make it easier for ships to move fuel to U.S. ports, and allowing gasoline producers to start selling their "winter blends" — which are cheaper to make — a little earlier this year.

" A lot of the things that got us through the last six months, all those buffers, have really been worn away," Cahill says.

Can an oil deal with Venezuela refill the reserves?

In late August, the Trump administration announced it was entering a partnership with an oil company in Venezuela allowing the federal government a majority stake in 17 Venezuelan oil fields. In an online statement, the White House said the new deal would ensure "a stable supply of low-cost oil that can facilitate refilling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve."

A few days after the White House announced the new deal, U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright clarified that the plan was not to fill up the U.S. reserve with a bunch of Venezuelan crude oil. Rather, he suggested during an interview with CNBC, the U.S. might exchange U.S. barrels for Venezuelan ones.

That's because not all crude oil is the same — some is physically lighter or heavier and sulphur levels vary. Much of Venezuela's oil is heavy and dense, with a lot of sulphur, says Gross, of the Brookings Institution.

"It's this heavy, goopy, thicker than molasses stuff," she says, "That's not necessarily what you want to put in these caverns."

Much of the oil in the U.S. strategic reserves is lighter, with medium or light levels of sulphur, says Carl Larry, a manager at Enverus, an energy data and research provider. Lighter crude, Larry says, is easier for producing gasoline and diesel than heavier crude.

On CNBC, Wright said as part of the deal the U.S. could swap different grades of oil: "We'll swap you a barrel of heavy crude for a barrel of light or medium United States crude."

But even if the U.S. wants to do a swap for Venezuelan oil, much of the new production won't happen anytime soon. Some of the 17 oil fields under discussion in the U.S. deal in Venezuela are new, and will need to be developed from scratch, says Jorge León, head of geopolitical analysis at research firm Rystad Energy. Others, he says, will need re-investment and redevelopment.

"You need to literally make the holes on the ground and insert cement and piping and build all the infrastructure," León continued.

Some oil fields are so far away from infrastructure that they will take over a decade for oil to start flowing, says Francisco Monaldi, director of the Latin American Energy Program at the Baker Institute at Rice University. "I wouldn't say 'never,' but say 10 to 20 years," he says.

Much of the oil under discussion in the U.S. deal is the so-called Faja Venezuelan oil; it's thick like peanut butter and will be difficult to extract. The oil company that the U.S. is partnering with in Venezuela is Barbados-headquartered North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP).

In an email to NPR, the company said, "The NABEP team is deeply familiar with the unique challenges of oil production in Venezuela. Our engineering team is led by local industry professionals with decades of experience, including in our PetroCedeno and Junín Sur fields in the Faja. This team's track-record is clear, having already increased production in NABEP's existing assets tenfold over the past two years."

Lessons from China

Ultimately, the U.S. can learn something about how to handle their strategic reserves from China, says Antoine Halff, non-resident fellow at Columbia University and an expert on oil markets.

China, which has the largest oil stockpiles in the world, has dipped into its reserves since the Iran war began in February, Halff says. But China is drawing from it less because of the nation's growing fleet of electric cars, trucks and scooters. Electric transport is already displacing demand for at least 1.5 million barrels of oil a day in China, according to the International Energy Agency.

"To manage market disruption risks, China shows it pays to have a multi-pronged approach," Halff says in an email.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has reversed federal policies that promoted or encouraged electric vehicles; for example, last year it scrapped a federal tax credit worth up to $7,500 for buying or leasing a new EV.

Ultimately, some energy experts say the solution to a healthy reserve might not only be the ability to quickly replenish supply — it might also be shrinking demand.

Copyright 2026, NPR

The German multinational chain Aldi opened its downtown St. Paul location this week, marking the return of a full-service grocery store to the area.

Downtown St. Paul has been without a grocery store for over a year, since the closure of Lunds & Byerlys in March 2025. Aldi took over its space on Robert and 10th streets.

Downtown St. Paul residents, workers and leaders celebrated Aldi’s grand opening on Thursday morning. Around 150 people were in line ahead of the 8:30 a.m. ribbon cutting.

“I'm just glad we got something like this in downtown St. Paul. It’s a big thing for the community,” said Jerry Campbell, who lives nearby.

Like many, Campbell said he is thankful to have a grocery store back in walking distance.

“For me, it means less money spent getting groceries delivered because I don't drive. Now I have a place I can just walk to and fit easily my schedule,” said William Huhner, who lives and works in the area.

Retired couple Ann Sullivan and Wayne Rhendahl were among a sizable crowd that gathered Wednesday morning for Aldi’s soft open. They appreciated now being able to purchase food in smaller quantities — and at a discount.

“We definitely notice the lower prices,” Rhendahl said.

St. Paul invested in Aldi success

St. Paul City Council President Rebecca Noecker said the city worked to support Aldi’s opening because the number one concern from residents in the area has been not having a grocery store.

When Lunds & Byerlys closed, the company cited “significant staffing and financial challenges” since 2020 as challenges. The company said harassment, shoplifting and vandalism made it hard to retain employees and managers. Long-term construction around the store and work-from-home policies also reduced foot traffic in the area, according to the Saint Paul Downtown Alliance.

Noecker said she reassured Aldi representatives that the city would be a good partner and pointed to significant investments in safety programs and public infrastructure. The $8 million funding into Pedro Park across the street from Aldi, which reopened last year, was one example.

Is Aldi a sign of downtown resurgence?

Area leaders say yes.

“I do anticipate it will attract more people both to live, work, and visit downtown, and then that will only have positive spillover effects in terms of other retail and other amenities that we can expect to see,” Noecker said.

Joe Spencer, president of the Saint Paul Downtown Alliance, called Aldi “a great shot in the arm” for the local economy and said it reflects a shifting market tide in downtown St. Paul.

A new 178-unit apartment building opened Thursday, with the adjacent urban park near completion. Investors have recently purchased key downtown buildings and shared plans to infuse money into the properties.

“We're seeing this new moment in downtown St. Paul,” Spencer said. “We're seeing new growth. We're seeing new apartments come online. We're seeing the population start to grow again, and we're seeing new investments happening in downtown St. Paul.”

He said the last time there was such momentum in downtown St. Paul was around 10 to 15 years ago, when Lunds & Byerlys, CHS Field and several restaurants in the Lowertown neighborhood first opened.

“We're really excited about the future and the kind of transformation that's upon us,” Spencer said.

After the store opening Thursday, people carried bright Aldi bags down the street and into nearby restaurants. One pair peered into a pizzeria with a sign: “Coming soon.”

The union representing about 150 doctors at Allina Health’s Mercy Hospital in Coon Rapids and its Unity campus in Fridley announced Wednesday that it has reached a tentative agreement for a first contract with the health system.

Doctors Council SEIU, the union that represents the physicians, said the three-year contract includes pay transparency, greater professional autonomy and a grievance process for advocating on behalf of patients. However, the union has dropped its demand for paid sick leave, saying doctors were not receiving the time off required under state law.

The agreement follows a four-day strike last week, which is believed to be the first by inpatient doctors at a private-sector hospital in U.S. history.

“This hard-won first contract gives us the written protections we needed so we can keep providing the care our patients deserve, instead of watching burnout drive good doctors out,” said Dr. Saul Singh in a statement.

A spokesperson for Allina Health, one of Minnesota’s largest health systems, confirmed the tentative agreement in a statement and said the agreement will now go to a ratification vote by union members in the coming days.

If the doctors, including obstetricians, psychiatrists and critical care physicians, vote to ratify the contract, it will conclude three years of 66 contentious bargaining negotiations with Allina.

In 2023, Allina physicians voted to unionize after facing challenging conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. The union said long hours and difficult working environments motivated the doctors to organize. Allina contested the vote, delaying federal certification of the union for nearly a year.

Dr. John Wust, an OB-GYN at Mercy Hospital in Coon Rapids, said while striking outside of the hospital last week that, during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, physician input was excluded from business decisions affecting patients.

He said unionized physicians at Allina are concerned about the growing influence of artificial intelligence in electronic medical records and the push to use AI in diagnosing patients.

“Our union collectively protects the rights of physicians in their advocacy for patients and patient safety in the context of very powerful economic forces, including the emergence of AI in healthcare,” Wust said on the tentative agreement with Allina.

The agreement comes while Allina pursues a proposed merger with California-based Sutter Health, which is currently under review by the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office.

The two healthcare systems said the agreement, if finalized, would result in an investment of more than $2 billion in facilities across Minnesota and western Wisconsin, including new locations and improved technology.

Unions representing doctors, nurses, and other healthcare workers at Allina have expressed concerns about the merger and its potential impact on union members' contracts, benefits and patient care.

Reporters from three news outlets banned from the White House by President Donald Trump were back on the grounds Thursday afternoon, hours after a federal judge ordered the administration to reinstate their access.

On a chaotic day at the White House gates and in court, CNN, MS NOW and Politico journalists were allowed back in by midday, after earlier issues gaining access.

It was the latest development in an extraordinary showdown between Trump and media outlets whose coverage he dislikes. And it played out during a heavy news cycle with Chinese leader Xi Jinping visiting with Trump and world leaders gathered for the United Nations General Assembly.

On Thursday morning, a Secret Service agent had confiscated the journalists’ credentials, the news outlets said in a court filing asking for an immediate hearing to address what seemed to be the White House ignoring the court’s order. The administration said in its own filing shortly after the reporters were allowed back in that it took the White House time to begin the process of reinstating badges.

Trump first announced he was banning the outlets Friday, assailing what he called “fake news.” He later said their reporting was a risk to national security. The outlets argued in a joint lawsuit that the ban was a blatant violation of the First Amendment because it singled them out for the content of their coverage.

In his late-night ruling to temporarily strike down the ban, Kelly said the news outlets had met the legal thresholds to obtain a temporary restraining order, in effect for 14 days. Kelly said they were likely to succeed in showing their access had been revoked without due process.

“This is a high bar, but Plaintiffs have met it,” he wrote.

Kelly — whom Trump nominated in 2017 and who ordered a CNN journalist’s access restored in a similar case in 2018 — said the government must have clear standards for conduct that would lead to revoking a press pass. He called the standard of objectionable reporting outlined in letters that the White House sent the outlets “so vague it hardly does the trick.”

The judge also made clear he did not buy the administration’s argument that the news outlets’ reporting endangered national security — and noted that Trump himself had not used that argument in the beginning, focusing solely on what he called negative coverage.

“Nothing in the record ... suggests that the revocation of Plaintiffs’ hard passes was motivated by national security concerns,” he wrote.

The ruling came after Kelly heard arguments in an emergency hearing Wednesday. Temporary restraining orders are typically designed to preserve the status quo pending a closer review of the case by the court.

“This is a strong ruling vindicating freedom of the press, due process and the rule of law," Theodore Boutrous Jr., attorney for the outlets, said in an emailed statement. "We greatly appreciate the court’s swift action.”

The White House did not respond to emails from The Associated Press asking for comment on the order.

Attorneys debated access to the White House and any risk to national security

Boutrous argued in the hearing that there was an urgent need for renewed access, saying that the ban caused irreparable harm to the outlets at a time of momentous news events. “We’re at war. We have world leaders coming to Washington.”

Justice Department attorney Michael Velchik, in his argument, reiterated the administration’s point that the president has the right to choose who gets into the White House.

“Access to the White House is a privilege, not a right,” Velchik said.

In arguing that Trump was not engaging in viewpoint discrimination — the government singling out specific media outlets for the content of what they say or publish — Velchik said the president had criticized other news organizations, but not banned them. He noted, for example, that Trump had called ABC “the worst."

He added: “The president should be able to take immediate action to protect national security."

In response, Boutrous said, “Suddenly it’s a national security case,” arguing that the president brought up that point only after the lawsuit was filed.

Trump “keeps proving our point,” Boutrous said, describing how the president has consistently used negative coverage of him as justification for the ban.

Kelly seemed to agree, writing of the national security claim: “Certainly, that is not what President Trump said when he announced that he was ‘banning’ Plaintiffs from the White House — instead, he focused on the alleged lack of truthfulness and negativity of Plaintiffs’ reporting.”

The Trump administration outlined ‘reporting incidents’ of each news outlet

In a filing Tuesday, administration lawyers detailed letters sent to each of the three news outlets that identified “a non-exhaustive list of reporting incidents, including those that have threatened national security and spread falsehoods.”

Among the incidents cited were: CNN reporting on “‘top-secret’ construction details related to the East Wing bunker”; MS NOW reporting “on an alleged leak investigation”; and Politico publishing “a document detailing funding for the White House ballroom containing intricate descriptions of how the Secret Service would invest in security improvements.”

Politico’s letter also included an incident in June of a report in which a “senior administration official … granted anonymity” predicted whether a preliminary deal would end the conflict with Iran.

That item appeared to reference a background briefing set up by the White House, where an official briefed reporters on condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the administration itself. Several other outlets also reported the official’s remarks.

Major networks refrained from covering Trump for the media pool

The ban prompted other media outlets to take action in solidarity. The U.S. network press pool — consisting of the five major networks, including CNN — has suspended coverage of Trump pool events pending further notice.

The ruling did not address that rotating pool. After the hearing Wednesday, the networks continued to refuse to air footage of Trump without assurances that CNN would be permitted into the White House pool.

At Joint Base Andrews, where the president formally welcomed Chinese President Xi Jinping, journalists from Fox News, CBS and NBC were present but not shooting video.

Other television outlets whose crews were present, according to signs on their tripods and cameras, were NewsNation, Newsmax, Right Side Broadcasting Network, One America News and LindellTV.

Ahead of Wednesday’s hearing, an amicus brief was filed by other news groups, including The AP, urging the court to immediately restore the three outlets’ White House access.

In a Winona State University biology lab, freshman Chayse Pulvermacher was isolating the DNA of an apple and then pipetting it into a special gel to see if she could identify it. The process is full of skills she hopes will help her land a job after college.

“I would love to work in a hospital, but bedside is my worst nightmare,” she said. “[I’d] much rather work in a lab setting, testing things — basically like this,” she said gesturing to the lab equipment around her.

Pulvermacher may have great luck finding a job in nearby Rochester in a few years, where a slew of new bioscience companies are cropping up around Mayo Clinic.

Nurturing and growing these startups is a big goal of Destination Medical Center, Rochester’s 20-year, $5.6 billion endeavor to remake the city and diversify the employer base beyond Mayo Clinic.

But some of those bio-science startups are struggling to find the right employees with the right skills.

In recent years, the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development convened a working group of the region's public and private sector institutions to come up with solutions.

Starting early

Employers in the DEED working group often say they are looking for people with specific lab skills, said Becky Zoubek, who leads the working group for DEED.

“Cell culture, [laboratory] quality control and regulatory expertise are pretty high on that list,” she said.

Schools like Winona State University have adjusted their curriculum in recent years to meet employer demand.

“[Students] are learning techniques that are being used diagnostically, research-wise,” said WSU Biology Department Chair Amy Runck. “And then all those other skills along the way too, whether it's pipetting, centrifuges, running gels, quantifying DNA and RNA, all those supportive techniques they're learning that make them well qualified to work in a lab.”

The working group is also exploring short-term courses that could be taught locally and quickly to expose new hires to a specific skill.

Meanwhile, Destination Medical Center officials are working to rebrand the city as one that’s not only home to Mayo Clinic, but one where innovation can thrive. They tout a soon-to-open shared lab space downtown called One Discovery Square as a big step forward: Once open, it will allow startups born inside Mayo to grow locally without having to build huge, expensive laboratories.

Gov. Tim Walz joined local government, business and health care industry leaders at an event at One Discovery Square Wednesday to praise the DMC’s progress in becoming what Mayo Clinic President and CEO Dr. Gianrico Farrugia called “a world class health care innovation hub and a nexus for economic development in the state and the country.”

Because of the “robust biomedical innovation ecosystem” that has been developed, “world class companies and organizations are now constantly looking to Rochester as the place to come pursue these innovation ideas,” Farrugia said.

It’s an advantage the region is trying to capitalize on.

“Rochester really has a combination of assets that's really difficult to replicate, especially with the Mayo Clinic, and that's obviously an extraordinary anchor,” DEED’s Zoubek told MPR News. “Companies can be located in close proximity to the Mayo researchers and clinicians and other life science companies and a growing innovation infrastructure.”

But these biomedical and med-tech startups are not just having difficulty finding people with bioscience degrees and experience working in laboratories; that’s just one piece of Rochester’s employment puzzle. Employers also need workers with business, legal, technology and bookkeeping skills and experience, too.

Niche skills

Cytotheryx is a Mayo Clinic spin-off that focuses on growing human liver cells called hepatocytes in pigs, so they can be used in research and in liver disease treatment.

Finding workers with animal husbandry experience has been essential to the company’s success so far, said Anna Argo, who is the company’s interim CEO. It’s a niche expertise, but one easier to come by in the rolling farmland of the Upper Midwest compared to the east and west coasts, where most biotech science and commercialization is happening.

"It's the workforce that we have here — the ability to draw from people who have lived and grown up around animals, and who studied animal science,” she said.

But Argo said filling other jobs is more difficult. For example, she said it took a year to fill a finance and operations job. Argo said it can be difficult to draw certain types of candidates to Rochester because of Mayo’s dominance.

“When you recruit people, especially from out of state, if they were to want to take a career step someplace else, there's Mayo, of course. There are smatterings of biotech companies here, but not a lot,” she said. “And so, you're asking them to relocate for potentially a very small pool of next opportunities."

Another Mayo spin-off is Vyriad, which is developing new cancer therapies. After developing the concept within Mayo’s walls, Vyriad was created in 2015 — and staying in the community was an obvious choice, said Vyriad president Luke Russell.

Vyriad has drawn on expertise within Mayo Clinic and recruited employees from the hospital, too. It grew quickly into unused office space once home to IBM.

But Russell said it's hard to find executives with drug development experience in Rochester, partly because the city doesn’t have a major academic anchor.

"In large cities like in Boston or in San Francisco where the ecosystem for biotech exists in just a much stronger way, it's also much easier to find the biotech executives that you need to run these types of companies."

Russell said diversifying Rochester's workforce will take time, because the city's reputation needs to change, too. In the meantime, the company is developing talent from within, giving younger hires opportunities to grow professionally, with the hope that they’ll put down roots and stay for the long haul.

"It’s a huge branding operation. Just getting the name out there, talking about what we're doing, and talking more about the number of opportunities that exist here,” Russell said. “I think it’s really helpful in making people aware that this really is an opportunity, and it's worth moving for."

A full synthetic oil change at Turbo Tim’s used to cost under $100, but now that isn’t the case.

The shop absorbed the losses on oil changes and other oil services for nearly six months before raising prices by about 20 to 30 percent nearly five months ago, according to St. Paul-Midway store manager Troy Muchow.

“We weren't really aware how long or how much these prices were going to be changing, but they're not changing and they're not falling back down, and we were forced to make some hard decisions that we didn't want to make as a company,” Muchow said.

Price increases and supply issues in the auto shop industry are tied in part to disruptions in global oil markets, since the U.S. war with Iran began in February. Roughly 20 percent of the world’s petroleum supply passed through the Strait of Hormuz, a key shipping route out of the Persian Gulf.

Muchow said they typically use 300 to 400 gallons of motor oil a week, but because of supplier shortages, they’d be lucky to receive half of that. They’ve been forced to go to other suppliers to meet their needs.

“They're trying to be fair to their customers, and they just are looking at the grand scheme of things, so instead of filling up some people, some of their customers, they're just trying to be fair, which is totally understandable, so it leaves a shortage for not just us, but a lot of automotive shops out there,” he said.

What are the experts saying?

Lake Speed Jr., a lubrication specialist, said refineries are choosing to make more diesel fuel instead of the synthetic-based oil because it’ll give them the highest profit margins.

“So even when there's a supply shortage in Group III synthetic base oil prices that are at an all-time high, they can still make more money-making diesel, so they're decommissioning long term, making synthetic base oil, so they can make more diesel,” Speed Jr. said.

He cited a HF Sinclair's Petro-Canada Lubricants plant in Mississauga, Ontario, where the company plans to phase out base-oil refining during 2027 as an example. This matters in Minnesota because much of the state’s crude oil supply comes from Canada.

Speed Jr. said oil companies aren’t the root cause of the issue, but that “this is a geopolitical problem that caused this.” He believes there’s more to come though and said this is just the “first big wave" of retail price increases.

“If nothing changes, and if raw material prices stay high, there's probably another wave of raw material prices coming,” he said. “If supply stays limited and people can't get the raw materials, then basic economics kicks in and people are going to pay more to get them, it's a mess.”

Naafey Sardar, an assistant economics professor at St. Olaf College, said the increased prices will ultimately keep falling to the consumers who need oil changes.

“I still feel like people will have to find a way to afford that, but it's gonna maybe come at a cost, so maybe people start racking up credit card debt, but they're eventually going to have to find a way to pay for it,” he said. “It's like food, you're still going to need to eat food, irrespective of or no matter how expensive it gets.”

If the war drags on until the end of next year, he said the economy could fall into a recession.

“You go back to the recessions the U.S. experienced in the early 90s, in the 70s and the 80s,” he said. “Those decades or those recessions were essentially preceded by higher oil prices and higher energy prices.”

Tyler Schipper, an associate professor of economics at the University of St. Thomas, said even if the war we’re to end today, consumers would still feel those high costs.

“Even in a post-Iran conflict world where all of this is resolved, there are still going to be lingering higher costs simply because the world has changed.” Schipper said. “Iran realizes it has this this economic, for lack of a better word, trump card that it can rely on in the future to disrupt international trade.”

At a public hearing this week, several Minneapolis rideshare drivers told the City Council they’re worried about losing their jobs to driverless taxis. But some residents said they want to see the additional transportation option on the roads.

The council is considering an ordinance that would require autonomous vehicle companies to pay a “human monitor” — a licensed driver — to sit in the driver’s seat of their vehicles. Companies would also need to get a license to operate from the city. That would apply to Waymo, a driverless taxi company currently testing out the roads in Minneapolis.

Council member Robin Wonsley is one of the proposal’s authors. She told members of the council and the public that the city needs to establish some ground rules before those companies roll out.

“We do not have any regulations in place,” Wonsley said. “If these autonomous vehicles or big tech companies decide to come and operate and set up shop here in Minneapolis, our residents nor workers have any protections from any likely adverse effects.”

Those adverse effects, she said, include the threat of job loss for the city’s thousands of rideshare drivers.

Several of those drivers and other supporters spoke at Tuesday’s public hearing.

Uber and Lyft driver Abdurshad Mohammed said he hopes the ordinance would protect drivers' jobs.

“The money I earn helps pay for my family needs. It goes to local businesses, groceries, gas, rent and other expenses,” Mohammed said. “So I'm worried when I hear about companies like Waymo and Tesla coming into Minneapolis and replacing drivers with autonomous vehicles.”

A spokesperson for Waymo said in a previous statement that the ordinance goes too far in its proposed regulations and would limit the company’s ability to operate in the city.

At Tuesday’s meeting, some residents urged the council to consider potential benefits of driverless taxi services.

Justin Salisbury, a blind Minneapolis resident, told the council he sometimes has drivers suddenly cancel his rides. He wonders if it’s because of his disability, and said he’s heard from other blind residents — especially those who use service animals — that they struggle to get rides.

“Disabled people want to be a part of driving Minnesota in the sense of being part of the workforce, and a lot of times lack of access to enough transportation is part of why we don't get the jobs that we need,” Salisbury said. “If I had the choice to choose an autonomous vehicle, I might choose that.”

Some speakers pointed to data indicating that driverless cars are safer than those driven by humans. Waymo says its cars crash less and result in fewer injuries, based on its data from other cities. And some residents pointed out that they’ve been in Ubers and Lyfts with drivers who break road rules.

But several speakers said they have safety concerns about Waymo vehicles, too. Phoenix Stremski said she owns a Tesla with autonomous driving capabilities, and uses the autonomous features most of the time. But she still takes over in tricky conditions.

“There have been occasions where it has, in road construction season, attempted to drive me into a 15-foot-deep ditch or a road that wasn't even there,” Stremski said. “Is it ready for prime time? Maybe eventually. Maybe we'll get there.”

Council member Wonsley agreed that she wants more information on safety before the cars can operate here, pointing to incidents in other cities of Waymo vehicles causing traffic jams, getting in the way of first responders and passing stopped school buses.

If the ordinance passes, it will take effect in October 2027. Wonsley said that gives the council time to adjust the rules as they learn more about safety and potential job losses. The council is awaiting a report from city staff on some of those questions, which they expect to get next month.

Until the passage of that ordinance, Waymo continues to exist in a legal gray area. The state doesn’t have any specific rules about autonomous vehicles, and most of its driving laws assume there’s a driver in a car who can take responsibility in case of a crash or a stop by law enforcement.

Some council members said they believe the current lack of rules make it legally possible for companies to put autonomous vehicles on the roads.

But other policymakers disagree. DFL State Sen. Scott Dibble, who is working to draft statewide legislation on the issue, said he believes the lack of specific autonomous vehicles rules means those vehicles can’t operate.

“Built into our laws on driving is a requirement that anyone who's driving a car be a person who has a driver's license,” Dibble said. “That's of course impossible with a driverless vehicle.”

Authors of the Minneapolis ordinance say those legal questions are another reason to pass clear regulations.

The ordinance is scheduled for another public hearing on Sept. 29, with a vote possible in early October.

After nearly two decades of starts and stops, bankruptcy and controversy, mineworkers are finally blasting iron ore from deep underground at the first new taconite mine in Minnesota in half a century.

Last week, local leaders and mine company executives hobnobbed with Trump administration officials who came to the Iron Range to witness one of the first blasts at Mesabi Metallics, a massive new $2.5 billion iron ore mine and processing plant in the final stages of construction outside the tiny town of Nashwauk.

Workers placed over a million pounds of explosives deep in a crater-like mine pit. After a countdown, a series of detonations sent plumes of rock and dust, colored red, white and blue for the occasion, spewing into the air.

The ground shook like an earthquake as the blasts dislodged an estimated 1.3 million tons of rich iron ore, which will then be scooped with giant shovels into trucks the size of two-story houses. From there, the ore will be hauled to a series of mammoth new buildings to be crushed, concentrated and fired in ultra-hot kilns, where it will be molded into specialized taconite pellets.

Those pellets, in turn, will be shipped around the country and the world, where they will help provide the feedstock for a new generation of cleaner, more efficient steel mills.

"Today is a very, very big day for the Iron Range, for the state of Minnesota and for this country,” Mesabi Metallics President and CEO Joe Broking told those on hand for the mine blast.

"We've experienced a lot of contraction on the Iron Range in Minnesota, and today we bring back the industrial might of the Iron Range to produce the Patriot Pellet," Broking added.

The mine’s opening comes at a critical time in northeast Minnesota, which is still reeling from closures last year at two of the region’s six taconite facilities: Minorca in Virginia and Hibbing Taconite.

“We have 600 people [who are] going on 17 months without permanent jobs,” said John Arbogast, a United Steelworkers Union district representative based in Eveleth. “So it is a big deal, and it's perfect timing for us.”

Many of those laid-off workers have already left the region, including some who moved to Arizona to work at mines there. But Arbogast said others recently found jobs at Mesabi, which has hired more than 200 workers thus far out of a planned 350 full-time employees.

About 1,500 construction workers are still on site, scrambling to finish the remaining work and have the mine’s new pellet plant open by October, when Broking said Mesabi Metallics would start production.

Broking said Essar, the Indian conglomerate that owns Mesabi and the mine and had filed for bankruptcy a decade ago, is funding the project. But the Export-Import Bank, a U.S. government agency, has also awarded Mesabi a $770 million loan, said President John Jovanovich.

"This is not just a rebirth of a new part of the Iron Range,” he said. “It's really bringing it into the 21st century.”

‘Huge shot in the arm’

Mesabi Metallics is being built at the former site of Butler Taconite, which closed during a major economic downturn in the 1980s.

"Every taconite plant up here was shut down,” recalled Nashwauk Mayor Greg Heyblom. “It just ravaged the Range."

Many workers and their families left for jobs in the Twin Cities and beyond.

“It was a mass exodus out of here,” said Barb Kalmi, Vice President of the Nashwauk-Keewatin School Board. “Our school enrollment dropped dramatically. Church pews emptied out.”

Mike Anderson was superintendent of Butler Taconite when it closed in 1985. He was one of the last people to leave the mine. Now 75 and retired, he returned to witness firsthand mining's return to the site, where millions of tons of high-grade iron ore still sits underground.

“It's going to be a huge, huge shot in the arm for this whole area,” Anderson said.

Al Guddeck stood by Anderson’s side, kicking the red, dusty soil with his boot. He worked at Butler Taconite for 20 years before it closed.

When he was growing up, he remembers his Grandma hanging laundry on a clothesline perpetually stained red.

“The first thing she did is she went out and wiped the ore off the clothesline,” said Guddeck, now 80. “She never complained about it because Grandpa was working in the mines, so it was money.”

Now, local officials say Mesabi Metallics is poised to deliver a badly-needed economic jolt to the region.

The mine’s projected to produce about 7 million tons of ore pellets annually, and it is expected to generate tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue for schools and local communities, in addition to six-figure salaries that are among the highest-paying in the region.

It marks a major turnaround for Essar, which declared bankruptcy 10 years ago with the mine half-built. The company owed tens of million dollars to the state and several contractors. Minnesota officials yanked state mineral leases and gave them to rival miner Cleveland-Cliffs. Gov. Tim Walz even tried to ban Essar from the state.

But despite all those setbacks, Essar restarted construction at the mine site in earnest a few years ago and now is on the cusp of finishing the massive project. The company has repaid the state nearly $50 million, and has made another $47 million in tax, lease and rent payments. Local leaders like Heyblom say the company has worked hard to rebuild trust.

"A lot of those naysayers, I see them now, and now they're supporters," Heyblom said.

Next-generation steel

There’s additional excitement surrounding the Mesabi Metallics project because the mine will produce what are known as “DR” pellets, which can be used to create a high-grade iron product called “Direct Reduced Iron” that can feed smaller, more nimble electric arc furnaces, which now produce 70 percent of steel made in the U.S.

Two other Minnesota mines recently upgraded to produce DR pellets: Northshore Mining in Babbitt and Silver Bay, owned by Cleveland-Cliffs, and U.S. Steel’s Keewatin Taconite mine.

Mesabi initially plans to ship its pellets to customers around the country. But it has bigger ambitions. It's also planning another $5 billion dollar investment to build a new facility to make its own DRI product.

"We're preparing to launch one of the biggest investments in the history of this country in iron ore and DRI,” Broking told the Itasca County Board at a meeting just days before the mine blast.

Broking said Mesabi intends to submit permit applications for the new plant to the state by the end of the year. But it's also considering building outside Minnesota. The company currently has about 20 jobs posted for a proposed DRI and steel plant in Paducah, Ky.

Broking told MPR News that Mesabi is exploring several locations for possible "downstream facilities," including on the Iron Range.

But he told the Itasca County Board that in order for Mesabi to make such a large investment in Minnesota, the company needs a faster state-level environmental permitting process.

“For an investment where we're going to decarbonize the steel industry, where everything that we're doing is about sustainability, there must be a way to get things like this done efficiently,” Broking said.

In addition, Broking said the company needs more competitive state incentives, and the return of mineral leases that Minnesota stripped from Essar after it failed to meet contractual agreements.

The state subsequently awarded those leases to Cliffs, which has argued it needs the leases to extend the life of Hibbing Taconite. But Cliffs has not moved forward with plans to mine the site.

Without those additional leases, Mesabi Metallics has an estimated mine life of 23 years, Broking said. Mesabi has requested that Minnesota cancel Cliffs’ leases, something the state could do with the approval of the state’s executive council.

Meanwhile Mesabi Metallics has filed an antitrust lawsuit against its competitor, accusing Cliffs of using anticompetitive behavior to block the development of its mine.

Mesabi is seeking more than $5 billion in damages in the case, which is scheduled to go to a jury trial next May.

In a year full of rising costs, farmers face another growing expense: their loan payments.

The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by a quarter percentage point last week — the first hike in more than three years. The decision comes as inflation remains above the Fed’s 2 percent target.

The raise likely won’t affect many of the land and equipment loans farmers typically get. Farm business management instructor at South Central College Pam Uhlenkamp said those loans often have fixed interest rates over multiple years.

The bigger problem, she said, lies with operating loans for daily expenses such as feed, seeds and crop insurance.

“Those are only one-year loans, so we renew them every single year,” said Uhlenkamp. “They are subject to whatever those interest rate changes [are].”

She adds farmers will likely feel the effects of the rate hike next month and when they renew their loans for next year. The bump may not be financially detrimental if one looks at the big picture, Uhlenkamp said, but it still makes a difference.

“What happens is the cost to produce a bushel of corn goes up because we have higher fertilizer costs, higher fuel costs, which means now we need to borrow more off our operating note just to operate,” said Uhlenkamp. “Then that trickles down into if we have to borrow more, plus the interest rate is higher, it compounds our interest.”

The rate hike also presents a dilemma for farmers. Bryon Parman, an agricultural finance specialist at North Dakota State University, said farmers often pay off their annual operating loans with revenue from crop sales. But farmers could opt to instead store their crops and sell them later at a better price.

“If I'm holding it with an operating loan sitting out there at, let's say 7 percent interest, that's what it's costing me every month that I don't sell and pay off that note, because you've got that loan sitting out there,” said Parman.

The Federal Open Market Committee, which votes on interest rate changes, has another two meetings this year.

“A lot of the market is thinking that there might be another quarter of a percent increase before the end of the year,” Parman said. “The increase that we just experienced, plus the possibility of that one, if it does indeed occur, that's probably going to have an impact then on operating loans into next year, or any new equipment purchases or land loans.”

On the first day of school at Hoover Elementary in Coon Rapids, Gov. Tim Walz and Education Commissioner Willie Jett donned aprons and plastic gloves and stood in the cafeteria before a line of elementary students.

“Do you want orange chicken?” Walz asked a student before spooning a serving of lunch onto his plate.

The governor, a former teacher, has said the state’s universal school meals program, which he signed into law in 2023, is one of the proudest accomplishments of his eight-year tenure.

“I think this, coupled with the education funding and the child tax credit — probably as a package — are the things that I would rather be remembered [for],” Walz told journalists at Hoover.

Schools across the state started offering free breakfasts and lunches to all students in the fall of 2023. Now, three years later, a trio of studies from the University of Minnesota and nonprofit advocacy organization The Food Group offers more data on how the program is having an impact.

“It’s, without question, in my opinion, really, really helpful for families and students and parents alike expressing relief about not having the cost of meals being a factor,” said Leah Gardner, policy director at The Food Group.

“But that doesn’t mean the program’s perfect,” Gardner added.

More students are eating

The number of students eating school lunch went up 15 percent the first year of the universal school meals program. The number of kids eating breakfast at school went up 40 percent.

That’s according to the Minnesota Department of Education, which has also been tracking the cost of the program. The state has steadily increased its spending on school meals — from $277 million in 2024 to an estimated $306 million in 2026.

“Early on, we saw that the cost was a little more than it really projected,” Walz told journalists earlier this month.

“I think what it showed was there … was a lot of folks that were just barely above that line where they could get it, and they just weren’t eating because of that,” Walz said.

Gardner’s study, which included survey results from hundreds of Minnesota students, found evidence that supported the governor’s hunch.

Before free school meals, 34 percent of students who didn’t qualify for free or reduced-price lunch had to skip meals. The numbers were even higher for Black and Indigenous students and other students of color, 70 percent of whom skipped meals before they were offered at no cost.

“We talked to … students who were dealing with stress, anxiety about when they would go through the line if there was going to be money in their account or not,” Gardner said.

“We had a young person share a story about just pretending not to be hungry because he knew his mom couldn’t pay, and if that bill was added to her plate, she would not be eating,” Gardner added. “Our young people were not nearly as oblivious about the cost of meals as I think some people would like to think.”

And it’s not just that students are no longer going hungry. Introducing universal school meals has also reduced stigma in school cafeterias.

“Students are talking about it. They do notice it, and they feel much better all being together and eating together,” Gardner said. “They also talked about having more energy and being able to concentrate better because of being able to get enough [food].”

A ‘huge relief’ for families

Free school meals have also helped families’ household budgets. The state education department estimates the program has saved families a total of $1,000 per year per student.

Gardner’s survey found 51 percent of families are worrying less about household budgets thanks to the program. And 60 percent of families are having easier mornings getting their students to school on time because they don’t have to pack lunches and make breakfasts at home.

“We’re able to make this a reality right at the time that we’ve seen the cost of food grow substantially,” Gardner said. “It’s a huge relief financially, mentally and, also, parents attributed that their kids were showing up to school on time as a result and they felt [they were] doing better in school.”

Bailey Jordan, who lives in Minneapolis, has a fourth grade student. She said school breakfast has taken a significant amount of stress out of her hectic mornings. It’s also helped her daughter in other ways.

“She now became a breakfast eater. She wasn’t before,” Jordan said. “It’s very important, not only to fuel her body for the day, but so she can get into that routine. And then her friends join her, too. So not only is she getting that meal, but she’s eating with her friends and starting the day out that way.”

School staff say the program and a higher volume of kids in their cafeterias has been good for their budgets. That financial stability is making it easier to get healthier, higher-quality food into the cafeteria.

“Being able to invest more in locally sourced foods is, of course then also beneficial for the economy and the tastiness of the meals,” Gardner said.

In the Moorhead Public School District, nutrition services director Ashley Schneider said the program has helped her department get out of financial crisis and invest in more livable staff wages and equipment, like knives and food processors that help her kitchen teams make more food from scratch.

They’ve had some hits and also some misses.

“Some things are a huge flop,” Schneider said. “We tried meatloaf and they were just like, ‘What is this?’”

But among their successes are sambusas and a new crop of students who love brussels sprouts.

“Our kids are obsessed with brussels sprouts,” Schneider said. “A parent went to a local Facebook group and said that she was just super impressed, because when her student came home from school and she asked what they wanted for dinner that week, the student replied and said they wanted brussels sprouts like they get at school.”

Schneider credits the universal meals program with giving her department the financial stability it’s needed to keep expanding its offerings and investing more in scratch cooking.

“With that guaranteed kind of payment from every meal that we provide, we are able to collect on that. That helps us to then operate and actually have money to be able to do things,” Schneider said. “We are able to now invest back into our kitchens.”

But Minnesota’s universal school meals program has also introduced new challenges. The cost of the program is rising for the state. And an increase in school meal programs has made for new logistical challenges.

“When all of a sudden it’s like, ‘Bam! Now we have many more students eating’ … well, lines got long,” Gardner said. “That is something that’s come up as a barrier.”

Longer lines in cafeterias mean students have less time to eat — feedback that came through loud and clear when researchers asked students about their experience with school meals.

Gardner also believes her research has shown schools can do better about offering kids food they want to eat.

“It’s always a joy to talk to our young people because there’s just, like, brutal honesty,” Gardner said. “Our youth have a lot to say about what food they want.”

In the Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan school district, nutrition services coordinator Spencer Fischer said his department tries to use that brutal honesty to its advantage. They’ve set up what they call a “kitchen cabinet,” which is a panel of students that meets regularly to sample and advise on new menu items. Their work has resulted in some popular new cafeteria offerings like locally sourced apples, fresh-baked breakfast croissants, pumpkin-spice muffins, scrambled egg bowls, cheese curds, a charcuterie of fresh vegetables and ramen with spiced meat and bok choy.

“That’s the other thing with caretaking for students is giving students options,” Fischer said. “When students have options to choose from, they’re going to choose what they’re going to eat rather than being handed something that they don’t want.”

Fischer and Gardner believe Minnesota’s universal meals program will continue to give school lunch workers the resources and time they need to keep making cafeteria food healthier and more delicious as time goes on.

“With the increase in meal participation, it gives us opportunities to think differently about what school lunch is and how we can engage students even more,” Fischer said.

“The change that the staff on the front line has experienced is a renewed sense of pride and ownership of what they’re producing,” Fischer added, “The work we do really allows other people to do the important work that they need to do.”

Correction (Sept. 22, 2026): An earlier version of this story misspelled Spencer Fischer’s name. The story has been updated.

Yusuf Yusuf drives his truck 4,000 miles every week.

Yusuf has been a truck driver for nine years, and he thinks the current price of diesel fuel is "crazy." And says his boss's main concern right now is saving as much fuel as possible.

He recounted a story of how he had to fill the tank of his semi-truck in California, where diesel is over $8 per gallon. He said, at the time, his boss questioned why he would do that because of the high prices of fueling up in the state.

Diesel prices in Minnesota are the highest they've ever been, currently costing drivers over $6 per gallon, according to AAA. Prices have increased by over $2 per gallon since the U.S. began its war against in Iran in February and Ukraine struck Russian oil refineries over a week ago.

"As a driver I can get good money, but when you get a load and get $3,000 [for a tank of] fuel, you see that's already negative though, and [in] some states you can't even get a load like California, that's the place I mostly go, and it's too high," Yusuf said.

High diesel prices are having a wider impact across the economy. The Minnesota Department of Transportation is also feeling negative effects on their budget.

"The greatest impact, the direct impact that we will see with increasing diesel prices, really centers around our winter operations," Jed Falgren, the department's maintenance engineer said. "We have our plow trucks out all year long supporting other operations, but our greatest use of diesel fuel occurs when we're in our snow and ice removal processes during the winter."

MNDot operates 850 diesel powered plow trucks which burn through thousands of gallons of diesel every year, especially in the winter. In the warmer months, their trucks burn through 75,000-80,000 gallons of diesel per month, but when winter hits, they burn through 150,000-160,000 gallons per month month, Falgren said.

"Short-term we look at doing some of the same things that anybody would do, is there a way we can drive less," he said. "Is there a way we can look at maximizing our fuel economy? Making sure that our fleet is in as good a condition as possible?”

“We'll continue to do those kinds of things, but unfortunately, there ends up just being a limit on how much you can do on a technology that is so critical for us to do the work that we do."

Falgren said they've explored long-term solutions like using hydrogen as a potential fuel, but it won't help the short-term issues.

Ben Froehlich is the vice president of operations for Volk Transfer, Inc., a carrier based out of Mankato. Froehlich said their fleet of 40 trucks has already driven under 3 million miles so far this year, but have moved 9 million miles through their network and partnerships.

"We've done a little more on our routing. We were running pretty lean prior to this, so there wasn't a whole lot of room for improvement," Froehlich said. "A lot of our savings really has come down to changing in habits the drivers have had. [We’re] paying more attention to what they're doing, [they’re] paying more attention to what they're doing."

Volk freight truck drivers usually fill up 200 to 240 gallons at a time, and the cost has doubled to more than $1,200, according to Froehlich.

"We're not going to stop moving freight because fuel's expensive. Our job is to become more efficient and continue to taking care of the customers," he added. "But if diesel does retain the $6 per gallon or higher pricing, it is going to change the economics of trucking, and ultimately that will it will come downstream to the consumer more than it already has."

Ahmad Ibrahim owns Reyhana Transportation in Blaine with a fleet of six trucks. He said they deliver mainly to Wisconsin and Iowa, driving around 7,000 miles a week.

"The price of diesel affects the farmers. [But] it can affect everybody, no matter what you do, no matter how good your business is, because fuel is the is the main resource for this country," Ibrahim said.

Ibrahim said he had to raise rates for his customers, but it isn't even enough to cover the fuel costs.

"Every time the price goes up, we get affected right away," he said.

Ibrahim added he'd seen a lot of people leave the trucking business due to the cost.

"If you’re coming to me and said, 'Hey, I'd like to open a trucking business right now,’ I will tell you, ‘Go fly. Don't even think about it,’" Ibrahim said.

And high fuel prices affect a company’s ability to operate and stay in business.

"What we've seen happening is some contraction in the industry. We've seen some companies literally just exit, shut the door," said John Hausladen, president of the Minnesota Trucking Association. "We've seen some sell to other fleets, we've seen a number of fleets actually reduce the number of trucks that they are operating and we have actually seen a reduction in the number of truck drivers."

Although the number of truck drivers is decreasing, he said trucking won't go away. That decrease will instead affect consumer goods.

"Because trucks run on diesel, and virtually everything spends time on a truck, this will translate directly into increased prices to consumers," Hausladen said. "Some of those increases have already taken place. That's just the nature of what transportation is."

Correction (Sep. 21, 2026): An earlier version of this story incorrectly attributed the number of miles driven by Volk Transport drivers and when the war with Iran started. The above story has been updated.

A light rain didn't keep taco lovers away from Lake Street on Saturday.

In the early afternoon, people gathered at Mercado Central for local music, arts and a taco eating contest.

After 4 p.m., the party moved over to El Nuevo Campo for games, puppet making and a 5K run.

Along the way, attendees could visit up to 30 different taquerias on Lake Street and collect stamps for a chance to win a prize at the end of the month.

Rob and Stephanie Liebhart were part of the crowd. Rob even joined in the taco eating contest, though he missed a chance at finishing in the top three.

"We’ve done the taco tour a few times. We’ve lived along Lake Street for about 10 years,” he said.

The mood overall was festive, but patrons still felt the impact of Operation Metro Surge — when ICE agents conducted aggressive immigration enforcement in Minnesota last winter.

This year, the event is focused on promoting solidarity with the business community.

"I always say, it takes all of us to see them into the future, and if we want to see them in the next month, we really need to be intentional with our money and shop at our local stores," Lake Street Council's senior community engagement manager ZoeAna Martinez told MPR.

The event has been a staple for the community, but after the COVID-19 pandemic and the civil uprising following the murder of George Floyd, it took a hiatus but returned this year.

Then, after Operation Metro surge, some businesses were forced to temporarily or permanently close their doors as Lake Street and surrounding communities were a target of the Trump administration's immigration policies.

"Our entrepreneurs just are so resilient,” Martinez said. “[They] continue to face barriers year after year. [They’re] continuing to figure out ways to really pivot their business and adapt.”

"These are families that live here that have come here to make lives for themselves and support their families, and a lot of times it's through entrepreneurship."

The stops included Marsu Pizzeria and Taqueria, a few doors down from Mercado Central. Luis Martinez is the owner of Marsu. The tour kept him busy all day, with a line of people all the way to the door.

"I like this promotion for the Taco Tour. I like all the new people trying the tacos on Lake Street," Luis Martinez said.

During Operation Metro Surge, Martinez said, Minnesotans supported businesses like his.

He said he's trying to keep his prices down for as long as possible. But he still faces the same challenges as any other small business owner: rising supply costs, tariffs and fuel prices.

Back at Mercado Central, Rob and Stephanie Liebhart said they'd love to see even more support for immigrant-owned businesses and restaurants that serve authentic cuisine.

"I don't know if there's a way to do a falafel tour and pita tour and highlight Middle Eastern-type restaurants,” Rob said.

“They used to have a dumpling tour, I think,” Stephanie added. “They used to do that. But they haven't in a few years."

But for these local businesses, what makes the difference comes down to whether the community keeps coming back for more.

Reporters from CNN, MS NOW, and Politico on Saturday said they were denied access to White House grounds after President Trump announced a ban on the three media outlets.

Trump said in a Truth Social post on Friday he was banning these outlets from the White House, citing negative coverage of his administration and saying media outlets shouldn't be able to constantly report "FICTION and LIES" when they cover the president of the United States. He warned other news outlets would follow. It's Trump's latest move in an ongoing battle against the media.

On Friday afternoon, a Bloomberg News reporter asked Trump about the ban at a press conference and whether he was trying to intimidate the press. "No, no, no, no. I dislike dishonest press, like you. I think you're terrible," Trump responded.

He also said: "They purposely write negative news, and they do that because they want to try and diminish the Republicans and a Republican administration." Trump said there was no specific news story that led to his decision, instead it was a frustration that had built up over the last two years.

On Saturday morning, MS NOW, formerly MSNBC, said in a statement on X that their journalists were unable to access the White House grounds. MS NOW reporter Akayla Gardner said on air that she was denied access to the White House, and an officer asked her to "hand over" her badge because it was "disabled."

"I asked why I was not able to get inside," Gardner said. "He said it was above him."

However, Gardner said an MS NOW producer was able to access the grounds. MS NOW said they will continue to report on the president.

"The White House belongs to the American people and the decisions made inside are funded by our tax dollars," MS NOW said in their statement. "MS NOW intends to take any and all steps necessary to defend our First Amendment rights and the essential role of independent journalism in our democracy."

CNN reporter Betsy Klein said she was also denied access Saturday morning. Klein said she has been covering the White House in some capacity since the Obama administration, but on Saturday morning a Secret Service agent took her badge.

"I asked him if he could provide an explanation as to why it had been deactivated. He said he had no further information," Klein said. She said she was referred to the White House press office.

CNN said in a statement on X Saturday that they have "a right under the U.S. Constitution" to report without interference from the government.

"We will not be deflected from our duty to hold the government and other public bodies to account, and we will continue to report on the actions and processes of this administration without fear our favor."

Politico Global Editor-in-Chief Jonathan Greenberger told the newsroom on Saturday that Cheyenne Haslett, a White House reporter, was denied entry to the White House.

"We stand by her and all reporters here covering the White House. As we said yesterday, we will vigorously defend our First Amendment rights," Greenberger said in a statement shared with NPR.

Trump's announcement comes amid a midterm election season where Democrats have an edge — Trump has faced pushback over his unpopular war in the Middle East, a looming affordability crisis, and threats to demolish the John F. Kennedy Performing Arts Center.

White House Correspondents' Association President Jacqui Heinrich said Saturday that denying access to journalists violates the First Amendment and called on the Trump administration to "immediately restore our colleagues' access."

"The American people, through a free and independent press, must be able to scrutinize those elected to power, regardless of whether government officials view it favorably," she said in a statement. "That's why courts have repeatedly held that once the White House provides access to journalists, it cannot deny that access arbitrarily or based on the content of their reporting."

Theodore Boutrous, a leading First Amendment lawyer in the U.S., told NPR that the ban is, on its face, unconstitutional.

Last year, Trump barred an Associated Press reporter from covering two official events because the news service did not refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America. During his first term, Trump also barred a CNN reporter. Courts have backed the media both times, but the AP ruling is still being appealed.

Copyright 2026, NPR

Minnesota’s job growth was effectively flat last month and unemployment ticked up to 4.4 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis. The national rate was 4.4 percent.

That’s according to new job numbers from the state’s Department of Employment and Economic Development for the month of August.

Officials also noted that a smaller share of Minnesota’s population is working or looking for work. The state’s labor force participation rate has fallen every month this year, down to 66.9 percent in August from 68.1 percent one year ago.

DEED Commissioner Matt Varilek said the state’s population is aging and fewer new workers are moving here to replace them, especially after the surge in immigration enforcement efforts earlier this year.

“Our population growth has been boosted by a large number of arrivals from foreign sources, talented people choosing to come to this country and come to Minnesota, and current indications are that that has really almost been turned off entirely,” he said.

On an annual basis, Minnesota’s jobs growth is outpacing the national rate. Over the year, Minnesota added more than 45,000 jobs, a 1.5 percent increase, and the U.S. saw job growth of 0.3 percent.

Minnesota exports up, but maybe not for long

The state also released new export data Thursday. The value of Minnesota's exports rose 14 percent in the second quarter of this year compared to the same period in 2025. Exports rose by 15 percent nationally.

Canada remained the state's largest export market. Costa Rica became a top 10 export country for the first time, driven by a surge in optic and medical products.

Varilek said one of the reasons for growth could be relief from the Supreme Court, which struck down some of President Donald Trump’s tariffs this year. But that relief didn’t last long.

“As we look ahead to current export activity and future quarterly export releases, unfortunately, we now have to contend with a trade war with Canada, featuring tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian imports, and then the Canadians' tariffs on an equivalent level of U.S. exports in response,” he said.

He said the escalating trade war will likely raise prices for consumers and limit Minnesota businesses' ability to sell to Canadians.

The Minnesota Board of Animal Health confirmed that a cow in Brown County tested positive for rabies last week after it was euthanized.

The board said the owner of the heifer noticed the animal behaving oddly on Sept. 1 as it laid flat with its head down. A veterinarian observed the animal the same day and the owner had administered oral medication with bare hands. Another veterinarian examined the animal the following day and also gave it oral medication without wearing gloves.

A third veterinarian examined the animal on Sept. 3 and observed that the cow had uncoordinated hind legs and was high-stepping, vocalizing, hypersalivating and had a high temperature.

The heifer was euthanized and the head was removed for rabies testing at the Minnesota Department of Health Public Health Laboratory. Brain tissue tested positive for the rabies virus on Sept. 8.

Public health officials recommended that nine people who came in contact with the animal and its saliva, including the owner of the dairy cow, the owner’s daughter, two minor children, two of the veterinarians who examined the animal and three assisting veterinary technicians seek rabies post-exposure prophylaxis as a preventative measure.

Experts say the disease is extremely dangerous and life-threatening to both humans and animals.

“A lot of times, it eventually travels up to the brain and will cause encephalopathy and eventually lead to death,” said Dr. Katie Cornille, senior veterinarian at the state Board of Animal Health. “It is a fatal disease, so it’s something that we take very seriously.”

The Board quarantined 13 other cows on the same Brown County farm so they can be monitored for rabies symptoms. More than 40 cattle on the property will also be watched for any signs of rabies symptoms. A horse on the property was also possibly exposed, but it is up-to-date on its rabies vaccinations, along with three vaccinated dogs. They are all under observation as well, while two unvaccinated barn cats that were likely exposed to rabies were euthanized.

Once a domestic animal is exposed, it can take anywhere from two to 26 weeks for symptoms of rabies to develop, depending on the location of the bite and the amount of the virus that enters the body. Most domestic animals that show symptoms will die within three to 12 weeks.

To help prevent spreading the virus and to reduce exposure to other animals, the Minnesota Board of Animal Health places all domestic animals that have been exposed and are unvaccinated under a 45- to 180-day quarantine.

“Every case of rabies is going to be serious,” Cornille said. “I’m sure the individuals that own the animals, they’re handling the loss of the animal, and they don’t want to lose anymore. We want to make sure that if there are any infectious animals that they don’t spread it anywhere else.”

Rabies is most often spread by being bitten by a rabid animal, and health officials say the cow was likely bitten by a rabid skunk or bat.

Skunks and bats are the most common natural carriers of rabies in Minnesota. Multiple skunks were observed earlier this year on a neighboring plot of land that connected to the area where the rabid cow was held.

Wild animals account for the vast majority of rabies cases reported annually in the state, and fewer than 15 percent of cases reported each year are in domesticated species. The most common domestic animals infected by rabies are cattle, cats and dogs — and the symptoms each animal may show can vary.

Rabies prevention

Rabies is a preventable viral disease that affects the central nervous system in mammals and causes encephalopathy and eventually death. It’s most commonly transmitted through the bite of a rabid animal, but can also be spread through saliva.

However, once a person displays symptoms it’s already too late to receive treatment, said Dr. Carrie Klumb, senior epidemiologist at MDH.

“With rabies, once you’re showing symptoms, there’s no treatment that’s been shown to actually work and keep people alive,” Klumb said. “What we have to do is that if you’ve had an exposure to the virus, we need to give you the rabies vaccination before you ever show any symptoms, so that you never show any symptoms and you never develop the disease.”

The situation in Brown County, Klumb said, highlights the need for biosecurity and also prevention, and she urges those caring for farm animals “to take appropriate steps to put your personal protective equipment on before you treat the animal.”

“If you do have an ill animal that you’re caring for, remembering those basic things like: cover your eyes, nose and mouth,” Klum added. “Put some gloves on, call your veterinarian, make sure a professional can come evaluate your animal, or bring your animal into the vet to be evaluated.”

Although the case in Brown County focused on a cow, for Minnesotans Klumb said it’s more likely there will be encounters with a bat. About one percent of bats in the wild are believed to be carrying rabies. About three to four percent of bats MDH tests each year test positive for rabies.