Ethics panel says Sen. Gruenhagen should be instructed on how to send emails to colleagues

State Sen. Glenn Gruenhagen should receive instruction by Republican leaders on how to appropriately email his Senate colleagues, an ethics subcommittee said Wednesday.

Sen. Erin Maye Quade, DFL-Apple Valley, filed a complaint in April 2023 over a Gruenhagen email linking to a video of male-to-female gender-affirming surgery, saying it made her uncomfortable and violated Senate norms. In a lengthy hearing on Wednesday, Gruenhagen, R-Glencoe, said he was trying to educate his colleagues about an upcoming bill.

The bipartisan ethics subcommittee unanimously agreed on the resolution requiring instruction for Gruenhagen on how to “appropriately deliver email messages” to colleagues. Once he’s been instructed, the complaint will be dismissed, according to the resolution proposed by Sen. Mary Kunesh, DFL-New Brighton.

Before the four-person panel voted, Sen. Andrew Mathews, R-Princeton, said that he believes there was no probable cause for an ethics violation. He made a motion to that effect Wednesday night, but it failed on a tie.

Mathews and Sen. Jeremy Miller, R-Winona, voted for that motion, but Kunesh and Senate President Bobby Joe Champion, DFL-Minneapolis, voted against it.

On a voice vote Wednesday, the panel approved the compromise resolution, which now goes to the Senate Rules and Administration Committee.

“It is a good thing to get this resolved,” Mathews said.

The meeting followed a more than two-hour session on Wednesday in which both Maye Quade and Gruenhagen had 15 minutes to present their arguments and then took questions from the panel.

Maye Quade argued that by sending a link to a video of gender-affirming surgery to all senators last year, Gruenhagen violated the Senate norms and should be sent to sensitivity training on LGBTQ matters.