More than 40 Democratic legislators, along with educators and parents, said Thursday they don’t support a special legislative session over a new law limiting use of physical holds on students in schools, which has led to some law enforcement agencies pausing school resource officer programs.
It came a week after top Republican legislators called for a special session to repeal the new wording.
Gov. Tim Walz, DFL, said Tuesday that “some (school) districts have worked it out and they believe the language is clarified” and others have not. “… I’m certainly open to anything that provides a solution to that, if that means the Legislature working it out to make sure we have it.”
Educators and parents said at a news conference Thursday at the Minnesota Capitol that the new law provides important safeguards and shouldn’t be changed.
“I want to send my children to school in hopes that they ignite their love for learning, they want to grow. And I want them to make mistakes and not be harmed,” said Danielle Matthias, a parent who spoke Thursday.
She said it’s fine if more de-escalation training is needed, “but we can’t hold our children’s safety in the hands of luck. I want all Minnesota kids to breathe.”
Since 2015, state law has said school district staff is prohibited from using prone restraint as an emergency restraint for students with disabilities, and physical holding of such students can only happen in emergencies.
“Most disabilities are not visible,” said Abby Rombalski, a longtime educator, organizer with Education for Liberation Minnesota and parent in Robbinsdale Area Schools. “When Minnesota legislators agreed to the decision to ban chokeholds from Minnesota schools earlier this year, they were protecting all children from harm.”
What the new law says
A bill, which was approved in the last legislative session and signed by Walz, added new language to state law that says “an employee or agent of a district, including a school resource officer, security personnel, or police officer contracted with a district, shall not use prone restraint,” meaning putting a student into a face-down position.
Also added to the law was the following wording: “An employee or agent of a district, including a school resource officer, security personnel, or police officer contracted with a district, shall not inflict any form of physical holding that restricts or impairs a pupil’s ability to breathe; restricts or impairs a pupil’s ability to communicate distress; places pressure or weight on a pupil’s head, throat, neck, chest, lungs, sternum, diaphragm, back, or abdomen; or results in straddling a pupil’s torso.”
The law says school employees, bus drivers and other agents of the district “may use reasonable force when it is necessary under the circumstances to restrain a student to prevent bodily harm or death to the student or to another.”
The Minnesota Chiefs of Police Association said in a statement last month that they were still seeking clarity, “including what is acceptable under the new law in situations that do not present a threat of bodily harm or death but are clearly violations of state law.”
The association released the statement after Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison issued a legal opinion, which included: “The Legislature did not change the types of reasonable force that school staff and agents are authorized to use in responding to a situation involving a threat of bodily harm or death. Of course, what force is ‘reasonable’ is not defined in law and is determined on a case-by-case basis.”
At the end of Ellison’s analysis to Education Commissioner Willie Jett, he wrote that the chiefs association, League of Minnesota Cities and Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association “raised other important questions about the standards applicable to school resource officers or other contracted peace officers at school events. Those questions are beyond the scope of your August 18 request and more appropriately directed at the Legislature.”
An analysis by the League of Minnesota Cities Insurance Trust offered various examples under the new law: If a student is screaming in a lunchroom and throwing trays on the floor, the behavior doesn’t involve a risk of bodily harm or death and a SRO may not use force to control the student’s behavior or force to arrest the student. On the other hand, if a student is using a metal bar to attack windows and glass in a school and it reasonably appears to a SRO that the broken glass is placing the student and others at risk of bodily harm, the SRO may use reasonable force if necessary to restrain the student.
Legislative responses
Of 103 DFL legislators, 44 signed the letter opposing a special session, which was shared Thursday on X, formerly known as Twitter, by a Minnesota Public Radio news reporter.
The letter pointed out the use of prone restraints was banned in correctional facilities in Minnesota in 2021.
“If officers working in prisons can do their jobs without the use of these dangerous restraints, then surely those working with our children can do the same,” the letter continued. “Anyone advocating for the repeal of this law is working to take us backwards.”
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House Minority Leader Lisa Demuth, R-Cold Spring, responded in a Thursday statement.
“With dozens of school districts currently without SRO coverage across Minnesota, it’s incredibly urgent that we fix this problem, get SROs back in schools, and keep our students safe,” she said. “It’s disappointing to see so many Democrats opposed to a special session and continuing their irresponsible anti-law enforcement rhetoric.”
Supporters of law speak out
Khulia Pringle, Minnesota state director for the National Parents Union, said at Thursday’s news conference that if there’s not a threat of bodily harm or death, “Why in the world can’t other safer and more humane methods be used? This is a political hissy fit and Walz should know better and do better to protect our kids.”
If there was a special session, it should be about the teacher shortage and “desperate lack of purpose and mentorship for our young people,” said Jose Perez, director of Good Trouble, which is based out of a youth organization called Bridgemakers.
“This is the state where an officer that was sworn to protect and serve murdered George Floyd with a knee to the neck,” Perez said. “We should not be having special sessions about SROs.”
Josh Crosson, executive director of EdAllies, said the discussion isn’t about whether to have police officers in schools.
“Great minds can disagree on that point all day long,” he said. “This is a conversation about whether police officers and other adults can put their hands on our children, sometimes in dangerous ways, when a child is not posing a threat to self or others.”