Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
MN to Abandon Undocumented Immigrants
No one gets everything they want from budget negotiations. Compromises must be made, and there are winners and losers. This time, after huddling together for weeks, Minnesota lawmakers have decided that the losers will be the safest and most prosperous among us.
Haha, just kidding! We’d never take things away from the people who have the most. Instead, under an agreement reached between leaders of both houses and Gov. Tim Walz, Minnesota will snatch back health care from undocumented immigrants. (The Minnesota Reformer has a good rundown of the whole deal here.) “I’m not going to sugarcoat how difficult this was… we didn’t expect everybody to be happy on this," Walz told reporters, describing something that's far less difficult than not having health insurance.
These residents only became eligible for MinnesotaCare in January, when 20,000 immigrants signed up. You can look at that number (three times what lawmakers expected) and say that shows a clear need for this kind of coverage. Or, like Sen. Jordan Rasmusson (R-Fergus Falls) you can say the coverage “made us a magnet for those who broke the law to enter our country.”
Members of the DFL Progressive Caucus have protested the cuts and are pledging not to support the compromise. As Sen. Alice Mann (DFL-Bloomington) notes, in addition to the human costs, "There is no fiscal responsibility when you do this. When you take away people's healthcare, they end up in the emergency department, it costs money for everyone in the community.”
At least undocumented children will continue to be eligible for MinnesotaCare. But hey, there’s always the next budget to screw them over.
RIP Burl Gilyard
Minneapolis journalism lost one of the good guys today. You’re not likely to find anyone in town who has a bad word to say about Burl “Wiggy” Gilyard, personally or professionally. He began as a music journalist, became a features reporter, and covered business in recent years, ending up at the Star Tribune. (I worked with him, though never directly, for a few years at City Pages.)
Claude Peck, Gilyard’s former colleague at the Twin Cities Reader, broke the news of Gilyard’s passing today on Facebook. For decades, Gilyard was saddled with adrenomyeloneuropathy, a debilitating neuro-muscular disease, that was complicated by Addison's disease. As we wrote earlier this week, after Gilyard’s disease progressed, veteran newsman Brian Lambert organized a GoFundMe to cover medical expenses, and there will be a June 1 show in his honor at the Hook & Ladder.
Free Music at the Fair
Minnesota State Fair Grandstand shows can be hit or miss (don’t get me started again about the Turtles), but the free stages are pretty damn reliable. The fair released its free music lineup for 2025 today, and it’s as solid as ever.
This year the Bandshell will present the great East L.A. rockers Los Lobos, local music sensation Ber, Rachel “Fight Song” Platten, Arrested “Tennessee” Development, Tayler “TikTok” Holder, and Karla “Selena” Perez (she’s performing a tribute to the Tejano music legend).
Highlights at the Schilling Amphitheater, on the opposite end of the fairgrounds, include Lady Midnight and the “First Avenue Goes to the Fair” local showcase, featuring Christy Costello, Clare Doyle, Jack Klatt, Miloe, and (hmm) P.O.S.
Can you believe it’s less than four months till the fair?
Televised Evidence That Wolves Fans Like to Party
This space was originally set aside for tornado content, but being as the Twin Cities is now in the clear (check out this scary fella hanging over downtown Minneapolis earlier this afternoon), I’m just gonna fill it with some internet nonsense.
There’s a viral clip going around of a man at Wednesday's Wolves-Warriors game ingesting some sort of substance through his nose—and he was caught on camera. A popular theory has it that he is snorting the drug “cocaine.” Decide for yourself!
@ghanaboywsc My man getting loose at the game and ain’t even know he on TV😭😭 #timberwolvesbasketball
♬ original sound - GhanaBoy
As a respected professional journalist, I would never assume that someone is engaging in an illegal act based solely on appearances. So all I can say is: Awoooo indeed! And, of course, Wolves in five—OKC, Denver, doesn't matter.
