Minnesota Now

Minneapolis Public Schools is reversing course on its school closure plan. The district says it won't close any schools, for now. We heard about Tuesday night's school board meeting and talked with one of many parents who pushed back against the closures. An alleged sexual assault at Cornell University has brought conversations about prevention and healing to the forefront. We'll talk to a local c...

Minnesota has a rich choral music tradition, with composers and ensembles creating new works all the time. But how does that music find its way from a composer’s desk to a choir director looking for something new to perform? Twenty years ago, Twin Cities composers Tim Takach and Jocelyn Hagen set out to help answer that question. They started Graphite Publishing, a company that gives composers a w...

For decades, the coal mining industry has been reckoning with a disease called black lung. Now a similar condition is disabling and even killing workers who cut artificial stone, for trendy quartz countertops and backsplashes. It's called silicosis, and you get it by breathing in tiny crystals of a mineral called silica. The nation's largest manufacturer of artificial stone is Cambria, a company b...

When a story about sexual assault on a college campus makes national headlines, it can spark difficult questions: How common is campus sexual assault? Are universities doing enough to prevent it? And what happens to survivors after the headlines fade? At Cornell University, a former student filed a lawsuit alleging that seven fraternity members drugged and sexually assaulted her at a party in 2024...

Minneapolis Public Schools leaders are backing away from a plan put forth last month to close up to sixteen schools. The decision came during a school board meeting Tuesday night. Minneapolis Superintendent Lisa Sayles-Adams said at the meeting that the choice was based on community feedback. She added that changes still needed to happen and the upcoming budget process might be difficult. Minneapo...

A third of seniors in Minnesota are losing health coverage as private insurers drop their Medicare Advantage plans. These plans included more coverage than Medicare alone. We'll learn more about why they're going away and what it means for older adults. As rural health care options dwindle across the state, we'll talk to a leader of one health system that just opened a new clinic in southern Minne...

A library in Minneapolis is celebrating 40 years of collecting and lending LGBTQ+ books, movies and other materials. Quatrefoil Library started in 1986 as a personal collection shared among friends. Today, it has more than 25,000 items and more than 11,000 library card holders. And the library says that number doubled just in 2026. Iggy Gehlen is the board vice president and programming chair at Q...

As rural health care shrinks across the state, one health system is hoping to help reverse the trend. Fairmont Clinics has opened its doors in southern Minnesota. To start, it will offer general surgery, OB-GYN and urology care. Down the line, patients will also be able to receive primary and urgent care as well as higher level surgeries. Windom Area Health is behind the new clinic. Windom's chief...

One-third of Minnesota’s seniors, or 390,000 people, will be looking for new health care plans this week after losing Medicare Advantage coverage. Medicare Advantage is essentially an alternative to Medicare offered by private insurers. HealthPartners, Humana, United Healthcare and Blue Cross Blue Shield are among the insurers that are discontinuing or restructuring their Medicare Advantage plans....

Minneapolis households that are struggling to afford rent may have a new option. Tuesday through Thursday, the city’s public housing agency is taking applications for its housing voucher waitlist for the first time since 2019. Back then, applicants were aiming for the federal program known as Section 8, where tenants pay 30 percent of their income in rent and the government covers the rest. Eligib...

Federal agents searched Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar's home in D.C. today. It remains unclear what the Department of Homeland Security is investigating. It comes as racist rhetoric against Somali Minnesotans has ramped up in the lead up to the midterms. It may have felt like summer this weekend but we're in the thick of fall — which means the start of cold and flu season. An expert will join...

The Minnesota Vikings are going into a break with more wins on their record and more injuries on their roster. They're undefeated, 5-0 this season. Joining Nina Moini to talk more about this and other Minnesota sports stories are Minnesota Now weekly sports contributors, Wally Langfellow and Eric Nelson.

Monday is Indigenous People’s Day. While the word Indigenous is used now more than ever, words like "Indian" and "Indian Country" are still common. Reporter Melissa Olson joined Minnesota Now to share a story that'll help us understand why certain words and phrases have stuck around.

It was a deceptively warm weekend that felt like one last gasp of summer. But still, we are deep in autumn, also known as the start of cold and flu season. Some public health experts say rates of respiratory illness have picked up earlier than usual this year in parts of the U.S. Walgreens sales of cold and flu medicine are up more than 20 percent compared to this time last year, according to ABC...

Federal agents searched the Washington D.C. home of Democratic Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar this morning. It’s not clear what Department of Homeland Security agents were looking for or the scope of their investigation, but the raid comes as President Donald Trump has been increasing anti-Somali rhetoric in the runup to the midterm election next month. MPR politics reporter Peter Cox joined M...

A Twin Cities man is in custody on terrorism charges for making plans for an attack at the Mall of America. We got more details of the case and heard more about how federal agencies track and charge people who become radicalized. Journalists with ProPublica tracked down evidence of hundreds of U.S. citizens who have been detained by federal agents while the Trump administration carried out its imm...

Ananya Dance Theatre in St. Paul is known for making dance performances about the world around us that tackle questions about power, injustice and social change. Now, the company is turning its attention to recent crises here in the Twin Cities, focusing on Operation Metro Surge over the winter. Their show called “Prem | Love: An Occupation” premieres Saturday at The Southern Theater in Minneapoli...

In early January, at the peak of what the Trump administration called Operation Metro Surge, two Target employees in Richfield were pinned to the ground and aggressively detained by federal agents. They are U.S. citizens and were eventually released, but suffered injuries during the arrest. They are among the more than 500 U.S. citizens who were detained and held during the current administration...

Federal prosecutors announced terrorism charges against an 18-year-old in the Twin Cities who they said had plans to commit a mass shooting at the Mall of America. For additional context on this story, Minnesota Now spoke to Mark Osler who was an assistant U.S. attorney in Michigan in the late 1990s. He was also a former deputy Hennepin County attorney. Now, he’s a law professor at the University...

Multiple Twin Cities police chiefs and county sheriffs have called for the creation of a regional task force after a string of shootings involving Somali youth. Law enforcement have described the incidents as gang violence. But what defines a gang? We talked to a researcher. A local nonprofit supporting the economic stability of immigrants is starting a new chapter in a new home. The CEO of Commun...

A nonprofit that aims to help immigrants find economic stability and success has expanded its headquarters in the Twin Cities metro. Communities Advancing Prosperity for Immigrants, or CAPI is celebrating a grand reopening this weekend. It’s the end of a yearslong process of moving the organization’s services to Brooklyn Center, which has become one of the most diverse communities in the state. CE...

A new LGBTQ+ magazine and website has launched in Minnesota, three months after Lavender Magazine shut down its operations after a 30-year run. Lavender was a mainstay for the LGBTQ+ community in the state. Q Minnesota was created by several former Lavender staffers. The very first issue came out last Thursday. For more about the launch and what’s ahead, MPR News host Nina Moini spoke with Q Minne...

A string of shootings involving Somali youth has set off questions around youth gun violence and what law enforcement are calling gang violence. Some Somali leaders say this could fuel more racist rhetoric against the Somali community. For more context and perspective on gangs and gun violence, MPR News host Nina Moini spoke with Metro State University professor James Densley, an expert on gangs.

A group of Twin Cities elected and law enforcement officials are calling for a regional task force to address recent shootings that they say involved Somali youth, and Somali leaders are pushing back on hateful comments that followed those events. A national exhibit debuting in St. Paul this month confronts the Catholic Church's role in slavery in the U.S. We'll talk with a descendant of one of th...

A new immersive exhibit opening at the University of St. Thomas this week is asking visitors to confront a painful chapter in the history of the Catholic Church and U.S. slavery. “What We Inherit: Truth, Repair, and a Promise to the Future” tells the story of more than 300 Black people who were enslaved by the Jesuits and sold in 1838 to help pay the debts of Georgetown College. The exhibition, wh...