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The state of Minnesota sued Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in federal court on Tuesday over a nearly three-month delay in extraditing Christian Castro, the ICE agent accused of shooting Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis in north Minneapolis during Operation Metro Surge and later lying about it.

Castro has been held in the Cameron County jail near the Mexican border since being arrested on May 29 by the Texas Rangers. On July 30, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty sent a letter to Abbott requesting his signature on the extradition paperwork so Castro could face charges in Minnesota.

Castro was charged by the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office on May 18 with four felony counts of second-degree assault with a dangerous weapon and one misdemeanor count of falsely reporting a crime for the chaotic situation that developed in north Minneapolis on Jan. 14 after Castro allegedly shot Sosa-Celis.

A nationwide search warrant was issued the same day he was charged, and in her late-May letter, Moriarty pushed Abbott to return Castro to Minnesota.

“The final step is for you as the Governor to sign the extradition paperwork so that we can proceed with the case in Minnesota,” Moriarty wrote.

The federal lawsuit will seek to force the hand of Abbott, a Republican who is seeking a fourth term as governor in Texas and is locked in a tight race with Gina Hinojosa, the Democratic nominee. The suit, filed in Texas federal court by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, casts the delay of Castro’s extradition as unlawful, unusual and “inconsistent with historical practice.” It names Abbott and Cameron County Sheriff Manuel Trevino as defendants.

When asked about Castro’s extradition on Tuesday, Abbott’s press coordinator Agathe Cirasa said: “The Office of the Governor will not comment on pending extradition matters.”

Har Mar’s indoor mall will likely be demolished if it can iron out a new contract with its largest tenant, Cub Foods.

The redevelopment has been in the works for more than four years and could dramatically alter one of Roseville’s best-known commercial properties. Yet city officials and developers have said little publicly about the plans.

Vacant storefronts now make up more than two-thirds of the center, fueling years of speculation about its future. That interest intensified in June when JLL marketing materials called for a “full scrape and rebuild” of the 63-year-old shopping center.

Correspondence between the city and developers show plans to raze some of the buildings to make room for more freestanding restaurants and shops, according to records obtained by the Minnesota Star Tribune.

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey proposed a $2.3 billion budget Wednesday that would require a 11.3% increase in the city’s property tax levy, the elimination of 100 positions and the consolidation of several departments.

The tax increase means the owner of a median-valued Minneapolis home will pay $409 more a year. The property tax levy has gone up an average of 7.7% a year since 2018.

But the City Council may have other ideas, as Frey’s budget address is just the starting point for months of public hearings and negotiations before final passage of a budget in December. Last year, the council scaled back Frey’s proposed levy increase.

The cuts are needed to close a $32 million budget gap driven by increasing personnel costs and flat or declining revenue, but the city is seeing promising economic signs so far this year in downtown vacancies, major events in the city and rising property valuations.

Mike Lindell is stepping down as chief executive of MyPillow and will no longer be a majority owner of the company he founded in order to focus on his run for Minnesota governor.

“I want the state of Minnesota ... to know I’m all in,” he said on his streaming platform, LindellTV, on Tuesday afternoon.

Lindell has been leading in polls ahead of the Aug. 11 primary after he won President Donald Trump’s endorsement in July. He will face fellow Republicans Lisa Demuth and Kendall Qualls for a chance to get onto November’s ballot.

“I am putting Minnesota above myself, my title and my business interests so I can give this campaign and the people of our state my full time, energy and attention,” Lindell said in a statement.

Lindell founded MyPillow in 2004, and it went on to become a direct-sales sensation due to the ubiquitous infomercials he starred in. The company took a major hit after Lindell attached himself to Trump’s disproven claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 election. Major retailers stopped carrying MyPillow, resulting in millions in lost revenue and a cascading financial crisis at the company.

More than 100 city employees could be laid off in Minneapolis in the first major layoffs in 16 years as the city faces a $33 million budget gap.

Next week, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey will unveil a budget proposal with major cuts, layoffs and the elimination of some departments — and will still seek a double-digit increase in the city’s property tax levy to fund the 2027 budget.

Due to increasing personnel costs and flat or declining revenue, city officials have projected a $744 million budget and the mayor must figure out how to close a $33 million gap with cuts or new revenue before he presents a budget proposal to the City Council on Aug. 12. That will kick off several months of public hearings and negotiations before final passage in December.

The privately owned prison in Appleton, Minn., that was shuttered 16 years ago will reopen in the fall to hold detainees for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Owner and private prison operator CoreCivic announced a five-year deal Tuesday with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to house up to 1,600 ICE detainees. The reopening will happen in stages, and the prison is expected to be fully operational by next spring.

Once the facility is up and running, CoreCivic says it expects to generate $75 million in annual revenue.

In a statement, Patrick D. Swindle, CoreCivic’s CEO, said the company made recent repairs to the Appleton prison to prepare for a new contract. Contractors have been working at the prison since last fall.

“The geographic location of this facility, similar to our other recent contract awards, improves our ability to support our government partner throughout the United States,” Swindle’s statement said.

CoreCivic is one of the largest government contractors for immigrant detention and recently sold two California detention facilities to DHS for $1.5 billion.

A CoreCivic spokesman referred additional questions about the deal to ICE, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The City of St. Paul has hired an outside law firm to investigate sexual harassment allegations against Mayor Kaohly Her, including claims that she directed inappropriate sexual comments toward Police Chief Axel Henry and other city employees.

The Minnesota Star Tribune obtained an April 1 letter from Henry’s attorney, Chris Madel, to St. Paul City Attorney Irene Kao notifying the city that Henry had filed a formal complaint.

In choosing to name himself as the complainant, the letter read, “Chief Henry is not only seeking to address the wrongdoing but also create a measure of protection for his team, signaling that such conduct will not be tolerated.”

In a statement, Her’s spokesperson Matt Wagenius would not comment on the investigation.

“The mayor has deep respect for city employees and regrets any unintended impact her action may have had,” Wagenius said.

Included in the letter is a screenshot of a text message allegedly sent by Her to a city employee that reads, “Happy Weiner Wednesday!” and a note expressing regret that she can’t be with the employee to eat a hot dog that day.

Beneath the message is a partially redacted image showing a swaddled baby.

According to a person familiar with the inquiry who spoke on condition on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter, the redacted part of the image was the face of a St. Paul police officer assigned to Her’s security detail superimposed on the baby’s body.

Above the photo, a message read, “When she wraps you up in a blanket after you gave her a good weinering,” with two laughing emojis. The term “wienering” is often used as sexual innuendo on the internet.

According to people familiar with the St. Paul Police Department, a civilian employee typically brings in hot dogs for a small group of staff on Wednesdays, which has been informally dubbed, “Wiener Wednesdays” by some employees.

The person familiar with the investigation said it also includes sexualized communications and unwanted physical contact from Her directed at Henry.

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Prediction market platforms Kalshi and Polymarket notched an early legal victory Monday in fighting a state law meant to ban Minnesotans from making certain wagers.

U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez granted a preliminary injunction that pauses the state law banning the markets temporarily while legal challenges brought by the tech firms and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission wind through the courts.

The ruling effectively allows the platforms to continue operating for the time being while the legal battle progresses.

Prediction market wagering has exploded in popularity, allowing users to put real money on outcomes like the weather, sports or pop culture. That has put the sites in conflict with state gambling laws, though the companies and their regulator say the wagers should be regulated as short-term investments, not betting.

Minnesota’s law, passed earlier this year, would have rendered a swath of activity on the platforms a felony.

Before he can vote for himself in next month’s primary, Mike Lindell needs to register to vote in the state he wants to lead as governor.

The Minnesota secretary of state’s office said Lindell, President Donald Trump’s preferred candidate, “does not have an active record,” spokeswoman Cassondra Knudson said when asked if Lindell is a registered voter.

A Minnesota Star Tribune review of voter records shows Lindell has an active voter registration in Texas.

Lindell acknowledged last year he had been living in Texas and that he’d have to reestablish residency in Minnesota to run for governor, something he says he has now done. But Lindell has not signed up to cast a ballot for himself since his return to Minnesota, and Texas lists an active voter registration record for the MyPillow CEO.

In an interview with the Minnesota Star Tribune, Lindell said he didn’t know if he was registered to vote in Minnesota and would have to check. But he said “obviously I’m going to vote,” and that he wouldn’t vote in Texas because he doesn’t live there anymore.

“I’m not going to vote twice,” he said.

Allegiant is cutting hundreds of its popular Sun Country Airlines flights at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP) in September, as it says it’s dealing with a pilot staffing problem.

The move comes just two months after the longtime Minnesota airline was bought by rival budget carrier Allegiant. In a memo to employees this month, Allegiant CEO Greg Anderson said the MSP cancellations, which amount to a third of the carrier’s total MSP flights in September, are temporary and not a sign of a permanently lowered flight volume at Minnesota’s largest airport.

The flight reductions come after “higher-than-expected” employee attrition and increased demand for cargo flying, Anderson said.

The Ramsey County Attorney and sheriff have sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, accusing the department of withholding evidence about the detainment of a Hmong man who was pulled from his house in his underwear on a bitterly cold day during Operation Metro Surge.

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court in Minnesota, accuses Homeland Security of refusing to provide information to Ramsey County investigators as they weigh possible criminal charges in the Jan. 18 detainment of ChongLy Scott Thao, a U.S. citizen who was handcuffed and taken from his St. Paul home at gunpoint.

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi said Wednesday the lawsuit’s aim is to compel the U.S. government to share information so his office can determine “whether or not Minnesota law has been broken, and to uphold the rule of law wherever the facts take us and what the law prescribes.”

Minneapolis city leaders are grappling with a projected shortfall of up to $33 million as they put together the 2027 budget — putting them in a financial squeeze that could force some tough choices.

City Council President Elliott Payne has called the estimated gap in the general fund, the city’s operating account, “kind of alarming.”

The city’s deputy chief financial officer, Jayne Discenza, has said it is “a large gap.”

“I won’t sugarcoat that,” she told the council’s budget committee in June. “We have a lot of work to do, and we will do it.”

The city’s overall budget is about $2 billion; the general fund is projected to be $744 million next year.

Mayor Jacob Frey is making decisions now about what cuts to propose and how much taxes will have to go up in order to balance the budget. But the projected shortfall means city officials may have to forgo new initiatives if they want to ease the pain for taxpayers.

Minnesota will be dealing with thick smoke from wildfires burning over the Boundary Waters and Ontario as winds shift behind a weak frontal passage, blowing more from the north and northeast by Wednesday. That will bring thick smoke into much of Minnesota, including the Twin Cities, by Wednesday afternoon, impacting visibility and, more importantly, air quality.

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) is predicting hazardous air quality over much of the Minnesota Arrowhead, with unhealthy to very unhealthy air quality over a large portion of central and eastern Minnesota as these smoke plumes begin to push southward over the next 24 hours.

The combination of sunlight and wildfire smoke will create ripe conditions for "smog" creation, with ozone the primary risk, contributing to possible health threats, especially for people with respiratory ailments like asthma and COPD. People, especially those at risk, may want to consider staying indoors on  Wednesday and Thursday as the core of the smoke plume impacts the area.

After months of refusing to do so, the Justice Department has turned over a substantial amount of evidence from its investigations into the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti during Operation Metro Surge to state investigators, a person familiar with the investigation but not authorized to speak publicly about the details confirmed to the Minnesota Star Tribune.

The evidence, which has been changing hands for several days without acknowledgment by the federal government or Minnesota law enforcement officials, includes the SUV Good was driving when she was shot and killed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] agent Jonathan Ross.

The vehicle was transferred to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension [BCA] more than a week ago, this person confirmed. The SUV had been in federal custody since Good was killed on Jan. 7 in south Minneapolis.

Additional digital and physical evidence from the killings was turned over in the last several days, the source said, adding that state law enforcement officials consider the evidence comprehensive.

The U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division will send election monitors to Minnesota for the 2026 primaries and a handful of other states into areas where the agency claims it has seen “problems” in recent elections.

The decision comes as the federal government has recently retreated from its longstanding role of helping states safeguard elections and prepare for emerging threats ahead of Election Day.

The Department of Justice said sending election monitors is a routine practice that’s been done under both Democratic and Republican administrations.

“What we hope to do here is increase voter confidence, make sure there are no language barriers or access to voting for Americans with disabilities,” the DOJ’s Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon said in a video announcing the monitors this week.

After Minnesota’s Aug. 11 primary, Dhillon said there will be “an even more expanded program for vote monitors” in November’s general election.

The Minnesota Secretary of State’s Office said the federal government has routinely sent election monitors to Minnesota polling locations in the past.

But some Minnesota Democrats questioned the DOJ’s motives, especially as President Donald Trump continues to make unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud.

“Trump’s DOJ monitoring elections is like a fox monitoring a henhouse,“ Gov. Tim Walz said on X. ”We cannot allow our right to vote to be undermined by political interference. Every state must administer their elections free from unlawful federal intrusion.”

The Chief Communications Officer for the city of Minneapolis was fired last week amid allegations that he stole cash and credit cards from three fellow city employees, racking up hundreds of dollars in fraudulent charges at tobacco stores, according to five people with knowledge of the investigation.

Minneapolis police submitted a case file against Adam Fetcher, 42, to the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office for potential criminal charges on Tuesday. A spokesman for County Attorney Mary Moriarty confirmed that the case remains under review.

Fetcher, who served in the city’s top communications role for one year, is accused of stealing money from colleagues’ desks and purses shortly after returning from a work-approved rehabilitation program, according to people familiar with the matter.

In February, Fetcher shared with co-workers that he was seeking treatment for an unspecified substance abuse disorder and took a nine-week personnel leave. He returned in mid-April.

Fetcher was later caught on surveillance video inside a south Minneapolis smoke shop using a stolen card to buy Kratom, sources told the Minnesota Star Tribune. The herbal supplement is commonly used to treat opioid withdrawal symptoms, but carries its own risk of addiction.

After years of unseasonably warm weather, organizers of the Twin Cities Marathon have decided to move the race in 2027 from its traditional start on the first Sunday of October.

Beginning next year, the marathon will be held later in October in an effort to assure cooler conditions for runners. Twin Cities in Motion (TCM) announced the change Tuesday morning.

TCM President Dean Orton said the warmer temperatures necessitated the move now. The organization analyzed a significant window of weather data, which swayed it to change. Abating the heat risk to runners was the main priority, Orton said.

In 2023, TCM cancelled its 26.2-mile run and its related 10-mile race owing to a forecast of record heat that Sunday morning.

“At the end of the day, when you stack up the gains here,” Orton added, “I think overall support is going to be understanding*."*

We explored 13 river, lake and creek routes in the Twin Cities metro. Here's how to get on the water, whether you're a beginner or a seasoned paddler.

Whenever 9-year-old MJ Roaldi gets in the car with his mom, he requests “Fletcher’s song.”

That would be “Ordinary” by Alex Warren.

Fletcher Merkel was MJ’s classmate at Annunciation Catholic School in southwest Minneapolis who was killed in a mass shooting Aug. 27.

Even though they palled around and played sports together, MJ didn’t know “Ordinary” was Fletcher’s favorite song until it was performed at his funeral.

Since then, it has become a theme song, an expression of both grief and gratitude, for Fletcher’s classmates and the entire Annunciation community.

Students asked if they could sing “Ordinary” — and Justin Timberlake’s “Can’t Stop The Feeling” for fellow slain student Harper Moyski — at Annunciation’s Christmas pageant in December. It was performed at Fishing for Fletcher, a memorial event at Lake Harriet Bandshell in May. It’s on the playlist at just about every Annunciation social event.

Whenever they hear “Ordinary,” Fletcher’s pals know what to do: “We just find each other,” MJ said. And hold hands and sing along.

With only 10 boys in a class of nearly 40 students in Annunciation’s third grade last school year, the boys have bonded. They are going to see Alex Warren in concert Thursday in St. Paul. About 70 people from the Merkel family and Annunciation community are headed to Grand Casino Arena where they will have two suites.