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Legislative Tracking

Minnesota Legislative Tracker

A Minnesota bill tracker follows bills in the Minnesota Legislature, a 134-member House of Representatives and a 67-member Senate, and alerts you when a bill is heard in committee, amended, voted on, or acted on by the Governor.

November 3, 2026

min read

Ajay Jayagopal

Summarize with AI

Minnesota Legislature: How to Track Minnesota Bills

A Minnesota bill tracker, also called an MN legislature bill tracker, follows bills in the Minnesota Legislature, a 134-member House of Representatives and a 67-member Senate, and alerts you when a bill is heard in committee, amended, voted on, or acted on by the Governor.

Minnesota legislative tracking covers the whole path from introduction to the Governor's desk. The main options are the Legislature's own website, its MyBills tracker and mailing lists, free public trackers, and multi-state platforms such as Billflo. People also search for this as Minnesota Legislature bills, Minnesota Senate bills, or Minnesota House bills. The right choice depends on how many bills you follow, how many people share the work, and whether you need analysis and reporting.

Minnesota Legislature at a Glance: House, Senate, and Members

Readers who search for the Minnesota Legislature, the Minnesota Senate, the Minnesota House of Representatives, or Minnesota legislators are usually looking for one of three things: how it is organized, where to find a bill, or who represents them. The basics are below.

Question	Answer
Where does it meet?	Saint Paul, at the State Capitol
What is it called?	The Minnesota Legislature. The 2025 and 2026 sessions together form one biennium, the 94th Legislature. The official site is leg.mn.gov.
How many members?	134 in the House of Representatives, two per district, and 67 in the Senate, one per district
How long are the terms?	Two years in the House. Senators serve four-year terms, except that the pattern repeats every decade as four, four, and two years so that redistricting can follow the census.
Minnesota legislature makeup	The House was tied 67 to 67 after the 2024 election, with a power-sharing agreement that calls for co-chaired committees, and the DFL held a one-seat majority in the Senate as of early 2026. Special elections changed these counts, so check the House and Senate rosters. All 134 House seats are on the November 3, 2026 ballot.
How do I find my MN state legislators?	The House Public Information Services office answers questions about who your representatives are and what district you live in, at 651-296-6646 for the House and 651-296-0504 for the Senate. The House and Senate sites list members by district.
Where is the official record?	The Legislature's bill search and tracking pages, which let you search by bill number, author, topic, statutory citation, or keyword
Where are meetings broadcast?	The House's live webcast carries live and recorded sessions and committees, the Senate offers live audio from its chamber and committee rooms, and House coverage airs on local PBS stations
Are these the same as Minnesota's members of Congress?	No. Members of Congress are federal officials. See the section below.

A tracker builds on this official record. The sections below explain how to follow bills closely.

Minnesota State Legislators vs. Minnesota's Members of Congress

Searches such as "Minnesota congressional districts," "Minnesota senators," and "Minnesota representatives in Congress" often mix two different bodies. The Minnesota Senate and House meet in Saint Paul and write state law. Minnesota's delegation in Washington, D.C. writes federal law.

Body	Where	Who
State legislators	Minnesota Legislature, Saint Paul	67 state senators and 134 state representatives
Members of Congress	Congress, Washington, D.C.	2 U.S. senators and 8 U.S. representatives, one for each of Minnesota's eight congressional districts

The Clerk of the House's official list for the 119th Congress names Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith as Minnesota's U.S. senators. Use the House's Find Your Representative page and the Senate site to confirm your members, because the 119th Congress ends in January 2027. Billflo covers state and local government, not Congress.

Why You Need a Tracker for Minnesota Bills

Minnesota's calendar is built around a two-year biennium with a cap on legislative days. The constitution limits the Legislature to 120 legislative days in a biennium and bars regular sessions after the first Monday following the third Saturday in May of any year. A legislative day counts when either house is called to order on the floor, so committee-only days do not count. A single organization may care about only a small share of the bills introduced, and relevant bills are not always identified by their titles alone.

Minnesota also has features that reward close attention. House and Senate versions of the same idea move on separate tracks until a conference committee reconciles them. The Governor has only three days to act on most bills, but 14 days after adjournment for bills passed in the last three days of an even-numbered-year session, and a pocket veto cannot be overridden. And in recent years a tied House has used a power-sharing agreement that requires bipartisan votes to move bills out of committee. Organizations that follow Minnesota should plan tracking that covers the whole biennium and the Governor's post-session period.

Minnesota Legislative Session: Dates, Length, and Deadlines

The Minnesota Legislature meets in regular sessions in each year of a two-year biennium.

Question	Answer
When does the session begin?	In odd-numbered years the Legislature meets on the first Tuesday after the second Monday in January (Minnesota Statutes 3.011). That is Tuesday, January 12, 2027, applying the statute. The 2026 session convened February 17.
How long can it meet?	No more than 120 legislative days in a biennium, and no regular session after the first Monday following the third Saturday in May of any year
What happened in 2026?	The 2026 regular session convened February 17 and adjourned May 18, 2026, lasting 91 calendar days and 36 legislative days per chamber, with 78 legislative days for the biennium
What is a legislative day?	A day on which either house is called to order on the floor
What is a special session?	A session called after the regular session ends. The 2025 biennium included a special session that balanced the state budget.
When can bills be introduced?	Bills can be introduced throughout the session, and the Legislature publishes a schedule of committee deadlines each year

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Deadlines: Minnesota's committee deadlines are set by joint action of the House and Senate each session, and the Legislature publishes them on its calendar pages. The final adjournment cannot come later than the first Monday following the third Saturday in May. Check the current session's deadlines before relying on a date.

The recent calendar shows how a biennium runs. Dates change.

Milestone	Date
2025 regular session begins (first Tuesday after the second Monday in January)	January 14, 2025
2026 regular session convenes	February 17, 2026
2026 regular session adjourns sine die	May 18, 2026
General election	November 3, 2026
2027 regular session begins (statutory date)	January 12, 2027

How a Minnesota Bill Becomes Law

The route below is the standard path, according to the Legislature's How a Bill Becomes a Law page and the Senate's lawmaking process guide.

Stage	What happens	What a tracker should capture
1. Introduction and first reading	The chief author introduces the bill, which is the first reading, and the presiding officer refers it to a committee	New bills that match your subjects, with authors and bill number
2. Committee	The bill is discussed in one or more committees. Non-controversial bills can go to the consent calendar.	Hearing notice, amendments, and committee vote
3. Second reading	After the body accepts the committee report, the bill has its second reading and goes on the House General Register or the Senate General Orders	Calendar placement
4. Calendar and third reading	In the House, the bill goes on the Calendar for the Day. In the Senate, it goes on the Calendar, where it is read a third time and locked against amendment.	Third reading and roll call
5. Second body	The other body repeats the process	Second-body amendments
6. Conference committee	If the versions differ, a conference committee drafts a compromise that both bodies must repass	Conference members and report
7. Governor	The bill is presented to the Governor, who signs it, vetoes it, or lets it become law without a signature	Presentment date, deadline, and action taken
8. Law	An enacted bill becomes session law and takes effect on its effective date	Chapter number and effective date

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Timing rules that affect your calendar:

A bill needs 68 votes to pass the House and 34 votes to pass the Senate.
The Governor generally has three calendar days, Sundays excepted, from presentment to sign or veto a bill. A bill not acted on in that time becomes law.
For bills passed in the last three days of an even-numbered-year session, the Governor has 14 days from final adjournment to sign and file the bill. A bill not signed in that time does not become law, which is a pocket veto.
A veto can be overridden by two-thirds of each house, which is 90 votes in the House and 45 in the Senate, only while the Legislature has not adjourned. A pocket veto cannot be overridden.

Minnesota Bill Numbers and Versions

Minnesota numbers its bills as House Files and Senate Files. The numbers are tied to the biennium, so a file number does not identify a bill across legislatures.

Label	Meaning	Examples seen on the Legislature's site
HF	House File, a bill introduced in the House	HF 3231
SF	Senate File, a bill introduced in the Senate	Listed in the Senate's bill pages
Session	The two-year biennium and its sessions	The 94th Legislature, 2025 and 2026
Special session bills	Bills in a special session, with their own numbering	The 2025 special session

A bill also appears in versions, including introduced, engrossed, and amended. The House Research Department publishes bill summaries, and the Revisor of Statutes publishes the statutes and session laws at revisor.mn.gov. Check how each file appears on its status page.

Reading a Minnesota Bill's Status: A Glossary

The Legislature explains its process in its Making Laws series. These are the terms that appear most often in tracking.

Term	What it means
Biennium	The two-year period of a Legislature
Legislative day	A day on which either house is called to order on the floor
First, second, third reading	The three readings of a bill: introduction, after the committee report, and before the final vote
General Register / General Orders	The House and Senate agendas for bills after the second reading
Calendar for the Day	The House list of bills designated for a vote by the full House
Consent calendar	A calendar for non-controversial bills that usually pass without debate
Conference committee	A committee that reconciles House and Senate versions
Pocket veto	A bill passed in the last three days of an even-year session that the Governor does not sign within 14 days of adjournment
Final enactment	The date and time the Governor signs, or for a bill that becomes law without signature, the end of the last day the Governor could have vetoed it

When a tracking alert contains one of these terms, it tells you whether a bill is moving, stalled, or finished.

When Minnesota Laws Take Effect

Under Minnesota Statutes 645.02, an act generally takes effect on August 1 following its final enactment, unless the act sets a different date. The Legislature's FAQ adds that bills containing an item of appropriation take effect on July 1. For a bill the Governor signs, final enactment is the date and time of signature. For a bill that becomes law without a signature, it is the end of the last day the Governor could have vetoed it. Special laws that need local approval take effect the day after the approval certificate is filed with the Secretary of State. Read each act's effective-date language, and note the date on your tracking record, because compliance and planning work often depends on it.

The House Research Department's bill summaries, for example its omnibus summaries, state the effective dates for each section.

What to Track at Each Stage

Introduction: Review newly introduced bills against your subjects at least once each week. Search the bill text, not only the title. The Legislature lets you search by number, author, topic, statute, or keyword.

Committee hearings: Subscribe to the House and Senate schedule mailing lists through the Legislature's electronic notification services, and watch the committee schedules, which are updated throughout the day.

Fiscal and research materials: The House Research Department, Senate Counsel, Research, and Fiscal Analysis, and the Legislative Reference Library publish summaries and guides.

Amendments: A bill can change substantially between introduction and passage. Compare each version with the previous one.

Calendars: Follow the General Register, General Orders, and Calendar for the Day to see when a bill reaches the floor.

Conference committees: Record the members, the report, and whether both bodies repass it.

The Governor's desk: Record the date a bill is presented, the three-day or 14-day deadline, and the action taken. Watch the last three days of an even-year session for pocket vetoes.

Enacted laws: Record the chapter, the final enactment date, and the effective date.

Two Years, One Biennium: Minnesota Legislative Tracking Across the Legislature

A Minnesota Legislature covers two years, and the two sessions are one biennium. The 94th Legislature held its first session in 2025 and its second from February 17 to May 18, 2026. After the November 3, 2026 election, the next Legislature convenes on the first Tuesday after the second Monday in January 2027. The 120-legislative-day limit applies to the whole biennium, so a long first session leaves fewer days for the second.

Three habits help:

Check the biennium: Make sure the bill you are following is in the Legislature you expect. File numbers are tied to the biennium.
Follow committees, not only bills: A committee's schedule shows which bills are coming before it, and a bipartisan vote may be needed in a tied chamber.
Follow named legislators: Alerts tied to an author or a committee chair can show interest in a subject before a bill is filed. After an election, confirm who now serves each district.

Minnesota Bill Tracker Options Compared

A Minnesota bill tracker, an MN legislature bill tracker, and Minnesota legislature bill tracking are different names for the same need: a dependable way to follow bills in Saint Paul. There is no single correct tool. The table describes the main categories using publicly stated information. Features and prices change, so confirm current details with each provider.

Tool	What it is	Typical strength	Typical limitation
Legislature bill pages	The Legislature's search by bill number, author, topic, statute, or keyword, with status pages that list actions and the full text	The authoritative status and text of any bill	A lookup tool, with no team workflow
MyBills	A personal tracker for House and Senate bills on the Legislature's site	Shows recent or upcoming significant action on the bills you add	It requires a login and does not send email alerts. Confirm whether it meets your needs for alerts, shared team records, and reporting.
Electronic notification services	Mailing lists from the House and Senate for schedules, journals, committees, and more	Email notice of committee schedules	Schedules and notices, not a bill-by-bill alert
Live video and audio	The House's live webcast and Senate chamber and committee audio	Live and recorded sessions and committees	Video and audio, not a bill workflow tool
Free public bill trackers	Vendor tools that let individuals follow bills at no cost	Topic selection and email digests	Free plans commonly limit alerts, team features, or reporting
Multi-state legislative tracking platforms	Platforms that cover many states in one product, including Billflo	One workspace for Minnesota and other jurisdictions, with analysis, collaboration, and reporting	Compare Minnesota-specific coverage and depth on a trial before purchase
Spreadsheet	A manual list of bills	No cost and flexible	Accurate only as of the last update

For a broader comparison, see the best legislative tracking software.

What a Dedicated Minnesota Legislative Tracker Adds

The Legislature's tools tell you where a bill stands. Dedicated legislative tracking software adds the layer needed to act on that information:

Alerts across topics: Notice when a new or amended bill matches a keyword, committee, or sponsor, including bills not already on your list.
One record across both bodies: A watchlist that keeps House and Senate versions of the same idea together.
One record for the team: Shared bill lists, notes, and assignments that stay with the bill when responsibility changes.
Version comparison: A view of what changed between versions of a bill, including conference reports.
Summaries and analysis: Condensed explanations of long bills and answers to questions about their content.
Hearing coverage: Transcripts or summaries of committee hearings, not only calendar listings.
Reports: Current summaries for supervisors, boards, clients, or members.
Access control: Role-based permissions and audit records, which public agencies often require.

Beyond the Legislature: State Agency and Local Meetings

Decisions that affect your organization are not made only in Saint Paul. Minnesota's counties, cities, townships, school districts, and state agencies each hold public meetings, adopt ordinances and rules, and vote on matters that may parallel or follow state legislation. A state bill on a topic such as education, housing, or energy often produces local action once it becomes law. The Legislative Reference Library publishes issue guides and research, and the Secretary of State describes the Legislature's role in state government.

Organizations that follow Minnesota should decide early how far down the chain their tracking needs to reach.

State legislation only: Suitable when your interest is in shaping or preparing for statutes.
State plus local: Suitable when local ordinances and council votes affect your programs, budgets, or members.

When evaluating a platform, ask which local bodies it covers, how agendas and ordinances are collected, and how local items are alerted. Coverage of local bodies differs widely between vendors. Billflo covers state and local government.

How to Use a Minnesota Bill Tracker: A 12-Step Minnesota Legislative Tracking Workflow

A reliable tracking routine does not depend on one person's memory. It uses the official record as the source, alerts to catch changes, and a fixed schedule for review. The twelve steps below can be followed with the Legislature's own tools, or with a dedicated platform such as Billflo.

Define scope: List your subjects, relevant committees, and authors. Write the scope down so that the team applies it the same way.
Build your starting bill list from the official record: Use the Legislature's bill search for the biennium, and record each file number, including House Files and Senate Files that address the same subject.
Set alert rules: Use keywords with variants, because the same subject may be described with different wording. In Billflo alerts, rules can follow bills, committees, speakers, and keywords, so that new bills that are not yet on your list still reach you.
Review new bills weekly: and daily once committees begin to meet. Check the committee schedules, because hearings are added throughout the session.
Assign an owner: One named person should review alerts, with a defined backup. Shared inboxes without a responsible person are the most common reason alerts are missed.
Record your position and reasoning on each followed bill, with a note on who owns follow-up. Keeping notes, documents, and fiscal figures with the bill means that a new team member can understand its history. In Billflo, a legislative tracking project groups the bills, notes, and documents for one issue.
Watch for new versions: Compare versions after every amendment and conference report. Billflo's bill comparison shows what changed between versions, and its answers cite the bill behind them.
Mark the deadlines: Take the dates from the Legislature's calendar pages, remember the 120-legislative-day limit and the May adjournment limit, and note which of your bills have cleared committee.
Follow what is said at hearings: The record shows what happened, and the hearing shows why. Billflo's live session intelligence provides live transcripts, session summaries with key topics, speaker identification, and video timestamps that jump to where a bill was taken up.
Report on a schedule: Send an update weekly during session and at session end. Collaboration and reporting in Billflo produces PDF or DOCX reports that stay current as the bills change.
Check against the official site: periodically to confirm that the record is accurate. When a status looks wrong, the Legislature's bill page is the authority.
Follow the post-session period: After adjournment, track the Governor's signing and veto actions, any pocket veto, and each act's effective date.

A Sample Tracking Day During Session

The schedule below is an illustration of how one analyst might work through a busy committee day. It is not tied to any specific product or date.

Time	Task
Early morning	Review overnight alerts: newly introduced bills, new versions, and posted committee schedules. Discard matches that are not relevant.
Before the first hearing	Read the committee notice and the bill text, and note the author's amendments.
During hearings	Follow the live stream or the recording on the bills you track. Note which witnesses support and oppose, and what amendments are discussed.
After hearings	Update each bill record with the outcome, the vote, and next steps.
End of day	Send a short update to supervisors, clients, or members with what moved and what requires action.

Common Mistakes in Tracking Minnesota Bills

Tracking only one body's file: House and Senate versions move on separate tracks. Track both, and watch for the conference committee.

Reading only the title: A bill's title may describe an earlier version. Read the current version.

Relying on MyBills for alerts: MyBills does not send email alerts. Use the mailing lists or a tracker with alerts.

Ignoring the legislative-day limit: The Legislature may meet no more than 120 legislative days in a biennium, so a long first session leaves fewer days in the second.

Missing the end-of-session window: The Governor has 14 days after adjournment for bills passed in the last three days of an even-year session, and a pocket veto cannot be overridden.

Assuming a veto can always be overridden: An override needs two-thirds of each house, and only while the Legislature is still in session.

Missing the power-sharing rules: When a chamber is evenly split, committee chairs, membership, and the votes needed to advance a bill can differ from the usual rules.

Treating signature as the end: A signed bill still has an effective date, usually August 1 or July 1 for appropriations, and it may direct an agency to take further action. Record both.

Starter Alert Keywords for a Minnesota Legislative Tracker

Alert rules work best when they include the terms legislators actually use. The lists below are starting points for a first set of Minnesota alerts. Adjust them for your organization, and review them at the start of each biennium.

Subject	Example terms
Education	school, student, teacher, charter, higher education, scholarship
Health	health care, Medicaid, behavioral health, hospital, pharmacy, insurance
Artificial intelligence	artificial intelligence, automated decision, algorithm, generative, deepfake
Privacy and data	privacy, personal information, data broker, biometric, consumer data
Labor and employment	employer, wages, workplace, worker, paid leave
Agriculture and natural resources	agriculture, farm, water, mining, forestry, wildlife
Energy and environment	energy, utility, emissions, renewable, carbon
Housing and land use	housing, zoning, landlord, tenant, land use
Transportation	transportation, highway, transit, motor vehicle, rail
Taxes and budget	tax, revenue, appropriation, budget, fiscal
Public safety	law enforcement, firearm, corrections, sentencing
Elections	election, ballot, voter, campaign finance, redistricting

Test each rule against a week of alerts. If a term returns too many unrelated bills, add a committee or an author to narrow it. If it returns too few, add variants of the same idea.

Official and Independent Sources

A tracker is only as reliable as its sources. These are the primary references for Minnesota legislation.

Minnesota Legislature: The official site for bills, committees, members, and session information.
How to Follow a Bill and MyBills: Bill search and the personal tracker.
Electronic notification services: House and Senate mailing lists.
How a Bill Becomes a Law and Frequently Asked Questions: The Legislature's process guide and FAQs on sessions, bills, and votes.
House Research: Making Laws and Veto Procedures: The House Research Department's guides.
Senate: The Lawmaking Process and Inside the Minnesota Senate: The Senate's guides.
Legislative Reference Library: Veto Process and sessions history: Vetoes and session dates.
Session Daily: The House's news service.
Minnesota Constitution and Minnesota Statutes 645.02: The session, veto, and effective-date provisions cited in this guide.
Clerk of the House list of members and Find Your Representative: Federal delegation lookups.

A platform should be able to point back to these sources. When a figure or status looks wrong, check it against the official record.

How to Choose a Minnesota Bill Tracker

The Minnesota Legislature rewards steady attention. A two-year biennium is capped at 120 legislative days, House and Senate versions move separately until a conference committee, the Governor's timing changes in the last days of an even-year session, and a tied chamber can change how bills move. The practical question is not whether to track Minnesota bills, but how much structure your work requires.

Match the Tool to the Workload

Your situation	A reasonable approach
A few bills, one person	The Legislature's bill pages, MyBills, the schedule mailing lists, and a spreadsheet
Many bills, or several people sharing them	A dedicated legislative tracking platform with shared records, cross-topic alerts, and reports
Minnesota together with other states or local bodies	A multi-state platform, so that one record covers every jurisdiction

Whichever approach you choose, three habits matter more than the tool. Read each new version, check the committee schedules as they are published, and give one named person responsibility for reviewing alerts.

Where Billflo Fits

Billflo is an AI-native legislative intelligence platform covering all 50 states and local government, which includes the Minnesota Legislature. It addresses the problems this guide has described:

Versions and companion bills: Legislative tracking projects keep version history, and bill comparison shows what changed between versions.
Hearings and a short clock: Alerts follow bills, committees, speakers, and keywords by text message, push notification, or email. Live session intelligence provides live transcripts, session summaries with key topics, speaker identification, and video timestamps that jump to where a bill was taken up.
Verification: In AI analysis, every answer cites the bill behind it, so a reader can confirm the statement against the official record.
Teams and reporting: Collaboration and reporting provides shared projects and PDF or DOCX reports that stay current. Role-based access, audit trails, and secure data handling support public agency requirements.

Billflo offers a free plan, and other plans are priced by agency size. It is a legislative intelligence platform and does not include grassroots advocacy, PAC management, or stakeholder relationship management tools.

For the wider workflow, read the guide to state legislative tracking, the guide to legislative tracking software, and the companion guides to California, Washington, Arizona, Massachusetts, Alabama, Arkansas, Maryland, Utah, Oregon, Wisconsin, and Michigan legislative tracking.

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Frequently asked questions

1. What are the two chambers of the Minnesota Legislature?

The Minnesota Legislature has two chambers: the House of Representatives, with 134 members serving two-year terms, and the Senate, with 67 members serving four-year terms in most cycles. Each Senate district has one senator, and each House district has two representatives. The Legislature meets in Saint Paul, and the House and Senate sites list the members by district.

2. What is the best way to track Minnesota bills, and is there an official or free tracker?

It depends on your needs. The Legislature's website lets you look up any bill, MyBills lets you build a personal list, and the House and Senate mailing lists send committee schedules by email. MyBills does not send email alerts. Billflo also offers a free plan. Organizations that follow many bills, share the work among several people, or need reports usually add a dedicated legislative tracking platform. Compare Minnesota-specific coverage on a trial before choosing.

3. When is the Minnesota legislative session?

In odd-numbered years the Legislature convenes on the first Tuesday after the second Monday in January, which is January 12 in 2027. The Legislature may meet no more than 120 legislative days in a biennium and may not hold a regular session after the first Monday following the third Saturday in May. The 2026 session ran from February 17 to May 18.

4. How does a Minnesota bill become law?

A bill is introduced and referred to a committee, which holds hearings and reports it. After a second reading it goes onto the House General Register or Senate General Orders, then to a third reading and a vote. A bill needs 68 votes in the House and 34 in the Senate. A conference committee reconciles differences. The Governor has three days to act, or 14 days after adjournment for bills passed in the last three days of an even-year session. A veto can be overridden by two-thirds of each house while the Legislature is in session.

5. What is the makeup of the Minnesota Legislature?

The House was tied 67 to 67 after the 2024 election and operated under a power-sharing agreement, and the DFL held a one-seat majority in the Senate as of early 2026. Special elections changed these counts, so check the Legislature's rosters. All 134 House seats are on the November 3, 2026 ballot.

6. How do I find my Minnesota legislators and districts?

The House and Senate sites list members by district, and the Legislature's public information offices answer questions about who your representatives are and what district you live in. Each member's page lists their district and contact information.

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