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Election Law
Primary Ballots
Petitioner asked the Republican Party of Minnesota to include his name on its ballot for the 2024 presidential nomination primary. When the Chair of the Republican Party of Minnesota notified respondent Secretary of State, of the candidates for its ballot in the 2024 presidential nomination primary, petitioner was not included as a candidate. Petitioner and his campaign committee filed a petition under Minn. Stat. § 204B.44, asking that Secretary of State be directed to include petitioner’s name as a candidate on the presidential nomination primary ballot of the Republican Party of Minnesota. Petitioners asserted that the procedures established by Minn. Stat. § 207A.13, subd. 2(a), which authorize a major political party to determine the candidates that will appear on its ballot for the presidential nomination primary, violated the Electors Clause of the United States Constitution.
In an opinion explaining its earlier order, the Supreme Court held that § 207A.13, subd. 2(a), does not violate the Electors Clause of the United States Constitution because statutes that govern the presidential nomination primary do not fall within the scope of the Electors Clause. Petition denied.
A23-1900 Binkley for President 2024 v. Simon (Original Jurisdiction)
Tax
Gross Income
The dispute here centered on two years of Minnesota individual tax returns filed by relators. In 2019 and 2020, relators, residents of Wisconsin, filed joint tax returns reporting no Minnesota taxable income, despite receiving more than 1 million dollars in payments from Minnesota sources over those 2 years. Relators asserted that the payments received from Minnesota sources were not taxable wages or ordinary business income. Respondent Commissioner of Revenue disagreed, modified relators’ reported income accordingly, assessed additional income tax, and imposed a 25 percent penalty for filing a frivolous tax return under Minn. Stat. § 298A.60, subd. 7. Relators appealed the Commissioner’s assessment and the Minnesota Tax Court granted summary judgment in the Commissioner’s favor.
The Supreme Court held that (1) the Commissioner has the authority to adjust a taxpayer’s reported federal adjusted gross income when determining the correct amount of state income tax owed by the taxpayer under our decision in Specktor v. Commissioner of Revenue, 308 N.W.2d 806 (Minn. 1981), and Minn. Stat. § 270C.33, subd. 4; (2) the Tax Court did not err in granting summary judgment in favor of the Commissioner; and (3) the statutory penalty imposed for filing a frivolous tax return under Minn. Stat. § 289A.60, subd. 7, is not unconstitutional under the Due Process Clauses and Excessive Fines Clauses of the United States Constitution and Minnesota Constitution or the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution. Affirmed
A23-1259 Wendell v. Comm’r of Revenue (Tax Court)
Criminal
Plea Withdrawal
Accuracy
This case involved an unusual turn of events in a guilty-plea hearing when a defendant made a statement seemingly negating his guilt of at least one element of the crime that he had just pleaded guilty to committing. Shortly after defendant pleaded guilty to third-degree criminal sexual conduct using force, defendant made a statement on the record apparently denying that he had committed that offense. Defendant then responded affirmatively to a series of leading questions posed by defense counsel in an effort to rehabilitate the factual basis for the guilty plea. Without any inquiry on the record from the District Court judge, the prosecutor, or defense counsel with defendant regarding his prior contradictory assertion of innocence, the judge found defendant’s factual basis sufficient to support his guilty plea, accepted it, and adjudged defendant guilty. Defendant did not request withdrawal of his guilty plea at the continued sentencing hearing, and the District Court sentenced defendant to 153 months in prison. On appeal, Jones argued that his unaddressed assertion of innocence made the factual basis for his guilty plea inaccurate. The court of appeals affirmed.
The Supreme Court held that a guilty plea is inaccurate, thus entitling a defendant to withdraw the plea to correct a manifest injustice under Minn. R. Crim. P. 15.05, subd. 1, when a defendant makes a statement during the plea colloquy essentially negating an element of the charged offense, only leading questions are asked in an attempt to rehabilitate the plea, the statement is neither withdrawn nor corrected by the defendant on the record, and the factual basis for the plea is not sufficiently established by other means. Reversed and remanded.