Did Minnesota Senate president have a conflict of interest? Ethics panel reaches mixed finding.

The Minnesota Senate’s ethics panel declared Thursday that Sen. Bobby Joe Champion did not have a financial conflict of interest when he introduced a bill in March to award $1 million to a nonprofit run by his former legal client.

However, the Senate’s Subcommittee on Ethical Conduct chose not to make a finding on whether Champion had a conflict of interest when he secured funding for the same violence prevention nonprofit in 2023.

That year, Champion authored a bill awarding $3 million to 21 Days of Peace and didn’t disclose that he had provided legal representation to the nonprofit’s founder, the Rev. Jerry McAfee, in several court cases months earlier. One of those court cases didn’t wrap up until after Champion introduced the funding bill for McAfee’s nonprofit.

Champion, DFL-Minneapolis, maintained there was no conflict of interest to disclose in 2023 because the work he did for McAfee in his capacity as a private attorney was pro bono.

At the same time, Champion, who is president of the Minnesota Senate, temporarily stepped down from his role as chair of the ethics subcommittee and asked the panel for an advisory opinion, which it provided Thursday.

Going forward, the Senate ethics panel advised Champion to “disclose any appearance of a potential conflict of interest to the committees of interest when he is the chief author of bills.”

“Mere disclosure, I think, is all that we’re after, and that standard would be applied to any member in here regardless of party,” said Sen. Andrew Mathews, R-Princeton. “I think mere disclosure would be beneficial to the people of Minnesota, to the constituencies that we serve and would give each of our committees that are examining bills all the relevant information that they need.”

Ethics Subcommittee Chair Sandy Pappas, DFL-St. Paul, said the panel’s recommendations to Champion “are really applicable to all of us legislators.” She defended Champion’s pro-bono work in his community and said it would be a shame if he stopped doing it.

Members of the ethics subcommittee, evenly split between two Democrats and two Republicans, noted that Minnesota has a part-time Legislature with many members holding other jobs. That poses more opportunities for conflicts to arise.

“We are very embedded in our communities,” Pappas said. “We have a lot of relationships, a lot of people we know ... and we have also professional jobs in our community. If we have such a broad definition of conflict of interest that involves anyone we know, I think that’s just unworkable.”

Champion told reporters Thursday that the ethics panel’s advisory opinion should “alleviate any other innuendos that there was a conflict when there wasn’t a conflict.” He said all senators have to follow the state’s conflict of interest law, and asserted that media outlets tried to hold him to a higher standard.

Minnesota law narrowly defines a conflict of interest as when a legislator “is required to take an action or make a decision that would substantially affect his or her financial interests or those of an associated business.” Champion said his free legal work didn’t constitute a conflict under that definition.

But ethics experts have said Minnesota’s conflict of interest law for legislators is too weak, arguing that Champion’s dual relationships with nonprofits as both lawmaker and attorney constitute “a conflict of interest by any standard.”

Sen. Michael Kreun, R-Blaine, is one of six GOP lawmakers who recently filed an ethics complaint against Champion over the conflict of interest concerns. He said in a statement Thursday that legislators should be held to a higher standard and “avoid behavior that betrays the public trust.”

“The choice to carry legislation that provided funding to an entity with which Champion has a privileged relationship without disclosing the relationship fails to meet those standards and this opinion from the Subcommittee on Ethical Conduct acknowledges that fact by saying he should make disclosures in the future,” Kreun said.

The GOP’s ethics complaint alleges that Champion violated Senate rules on ethical conduct and public trust. The Senate’s ethics subcommittee is scheduled to meet again in early May to respond to that complaint.

Senate Republicans made a motion on the floor Thursday to remove Champion from his role as president of the chamber. Democrats referred the resolution to the rules committee for future discussion.