Minnesota political players to watch in 2023

Every election brings in new faces and players to watch.

Much attention typically goes to the trio of top leaders who inevitably end up in closed-door negotiations to hash out the broad strokes of a budget deal. Since the Democrats swept control of both the Minnesota House and Senate in the midterm election, the top three leaders heading into the 2023 legislative session are all DFLers.

Some top players will remain the same, while others who have been at the State Capitol and representing Minnesota in Washington, D.C., for many years are stepping into new leadership roles in 2023. Fresh faces will take on high-profile jobs in the executive branch.

Here are some of the people to watch as the work begins in St. Paul and Washington next year.

— Gov. Tim Walz, fresh off reelection to a second term, now has leadership allies in both legislative chambers and could feel more emboldened to push for his long-languishing priorities. House Speaker Melissa Hortman returns to her leadership role, making her the most experienced dealmaker of the trio. She'll have to contend with a politically aligned but closely divided Senate led by new Majority Leader Kari Dziedzic, who must keep her caucus united with a single-vote majority.

— Republican House Minority Leader Lisa Demuth's bid to lead the House minority GOP caucus was a surprise even to some of the most plugged-in political watchers, but she's been quietly making moves in that direction for years. For the last two years she's been assistant minority leader to Rep. Kurt Daudt. Demuth, a three-term legislator from Cold Spring, says she'll bring a more collaborative style to the leadership post, promising to try to work with Democrats on issues where they can agree.

— The DFL's unexpected flip of the state Senate wouldn't have happened without a group of four incoming freshman senators who prevailed in some of the hardest-fought races on the ballot this fall: Judy Seeberger, an Afton attorney, teacher and paramedic who won an open seat in the east metro suburbs; Heather Gustafson of Vadnais Heights, who toppled Senate Education Chair Roger Chamberlain in a northeast metro district; Grant Hauschild, a Hermantown native who narrowly won a race for a sprawling Senate district that covers much of the Arrowhead region; and Rob Kupec, who won a Moorhead-area Senate race that had been trending toward Republicans.

With the session still weeks away, the four issued a news release uniting around elimination of the state's tax on Social Security benefits — suggesting they could team up to push other agenda items they campaigned on in the fall.

— Department of Health Commissioner Brooke Cunningham is stepping into what has been one of the most high-profile jobs in state government in recent years under Commissioner Jan Malcolm, a central figure in the state's pandemic response who is retiring. Whether COVID-19 or other emergencies keep the health commissioner in the spotlight remains to be seen, but Cunningham brings to the job a focus on tackling health inequities. She was previously assistant commissioner of the department's Health Equity Bureau and an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota Medical School, where she focused on race and medicine.

— Meanwhile in Washington, U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer was able to win a heated campaign behind closed doors to become the third-ranking Republican in the U.S. House following a dicey midterm election for the GOP. As he officially takes on the role next month, Emmer will have the challenge of counting votes and persuading members as House majority whip for a Republican conference that holds control of the House by only a small number of seats. That means Emmer is likely to be a key player in many of the major political debates dominating lawmakers' attention on Capitol Hill.

Staff writer Hunter Woodall contributed to this story.