Minnesota Wants 5-Year Gun Seizures—No Charge, No Hearing

The existing Minnesota ERPO law only went live in January 2024. In its first year, 138 petitions were filed. By 2025, that number had nearly tripled to 314. Judges approved **96% of them.**

Near-automatic. No adversarial hearing. Your guns, gone.

Now the Legislature wants to make it worse—much worse.

The expansion bill stretches ERPOs from one year to **five years**. It lets petitions be filed after business hours and on weekends, shrinking your window to respond before the order lands. It opens the filing authority to **any patrol officer on scene**—not just chiefs or sheriffs. And it kills the requirement that departments reimburse you at fair market value for surrendered property.

**Your rights. Their convenience. Your loss.**

Rep. Cedrick Frazier (DFL-New Hope) is carrying the House bill and calls it legislation that "has saved many lives." That's the sales pitch. The fine print is a due-process chainsaw.

Here's what CBS Minnesota quietly noted: this bill already cleared the tied Minnesota House out of committee—which means **Republican lawmakers voted for it**. That's not bipartisan wisdom. That's Republicans helping Democrats cement a permanent gun-confiscation framework.

The NRA didn't mince words. In a letter to the Senate committee, it called this exactly what it is: a **"gun confiscation"** scheme. When 96% of petitions are rubber-stamped by judges, this isn't a careful judicial safety valve—it's a one-way door with a five-year lock.

The Richfield Police Chief, who also heads the Minnesota Chiefs of Police Association, is cheerleading the bill. He frames easier on-scene paperwork as officer efficiency. What he's actually describing is a system where a **single officer's judgment—at midnight on a Saturday**—can trigger a multi-year loss of your constitutional rights before any prosecutor files a single charge.

The DFL-controlled Senate is advancing a companion bill. Governor Tim Walz has signaled no interest in protecting Minnesota gun owners from this expansion.

The machinery is moving fast. The opposition window is closing.

**Contact your Minnesota state rep and senator now**—especially any Republican who voted this out of committee—and demand they kill this bill. Find your legislators at leg.mn.gov. The NRA-ILA is already engaged; get behind their effort.

Because if Minnesota gun owners stay quiet, the next five-year ERPO filed on a Sunday night might have your name on it—and you won't know it until the knock comes.