Legislators’ addresses could be stripped from campaign documents

In the wake of the assassination of Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman in June 2025, legislators’ home addresses were removed from campaign committee registration information on the Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board website. Those addresses, however, were still available in other documents.

“Suffice it to say that public availability of home addresses of many legislators put our safety at risk in the heightened political environment we find ourselves in,” said Rep. Mike Freiberg (DFL-Golden Valley).

The Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board oversees campaign finance reporting by candidates for state office, including campaign committee registration and fundraising, and lobbyist registration and disclosures.

Rep. Mike Freiberg

Freiberg sponsors HF3363 that, as amended, would prohibit the board from posting on its website street addresses of individuals disclosed within campaign reports.

The bill would extend the authority of any campaign staff, not just the campaign treasurer, to use the board’s reporting system and only require them to submit a city, state, and zip code instead of a complete address in the report.

For the disclaimer on printed campaign materials, rather than an address, the material would need to include the campaign entity’s mailing address, an actively monitored email address, or a reference to the entity’s website.

The House Elections Finance and Government Operations Committee approved the bill Wednesday, sending it to the House Judiciary Finance and Civil Law Committee.

Alex Baiocco, director of government affairs for the People United for Privacy Foundation, wrote in support of the bill, saying it “ensures the state’s legitimate transparency and regulatory objectives are met while keeping particularly abuse-prone information confidential.”

Thirteen amendments covering more documents that contain street addresses were proposed, 12 were approved, further stripping addresses from nominating petitions, affidavits of candidacy, and lobbyist gift reports, among other documents, as well as retroactively redacting addresses from other reports.  

An amendment successfully offered by Rep. Duane Quam (R-Byron) would allow leaders of each major political party access to candidate street addresses even as it is made private from the public. “Leadership have earned the right for accessibility that the public does not have,” he said.