Walz Drew Fire From Minn Nurses Association for Siding With Mayo Clinic on Staffing Ratio Bill

After the Mayo Clinic threatened to move a billion-dollar expansion out of state, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and the Democratic lawmakers pulled back from controversial nurse staffing ratios last year and reoriented the legislation toward violence prevention and studying burnout among nurses.

Minnesota Democrats also retreated last year from establishing a healthcare affordability board and rules after the Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic had raised objections, according to Politico.

Vice President Kamala Harris has picked Walz to be her running mate, so his record on healthcare and other issues will be getting intense scrutiny.

Walz is a staunch advocate for reproductive rights, and the Star Tribune reported in March 2024 that he was now “opening up” about his family’s experience with in vitro fertilization after a court ruling in Alabama raised the prospect of IVF clinics closing. After seven years of fertility treatments at the Mayo Clinic, he and his wife Gwen had their first child, Hope, in 2001. The newspaper reported that Walz and Minnesota Democrats were preparing to add guaranteed access to IVF and fertility treatments to state law passed in 2023 that codified abortion rights.

According to the Star Tribune, his mother struggled with medical debt after his father from cancer when Walz was 19. Walz signed Minnesota medical debt legislation in June 2024 that, among things, bans medical providers from withholding medically necessary care due to unpaid debt, exempts medical debt from affecting credit scores and requires provider to publish their medical debt collection practices.

When he was in Congress, the newspaper reported, Walz focused on focused on veterans’ issues such as mental health, suicide and pain management.

Walz’s southern Minnesota district included the Mayo Clinic, a revered and powerful institution in Rochester, Minnesota, which is about 90 miles southeast of Minneapolis.

Before the staffing ratio was dropped entirely from the legislation last year, the Mayo Clinic was successful in getting exempted from the bill, arguing that it should have the flexibility to use its own advanced systems for assigning staff without navigating state government mandates. At that time, Mary Turner, president of the Minnesota Nurses Association, issued a statement that blasted Walz for “his abdication of good government and acquiescence to anti-democratic and antilabor corporate bullies.”

Several weeks earlier, the Star Tribune reported that a lobbyist for Mayo had emailed Walz to express frustration with the staffing ratio bill and that the legislation would imperil multi-billion dollar investment in new facilities in Rochester.

"Our Board was set to move forward to consider this investment next week," the email to Walz said, according to the Star Tribune's reporting. "Because these bills continue to proceed without meaningful and necessary changes to avert their harms to Minnesotans, we cannot proceed with seeking approval to make this investment in Minnesota. We will need to direct this enormous investment to other states."

Politico’s story on the healthcare affordability legislation also mentions Mayo threatening to withdraw its investment plans.

“Mayo Clinic issued an ultimatum to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Democratic lawmakers earlier this month: Kill a proposed health affordability bill, or say goodbye to $4 billion in new hospital investments,” said the story's opening paragraph.

Progressives in the Democratic Party wanted Harris to pick Walz as her running mate and large unions, including the United Auto Workers, the United Steelworkers and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, were quick to endorse him this morning.