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Ellison asks court to recover $58 million from Big Tobacco
Minnesota’s Attorney General alleged that tobacco manufacturers have shorted the state in payments called for in the historic 1998 court settlement.
ST PAUL, Minn. — Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has filed a motion seeking to recover $58 million in alleged underpayments from America’s tobacco manufacturers, accusing them of violating terms of the historic 1998 settlement with the state.
The motion, filed in Ramsey County District Court, seeks not only repayment of the $58 million but also interest, civil penalties and the assurance that Big Tobacco will not underpay Minnesota in the future.
After a months-long trial in 1998, Minnesota settled with the tobacco industry’s largest companies restricting marketing of tobacco products and requiring annual payments to the state based, in part, on the size of their after-tax profits in a given year.
Ellison’s office said the dispute over payment amounts arises from a provision included in the settlement that increases the size of tobacco manufacturers’ annual payments if “current” after-tax profits are greater than they were in 1997. The tobacco companies involved in the settlement argued they should be able to re-calculate their 1997 profits by applying modern corporate tax rates.
Ellison’s office maintained that the settlement explicitly calls for the use of 1997 tax rates when calculating after-tax profits.
The motion the AG filed alleges that after the Trump administration lowered federal corporate tax rates in 2018, Philip Morris misrepresented the content of the Minnesota settlement to the third-party payment administrator, PricewaterhouseCoopers, in a way that incorrectly reduced the manufacturers’ payments to Minnesota by nearly $10 million per year.
“After lying to the American people about the dangers of their products, it is unfortunately not surprising that the largest tobacco manufacturers have also tried to avoid the commitments they made when settling with Minnesota,” said Ellison in a released statement. “It is particularly galling that, after these tobacco companies received a massive tax cut from President Trump, they turned around and used that windfall to justify underpaying the people of Minnesota.”
The AG’s office said tobacco manufacturers have faced similar challenges over underpayments in both Mississippi and Texas, where courts have ruled the underpayments were improper and ordered Big Tobacco to reimburse the states.
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The U of M, law enforcement and community groups has several initiatives underway to get a handle on violent crime in the area.
MINNEAPOLIS — The latest chaotic evening in Dinkytown over the Fourth of July holiday has renewed conversations about safety near the University of Minnesota campus, where crime concerns have been prevalent for several years now.
Richard Painter, a U of M law professor and director with the nonprofit Campus Safety Coalition, said these issues have persisted “both during the school year and over the summer.”
“It’s very important for the community to buy into campus safety initiatives, and for safety initiatives in Dinkytown,” Painter said. “Interim President Ettinger made a lot of headway in this area during his year in charge and I would expect [new president] Rebecca Cunningham to do the same.”
Painter called for bolstered University of Minnesota Police staffing, increased cooperation between UMPD and Minneapolis Police, more vibrancy in the business community and stiffer prosecution by the Hennepin County District Attorney.
“I am optimistic,” Painter said, “about the potential for good leadership from our new university leadership under Rebecca Cunningham.”
Some of those safety efforts are already underway.
For example, in late March, UMPD began responding to 911 calls in neighborhoods off-campus to assist MPD with their workload. Last month, UMPD Chief Matt Clark told the Board of Regents that his officers had responded to 172 emergency calls in this expanded patrol zone between late March and mid-June.
UMPD has also increased its police staffing by 35 percent since 2022, according to Clark. The force now has 62 officers out of an authorized strength of 73.
Meanwhile, plans are moving forward for a new “Safety Center” in Dinkytown, which KARE 11 first reported about last March.
At the Board of Regents meeting last month, Chief Clark confirmed that the university has signed a lease to open the center this September at 315 Fourth Avenue Southeast in the Saint Anthony Main neighborhood, about a mile or so from campus.
The center will include resources for both students and community groups.
“The safety center will be home to the Somali Elders Youth Link, that is a group of Somali elders that we are hiring and worked with last summer,” Clark said. “They’ll be back in Dinkytown this summer to assist with youth diversion.”
Clark said the safety ambassador group known as “Block by Block” will also work out of the center.
“I believe it will help to have a Safety Center in Dinkytown,” Richard Painter said. “If the areas surrounding campus are not safe, then students are not going to want to come here.”
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Bloomington Police say they need to get ahead of AI, not fall behind.
BLOOMINGTON, Minn. — Artificial intelligence is changing our world fast.
Bloomington Police say they need to get ahead of AI not fall behind.
“We recently put out a posting, we’re gonna have two artificial intelligence officers,” said Police Chief Booker Hodges. “So I think we might be the first fleet police department to do that.”
Chief Hodges isn’t talking about a Robocop. He’s looking to hire two real, human employees who could look into how AI can be used to help the department.
“Law enforcement typically trails behind and most technology pieces,” said Hodges. “So my goal with this is to get ahead of it.”
He says he wants to be very careful with this technology, any evidence would need human verification.
“Their primary responsibility is going to be to explore how we could utilize this technology, one, with body worn camera video, how can we use it to redact it?” said Hodges. “And two, to see if how criminals might be using it.”
He says AI could also be used to make radio traffic more accessible to the public, which could automatically detect and censor private information.
They could also use it to recognize false reports.
“With swatting calls, it’d be nice to have some AI to be able to determine if this is an actual person or if this is an AI,” the chief said.
But he says part of the challenge will be moral dilemmas that would come up.
“I get very cautious when I hear people wanting to use it for predictive models, like predicting a certain person is going to commit a crime,” said Hodges. “I just think that’s going down a path we don’t want to go down.”
Candidates for the job will come from within the department itself, and will be given special training.
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Flood waters already eroded parts of the Rapidan and Woolen Mills Dam and there’s more rain in the forecast.
FARIBAULT, Minn. — Another inch and a half of rain fell Thursday night, including in the area around Faribault.
It’s just another city that’s so water logged, the dam next to the popular Faribault Mill is now damaged.
The city says part of it was eroded by the flood waters and it’s now working to stabilize the problem.
“I’ve never seen my buddy’s shop underwater like that,” said resident Jim Thompson, who was fishing the Cannon River that runs through the dam. “It’s moving pretty fast and it’s swirling; it’s got a lot of strength to it.”
Governor Tim Walz says about half the counties across the state are now impacted by this season’s relentless rain, pushing rivers to record levels.
“It couldn’t hold all the water and this dam has been here forever,” said Thompson. “It’s definitely way beyond its capacity.”
Federal data shows the dam is 159 years old and one of 13 within Rice County. It was last inspected a year ago, and while the Army Corps of Engineers reports it’s in satisfactory condition, if it fails fully, it classified the potential hazard as significant.
That’s the same classification as the Rapidan Dam about an hour away, that made national headlines when it recently partially failed. The failure prompted the Department of Public Safety to announce the water levels are now threatening a nearby bridge.
“To get a full damage assessment of those areas, we need those flood waters to go down to be able to do that,” said Department of Public Safety Commissioner Bob Jacobson. “This disaster is not over.”
The rivers are slowly receding, but a recent climate assessment study found up to 15% more precipitation fell across the Midwest in the last decade compared to the previous one – putting even more strain on some dams.
There are nearly 92,000 of them across the country with an average age of 63.
Another dam in Faribault called King’s Mill is three time that old and that data shows it’s in fair condition with a high potential for hazard if it fails.
As for the Woolen Mill Dam, Faribault city officials say they notified the state. Although, they don’t expect any risk to the public, but are continuing to monitor the area.
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