ST PAUL, Minn – Votes this weekend at the Minnesota State Capitol could put a proposed passenger rail connection between the Twin Cities and Duluth on fast track for cancellation.
Both the Minnesota House and Senate voted to cut funding for the proposed Northern Lights Express as lawmakers worked to wrap up business in the final hours of the 2025 legislative session.
The bill proposes redirecting $77 million from the rail project to cover unemployment insurance for seasonal workers in education.
According to Republican House Transportation Committee Chair Rep. Jon Koznick, approximately $108 million in state funding remains for the Northern Lights Express; however, he believes this weekend’s legislative action will likely mark the end of the rail project.
“With the House and Senate voting to shift a significant amount of the state’s share of the project’s funding, the Northern Lights Express train is effectively dead, and taxpayers are better off because of it,” Koznick said in a statement, describing the scheme as one among multiple “wasteful rail projects that Minnesotans barely use and can not afford.”
Lawmakers approved nearly $195 million for the project in 2023, which was required to secure federal funding. The project was supposed to use existing BNSF Railroad tracks for four daily round trips between Minneapolis and Duluth, with stops in Coon Rapids, Cambridge, and Hinckley.
The bill to defund the Northern Lights Express passed unanimously in the House (131-0) on Saturday and was approved 44-23 in the Minnesota Senate on Sunday. The bill now goes to Governor Tim Walz for his signature.
