Supreme Court accepts but stays review of case against Rice County

The Minnesota Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to review a case against Rice County’s election administrator. But justices stayed review pending the outcome of another case.

Attorney Matt Benda and Rice County resident Kathleen Hagen are appealing dismissal of their lawsuit against Rice County Property Tax and Elections Director Denise Anderson. The lawsuit claimed the county didn’t fulfill their public records requests and sought to ban the county from using modems to send unofficial election results to the county elections office and then to the Secretary of State’s Office. The Minnesota Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal and Benda appealed to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court granted the petition for review but stayed the review pending its decision in another case involving a similar legal question over who must be served legal notice of a case.

One of the issues in dispute in the Rice County case is over whether every candidate who was on the ballot in Rice County in the November 2022 election should have been served notice.