Minnesota Now

A tragic plane and helicopter crash in Washington D.C. may be the deadliest in the U.S. in nearly 24 years. Among the victims, many members of the national figure skating community. We talked to a local coach connected with the victims.

President Donald Trump’s wave of executive orders as he takes office has some organizations questioning the source of their funding. We learned how community health clinics across the state are responding.

You may remember our conversation with the 74-year old ultramarathoner who has impressed fans statewide. MPR News correspondent Dan Kraker shared the latest on his race.

As we kick off the Lunar New Year, Minnesota designers and artists are celebrating the Year of the Snake with a fashion show and photography exhibit called, “The Serpent’s Charm.”

In our series Thank You, Stranger, we hear about small acts of kindness that have a big impact.

On this week’s edition, a cyclist tells the story of a driver who shared the road when he was down on his luck. Minnesota Now producer Ellen Finn spoke with Ray Tahnk Johnson about his experience.

Wednesday marked the beginning of Lunar New Year, kicking off a month of celebrations across the globe. To celebrate the Year of the Snake, a group of Minnesota designers and artists are hosing a fashion show and photography exhibit.

The show, called “The Serpent’s Charm” is Friday night at The Luminare in Minneapolis.

The show’s director, Vivian Tran, and a fashion designer, Jaylee Rosand joined Minnesota Now to talk about the upcoming show and photography exhibit.

President Donald Trump laid out a slew of executive orders earlier this week that could indicate a funding freeze within a wide variety of services and jobs, including the healthcare industry.

A judge paused the freeze earlier this week, but many clinics in Minnesota have already started to feel the effects of the uncertainty around future funding. Community Health Centers, which were established during the Civil Rights Movement to support people without the money to pay for medical services, use federal money to operate.

Jonathan Watson, the CEO of the Minnesota Association of Community Health Centers, joined Minnesota Now to talk about the uncertainty facing 17 centers across the state.

The figure skating community in Minnesota and across the country was reeling Thursday, in the wake of Wednesday night’s plane crash in Washington, D.C.

U.S. Figure Skating said several of its team members were aboard the American Airlines plane that collided with an Army helicopter — skaters, coaches and families returning from a training camp in Wichita, Kansas. That camp had followed the U.S. Figure Skating Championships.

St. Paul Figure Skating Club coach and skating director Ben Miller Reisman told MPR News that as of Thursday morning, he had not heard of any Minnesotans among the victims of the crash. He joined Minnesota Now to talk about the impact the crash has had on the tight-knit figure skating community.

On Minnesota Now, we get to hear from so many different people in Minnesota over the phone and in the studio. But we don’t often meet them in the community, where news — and life — happens. In a new series we are calling Out to Lunch, we sit down for a meal with people from Minnesota news and culture to get to know them better.

Our first guest is DFL Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, who received national attention last year while campaigning for former Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz. But she has worked in politics and advocacy since her early 20s, beginning with the Sen. Paul Wellstone’s 2002 campaign. Later, she led Minnesota’s chapter of the Children’s Defense Fund and served in the Minnesota House.

A member of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe, she is now the highest-ranking Indigenous woman elected to executive office. She met MPR News host Nina Moini at Owamni in Minneapolis.

The Nation’s Report Card is out and it is giving us a snapshot of how students are doing in school. In Minnesota, kids still haven’t caught up to pre-pandemic test scores. We talk to a local school district about the results and how they are trying to make progress.

As deportation efforts from the Trump administration have become more public, it has led to rumors about ICE raids and arrests. We hear from a local organization that is trying to stop misinformation.

Plus is spring coming early? Paul Huttner will join us with more on a winter warm-up.

And we are debuting a new segment on Minnesota Now, Out to Lunch! We sit down for a meal with people in the news in hopes of sharing something you haven’t already heard. Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan is our first guest.

After a deep freeze, Minnesota is experiencing a January thaw that feels almost like spring! MPR Chief Meteorologist Paul Huttner joins MPR News host Nina Moini with a look at the forecast.

The Trump administration’s immigration policy promises are leading to rumors of mass immigration arrests in Minnesota, as a push for more deportations reaches cities across the country. It has also sparked a flurry of misinformation shared online.

Social media posts alleging that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, agents are detaining immigrants in Minnesota have circulated widely in the past two weeks, but many of these reports are unconfirmed.

ICE officials push back on the term “raids.” In a previous statement to MPR News, an ICE official said their officers do not conduct raids and that all arrests are either targeted to a specific person or are the result of encounters during targeted enforcement.

Ryan Pérez, Leadership and Organizing director at COPAL Minnesota, joins MPR News host Nina Moini to talk about this misinformation and its impacts on the immigrant community.

It’s been nearly five years since the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted learning for children. New data known as the Nation’s Report Card shows that across the nation, fourth and eighth graders in 2024 still performed below pre-pandemic levels.

That’s also true for Minnesota. Across the state, students’ test scores did not significantly change from two years prior. The last time the test was conducted in 2022, students around the country showed steep learning losses from the pandemic. Many experts had hoped to see students rebounding from some of those losses in 2024.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which provides data for the Nation’s Report Card, is mandated by Congress and is the largest nationally-representative test of student learning. The assessments in math and reading are given every two years to a broad sample of students in fourth and eighth grade.

For more on these results and what they might mean for Minnesota’s students, MPR News host Nina Moini talks with Julio Caésar, executive director or research, evaluation and assessment for Bloomington Public Schools.