Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s administration allocated nearly $449,000 in taxpayer money to a left-wing legal nonprofit as part of an apparent “sue-and-settlement” plan that put the first transgender inmate in a state women’s prison, The Post can exclusively reveal.
In 2023, the Democratic vice presidential nominee’s office shelled out $448,904 to Saint Paul-based Gender Justice, one year after the nonprofit filed a sex discrimination complaint against Minnesota’s Department of Corrections (DOC), according to a review of public records shared with The Post by the taxpayer watchdog group OpenTheBooks.com.
The complaint argued that the DOC was discriminating by housing the transgender inmate, Christina Lusk, in a men’s prison and denying access to sex-reassignment procedures including a vaginoplasty.
Lusk had received hormone therapy and pursued genital reconstructive surgery before being arrested in December 2018 and charged with meth possession, receiving a five-year prison sentence.
Though the DOC initially moved to dismiss the suit and touted efforts to defend “some of the most progressive transgender policies in the nation,” the agency agreed to a whopping $495,000 settlement in May 2023 that entitled Lusk to $245,903 in cash and Gender Justice to $198,000 in attorneys’ fees and costs.
Lusk was ordered to be transferred to a women’s facility in Shakopee, southwest of Minneapolis, and promised full reimbursement pending a medical evaluation and approval from a medical insurance provider for vaginoplasty and “breast revision” procedures — even after the end of Lusk’s incarceration period if necessary, per the settlement.
As of January 31, Lusk had been released from state custody and placed under supervision.
Gender Justice had only received a paltry $1,500 from the Minnesota government in 2022, the year before the unprecedented litigation got underway.
The DOC in 2023 categorized the massive expenses as “legal services” paid to Gender Justice, and the cash to Lusk was marked as “other operating costs” paid to a non-taxable vendor, records show.
Gender Justice got another $5,000 that year from the state’s Office of Higher Education for help with “general management” of “fiscal services.”
OpenTheBooks believes the facts point to the case itself being a sue-and-settle, where closed-door legal arbitration is used to change public policy without the approval of the legislature.
Attorneys at Minneapolis-based Robins Kaplan LLP, which partnered with Gender Justice on the lawsuit and got $51,096 in return for costs, had donated more than $22,000 to Walz’s 2022 gubernatorial campaign, state campaign finance records show.
A treasurer on Gender Justice’s board also serves concurrently as the manager of Adult Mental Health Programs and Services at the Minnesota Department of Human Services.
“In this instance, we have a nonprofit with ties to the administration and a law firm with five figures in donations to the Walz campaign on the same side of the table, across from the Department of Corrections,” said OpenTheBooks spokesman Christopher Neefus. --->READ MORE HERE
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