Good morning and happy Tuesday. 

Time is short and there are a lot of details to resolve at the Minnesota Capitol. While leaders were touting their agreement Monday on a framework for dividing up the surplus, they left much of the work to conference committee negotiators. And in the education conference committee, things weren’t going well Monday. As MPR’s Tim Pugmire reports DFL House Education Chair Jim Davnie acknowledged the framework agreement and the tight timeline. "Leadership has indicated that we have two days to resolve this, and delay is not on the table." Davnie wants his counterpart, Republican Senate Education Chair Roger Chamberlain, to present the next budget offer. But Chamberlain insisted it is Davnie's turn. “I really have nothing more to say. You can talk and talk and talk if you wish. But tomorrow the Senate will have a hearing. We will post it. Please pay attention. If we don’t have an offer to discuss, we shall not be meeting.” 

Mike Murphy has apologized for calling Kendall Qualls “a sellout” at the Republican state convention. Murphy, the mayor of Lexington and a candidate for the GOP endorsement for governor, swung the convention to endorse Scott Jensen Saturday after telling delegates that Qualls had first offered him the lieutenant governor spot and then withdrew the offer. In a video posted to Twitter Monday, Murphy apologized and said, “Emotions were running high. There was no reason for me to storm out there, and I probably shouldn’t have.” Saying he had very little time to decide what to say at the convention, Murphy said in the video, “It’s over with. It’s done now. We need to move on. I do regret what I said.” Murphy said it’s now time for the party to come together and back Jensen. 

The Associated Press reportsthe U.S. death toll from COVID-19 hit 1 million on Monday, a once-unimaginable figure that only hints at the multitudes of loved ones and friends staggered by grief and frustration. The confirmed number of dead is equivalent to a 9/11 attack every day for 336 days. It is roughly equal to how many Americans died in the Civil War and World War II combined. It’s as if Boston and Pittsburgh were wiped out. “It is hard to imagine a million people plucked from this earth,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, who leads a new pandemic center at the Brown University School of Public Health in Providence, Rhode Island. “It’s still happening and we are letting it happen.” Some of those left behind say they cannot return to normal. They replay their loved ones’ voicemail messages. Or watch old videos to see them dance. When other people say they are done with the virus, they bristle with anger or ache in silence. “‘Normal.’ I hate that word,” said Julie Wallace, 55, of Elyria, Ohio, who lost her husband to COVID-19 in 2020. “All of us never get to go back to normal.”

A report from Amnesty International says the U.S. has made little progress in reducing the rate of sexual violence against Native American women. MPR’s Dan Gunderson reports the organization released a new report Tuesday, 15 years after its first report highlighting the disproportionate rate of violence against American Indian and Alaska Native women. Amnesty International's Tarah Demant said at least 56 percent of Native women have experienced sexual violence. "At least one in three have experienced rape, which is 2.2 times more likely than non-Hispanic white women,” Demant said. “But because of the inadequate data tracking that happens by the US government, these numbers are likely actually much lower than reality." Demant said a maze of federal, state and tribal jurisdictions and limited funding hamper efforts to reduce sexual violence against Native women. 

Third party candidate for governor Cory Hepola has chosen the Fargo Public Schools director of equity and inclusion Tamara Uselman as his running mate. Uselman is a native of New York Mills and a resident of Pelican Rapids. Hepola is running as a Forward Party candidate.