Is a meeting “public” if you have to show REAL-ID or pay a fee?
At our request, the Minnesota Commissioner of Administration has directed the state’s Data Practices Office (DPO) to issue an advisory opinion as to whether the Minneapolis-St. Paul Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC) violates the state’s Open Meeting Law by holding its meetings in an area at the MSP airport accessible only by passing through a TSA checkpoint, which requires either REAL-ID compliant ID, a passport, or paying a $45 fee.
The Commissioner has complete discretion to decide when to issue an advisory opinion. We are pleased that they have decided to do so in this case. We thank the DPO for their (unsuccessful buy helpful) efforts at informal mediation with the MAC, which preceded our request for a formal advisory opinion.
So far as we know, this will be the first official review by any state or local government body, under any state or local open meeting law, of whether a meeting of a government body can be considered “public” or “open” if REAL-ID or a fee is required for entry.
As stated in the Commissioner’s notice of the preparation of an advisory opinion, under Minnesota law, “Although the advisory opinion will not be binding on the Board, a court must give the opinion deference.”
We look forward to the Commissioner’s opinion. According to the notice , “Section 13.072 requires the Commissioner to issue an opinion within 50 days of receipt of the request. Therefore, the Commissioner must issue the opinion by May 21, 2026.”
An interesting case from last year I think you may be interested in: Billings v. TSA (23-1290), which held that a so-called “National Amendment” imposing significant new requirements is, in fact, a legislative rule within the meaning of the Administrative Procedure Act, and therefore requires public notice and comment. In other words, “an agency’s adherence to its own regulations does not somehow enable it to bypass the APA”, and “TSA does not claim to fit within the good-cause—or any other—exception here. What the APA generally does not except from its rulemaking procedures are legislative rules. As to those, an agency cannot simply rulemake its way out of the APA’s requirements for rulemaking.”
https://www.cozen.com/news-resources/publications/2025/d-c-circuit-reins-in-tsa-s-rulemaking-on-apa-grounds-a-win-for-transparency
https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69265670/city-of-billings-v-tsa/
This is a bit reminiscent of this case long ago on the other side of the Atlantic, where an aviation security regulation violated a publication requirement in an EU treaty: https://papersplease.org/wp/2009/03/11/european-court-invalidates-secret-carry-on-baggage-blacklist/