North Dakota
North Dakota bill would allow children to live with mothers in prisons
BISMARCK — A North Dakota bill could allow children to temporarily live with their mothers in prison.
The North Dakota Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has requested legislation that would let children reside at the Heart River Correctional Center in Mandan with their mothers.
Senate Bill 2115
would let the DOCR hire staff and develop policy to achieve that goal.
The bill also would prevent the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and its staff from being held liable for any injuries to the children unless “the injury is affirmatively caused by the negligent act of a state employee.”
Mothers would be responsible for their children, including medical expenses, DOCR Director Colby Braun told The Forum. Medical care would have to be sought outside the facility, he said.
The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to work on the bill — a hearing for SB 2115 is scheduled for 10 a.m. Wednesday, Jan. 15.
The legislation is focused on mothers who come to Heart River while pregnant, Braun said. If a woman births her child while in custody, SB 2115 would allow the mother and baby to stay together for some time after birth, he said, adding that doing so provides better outcomes for families.
“What we’re trying to do is really support the goal of … making sure that we’re keeping good contact with mom and their children prior to them leaving prison,” he said.
The bill doesn’t limit the age of a child who could live with their mother in prison. That could allow children to spend time with their mothers over a short time period, such as a weekend, shortly before a woman is released from prison, Braun said.
The legislation would give children the opportunity to reconnect with mothers as they prepare to leave prison and return to their families, he said.
The bill doesn’t say how long a child could live in the prison. It’s unclear how much the change could cost the state, according to a fiscal note attached to the bill.
The DOCR is still working on the policy that would detail the logistics of allowing children to live in Heart River. For now, the bill only addresses liability and creates the authority to allow mothers to have their children with them in the prison.
Parental separation impacts
Parental separation due to incarceration can have extreme effects on children, said Wanda Bertram, communication strategist for the
Prison Policy Initiative.
That includes lower educational performance in school, a higher likelihood that children end up in the foster care system and termination of parental rights, the nonprofit said.
“This is all documented to lead to a host of different negative factors in the child’s life,” Bertram told The Forum. “So, anything that can be done to mitigate that is a step in the right direction.”
The nonprofit that researches criminal justice reform has advocated for releasing incarcerated parents of young children, Bertram said. At least a dozen states have made laws addressing family separation.
Sometimes called a nursery prison program, a small number of states allow children to temporarily live with their mothers in prisons.
South Dakota
allows incarcerated mothers to bond with their children for 30 months after the child’s birth.
Some states and the federal government have proximity laws, which set a maximum distance between the facility where a parent is incarcerated and where their children live.
Minnesota
allows mothers who have been sentenced to prison to live at home with their children for up to a year after birth.
The DOCR hasn’t discussed releasing mothers from custody so they could care for children outside of prisons, Braun said.
States have been slow to adopt a program like North Dakota could because they don’t have the facilities to do so, Bertram said.
“Something like a prison nursery program involves a lot of investment in new infrastructure,” she said, noting increasing funds for the prison system can move slowly.
States also typically incarcerate a small number of women, she said. Of the 2,033 inmates who are incarcerated in North Dakota, 260, or 13%, are women, according to data from the DOCR.
“When you’re talking about programs that involve building new infrastructure or allocating resources to new programs, and something that’s going to impact a quite small number of people, it’s understandable why movement on that would be slow,” Bertram said.
Allowing incarcerated mothers to keep their babies with them in North Dakota has been a topic of discussion for “a long time,” Braun said. North Dakota previously didn’t have the space to do it, he said.
“As we’re looking at a new women’s facility, … one of the goals that we had is being able to have a unit where mom and baby could be together,” he said.
Heart River and the Dakota Women’s Correctional and Rehabilitation Center in New England are North Dakota’s only female prisons. Until recently, the New England facility was the state’s only prison for women.
North Dakota plans to
build a 260-bed women’s prison at Heart River
to replace the New England facility. The $161.2 million project was approved in 2023 and is expected to take three years to complete.
North Dakota
North Dakota primary turnout was just under 21%; about a third of Fargo’s eligible voters cast ballots in the mayor’s race
FARGO, N.D. (Valley News Live) — Statewide, primary turnout came in just under 21%, with a little over 125,000 ballots cast across North Dakota.
Cass County, which led the state in early in-person voting, finished at about 19% overall turnout.
This was also the first year that absentee ballots had to be received by Election Day, and nearly 87% of those ballots were returned.
Fargo mayoral race turnout
Inside Fargo, the numbers get more specific. The city’s 2026 population is estimated at about 138,574 people. In the mayoral race, 21,610 ballots were cast.
If you stack that against the entire population — kids, non-citizens, everyone — that works out to about 15.6% of Fargo residents casting a vote for mayor and about 7.3% of everyone living here voting for the winner.
Election officials say there are 63,316 active voters in Fargo. Based on that, about 34.13% of eligible voters took part in the mayor’s race, and about 15.93% — nearly 16% — of eligible voters cast a ballot for Josh Boschee.
For context, state election officials say that in the last Fargo mayoral election in 2022, 23,950 votes were cast. But that primary also included a U.S. Senate contest at the top of the ballot — the kind of high-profile race that tends to draw more voters.
This time around, neither U.S. Senate seat is up, and there’s no governor’s race either, so the mayoral and local contests had to do more of the work driving turnout on their own.
Ballot shortage at Atonement Lutheran Church
Officials confirm they ran extra ballots to Atonement Lutheran Church, but say that’s normal as turnout shifts between vote centers.
According to the auditor, it didn’t create any lines they’re aware of, didn’t change the outcome, and mainly meant that some polling places took a little longer than usual to get their materials back in.
Infrastructure sales tax approved
Voters overwhelmingly approved keeping Fargo’s 1% Infrastructure Sales Tax. The measure passed with 15,255 votes, or 72.89%, in favor. 5,673 votes, or 27.11%, were against.
That means the existing 1% tax will remain in place until December 2048, rather than expiring in 2028.
Copyright 2026 KVLY. All rights reserved.
North Dakota
Capstone Academy of Fargo and nonprofit sue North Dakota over teacher licensing requirements
FARGO — A private religious school in Fargo has teamed up with a civil liberties law firm in suing the state of North Dakota over its teacher licensing law.
Capstone Classical Academy and the nonprofit Institute for Justice, based in Arlington, Virginia,
filed a 50-page federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court
in North Dakota on Wednesday, June 10.
They challenge what they call the nation’s “most extreme” teacher licensing law, which keeps people with doctorate degrees, working professionals and other qualified experts out of private school classrooms unless they first complete a state licensing program.
Capstone,
which opened in temporary locations in 2022 and moved to a new, sprawling campus at 6597 43rd St. S. in 2025,
teaches pre-k through Grade 12 students.
Bringing the lawsuit along with Capstone are Kaylie Young, a teacher at the school, and Paul Nelson, a parent of a student.
David Samson / The Forum
Named as defendants are state Superintendent of Public Instruction Levi Bachmeier, various members of the North Dakota Education Standards and Practices Board, and Rebecca Pitkin, executive director of that independent board responsible for teacher licensure and other professional practices.
The state has 21 days to respond to the lawsuit, the Institute said.
Bachmeier told The Forum that since he’s named as a defendant, he cannot comment.
Pitkin submitted a statement, saying, “The Education Standards and Practices Board (ESPB) is mandated by North Dakota law to ensure that all classroom teachers are properly licensed. In recent years, ESPB has collaborated closely with Capstone’s administration and faculty to guarantee adherence to this legal requirement.”
Capstone and the Institute held a joint news conference via Zoom on Wednesday.
Headmaster Paul Fisher said they’re not suing as adversaries of the Department of Public Instruction or ESPB, but for freedom to deliver a distinct mission without the hindrance of state regulations.
Chris Flynn / The Forum
“The state, by the Century Code, is forcing a square peg to fit into a round hole, and in doing so, they are violating parental choice and teachers’ professional freedom,” Fisher said.
In May of 2025, Capstone received a compliance letter from the state threatening to take away Capstone’s state approval unless the school complied with teacher licensing laws.
Michael Bindas, a senior Institute attorney, said Capstone had been working “creatively” with the state to find solutions, but with the compliance letter, it became clear the state was no longer willing to do so.
David Samson / The Forum
Since then, the school said it has navigated paperwork, kept postings open for jobs already filled, reshaped courses to fit state-approved categories and paid “thousands and thousands of dollars” to come into compliance.
“That time, that money, that energy should be going toward educating children, not to comply with unnecessary and often irrational regulations,” Bindas said.
Capstone already has high standards for teachers in terms of content expertise and teaching competence, Fisher said, and the school vets their character and runs mandatory background checks.
Fisher said he must honor the mission of the school and the trust of parents “who pay their taxes to the public schools, and then, in addition to that, pay tuition to provide what they believe is the right education for their child.”
David Samson / The Forum
Another Institute attorney, Riley Grace Borden, said the plaintiffs, Young and Nelson, chose Capstone because it is unique.
“It was a sacrifice for them to do that. Both … face longer commutes, Kaylie faces a lower salary. But they chose Capstone because it offers different courses, it has a different mission and focus,” Borden said.
She said the Institute approached a number of schools in North Dakota when considering bringing legal action related to teacher licensing.
“A bunch of them, every single one we talked to, in fact, was suffering,” she said.
In fact, Borden blamed the state’s “impractical and expensive” teacher licensing laws for an ongoing teacher shortage in the state.
Chris Flynn / The Forum
North Dakota legalized homeschooling in 1989, allowing parents without a teaching license or a college degree to teach their children.
Bindas said there’s no reason North Dakota can’t take the same “light touch” for private schools, and he’d go even further.
“At the end of the day, I don’t think licensure is necessary … government can and often does, and in this case has gone far beyond anything within its legitimate powers,” he said.
It’s unclear whether other private schools in Fargo or in the state will join in the lawsuit, Borden said, as some gave different reasons as to why they weren’t in a position to do so.
A busy primary election season continues across the country.
Incumbent Rep. Julie Fedorchak won a GOP primary on Tuesday, June 9, in North Dakota as Republicans aim to hold a narrow majority in the chamber. The race comes amid a number of challenges to incumbents this month, with Trump-backed Fedorchak providing another strong showing for the president’s support. The state also voted for attorney general, secretary of state and mayor of the city Fargo.
Here are the North Dakota House race results, according to the Associated Press and CNN.
North Dakota House primary results
District 1
- Republican: Incumbent Rep. Julie Fedorchak (72.9% of votes) defeated Alex Balazs (27.1% of votes) with an estimated 97% of votes counted.
- Democrat: Trygve Hammer won uncontested.
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