Amid a summer of choreographed campaign roll-outs for the governor’s office and Congress, a number of candidates are quietly preparing for next year’s legislative election, when the House DFL Caucus will look to defend its majority.

On the same day the U.S. Supreme Court struck struck down the federal Defense of Marriage Act, the Minnesotans United PAC released the full "Minnesota 15" list of pro-gay marriage legislators who will be made "priorities" in their reelection campaigns. That list includes the five legislative Republicans who voted in favor of the bill and 10 rural Democrats serving in the House who could be vulnerable after casting their "yes" votes.

Republican legislators who voted in favor of a controversial bill to legalize gay marriage last session are now back home in their districts, and some of them are dealing with blowback from that decision.

On Thursday afternoon the Minnesota House passed its long-watched bill to legalize same-sex marriage by a 75-59 vote that followed roughly three hours of floor debate.

A bill that would bump the state minimum wage up to $9.50 an hour has cleared the floor of the Minnesota House.

Kelly’s previous bill, which got a cold reception from gay marriage advocates earlier this month, added civil unions alongside any instance of the word marriage in state statute. His new proposal would eliminate marriage from the lawbooks and and enshrine civil unions in its place

Republican Rep. Tim Kelly is one of the last GOP legislators you’d expect to find on the bad side of gay marriage advocates. The three-term member from Red Wing is well-known for bucking his own caucus in 2011 as Republicans worked to pass a controversial constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

Republican Rep. Tim Kelly introduced the proposal in a Capitol news conference on Wednesday, which would add civil union language in state law next to any mention of marriage. Kelly was joined by Republican Reps. Pat Garofalo, Andrea Kieffer and Denny McNamara. Rochester DFL Rep. Kim Norton has also signed on to the bill but was not at the news conference.

For Branden Petersen, the past week has been, in his words, “unlike anything I’ve ever experienced before.” It all started when the 27-year-old Republican senator from Andover told the Star Tribune that he’s likely to support a DFL effort to legalize gay marriage in 2013, just months after voters rejected a constitutional amendment to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

Democrats had an outstanding night on Tuesday. They won back control of the Minnesota House and Senate, picked up a congressional seat, and defeated two contentious amendments that most political observers expected to prevail.