In a significant development, U.S. prosecutors announced on Wednesday that they will not pursue the death penalty in a plea deal with the individual accused of orchestrating the political murders of Minnesota’s top Democratic leader and her husband, along with the attempted murders of a state senator and his spouse.
The accused, Vance Boelter, is set to attend a plea change hearing on Thursday morning at Minneapolis federal court.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Bradley M. Endicott and Matthew D. Forbes conveyed in a court letter that, “The Attorney General has decided and instructed the government to forego the death penalty for Defendant Vance Luther Boelter, aligned with the conditions outlined in the proposed plea agreement.”
Boelter’s defense team has yet to provide a comment on the matter, and the court document did not include specifics regarding the plea deal.
Former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman, her spouse Mark Hortman, alongside state Senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette Hoffman, were attacked at their residences by an assailant impersonating a police officer in a fake patrol car during the early morning hours of June 14, 2025. The Hortmans’ golden retriever was tragically wounded and later euthanized.
Boelter, aged 58, was apprehended near his Green Isle home the following day after what authorities have described as the most extensive manhunt in Minnesota’s history. He is currently facing multiple federal and state charges, including murder and attempted murder. The state proceedings have been paused pending the outcome of his federal case.
Minnesota abolished capital punishment in 1911 and has never had a federal death penalty case. While the Trump administration has pushed for greater use of capital punishment, there were questions about whether Boelter’s case would qualify for the death penalty under federal law.
Prosecutors have called the attacks political. When they announced the federal indictment in July, they released a rambling handwritten letter they say Boelter wrote to FBI Director Kash Patel in which he confessed to the shootings. However, the letter didn’t make clear why he targeted the Hortmans or the Hoffmans.
In some messages to media, Boelter referenced a vague and cryptic “investigation” he had been carrying out, sometimes suggesting it was about the COVID-19 vaccine.
Friends described Boelter as an evangelical Christian and occasional preacher and missionary, who held politically conservative views and had been struggling to find work.
When Minnesota’s legislative session convened in February, Hoffman got a warm welcome as he walked up the stairs into the Senate chamber. He said in a lawsuit filed against Boelter in April that his left arm and hand likely would never fully recover, and that he also had permanent injuries to his digestive and urinary systems.
Yvette Hoffman was left with permanent physical weakness, the lawsuit said, while their adult daughter, Hope Hoffman, who was there and called 911 but was not shot, suffered severe psychological trauma.
