A new Minnesota law bars homeowner's insurers from denying claims when police damage an innocent person's property with tear gas or flash-bangs.
House File 4133, authored by Representatives Kelly Moller, Zack Stephenson, Kari Rehrauer, and Larry Kraft, with Senator Bonnie Westlin carrying the Senate companion, cleared the Minnesota House of Representatives on April 20, 2026, and the Senate on April 28, 2026. The governor approved the bill on May 5, 2026. It takes effect January 1, 2027, and applies to any homeowner's policy offered, issued, or renewed on or after that date.
The legislation tackles a fairly narrow scenario, but one that has drawn growing attention nationally: what happens when officers deploy tear gas, smoke, or flash-bangs at a property and the homeowner had nothing to do with the underlying incident. Damage in those situations can run from ruined drywall and contaminated HVAC systems to homes that need professional decontamination before anyone can move back in. Many homeowner's policies have historically pointed to civil authority or governmental action language to turn those claims away.
The new law takes direct aim at that practice. It prohibits a homeowner's policy from excluding coverage for property damage when the homeowner is an innocent third party entitled to just compensation under Minnesota's existing statute on the subject, and the damage results from a peace officer's use of chemical irritants, smoke screens, or diversionary devices.
Insurers do not lose every tool in the box. The law expressly permits civil authority exclusions and other standard policy provisions to remain, so long as they are not used to wipe out the specific coverage the law requires. It also makes clear that nothing in the section changes a local government's underlying duty to pay just compensation directly.
Homeowners also get a say in how their property is repaired. Insurers must let the policyholder choose a mitigation contractor and, where necessary, an industrial hygienist to assess and remediate the damage. The hygienist must hold a certified industrial hygienist credential from the Board for Global EHS Credentialing or an equivalent certification from a nationally or internationally recognized accrediting body. Any work done must follow recognized industry standards and, where applicable, chemical manufacturer guidelines.
For carriers, perhaps the most consequential piece sits in the law's subrogation language. When an insurer pays benefits on one of these claims, it is subrogated as a matter of law to the homeowner's right to recover just compensation from the responsible local government. A payment made in good faith and after a reasonable investigation is presumed reasonable and necessary, and the local government is required to reimburse it. The only ways to defeat that presumption are proof that the payment was obtained by fraud or that the insurer acted in bad faith.
If a local government does not reimburse as required, the insurer may bring an action to recover the amount paid, and is entitled to reasonable attorney fees, costs, and disbursements, including interest under Minnesota's existing insurance interest statute. Homeowners get a small but meaningful piece of the recovery as well: if the insurer is reimbursed by the local government, it must remit to the homeowner an amount equal to any deductible the homeowner paid toward the damage.
With the governor's signature now in hand, Minnesota becomes one of the more explicit jurisdictions in the country to spell out, by statute, that homeowner's policies must respond to this category of police-caused damage, while also handing carriers a clearer path to send the bill back to the government entity that caused it.
