More on Minnesota

The rest of what we have written about Minnesota. Every figure is quoted from Minnesota’s own statute or its courts’ own published schedule, and carries the date we last checked it.

Travel, custody and relocation in Minnesota

The passport rules are federal and read the same everywhere. This page is the other layer — what Minnesota law and Minnesota’s own court forms say about taking your child on a trip, moving, and who holds the passport between journeys.

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Read this alongside the federal rules

Getting a child’s passport, consent letters, the Hague Convention and what actually stops a departure are the same in all fifty states — they are on the main travel page. Start there, then come back here for the part that varies.

Custody jurisdictionMinn. Stat. ch. 518D, secs. 518D.101 Which state’s court may decide custody — and why a holiday elsewhere does not move it.
Abduction Prevention ActNoThe court still has its own powers; it just has no uniform-act toolkit to draw on.
Relocation noticeNo notice period Minn. Stat. sec. 518.175, subd. 3 (‘Move to another state’)
Triggered byOut of state. The statute is triggered by moving… Out of state. The statute is triggered by moving ‘the residence of the child to another state’. there is no mileage figure, and a move anywhere within Minnesota is outside subdivision 3.
What do you need?
Which court decidesAbduction-prevention powersMovingWhat the standard order says…Who holds the passportWhat catches people out in…Sources for this pageEvery state
8 sections on this page. Pick one, or show everything.
The short version7 points · tap one to jump to it
  1. Which court decides — and why a trip does not change it
  2. Abduction-prevention powers — Minnesota has not enacted the Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act.
  3. Moving, and how much warning you owe — Relocation and vacation are different questions, and orders often treat them in the same paragraph.
  4. What the standard order says about travel
  5. Who holds the passport — Addressed by statewide FORM, not by statute.
  6. What catches people out in Minnesota
  7. Every state
In this subject 8

Which court decides — and why a trip does not change it

Minnesota custody jurisdiction sits under Minn. Stat. ch. 518D, secs. 518D.101 – 518D.317 (Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act). The home-state definition is at Minn. Stat. sec. 518D.102 (Definitions). The practical point for travel is this: a child’s home state is where they lived for six consecutive months before a case started, and a temporary absence counts toward that period. A summer with grandparents in another state does not start a clock there, and it does not let the other parent file somewhere new.

Abduction-prevention powers

Minnesota has not enacted the Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act. A judge here still has general power to impose travel conditions, but there is no dedicated statutory menu of abduction-prevention measures to point to. If risk is a live issue, the federal route on the main travel page — a valid, enforceable order prohibiting removal, routed to CBP — matters more here, not less.

Moving, and how much warning you owe

‘(a) The parent with whom the child resides shall not move the residence of the child to another state except upon order of the court or with the consent of the other parent, if the other parent has been given parenting time by the decree. If the purpose of the move is to interfere with parenting time given to the other parent by the decree, the court shall not permit the child’s residence to be moved to another state. (b) The court shall apply a best interests standard when considering the request of the parent with whom the child resides to move the child’s residence to another state. The factors the court must consider in determining the child’s best interests include, but are not limited to: (1) the nature, quality, extent of involvement, and duration of the child’s relationship with the person proposing to relocate and with the nonrelocating person, siblings, and other significant persons in the child’s life; (2) the age, developmental stage, needs of the child, and the likely impact the relocation will have on the child’s physical, educational, and emotional development, taking into consideration special needs of the child; (3) the feasibility of preserving the relationship between the nonrelocating person and the child through suitable parenting time arrangements, considering the logistics and financial circumstances of the parties; … (5) whether there is an established pattern of conduct of the person seeking the relocation either to promote or thwart the relationship of the child and the nonrelocating person; (6) whether the relocation of the child will enhance the general quality of the life for both the custodial parent seeking the relocation and the child …; (7) the reasons of each person for seeking or opposing the relocation; and (8) the effect on the safety and welfare of the child, or of the parent requesting to move the child’s residence, of domestic abuse … (c) The burden of proof is upon the parent requesting to move the residence of the child to another state, except that if the court finds that the person requesting permission to move has been a victim of domestic abuse by the other parent, the burden of proof is upon the parent opposing the move. The court must consider all of the factors in this subdivision in determining the best interests of the child.’ Subdivision 3 sets no advance-notice period. The only Minnesota address-notice duty is a general one: Minn. Stat. sec. 518.68, subd. 2, item 8, requires every support/custody/parenting-time order to carry the notice ‘Unless otherwise ordered, each party shall notify the other party, the court, and the public authority responsible for collection, if applicable, of the following information within ten days of any change: the residential and mailing address, telephone number, driver’s license number, Social Security number, and name, address, and telephone number of the employer.’

Relocation and vacation are different questions, and orders often treat them in the same paragraph. A trip is temporary; a move changes the child’s residence. Read your own order for which one your plan actually is before you assume the relocation rule does not apply.

What the standard order says about travel

Minnesota publishes a statewide parenting form or guideline — Two statewide instruments, neither of which is a binding default order: (1) the ‘Child-Focused Parenting Time Guide’, prepared by the Minnesota State Court Administrator’s Office – this is the ‘Appendix B’ parenting time guidance that Minn. Stat. sec. 518.68, subd. 2, item 4(g) tells every order to point parents to (‘Reasonable parenting time guidelines are contained in Appendix B, which is available from the court administrator’); and (2) the statewide CHC-series custody and parenting time forms (CHC101-107, CHC201-204, CHC301-303, CHC401-403, PAR101-103, PAR201-203). The CHC forms are pleadings and motions rather than a template order with travel terms; there is no standalone statewide ‘parenting plan’ form number. That matters, because its default wording is what lands in a lot of orders unchanged, and it is where your travel terms probably came from.

The Child-Focused Parenting Time Guide is expressly advisory – it states that parents, judges and others creating parenting time schedules ‘are not required to follow the suggestions in this Guide’. On vacations it tells parents to decide how much vacation parenting time each parent gets each year and ‘how much advance notice must be given to the other parent before the start of vacation parenting time. For example, parents may agree to give each other 30 days’ advance notice.’ On distance it tells parents to weigh travel times, ‘the age of the child and whether the child is able to travel alone’, and ‘whether a parent or other adult will accompany the child’. On international travel it raises ‘how to cooperate to obtain and hold a passport for the child’ and refers parents to the U.S. Department of State. It sets no itinerary requirement and draws no in-state/out-of-state distinction. Statutorily, Minn. Stat. sec. 518.175, subd. 1(e) requires only that, on a party’s request, ‘an order for parenting time must include a specific schedule for regular parenting time, including the frequency and duration of parenting time and parenting time during holidays, vacations, and school breaks’ – it prescribes no content for those blocks. Subdivision 1(g) sets the rebuttable presumption of at least 25 percent parenting time.

Who holds the passport

Addressed by statewide FORM, not by statute. The Minnesota Judicial Branch publishes a dedicated statewide passport remedy: form FAM1002, ‘Application for Ex Parte Order Regarding Children’s Passports’, with instructions at FAM1001. That is unusual – most states have no standalone passport form. No Minnesota STATUTE reviewed here creates a passport-surrender or passport-alert remedy; Minnesota has not enacted UCAPA. The State Court Administrator’s Child-Focused Parenting Time Guide raises ‘how to cooperate to obtain and hold a passport for the child’ as an issue for parents to settle, and points to the U.S. Department of State, but prescribes no default custodian.

What catches people out in Minnesota

Minnesota has no relocation notice period. Sec. 518.175, subd. 3 requires a court order or the other parent’s consent before an out-of-state move – it does not require advance notice, and there is no number of days.
Minnesota’s relocation rule is purely out-of-state. A move from International Falls to Worthington – roughly the length of the state – does not trigger subd. 3 at all, while a move across the river to Hudson, Wisconsin does.
Subd. 3(a) only bites ‘if the other parent has been given parenting time by the decree’. If the other parent has no parenting-time award, the subdivision does not restrict the move.
The burden FLIPS where the moving parent is a domestic-abuse victim: under subd. 3(c) the parent OPPOSING the move then carries the burden of proof. That reversal is easy to miss.
The ten-day change-of-address notice in Minn. Stat. sec. 518.68, subd. 2, item 8 is a general information-updating duty printed in every order. It is not a relocation notice and gives no one a veto or an objection window – do not report it as Minnesota’s relocation notice period.
The ‘Appendix B’ parenting time guidelines that Minnesota orders are required to mention are the State Court Administrator’s Child-Focused Parenting Time Guide, and that Guide is advisory. Its ’30 days’ advance notice is offered as an EXAMPLE for parents, not as a Minnesota default.
Minnesota has a statewide ex parte passport form (FAM1001/FAM1002) even though it has no UCAPA. Do not tell a Minnesota parent there is no passport remedy – there is a form, it is just not statute-based.
mncourts.gov sits behind Cloudflare and returns HTTP 403 to plain automated PDF downloads; the Child-Focused Parenting Time Guide was read here through a rendering fetch of the same primary URL rather than a direct download, so its quoted language is reported as accurately as that route allows and should be re-read against the PDF before it is relied on verbatim.

Sources for this page

Sources we could not reach when this page was built, recorded so you know what is missing rather than assuming it was checked: https://mncourts.gov/mncourtsgov/media/CourtForms/FAM1001.pdf and FAM1002 refused access when we tried to download them, so the exact relief options on the passport form (surrender, holding, Children’s Passport Issuance Alert Program enrollment) could not be quoted. The form’s existence, number and title were confirmed on the Minnesota Judicial Branch forms pages.; https://www.uniformlaws.org – enactment tables render only via JavaScript; UCAPA status was determined from the Minnesota Statutes Domestic Relations chapter index instead.

Every fact above is taken from the source linked beside it. Where a figure could not be confirmed from an official source, this page says so rather than printing a plausible number. Found an error? Tell us — it goes on the corrections page with the date.

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Sources last checked30 August 2026
Page published30 August 2026
What this means. This is when the sources on this page were last read against their originals — statutes, court rules, official schedules — taken from the date this page was built from its sources. It is not the date the page was last edited. Adding a link or fixing a typo does not move it; re-reading the statute does. Law changes without notice, so treat anything time-sensitive as needing a fresh check. Where we get something wrong we publish it at thecusp.app/corrections with the date, what changed, and how long the error was live.