Former Minnesota Sen. Justin Eichorn pleads guilty to attempted child porn possession

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]Former Republican state Senator Justin Eichorn is now in handcuffs after pleading guilty in court a few hours ago. This comes after he was first charged with trying to pay a teen for sex. Frankie McAlister was inside the federal courthouse in St. Paul when he was put in handcuffs. He's here with the details on the plea. Frankie?

[00:00:19]Aaron, good afternoon. Now, prosecutors allege that he was uh responding to an online prostitution ad that was set up as a sex trafficking sting uh by police.

[00:00:29]Now, today, right inside of the courthouse here in St. Paul, he pleaded to an attempted possession of child pornography. Now, the senator was the senator up until March of 2025. He was representing District 6. He was formally charged with attempted enticement of a minor. Now, under federal sentencing guidelines, he would have faced a minimum of 10 years in prison if convicted of that charge, but instead, this plea is now a lesser charge where he admitted in the sex sting to asking who he thought was a teen to text him nude pictures. Now, while defending him today, his attorney suggested that he has zero criminal history, has some medical issues such as carpal tunnel syndrome, and has a divorce hearing coming up in June. But, the plaintiff's lawyer said those aren't real issues that apply to the case.

[00:01:17]Now, the judge did say right at the end here uh that he wants a sentencing case uh scheduled on the calendar ASAP, and the former senator will be held in the Sherburne County um jail in the meantime.

[00:01:29]Aaron? Okay, Frankie live for us. We appreciate it. Thank you.