The governor’s plan to trim about $2.7 billion from the state budget will cost Minnesota a few thousand jobs and possibly more, his aides told lawmakers Thursday.

Gov. Tim Pawlenty outlined this week the spending cuts and deferrals he plans to make with his executive power to resolve the state’s budget deficit. The announcement came after lawmakers failed to agree on a budget solution before they left town for the year. But Democrats who control the Legislature contend the Republican governor is on shaky legal ground with his go-it-alone approach. The law Pawlenty is using to reduce approved spending or withhold checks indefinitely has never been applied to this extent. Nor has it been invoked at the beginning of a two-year budget cycle.

Still, Democrats have no power to stop the cuts, most of which won’t be felt until mid-2010.

Instead, they used Thursday’s meeting of the Legislative Advisory Commission to tease out details on who would get hurt. They warned property taxes would rise substantially, some nursing homes could go under and thousands of people would lose subsidized health care.

Under questioning, state budget director Jim Schowalter estimated at least 3,155 public and private jobs would be lost.