Candidates line up for St. Paul legislative races in advance of precinct caucuses

Jan. 30—Fueled by a raft of social causes that include tuition-free college, universal child care, a $15 minimum wage indexed to inflation and the legalization of marijuana, Amane Badhasso is running for Congress as a Democrat. To get there, the Ethiopian refugee and St. Paul community organizer will have to unseat U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, a 21-year incumbent who holds heavy clout and name recognition within the same party.

Badhasso is counting on the support of St. Paul's large immigrant community, including fellow political candidates like Mai Chong Xiong, a Hmong immigrant and co-chair of the board of the liberal organizing group TakeAction Minnesota. Xiong announced her candidacy for longstanding Ramsey County Commissioner Jim McDonough's seat in May 2021, months before McDonough had made official any plans to retire from office.

"The power of progressive movements can't be stopped," wrote Xiong, in a campaign announcement on her Facebook page last November.

As they hit the campaign trail, they'll be joined by a bevy of first-time legislative candidates in St. Paul, several of them ethnic leaders seeking the Democratic-Farmer-Labor endorsement for open seats, and some of them running to the left of DFL incumbents.

DFL CANDIDATES PLANNING TO RUN

Within the DFL, candidates have announced plans to run against state Sen. Sandy Pappas (Zuki Ellis, Sheigh Freeberg), state Rep. John Thompson (Liz Lee, Hoang Murphy) and McCollum (Badhasso).

Other potential candidates are weighing their options and have yet to announce. Redistricting may lead to heavy turnover in the Legislature, and more surprises could be in store.

With state Rep. Rena Moran running for a seat on the county board and state Rep. Carlos Mariani choosing to retire from office after 32 years, both House Districts 65A and 65B are up for grabs. Each seat has drawn multiple candidates.

"It's a little bit of the retirement factor, but for me and folks of my generation, we've seen a little bit of political resurgence as a result of what's happened over the last couple of years," said Haley Cobb, the 28-year-old chair of DFL Senate District 65, which will host three competitive endorsement races. "Folks are stepping up. Now is the time."

A heated public discourse on race following the death of George Floyd, a Black man killed by police in Minneapolis, and the racial, social and economic inequities laid bare by the pandemic have energized new DFL candidates, many of them younger than the status quo and tied to increasingly diverse districts.

"In my union, 90 percent of people were laid off at the height of COVID," said Freeberg, secretary-treasurer with the Twin Cities Hospitality Union.

GOP CANDIDATES

Republicans don't have a modern track record of winning legislative seats in St. Paul.

It's unclear whether the city's political backdrop will bring out the same energy within the GOP. An inquiry to the St. Paul Republican City Committee was not returned Thursday.

"In general, Republicans haven't announced candidacies for state office yet," said Fred Turk, a Republican who ran for state legislative seat 67B on the East Side in 2018 and 2020.

Turk received 24 percent of the vote against state Rep. Jay Xiong, a DFLer, two years ago.

IMMIGRANTS, PEOPLE OF COLOR

Some candidates aren't shy about highlighting their journey as an immigrant or person of color and their experiences with adversity. Some have pledged to run regardless of whether longstanding incumbents call it quits.

"Liz is fluent in Hmong, and the elders can talk to her very directly," said Lee's campaign manager, Cody Hankerson, who said the House District 67A candidate visits the Hmong Village Shopping Center on Johnson Parkway three times per week to meet voters. "It's been pretty cool to see."

Samakab Hussein is thinking strategically. By his own admission, he knew little about the structure of St. Paul City Hall when he attempted to unseat St. Paul City Council member Dai Thao seven years ago on a platform heavily geared toward the East African community.

After some soul searching that year, and unable to clinch the DFL endorsement after an 11-hour ward convention that ended in deadlock, Hussein pulled out of the running before Election Day and soon joined the city's Capital Investment Board, where he focused instead on learning the nuts and bolts of city finance.

After six years on St. Paul's CIB committee, he thinks he's finally ready to bring a wider array of St. Paul issues to the state Capitol. Hussein on Monday announced he will run for the House District 65A seat currently occupied by Moran, who has chosen to seek a seat on the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners in November. The 65A seat also has drawn candidate Michael Bearfoot, a systems engineer from Hamline-Midway.

PRECINCT CAUCUSES TUESDAY

Candidate filings officially open May 17, but the stage will be set Tuesday when the major parties host precinct caucuses. In St. Paul, all of the DFL's precinct caucuses will be virtual, meaning prospective delegates can fill out an online form or drop one off. Delegates will then be chosen for the Senate district conventions, to be held in March or April, where party members will make key endorsements for state legislative seats.

On Monday morning, Minnesota DFL Party Chairman Ken Martin and Republican Party of Minnesota Chairman David Hann will hold a joint news conference at the state Capitol encouraging both parties to participate in the precinct caucuses.

In other words, Tuesday's precinct caucuses will be the first step toward gaining the party's endorsement — which is not essential, but important — to run for office in St. Paul.

"We're hoping that in March or April, when we have our convention, we'll be able to be in person," Cobb said. "This is the absolute first step. Caucuses are the point of entry for a lot of people to get involved in politics for the first time."

The state legislative seats will appear on the primary and November ballots opposite statewide races for governor, state attorney general, secretary of state and state auditor.

For statewide offices, the state DFL will host an endorsing convention in late May. The Ramsey County sheriff and Ramsey County attorney will run countywide, and the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners will be chosen within their seven districts. The Ramsey County DFL will host a county convention in late spring.

Because much of St. Paul is overwhelmingly DFL, the winners of the DFL primaries in August are likely favorites for the November general election. Any turnover within St. Paul districts may not amount to much when it comes to which party holds power at the Legislature.

SENATE DISTRICT 67 (THOMPSON, LEE, MURPHY)

At the age of 8, Hoang Murphy was placed in foster care after a teacher saw "I was a kid in danger," said the candidate for House District 67A on St. Paul's East Side in his campaign materials.

Murphy, the son of Vietnamese immigrants and the founder of the organization Foster Advocates, helped steer the creation of the state's new Fostering Higher Education Act, which allows former foster kids to attend any accredited institution of higher education for free, including tuition and living expenses, before age 27.

He's running for the seat currently held by Thompson, who was expelled from the House DFL caucus in September and now serves as a political independent. Thompson resisted repeated calls last year from House DFL leaders and other top Democrats, including Gov. Tim Walz, to resign from the Legislature after old allegations of domestic abuse resurfaced. If Thompson chooses to run again, the contest will be a rematch. Thompson defeated Murphy in the August 2020 DFL primary, with 59 percent of the vote to Murphy's 41 percent.

Murphy isn't Thompson's only challenger. Kaozouapa "Liz" Lee, who grew up in Hayden Heights, is a former staff assistant to U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar and then-U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, who is now the state attorney general. Lee, the daughter of Hmong refugees, said in her campaign materials she has "spent the last decade advocating for issues like health equity, bridging the academic achievement gap, increasing affordable housing and re-investing in public transit."

SENATE DISTRICT 65 (PAPPAS, FREEBERG, ELLIS, ISA, SARABIA, HUSSEIN, BEARFOOT)

State Sen. Sandy Pappas began her first term in the House in 1984 and has served in the Senate since 1990. She's picked up challengers in the form of Sheigh Freeberg, secretary-treasurer of the Twin Cities Hospitality Union Unite Here Local 17, and Zuki Ellis, who sits on the St. Paul School Board.

Freeberg recently received the endorsement of the Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America, which — like TakeAction Minnesota — has become increasingly visible in local elections. He said if he fails to win the DFL endorsement, he still plans to run in the August primary.

One challenger Pappas no longer has to contend with is Maria Isa Perez Hedges, who retooled her campaign for the state Senate seat after learning that Mariani — who has served in the House since 1990 and is in his 16th term — would not seek re-election.

Isa, a West Sider who has built a career as a recording artist, is now running for the open House seat in 65B. She currently directs the mentorship program for the Twin Cities Mobile Jazz Project and serves on the Capitol Area Architectural and Planning Board Public Task Force.

Also running for House District 65B is Maria Sarabia, a resident of the West Seventh Street area who describes herself in her campaign materials as "a mom, a proud Latina and big policy geek." Sarabia, who said she was removed from her teen mother as a child and ended up in the child welfare system before being "adopted into a loving family," is the division director for Aging and Disability Services at Ramsey County.

With Moran, the state representative, running for a seat on the county board, at least two candidates have announced interest in the 65A seat.

"My main points that I'm going hit strongest are climate change, social justice and affordable health care," said Bearfoot, a systems engineer from Hamline-Midway, in a brief interview. "I think now's the time. One of the things that's been weighing on my brain recently is the $7.7 billion surplus. Change can no longer be rhetorical."

Hussein, in a written statement, said he would "prioritize public trust in how we sustain safe and secure neighborhoods, affordable housing in our community and job creation," as well as climate change, "economic opportunity for all and finally tackle the opportunity gaps that exist for too many in our community."

As of Moran's announcement on Monday, 23 legislators — 16 DFLers and seven Republicans — have announced they are retiring or seeking another office this year. That could be a precursor of bigger changes ahead. Legislative maps are being redrawn, and over the last 50 years, the average turnover rate for legislative seats during a redistricting year is 32 percent, or 64 seats.

Bill Salisbury and Dave Orrick contributed to this report.