In January of 2012, Susan Allen became the first Native American woman elected to serve in the Minnesota Legislature and the first openly queer/Two Spirit Native woman elected to any state legislature. Although her campaign for office was short (just over two weeks), it benefitted from community support, high-profile advocates, and Allen’s willingness to share her background with voters.
After longtime state senator Linda Berglin resigned from the Minnesota Legislature in August 2011, State Rep. Jeff Hayden was elected to Berglin’s seat, leaving Hayden’s House seat open in District 61B. The district, a swath of south Minneapolis from Lake Street to Minnehaha Parkway along I-35W and over to Powderhorn Park, was considered a stronghold for the Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Party. No Republican announced a campaign for the seat.
Susan Allen, an attorney who specialized in tribal law, had never run for office. She was approached by State Representative Karen Clark, who represented a neighboring district and was the first out lesbian to serve in the legislature, and Sharon Day, the founder and executive director of the Indigenous Peoples Task Force in Minneapolis. Allen’s supporters soon included former State Senator Linda Berglin and City Council member Robert Lilligren.
An enrolled member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe (Sičháŋǧu Oyáte), Allen had been born on March 27, 1963, on the Ute Reservation in Utah, where her father was an Episcopal priest. Philip Allen (Oglála Lakȟóta) was well-known for his ministry in Indian country. Her mother, Helen, was a Sičháŋǧu Lakȟóta artist known for her beadwork and community education. Her family moved often as her father worked to reform the Episcopal Church, and by the time she was fourteen, Allen had attended twenty different schools in five states. As an adult, she came to identify as both lesbian and Two-Spirit.
After she agreed to run in October 2011, Allen sprinted to shore up community support ahead of the DFL convention planned for November 12. Two additional DFL candidates vied for the party endorsement: educator Nelson Inz and Josh Bassais, who worked for the Laborers International Union (LIUNA).
Allen had been drawn to the law as a tool for social justice while growing up during a time of major political and social change in Indian country. The American Indian Movement, founded in Minneapolis in 1968, promoted culturally relevant education for Allen’s generation of Native youth. During the campaign, she spoke of her own educational upbringing and the need to focus on the achievement gaps of students from marginalized communities.
Allen also spoke freely about her sobriety journey. At one point during her struggles with alcoholism, she had been homeless on Franklin Avenue, just blocks from the district she later ran to represent. She hoped others would see hope in her ability to get sober and earn degrees from Augsburg College, the University of New Mexico Law School, and William Mitchell (now Mitchell Hamline) School of Law. In addition to education, Allen’s campaign focused on bolstering Minnesota’s social service safety net.
At the November 12 convention at South High School, Allen—attending her first political convention—won the party’s endorsement with 65 percent of the vote on the third ballot. Inz and Bassais dropped out of the race (though their names still appeared on the primary ballot, as did Paul Davis’s).
With the endorsement, Allen easily won the December 6 primary with 82 percent of the vote. In the general election, she faced activist Nate Blumenshine, who ran under the Respect Party. Allen garnered 1,155 votes—56 percent—to Blumenshine’s 896. She was sworn in on January 19, 2012, in a ceremony that included a Native American drum circle performing honor songs on the floor of the Minnesota House.
Allen’s election was a trailblazing moment for Minnesota’s Native American, Two Spirit, and LGBTQIA+ communities. During her time in the House, marriage equality became law in Minnesota, the minimum wage was raised and indexed to inflation, and the voices of Native Americans were elevated at the Capitol. When she announced in 2017 she would not seek re-election after four terms, Allen reiterated that she ran “to be a voice for those left out of the political system.” “It was never my intent to serve in the Legislature forever,” she added, “but rather to answer a call to public service at a time when racial minorities were severely underrepresented in the Legislature. Since that time an increasing number of candidates from minority backgrounds have stepped up to run for public office at all levels of government.”