Despite threats, first Somali American legislator-elect from St. Cloud is eager to serve
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Five days after his election victory, Abdi Daisane finally had a moment to reflect on his historic win.
It was Sunday, a rare quiet day at his usually bustling business, Blooming Kids Child Care Center in downtown St. Cloud.
Sitting at his desk with framed college diplomas and photos of his three kids behind him, Daisane said he's ready to get to work as a state representative — the first Somali American elected to the Minnesota Legislature from the St. Cloud area.
"This is the honor of my life,” he said. “Nothing is more exciting than getting the opportunity to give back to the community that gave me so much."
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Daisane, a DFLer, flipped a state House seat in a city that has struggled with racism and xenophobia. His win was one of the more surprising victories in a year when Democratic candidates made sweeping gains in state and federal government.
He beat Republican Mike Conway, the current St. Cloud City Council president, for the House 14A seat. The district includes St. Cloud, St. Joseph, St. Augusta and Waite Park. It has been represented by a Repulican for decades.
Daisane, 38, was born in Somalia. When he was young, his family fled that country's civil war. He spent the next 18 years in a refugee camp in Kenya.
Then came what Daisane calls a life-changing opportunity to come to the United States. He arrived with no high school diploma and spoke little English.
“I had to struggle,” he said. “I had to learn. I had to read a lot of books.”
Daisane earned his high school diploma equivalency in Nebraska, then moved to St. Cloud 15 years ago to attend St. Cloud State University. He went on to earn his bachelor's and master's degrees, and later was a policy fellow at the University of Minnesota’s Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs. He became a U.S. citizen in 2014.
Daisane said he found a home in St. Cloud, a city with educational and job opportunities, and a small but growing Somali community.
“My plan was I'll just get my education out of the way, and I wasn't sure what the future holds,” he said. “But I love this community. I stayed after that.”
He worked for Avivo, a nonprofit helping people overcome barriers to employment. Later, he joined the Little Falls-based Initiative Foundation, where he oversaw a program that supports small businesses in greater Minnesota.
Daisane first ran for St. Cloud City Council 10 years ago. He didn't win, but says he knocked on a lot of doors and heard about issues on people's minds, including their struggles to afford housing. Then-Mayor Dave Kleis appointed him to the local Housing and Redevelopment Authority board.
In 2024, Daisane ran for the Minnesota House for the first time, challenging Republican Bernie Perryman but losing by about 2,500 votes.
“I never stopped running afterwards,” he said. “I continued having conversations. I continued talking to people, and planning ahead for the 2026 election.”
This year, Perryman opted to run for the state Senate, leaving the House District 14A seat open. And the political climate had changed considerably since President Donald Trump won the St. Cloud area in 2024.
The cost of living was up. Federal immigration enforcement had targeted communities across Minnesota, including St. Cloud.
In January, U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement agents showed up to Star City Mall, a hub of East African-owned businesses in St. Cloud, where they clashed with protesters in the parking lot.
In recent months Trump and other White House officials have repeatedly singled out Somali immigrants, blaming them for fraud in public assistance programs and youth violence. Daisane called the president’s rhetoric against Somali Minnesotans “horrible.”
“People were fed up with all those things,” he said. “So that also was to our advantage that people were ready for change, and wanted to see something different.”
Jaylani Hussein, executive director of the Council on American Islamic Relations-Minnesota, said the president's attacks on Somali Americans backfired by galvanizing Somali voters and their allies to show up in large numbers at the ballot box.
“I think Abdi benefited from a moment where people really felt that voting was a way to push back against the demonization, and also the weaponization of ICE against lawful U.S. citizens who have the ability to vote, and they used that,” Hussein said.
St. Cloud’s Somali American community has diverse political opinions and hasn’t always voted as a bloc, said Matt Lindstrom, a political science professor at the College of St. Benedict and St. John's University. But that changed this year, he said.
"This time around they had an absolute common opponent,” Lindstrom said. “When the president says what he said, and in such a dehumanizing way, the East African community absolutely rallied around the get out the vote [effort] this year."
Even after Daisane's victory, the attacks have continued. Conservative media outlets have alleged connections between his childcare center and Minnesota's fraud scandal. Minnesota Congressman Tom Emmer, a Republican, repeated the unsubstantiated allegation on Fox News on Tuesday.
Daisane said those claims have no basis, and his childcare center regularly serves 85 to 90 children a day.
A spokesperson for the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office said that Blooming Kids Child Care Center is not among the sites it’s investigating as part of the fraud scandal associated with the nonprofit Partners in Nutrition.
Still, Daisane said he's received threatening messages, and provocateurs with cameras have shown up unannounced to his business.
“Those lies, those headlines that are just baseless, have consequences for people like me … in a time where we know that political violence is on the rise,” he said.
Daisane has asked the local police to increase patrols around his business. Security remains a concern, but he said it won't stop him from the work ahead, representing the St. Cloud area at the Minnesota state Capitol.
Daisane said he hopes to work on issues that voters brought up frequently during his campaign, including the rising cost of housing, healthcare, childcare and property taxes. His district is split almost evenly between renters and homeowners, and both are struggling with high costs, he said.
And he said he wants to help tackle fraud in state assistance programs, including childcare.
“I have the opportunity to bring my professional experience and say, ‘This is what we can do different,’” he said.
Daisane hopes his election win will also open doors for other Somali Americans to get involved in politics in greater Minnesota.
One trailblazer, Hudda Ibrahim, became the first Somali American to serve on the St. Cloud City Council when she was appointed in 2024. But Ibrahim lost her Ward 3 seat to Air Force veteran Luke Christian in the midterm election.
Still, Daisane hopes there will be others who follow. He said the election results show that efforts to label immigrant communities as fraudsters or terrorists isn't working.
“People know us as neighbors, as friends, as colleagues and coworkers, and people who contribute so much into this community,” he said. “There's only so much that you can try to do, but people know better. Minnesotans know better.”
