Representative Heather Edelson Contact information

Heather Edelson, born on April 4, 1981, is an American politician who has been serving in the Minnesota House of Representatives since 2019. She is a member of the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party (DFL) and represents District 50A in the western Twin Cities metropolitan area, which includes the city of Edina and parts of Hennepin County, Minnesota.

Edelson was raised in north Minneapolis and attended Columbia Heights Public Schools. She later attended the University of Minnesota, earning an M.S.W., and was the first person from her family to graduate from college. Edelson has worked as a mental health therapist and served as a guardian ad litem in Hennepin County.

She served on the Edina Public School Board Special Education Advisory Council and the Edina Race and Equity Working Group. Edelson also served as Edina’s Human Rights and Relations Commissioner.

Edelson was elected to the Minnesota House of Representatives in 2018 and has been reelected every two years since. She first ran for the DFL party endorsement in 2016, losing to Ron Erhardt, an 11-term incumbent who switched from the Republican to the DFL party in 2010. Erhardt lost the general election, and Edelson won the DFL endorsement in 2018, going on to defeat one-term Republican incumbent Dario Anselmo.

In the House, Edelson serves as vice chair of the Ways and Means Committee, and sits on the Education Finance, Environment and Natural Resources Finance and Policy, and Human Services Policy Committees. In 2021–22, she served as an assistant majority leader.

Edelson has been active in marijuana legalization. After concerns were raised over price and accessibility, Edelson authored a bill that would add the whole cannabis flower to the state’s medical cannabis program, saying it would decrease reliance on painkillers and opioids. She also drafted a bill that would allow medical cannabis and CBD oil in schools for students with a doctor’s approval. In 2022, Edelson sponsored legislation that legalized food and beverages, including gummies, containing THC if it was derived from hemp.