Jill Duson

Jill C. Duson (born 1953) is an American lawyer, lobbyist, and politician from Portland, Maine.

Duson has served on both the Portland School Board^[2] and the Portland, Maine City Council since 2001. In 2004, Duson became the first African-American mayor of Maine's largest city and the first African-American women mayor in the state when she was elected by her fellow council members to chair meetings under the city's then council-manager system.^[3]

In 2011, Duson ran for the newly created position of mayor. Rep. Anne Haskell was her campaign manager.^[4] She finished in sixth place out of fifteen candidates on the ballot.

In 2012, Duson was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention and a Democratic elector in the general election.^[5] She was a supporter of President Barack Obama.^[6]

In June 2016, Duson ran for the Democratic nomination for State Senate in her district. She lost to Representative and former sheriff Mark Dion.^[7]

In November 2017, Duson was re-elected for the fifth time over two challengers.^[8] Soon thereafter, she declared her intent to seek the nomination for State Senate in the 2018 election after Dion announced his intention to run for governor.^[9] In June, Duson received approximately 41% of the votes in the Democratic primary and lost to Rep. Heather Sanborn.^[10] She did not seek re-election in 2020. She was elected to the Maine Senate in 2022, becoming the first Black woman to serve as a state senator in Maine's history.^[11]

In April 2015, Duson led the charge to reduce the city's minimum wage to $8.75 an hour from the proposed $10.10 per hour proposed by Mayor Michael F. Brennan. Duson's proposal passed the city's Finance Committee before being rejected by the City Council in favor of the original proposal.^[12]

Duson grew up impoverished in Chester, Pennsylvania. Her mother was part of a rent strike when she was a child. However, she earned a B.A. from Antioch College, a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School, and a Certificate in Senior Executive in State & Local Government from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.^[4]

Duson has dealt with financial troubles, including potential foreclosure on her home in Portland's North Deering neighborhood. According to court records, she "had about $73 in the bank" at the time of her 2012 bankruptcy. In 2017, Duson was still fighting to avoid foreclosure.^[13]

Outside of elected office, Duson has worked as a lobbyist for Central Maine Power,^[2] Director of Bureau of Rehabilitation Services, Maine Department of Labor, compliance director for the Maine Human Rights Commission as well as in retail with L.L.Bean.^[5]