If you passed Haley Taylor Schlitz on the streets of St. Paul and saw her hanging out with friends, on the hunt for a sweet treat or walking her miniature dachshund, Liora, she’d look a lot like an average 20-something.
Taylor Schlitz is, however, one of the youngest women and the youngest African American to graduate from law school in the U.S., and from 9 to 5 she’s at her desk, suited up and working on case after case in the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office.
Taylor Schlitz was hired as an assistant attorney general, assigned to the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, in June 2024, according to the office.
Saying yes to the job meant leaving Fort Worth, Texas, and her family, which was challenging. But it helped that her dad was a big Bud Grant and Minnesota Vikings fan, plus he worked for Delta, so they flew several times to training camp in Mankato and games at the Metrodome.
The opportunity to serve the state was a welcome adventure, she said, and now, at 23 years old, she is the youngest assistant attorney general in the state.
“I just knew I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to work for such an attorney like Attorney General (Keith) Ellison … such a role model and a leader, especially in the legal field,” Taylor Schlitz said.
She also had been looking for opportunities to practice outside of Texas.
“I got the job and, being up here for a year, I can confidently say that this truly is the home I was looking for,” she said.
A lifetime of achievements at 23
As a young adult, Taylor Schlitz’s list of accomplishments surpasses what many achieve over a lifetime. At age 13, she enrolled in undergraduate school. At 16, she completed her studies at Texas Woman’s University and was then accepted into nine law schools.
“That was very validating to get acceptance to nine law schools,” Taylor Schlitz said. “I took pictures of all the acceptance letters and celebrated each one that came in. It was a very proud moment for me and my family.”
In 2019, she and her mother, Dr. Myiesha Taylor, co-wrote the book “The Homeschool Alternative: Incorporating a Homeschool Mindset for the Benefit of Black Children in America,” and she is currently working on her first solo nonfiction book on Gen Z and politics.
Her opinion pieces have been published in media such as the Black Wall Street Times, Insight News and the Minnesota Star Tribune. She was featured in a publication by Beyoncé during Black History Month in 2020, and served as a delegate for then-Vice President Joe Biden at the Democratic National Convention during the same year.
She currently serves on the board of directors for the Greater Twin Cities United Way, is board chair of the CapitolRiver Council in St. Paul, is a Josie R. Johnson Leadership Academy fellow and the list goes on.
“Haley has a lot of positive energy and enthusiasm, combined with a kind of pragmatism about what’s possible,” CapitolRiver Council executive director Jon Fure said. “One word that people most commonly use when they meet her is that she’s brilliant.”
Taylor Schlitz is the youngest board chair the council has ever had, Fure said, which he said speaks to her leadership qualities.
A gifted child
Taylor Schlitz credits much of her academic accolades to her parents’ decision to pull her out of the Texas public elementary school system.
“It’s just amazing what children can do when we allow them to explore their full abilities and their full potential,” her father, William Schlitz, said.
Schlitz said his daughter showed early signs of advanced intelligence. She’d finish assignments at an impressive speed, was consistently getting straight-A grades and could teach herself entire concepts like geometry.
But Schlitz couldn’t ignore that his biracial, Black daughter seemed to be mistreated in comparison to other students.
He remembers a 10-year-old Haley coming home from school and telling him and his wife how her elementary class reenacted the Civil War. The class split in two for North and South and Haley, the only Black student in the class, was cast as “the mullato slave girl,” Schlitz said.
“Her white classmates turned to her and said, in a mean way, ‘You know, if we were alive back then, I’d own you,’” Schlitz said. “We pulled her out at that moment, because it was clear to us.”
When Taylor Schlitz thinks back to that moment, she thinks about how disruptive it was to her learning, she said. An experience like that can break a student’s ability to engage and comprehend the curriculum, she said.
“I certainly was not learning; much less if I had stayed there longer,” Taylor Schlitz said. “We talk about mental health affecting youth, and that’s where it starts. It doesn’t start in eighth and ninth grade, it starts very young.”
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Following that experience, her grades began to drop. She lost her focus, and when she did engage, she was often teased by other classmates for being nerdy, she said. Her parents decided then to homeschool her.
“It was obvious that Texas was becoming a more and more hostile place to Black children in the education system,” her father said.
As a hybrid homeschooled child, Haley would alternate between completing online courses and taking in-person classes at a college preparatory school in Texas.
“I was able to graduate early and go to college,” Taylor Schlitz said. “But deeper than that, I grew as a student and as a person. I knew how I studied best, I managed stress, I changed my measurements of failure and success, and my time-management skills were so incredibly sharp by the time I got to college.”
She’s not the only one, either; her two younger siblings followed in her footsteps, graduating from college at 15 and 16. Her now 17-year-old sister, Hana, is working to get her master’s, and her 19-year-old brother, Ian, is pursuing a doctoral program, which he’ll finish in a year.
From education to justice
Initially, after graduating from college, Taylor Schlitz wanted to be a doctor like her mother, an emergency medicine physician. Her experience with early higher education, however, swayed her in a different direction.
She was fortunate enough to have parents who recognized her academic abilities at a young age, she said, and recognized that not all children are given the same opportunities.
Haley Taylor Schlitz in the Minnesota Department of Public Safety office in St. Paul. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
“So, how many students are we overlooking?” Taylor Schlitz said. “How many future leaders, doctors or lawyers are we … not doing the service we could be because they just don’t have that same knowledge or opportunity?”
The year after graduating from law school, Taylor Schlitz taught a fifth-grade history class for two years in Texas to gain hands-on experience in the classroom that would benefit her long-term aspirations of working in education policy.
“I was right and the experience was invaluable, for me to have my boots on the ground and for me to have my own personal experiences in the classroom with the teachers every single day,” Taylor Schlitz said.
Serving Minnesota
In her role as assistant attorney general, Taylor Schlitz represents the state and works with law enforcement, handling cases primarily related to road safety, driver and vehicle services, and drinking and driving.
Attorneys like her, working in different divisions, come to work in the office to “serve the people of Minnesota and the state to ensure Minnesota is greater, safer and continues to grow,” she said.
Her work has offered her a unique opportunity to learn about the Twin Cities landscape, roads and law enforcement. A fast-paced work environment, she said, she finds exciting.
“I went into the legal field and wanted to be an attorney to advocate for equity and justice, and that includes in the public safety realm,” Taylor Schlitz said.
As a Black woman working in public safety, she understands the hesitancy many people of color have when encountering law enforcement, she said, which is why it’s even more important that she is a part of increasing cultural diversity in her field, she said.
“Bring a seat to the table, as they say, otherwise you’re on the menu, right?” Taylor Schlitz said.
Taylor Schlitz said her Black heritage has shaped everything in her life, and it is through that lens that she advocates for justice and equity. Her grandfather, Dwight Taylor, was the second person killed during the Rodney King civil unrest in Los Angeles in 1992. She never got the chance to know him, she said, but his legacy is carried in her family.
“The conversations that are very, very unfortunately common in the Black community are of, ‘just make it home,’ when you get pulled over, ‘just make it home,’ when you get stopped, ‘just make it home,’” Taylor Schlitz said. “Not only did we have that conversation, but it also had that vein of ‘because Grandpa didn’t make it home.’”
She’s able to apply what she learns in her own life and help others do the same, she said. For example, it’s important that people of color know their rights, use their right to remain silent and right to an attorney before speaking to officers if they feel uncomfortable, she said. People should also cooperate with law enforcement orders, she said, because, as she was taught by her family, the number one priority is “making it home safely.”
“I’m so proud of her,” William Schlitz said. “She seems every day to wake up with the passion to be better and make an impact on the world.”
More to come in Minnesota
Living and working in Minnesota is a far cry from Texas, Taylor Schlitz said. At work, and in St. Paul, she feels much more welcomed and appreciated, she said, because her values are mirrored in the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office and in many of the state’s citizens.
“I was also desperate and hungry for that home, and that’s what St. Paul has really become for me,” Taylor Schlitz said. “A place where I’m not questioned, a place where my simple existence as a Black woman and my right to be is not being challenged every single day.”
According to Greater Twin Cities United Way President John Wilgers, Taylor Schlitz has great maturity and intelligence, but something equally valuable as a board member is her positive, infectious energy and the ability to represent the needs of Gen Z.
“She brings a solutions perspective … and I think the work that she does probably also provides her with a deep connection to the community,” Wilgers said.
She credits her mother, the most influential Black female role model in her life, for helping her become the person she is today; for giving her the tools to navigate injustice and believe in herself, she said.
Her mentors, her friends, her attorney team and neighbors have helped create a village, or “forest,” that pushes her to achieve greatness, she said. Most of all, both of her parents continue to be a source of inspiration, comfort and support in her life.
“I always encourage people when they ask, ‘How did you get through the hard times?’ … I always tell people to fall back on their village, on their forests, as I like to refer to it, with all the great trees that are in it, with their pearls of wisdom, with their experiences; they, too, have been criticized,” Taylor Schlitz said.
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Taylor Schlitz will continue to grow in her current position as assistant attorney general, defines herself as a lifelong learner and would like to one day start her own law firm.
“Running for office is definitely on the radar, maybe in the near future, maybe in the far future,” Taylor Schlitz said. “Whatever doors open and stars align.”
When Taylor Schlitz isn’t working on her book, reviewing cases or attending board meetings, she likes to read romance and fantasy novels, paint, play first-person shooter video games, do mind puzzles with friends and attend events at Rice Park in downtown St. Paul.
As Taylor Schlitz has begun to find home in Minnesota, she said she is thrilled to be able to pour herself into the St. Paul community through her various leadership roles.
“St. Paul and Minnesota always hold a place in my heart because it’s the state that gave me a chance,” Taylor Schlitz said.
This story was created in partnership with Power 104.7. To listen to the radio version, visit power1047.fm and click “listen live.”
