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Colin Allred was raised by a single mother under challenging circumstances, rising to become an NFL player, lawyer and now an improbable candidate for Congress.
But Judith Allred had help — from family, public school teachers, bookstore clerks and the local YMCA. Colin Allred acknowledges he’s not only Judith’s kid, but also a son of his Dallas district.
“It definitely took a village to raise me,” Allred said one afternoon as he drove around his old neighborhood. “It took a lot of people in my life, people who did more than what their normal range of duties were. They looked out for me.”
Now Allred says he wants to look out for the district by becoming its public servant.
He’s running an underdog campaign for Congress against longtime incumbent Republican Pete Sessions, chairman of the House Rules Committee and one of the most powerful lawmakers on the Hill.
A newcomer to politics, Allred, 35, is touting his close connection with the 32nd Congressional District and a bird’s-eye view of what it needs to move forward.
Other than short stints in the administration of former President Barack Obama, Allred has no public service record. His campaign is largely based on his ideas and biography.
“It’s an unlikely story,” Allred said. “When I was growing up here, I never imagined that I would be doing this now. This is a long way from how I grew up.”
But Sessions and other Republicans contend Allred is one of the most left-leaning candidates in Texas and would be a tool of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.
“Colin Allred is almost the polar opposite of Congressman Pete Sessions in every way,” Vice President Mike Pence said during a recent rally in Dallas. “Where Congressman Sessions has stood strong with our administration, his opponent actually worked for the Obama administration and supported the big-government policies that they advance that led to the slowest economic recovery since the Great Depression.”
In many ways, the fight between Allred and Sessions is generational, with the younger candidate stressing new ideas and new experiences in Congress.
“I’m a product of the district, and I’m offering it the kind of representation it needs and deserves,” Allred said.
According to a New York Times Upshot/Siena College poll completed in September, Sessions leads with 48 percent to Allred’s 47 percent, with 5 percent undecided. Pollsters talked to only 500 potential voters, with the margin of error at plus or minus 4.8 percentage points.
Finding himself
Before Allred could succeed, he had to find himself.
He was born in Dallas to a single mother who got critical assistance with raising him from her sister and brother in-law.
Making matters tricky was that on the outside, he looked like a black kid, but the only family he ever knew was white. An early encounter with overt racism was jarring.
“My first time dealing with racism here in North Texas was at a math competition in Azle,” Allred said. “These guys started chasing me around and saying they were going to hang me from a tree and calling me the N-word and all kinds of stuff. Luckily I was fast.”
But even before that incident, Allred knew he was different.
“To most people, when they interacted with me, I was an African-American or maybe some other minority, but then I’d go home and be with my white family,” Allred…
