On November 4, as Democrats celebrated big wins in key state elections, a wave of LGBTQ candidates won their own local and down-ballot races, further increasing LGBTQ representation in public office.
In Virginia, boosted by Abigail Spanberger’s gubernatorial victory, Democrats won 13 seats in the 100-member House of Delegates, expanding their caucus to 64 seats. All six incumbent LGBTQ delegates up for re-election — Rosia Henson (D-Woodbridge), Laura Jane Cohen (D-Berk.), Mark Sickles (D-Franconia), Adele McClure (D-Arlington), Joshua Cole (D-Fredericksburg) and Shea Price (D-Newport News) won their races.
In Virginia, buoyed by Abigail Spanberger’s gubernatorial victory, Democrats flipped 13 seats in the 100-member House of Delegates, expanding their caucus to 64 seats. All six incumbent LGBTQ delegates, including Rosia Henson (D-Woodbridge) and Laura Jane Cohen (D-Burke), are running for re-election. (D-Franconia), Adele McClure (D-Arlington), Joshua Cole (D-Fredericksburg), and Shea Price (D-Newport News) successfully secured their seats.
The LGBTQ caucus will also expand with the election of Lindsay Dougherty, a bisexual woman from Chester, who unseated Rep. Carrie Coyner (R-Chesterfield), one of the chamber’s few moderate Republicans. An eighth LGBTQ candidate, Lissie Hayes, narrowly lost her race to unseat Democrat Wendell Walker (R-Lynchburg).
In a nonpartisan election, Lori Silverman, who identifies as gay, won re-election to the Falls Church School Board. Meanwhile, Blacksburg Vice Mayor Michael Sutphin, a gay man, is in a dead heat with business owner Peter Macedo in a race likely to be decided by absentee and provisional ballots, with just 46 votes separating him.
In New Jersey, where Democrat Mikie Sherrill won the gubernatorial race, 11th Legislative District Representative Luann Peterpaul (D-Long Branch) secured re-election. Former Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey, who came out as gay before leaving office in 2004, advanced to the Jersey City mayoral runoff in December, finishing second to incumbent City Councilman James Solomon. In Franklin Township, Ed Potosnak, a gay Democrat, won re-election to City Council by a nearly 3-1 margin.
In Pennsylvania, Democrats retained three state Supreme Court justices, maintaining a 5-2 majority, and several LGBTQ candidates who voted against the bill also scored important victories.
In Chester County, Erica Deuso made history by becoming Pennsylvania’s first openly transgender mayor, winning with 64% of the vote in Downingtown.
In a statement, Deuso thanked voters for choosing “hope, common sense, and a vision of a community where every neighbor matters,” and vowed to lead with compassion, pragmatism, and a focus on results.
In Allegheny County, lesbian Jamie Hickton was elected to the county court of pleas.
Elsewhere in the county, Black pansexual progressive Dejah Baker came in first in the race for one of two seats representing District 1 on the Scherer Area School Board, despite a “dog whistle” campaign that exploited racial animus, implied Baker would discriminate against white people, and stoked hostility to diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
In Lancaster County, Shannon Zimmerman, a lesbian, won a seat on the Manheim Township School Board, Kate Linton, a nonbinary queer person, was elected to the Hempfield School Board, and Jeremy Zimmerman, a bisexual, won a seat on the Manheim Township School Board.
Jasmine Preston, a transgender woman, ran for mayor of the District of Columbia by just 74 votes, but Ethan Byers, a gay man, won one of the three open seats on the District of Columbia Council. Elsewhere in the county, Marshall Miller, a gay man, was elected to Lancaster City Council, and Bradley Mikitko, a gay Democrat in the Republican-leaning town, was re-elected as East Donegal City Auditor.
In Snyder County in central Pennsylvania, Jared Hoffman, a gay man, won a seat on the Selinsgrove Area School Board. In the Northeast, Christopher Bells, also gay, was elected to the Luzerne County Council, representing an area that was once reliably Democratic but has moved sharply to the right in recent years.
In Georgia, where Democrats won two seats on the statewide Public Service Commission, marking the first time the party has won a statewide constitutional office since 2006, LGBTQ representation remains strong.
Kelsey Bond, a non-binary bisexual Democratic Socialist, won a seat on the Atlanta City Council, incumbent Liliana Bakhtiari, the first non-binary queer person elected to the city council as an LGBTQ Muslim, and Alex Wang and Matt Westmoreland, the first gay people elected to the city council, were both re-elected unopposed.
In nearby Hapeville, At-Large City Councilman Brett Reichert also won re-election.
In Texas, state Rep. Jolanda Jones (D-Houston), the first black lesbian elected to the Texas state legislature, came in third in a crowded race, missing out on a runoff election early next year. But at the city level, Alejandra Salinas, who hopes to become the first LGBTQ Latina to serve on the city council, came in second in the first round for the at-large seat and will advance to a runoff on Dec. 13.
In Washington state, bisexual Alexis Mercedes Link won re-election to an at-large seat on the Seattle City Council, and gay Dionne Foster defeated City Council President Sarah Nelson for another at-large seat.
In other good news for the LGBTQ community, mostly Democratic or cross-aligned candidates won seats on 13 local school boards in Bucks County, which includes the Philadelphia suburbs that have become strongholds of the state’s conservative “parental rights” movement.
Remarkably, in the Centennial, Central Bucks, Pennridge, and Sudderton district school board races (all mired in “culture wars” over transgender protections, banning Pride flags, book removal, anti-LGBTQ bullying, and efforts to remove lessons on race and racism from the curriculum), Democrats won all four contested seats in each district, or one of three.
The Central Bucks School Board, which gained national attention for its “culture war” battles under Republican control, turned Democratic for the first time two years ago when voters rejected all candidates backed by the right-wing “parental rights” group Moms for Liberty. Karen Smith, the Republican-elected Democratic board president, later took the oath of office in a symbolic gesture atop a pile of banned books. After Tuesday’s election, Republicans will have no seats on the board, buoyed by Democrats’ strong performance in all votes.
Source: Metro Weekly – www.metroweekly.com
