The transgender woman from Honduras has traveled to Pennsylvania several times in recent weeks to campaign for Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democratic candidates.
Montserras Alemán, along with a group of other CASA in Action volunteers, visited York on August 31st and Lancaster on September 21st.
They knocked on doors in areas with large populations of African American, black and Latino voters. Aleman and other CASA in Action volunteers appealed to support Harris, Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pennsylvania), and other Democratic candidates who voted against her.
Aleman will be in Harrisburg on Nov. 2 and in York on Election Day.
“We accomplished the goals that we had in mind and that we wanted to accomplish,” she told the Washington Blade in a Zoom interview from Baltimore on Oct. 22. “We knocked on doors and handed out flyers.”
In an interview with the Blade, Aleman singled out Project 2025, which was harshly criticized by the Parliamentary Equality Caucus on Thursday.
“We know that we have a Project 2025 plan that impacts the entire Latino immigrant community, the LGBTI community, and everyone,” Aleman said. “That’s why I want to knock on doors and ask for help and support from everyone who can vote and who can exercise their right to vote.”
She told the Blade that she and her fellow volunteers had “no negative reactions.”
Alemán grew up in Yoro, about 210 miles north of Honduras’ capital Tegucigalpa.
She left Honduras on November 25, 2021.
Aleman entered Mexico in Palenque, a city in Chiapas state near the border with Guatemala. The Mexican government issued her a humanitarian visa, allowing her to legally travel to Mexico.
Aleman told the Blade that he walked or took a bus from El Paso, Texas, to Ciudad Juarez, a Mexican border city across the Rio Grande.
While living in a shelter in Ciudad Juárez, she scheduled an interview with U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Aleman currently lives in Baltimore.
“Discrimination against the LGBTI community exists everywhere, but it is more severe in Honduras,” Aleman said.
Aleman added that she feels “more free to express herself and talk to people” in the United States, and remains optimistic that Harris will defeat former President Donald Trump on Election Day. said.
“We have no other choice,” Aleman said.
Source: Washington Blade: LGBTQ News, Politics, LGBTQ Rights, Gay News – www.washingtonblade.com
