Victory in the News

Queering Congress

When California teacher Mark Takano ran for Congress 15 years ago, he lost to Republican challenger Ken Calvert by a scant 519 votes. Two years later, things looked more promising. Police had caught Calvert with a prostitute; Takano should have easily clinched a win. But just three months before the election, Ray Haynes—a Calvert supporter in the state assembly—outed Takano as gay. 

Despite the growing importance of LGBT issues on the Democratic platform—two rumored contenders for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, have been fierce advocates for marriage equality—the rank of elected officials will likely change little next year. "If you were to think of this in terms of representative democracy, we are not there yet," says Denis Dison of The Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, a group that supports LGBT candidates at all levels of government. "We should have maybe 30 members of the House. But [the underrepresentation] is also true of people of color, of women. The LGBT community is fairly new to this mission we have undertaken. It wasn't very long ago that people would not have been able to run." 

Frank retiring from Congress in 2012

The longest serving openly gay member of Congress won't seek re-election to the U.S. House in 2012.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) announced his retirement during a press conference at Newton City Hall in Massachusetts on Monday. Had the lawmaker sought re-election, he would have been pursuing a 17th term in Congress.

The Victory Fund has endorsed the re-election bids of openly gay U.S. House members Polis and Cicilline. The organization also backs the election to Congress of non-incumbent Pocan as well as Mark Takano in California and State Rep. Marko Liias in Washington State.