Monday, January 15, 2018

Down In Texas There Are A Number Of Trans People…

…running for for office. I think in the largest state in the contiguous U.S. they have the largest group of trans people running.
MEET THE FIVE TRANSGENDER TEXANS ON THE BALLOT IN 2018
Out Smart Magazine
By Lourdes Zavaleta
Posted On 05 Jan 2018

Bathroom bills, national successes fuel unprecedented slate.

As a child, Jenifer Rene Pool was picked on mercilessly. She was small in stature, and relied on thick eyeglasses due to poor eyesight.

“Classmates would grab my glasses and throw them around to each other,” the Houston transgender activist recalls.

“I hate bullies. Everyone should be treated fairly,” Pool adds. “This is the premise of our national Constitution, and for the most part, the Constitution of the State of Texas. It is why I have decided to run for State representative in 2018.”

In 2016, Pool was the first openly trans person to win a party primary in Texas, becoming the Democratic nominee for a Harris County commissioner’s seat before losing in the general election. This year, she is among five openly trans Texans running for office, which is by far the most ever.
[…]
Vanessa Edwards Foster, cofounder and president of the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC), is running as a Democrat for the Congressional District 27 seat held by U.S. representative Blake Farenthold (R-Corpus Christi), who announced his retirement last month amid allegations of sexual misconduct.

In Texas House District 94, Democrat Finnigan Jones is running for the seat held by incumbent State representative Tony Tinderholt (R-Arlington) who is rabidly anti-LGBTQ and authored legislation in 2017 that would have defined “sex” as the “physical condition of being male or female.”

Jones is the co-founder and executive director of Trans-Cendence, a Fort Worth-based nonprofit that supports and provides resources for trans people. He hopes his campaign will show trans youth that they can one day run for office, too.
[…]
In Texas House District 29, Dylan Wilde Forbis is running for the seat held by incumbent State representative Edward Thompson (R-Pearland), another bathroom-bill supporter. Forbis leads Queers with Careers and Trans Living Anthology, two LGBTQ support groups that allow queer people to share their testimonies.
[…]
Pool, meanwhile, will face attorney Adam Milasincic in the March 6 Democratic primary in Texas House District 138. The winner will take on incumbent Dwayne Bohac (R-Houston), a bathroom-bill supporter who received a grade of “F” on Equality Texas’ 2017 Legislative Scorecard. Pool says she is running in part because Bohac had no Democratic opponent in 2016.
I wish them all luck, it is going to be a hard fight to win with the way the Republicans have gerrymandered the districts in Texas to block out Democratic candidates.

I meet Vanessa Foster at Fantasia Fair a number of years ago and have been friends with her on Facebook for a number of years.

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