The phone's ringing off the hook!

Starting at a little after 8 in the morning up until about 6 in the evening, the phone has been ringing, ringing, ringing and the caller ID says, "US Capitol". We've requested literally hundreds of meetings with members of Congress for people coming from around the country to our 09 Lobby Day and congressional offices are responding to set up meetings with trans people and our families, friends and allies.

A few people have asked us if there is still time to sign up ... absolutely! There's still plenty of time for us to fax a request for you and we've been faxing daily so please register.

So keep our phones ringing! It's making us feel popular. :)

Gainesville Victory

From Mara Keisling:

March 24, 2009
Gainesville, Florida: NCTE congratulates the wonderful advocates at Equality is Gainesville's Business who organized and executed a highly professional and effective campaign to counter yet another organized anti-LGBT fear mongering effort. With 100% of the city ballots counted, the discriminatory Charter Amendment One has been soundly defeated by a vote of 58% to 42%.

Charter Amendment 1 was an effort by national rightwing organizations to repeal the city's new anti-discrimination law that would-and now will-allow gay, bi and transgender people to work and live based on their qualifications.

Equality has won. Truth has won. The LGBT-obsessed Right Wing Lie Machine has fallen way short again.

And residents of Gainesville and the amazing people at Equality is Gainesville's Business ROCK.

Lobby Day--are you going to be there? April 26-28

As of today, we have people registered for Lobby Day who together represent 65 different congressional districts, from 25 states plus the District of Columbia.That is amazing. We have also filled 75% of our room block at our host hotel. This is going to be a powerful experience.

And we do need all of these voices and many more to help educate Congress about why it is so vital to pass and send to the President legislation that will ban employment discrimination, will work to prevent hate crimes and much more. They need to hear from us.

A cheer goes up in the offices here each time another registration comes in because that strengthens the message we are taking to Capitol Hill in April. We hope to hear from you, too!

A Picture from a New Perspective--Inside the White House

This picture represents something you have probably never seen before. There are lots of pictures of the Washington Monument and Jefferson Memorial (in the distance), quite a few shot across the South Lawn of the White House and even some shot from inside the White House. But this one comes from a distinct view point. It was shot Wednesday afternoon from within the East Wing of the White House by a transgender person. I took that picture while waiting with a handful of cabinet secretaries, a score or so of Congressmembers, at least two Olympic gold medalists, and a who’s who of feminist, women’s rights and civil rights leaders including one of my heroes, Dr. Dorothy Haight.

I suppose pretty much everyone thinks it’s cool to be invited to the White House—especially now that so many of us have such hope for what the White House can mean for Americans again. And, of course, I know that there are invites, and then there are invites. Maybe mine on Wednesday, to attend the signing of an Executive Order creating the White House Council on Women and Girls, wasn’t an invite to meet personally with the President one on one to help him figure out global warming or to discuss the urgent needs of transgender people, but that a transwoman had been invited to such a significant moment for American women is still a very hopeful sign. I am proud to have attended and more proud to have been invited.

In his comments at the signing, the President talked about FDR’s Labor Secretary Frances Perkins—the first-ever woman cabinet member. By way of showing how far women in America had come, he noted that she had said about her pioneering appointment, "I had a kind of duty to other women to walk in and sit down on the chair that was offered, and so establish the rights of others long hence and far distant in geography to sit in the high seats." From twenty or so feet away from the President of the United States as his guest, I almost felt like he was reminding me of the steps transpeople are taking.

At NCTE, we do not pretend that our having been invited to send me to a mostly ceremonial, albeit significant, moment is akin to Perkins being the first woman in the cabinet. I was not, to say the least, in the high seats. But, imagine, this week a transperson was invited as a transperson to the White House. And bigger, more significant firsts have already happened this year. A transgender man, Diego Sanchez, was the first openly out transperson to become a staffer on Capitol Hill, standing on the shoulders of at least one other transperson who worked for a Senator in a district office. And this year a transgender person, Shannon Minter, argued for the second time before the California Supreme Court and was named Lawyer of the Year by California Lawyer magazine, standing on the shoulders of numerous trans lawyers who had mentored him. And this year, other firsts have happened and will continue to happen, and in years hence, these firsts will stand as foundations on which new, taller firsts will stand.

In the mean time, of course, trans people around the country and the world continue to face horrible disrespect, discrimination and violence, and I know my invitation to the White House this week is only one tiny step toward lessening those years from now.

I know more of us will be invited again soon, and next time hopefully to witness the signing of a Hate Crimes law or ENDA or maybe the much needed Executive Order protecting transgender federal employees.

I took that picture from the White House on Wednesday knowing that soon lots of trans people will take lots of pictures from the White House. And soon after that, or eventually, trans people will be in the White House often enough that pictures will seem unnecessary: we'll be sitting in the high seats.

Q Street Reception

Last night, Mara and I attended the Q Street reception, held in the Longworth House Office building. It was a gathering of LGBT people to honor the LGBT Equality Caucus, which is led by three openly gay/lesbian members of Congress—Representatives Barney Frank, Tammy Baldwin and Jared Polis—and has more than 70 other members of Congress. We listened to politician after politician get up and speak to a crowded hall about the importance of LGBT rights, of gender-identity inclusive bills, of the need to overcome oppression in all its forms.

For me, it was a reminder of how far we have actually come—I was a resident of Massachusetts in 1987 when Barney Frank’s sexual orientation became public knowledge. I had just come out as a young queer person the year before and it had a huge impact on me that one of us could be here in Washington. The controversy then, of course, was much greater than it would be now. And that’s my point—it’s good to be reminded from time to time that things have changed and that the courage of an individual to speak out makes an impact on generations to come. And it was good to catch the excitement about a world that is safer and fairer for LGBT people, including trans people. We have a long way still to go, but we’ve also come a long way.