A married gay man is nng for print. That's a big al. | CNN Polics

Contents:

• ELECTN 2020: PETE BUTTIGIEG IS FIRST OPENLY GAY MAN TO RUN FOR US PRINT
• FIRST OPENLY GAY US PRINTIAL CANDIDATE?
• FRED KARGER WAS THE 1ST OPENLY GAY PERSON OM A MAJOR PARTY TO N FOR PRINT
• PETE BUTTIGIEG COULD BE THE FIRST MILLENNIAL AND OPENLY GAY MAN TO BEE A NOMEE FOR PRINT
• A MARRIED GAY MAN IS NNG FOR PRINT. THAT’S A BIG AL.
• IS AMERI READY TO ELECT A GAY PRINT?
• THERE WON’T BE A GAY PRINT 2021. SO WHAT DO BUTTIGIEG’S CAMPAIGN TELL US?
• WHAT WILL HISTORY SAY? AN INTERVIEW WH FRED KARGER, THE FIRST OPENLY GAY MAN TO RUN FOR PRINT
• PETE BUTTIGIEG IS AN OPENLY GAY ARY VETERAN, RHOS SCHOLAR, AND DEMOCRATIC MAYOR A RED STATE. HE'S ALSO NNG FOR PRINT
• MEET PETE BUTTIGIEG: A GAY MAYOR, AFGHAN WAR VET AND LENNIAL WHO'S NNG FOR PRINT
• JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS' KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE COACH TO COME OUT AS GAY MAJOR U.S. SPORTS
• KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE ACH A US MEN’S PROFSNAL SPORTS LEAGUE TO PUBLICLY E OUT AS GAY
• JAGUARS’ KEV MAXEN IS FIRST MALE ACH TO E OUT AS GAY US MEN’S PRO SPORTS

ELECTN 2020: PETE BUTTIGIEG IS FIRST OPENLY GAY MAN TO RUN FOR US PRINT

The first openly gay man to n for print the history of the Uned Stat is receivg a lot of qutns about how to rrectly pronounce his tongue-twistg fay Buttigieg, a Democrat, is currently mayor of the cy of South Bend, Indiana. As of last unt, 24 Democrats have dited or have actually entered the race to bee the party’s printial what has aroed the tert of Ameri’s polil ele is that Buttigieg is a proud openly gay man.

Nearly fifty years ago, police raid a New York Cy bar popular wh homosexuals lled the Stonewall Inn. She says that, over the years, gay rights activists have fought for the right to hold jobs, serve the ary, speak publicly about beg gay and marry someone of the same sex.

Earlier this year, an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that 70% of Amerins support the ia of a gay or lbian printial ndidate. Karger, a gay Republin who had never n for polil office, sought the GOP nomatn for the 2012 electn a field that clud several challengers: Mt Romney, Newt Ggrich, Michelle Bachman, Rick Santom, among others. Karger me out to this fay when he was 41, though he had told some of his llege iends that he was gay about 20 years earlier.

FIRST OPENLY GAY US PRINTIAL CANDIDATE?

In 2006, Karger’s activism to save the historic Laguna Beach gay bar the Boom Boom Room publicly brought the then 56-year-old out of the closet.

After beg a Republin almost 50 years, Karger says he will leave the party to vote for Democrat Pete Buttigieg, the openly gay mayor of South Bend, Indiana, the upg California printial primary. In an terview wh Q Voice News, Karger, 69, talks about how his gay uncle’s suici impacted him, fightg agast the Mormon Church, livg the closet, and makg history wh his printial mpaign.

Karger’s first work as an activist was 2006 when he lnched an effort to save the historic Laguna Beach gay bar the Boom Boom Room.

FRED KARGER WAS THE 1ST OPENLY GAY PERSON OM A MAJOR PARTY TO N FOR PRINT

“Part of my journey was that 2006 I worked on tryg to save a gay bar Laguna Beach lled the Boom Boom Room, ” Karger says. Rick Santom is notor for his anti-gay rhetoric, but durg Karger’s printial n, he says that Santom never cricized him or ma anti-gay ments. If he won the nomatn, Buttigieg would not only be the first lennial to n for print but also the first openly gay man to n.

"I’m very mdful of the historic nature of seekg to be the first out and openly gay major nomee ever, " Buttigieg tells Teen Vogue. Durg his mayoral reelectn mpaign, 2015, Buttigieg tells Teen Vogue he reached a pot where he realized that he need to publicly e out as a gay man, not only for himself but for the LGBTQ, he wrote an say, “Why Comg Out Matters”, for his lol newspaper, the South Bend Tribune. “For a lol stunt stgglg wh her sexualy, might be helpful for an openly gay mayor to send the msage that her muny will always have a place for her, ” he the time of his wrg the say, June 2015, Buttigieg says he had no ia what the polil nsequenc would be.

Pete would be the send openly gay ndidate om eher major polil party to n for print of the Uned historic mpaign 2012 ma me the first. I said speech after speech that I was nng for two reasons: (1) I wanted to send a msage to the entire LGBTQ muny, pecially our youth, that you n do anythg you want life, (2) I hoped that my historic n would make easier for the next openly gay ndidate.

PETE BUTTIGIEG COULD BE THE FIRST MILLENNIAL AND OPENLY GAY MAN TO BEE A NOMEE FOR PRINT

In spe of the poll numbers, Fox, NBC, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, and Bloomberg all refed to allow me to their bat, prumably bee they were aaid of the antigay Fox News would not let me to s send bate Am, Iowa, even though I had qualified for , I fought back. Should Buttigieg w his long-shot bid for the Democratic nomatn, he will bee the first nomee of a major polil party who publicly intifi as gay.

That a gay married man is nng a ser mpaign for print, however, is a big al, and we shouldn’t let the improbabily of his ndidacy stop om acknowledgg this moment. Barack Obama beme Print, and although he was supportive of expandg legal rights for the LGBT muny and gay upl, he was on the rerd durg his mpaign as beg opposed to same-sex marriage. In 2010, Print Obama signed to law the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Repeal Act, endg a policy enacted 1993 that prevent gay men and lbians om servg openly the ary.

A MARRIED GAY MAN IS NNG FOR PRINT. THAT’S A BIG AL.

Three years later, the Supreme Court led that stat nnot ban same-sex marriage, makg legal natnwi for gay and lbian upl to marry. And durg this time, ndidat who publicly intify as gay, bisexual and transgenr have broken barriers wh their ws.

In 2012, Wisns’s Tammy Baldw beme the first gay person elected to the US Senate (she was re-elected 2018). In last year’s midterm electns, Colorado’s Jared Polis beme the first gay man the US to be elected ernor, Kyrsten Sema, who is bisexual, won a US Senate seat Arizona, and Sharice Davids, a lbian, won her US Hoe race Kansas. All of this is to say, que simply, that a relatively brief perd of time, the polics surroundg gay marriage and LGBT equaly shifted dramatilly.

For a lol stunt stgglg wh her sexualy, might be helpful for an openly gay mayor to send the msage that her muny will always have a place for her. And for a nservative rint om a different generatn, whose unease wh social change is partly rooted the imprsn that he don’t know anyone gay, perhaps a faiar face n be a remr that we’re all this together as a muny. But one thg is for sure: Havg a gay ndidate – or nomee, or print – is no longer such a farfetched ia.

IS AMERI READY TO ELECT A GAY PRINT?

And while the new Congrs that took office last year had a rerd 10 openly LGBTQ+ members, no gay man or lbian had ever ma a credible n for the Whe Hoe. It beme obv that his stat as a gay man was more of a pl than a m, a untry where the speed of progrs on the issu has routely been unrtimated, pecially the 21st century.

“Sce 1972, anytime you asked me what might be like the next three years, I’ve always been too psimistic, ” said Barney Frank, the former Massachetts ngrsman who was the send Hoe member to say he was gay, 1987, and the first to marry his same-sex partner, 2012. ”For olr veterans of the movement like myself, who never expected marriage equaly our own lifetim – much ls a gay man the Whe Hoe – was pecially satisfyg to see this Rhos Scholar, an acplished lguist and ocsnal ncert pianist, charm his way to the top of the printial pack, to see him fish first Iowa and send New Hampshire, ahead of everyone except fied expectatns the bt way imagable to see Chris Wallace terview him on Fox News and never mentn his sexualy.

And was thrillg when Rh Limbgh claimed that Ameri was “still not ready to elect a gay guy kissg his hband” – and Buttigieg shot back that his marriage to a man had “never volved me havg to send hh money to a porn star after cheatg on my spoe” mpaign entered the big leagu by raisg more than $80m om nearly a ln small donors. Movement veterans such as Andrew Tobias were pecially thrilled by the succs of someone who so rembled the hero of Tobias’s important novel of 1973, The Bt Ltle Boy the World, whose hero is a gay boy who needs to be better at jt about everythg, orr to succeed spe the fact that he is of who took the time to learn what Buttigieg actually stands for were lighted by how substantive he was. All of which meant he would not only be the first gay print – he would also be by far the most progrsive ndidate ever elected to the Whe only big surprise of his mpaign was also s biggt disappotment.

THERE WON’T BE A GAY PRINT 2021. SO WHAT DO BUTTIGIEG’S CAMPAIGN TELL US?

While rightwg homophob remaed largely silent, Buttigieg’s angrit opponents turned out to be radil queers, who cid that the first male ndidate to kiss his hband on natnal televisn jt wasn’t gay one gay adviser to the Buttigieg mpaign explaed to the Guardian: “There is a perceptn that the fact of likg other men is sufficient to give you any cred, bee no longer brgs any reprsn the circl that all of his crics hab. ” While people my age who me out right after the Stonewall Rts of 1969 were sympathetic to many different paths to openns, some astal thirtysomethg gay men and lbians cid Buttigieg’s failure to e out of the closet until he was 33 was a hopels sign of reactn of the crics to what they perceived as Buttigieg’s nservatism was so visceral that some pretend he was nothg more than an advote of the stat quo.

WHAT WILL HISTORY SAY? AN INTERVIEW WH FRED KARGER, THE FIRST OPENLY GAY MAN TO RUN FOR PRINT

“I have the distctn of beg the first openly gay major party ndidate to n for print of the Uned Stat, ” he said, h om a walk about his neighborhood overlookg Lrel ’s a fact, even if ’s often fotten or 2012, the former Republin nsultant and rporate mpaign strategist waged a long-shot bid for the GOP nomatn.

PETE BUTTIGIEG IS AN OPENLY GAY ARY VETERAN, RHOS SCHOLAR, AND DEMOCRATIC MAYOR A RED STATE. HE'S ALSO NNG FOR PRINT

He had no illns he would prevail, much ls take up rincy the Whe ’s ma purpose was to participate at least one mpaign bate, to “send the msage to gay younger people and olr people and everyone between that you n do anythg you want life and [not] feel bad about yourself and... ”He appreciated the fact that Buttigieg, whenever troduced as the first openly gay ndidate for print, ma a pot of clarifyg the matter and givg Karger cred where cred was due.

OpnDon't lose sight of the fact Pete Buttigieg jt ma historyHe held his own as the first openly gay ndidate a printial bateJune 28, 2019Wh more than 20 ndidat makg a se for why they should be the Democratic nomee for print, might be temptg to see the whole thg as one big circ. That Pete Buttigieg, the gay mayor of South Bend, Indiana, may have also emerged as one of the night's wners seems like a too-perfect culmatn to Pri many ways, Buttigieg's abily to n for the natn's hight office ow to the radil transformatn of Amerin attus about homosexualy over the last several his n also at a moment when that progrs feels creasgly ls secure.

MEET PETE BUTTIGIEG: A GAY MAYOR, AFGHAN WAR VET AND LENNIAL WHO'S NNG FOR PRINT

In ls than two years, the Tmp admistratn has pursued — wh ightengly ltle ristance — an aggrsively anti-gay agenda, while more than a handful of stat have also recently passed or are nsirg anti-gay legislatn. And a new Harris Poll jt found creasg acceptance for LGBTQ persons among young Amerins age 18 to all that, 's surprisg Buttigieg ma so ltle of his gay inty Thursday night. Buttigieg needs a better answer on this — not jt for his own polil ambns, but pecially for the people hurtg his might also thk about sayg more about what means to be the first gay man to n for print.

On the mpaign trail, he speaks of beg gay terms of fay valu, emphasizg he is a lovg, mted same-sex marriage, and what his ndidacy says about cln and equaly Ameri today. “Pete’s succs so far this mpaign reprents an evolutn Amerin polics, upendg tradnal notns of electabily and provg that Ameri is ready to elect s first openly gay print, ” Ellt Imse, munitn director at the LGBTQ Victory Fund, said.

JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS' KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE COACH TO COME OUT AS GAY MAJOR U.S. SPORTS

“If Ain Amerins were sort of disproportnately cled to not vote for somebody who is gay, you would thk that would have shown up there as well, ” said David Barker, director of the Center for Congrsnal and Printial Studi at Amerin Universy Washgton. Man, ” wh Buttigieg’s same-sex marriage, and said Amerins are “still not ready to elect a gay guy kissg his hband on the bate stage [as] print. That he is legally married to another man mak unnecsary for him to “e out” a public statement while simultaneoly makg his inty he were to w 2020, Buttigieg wouldn’t necsarily be the first gay man to be elected to the Whe Hoe.

KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE ACH A US MEN’S PROFSNAL SPORTS LEAGUE TO PUBLICLY E OUT AS GAY

Beg gay is now a herent inty wh Amerin culture, not merely a sexual is as relevant to Buttigieg’s mpaign as beg black was to Barack Obama’s.

JAGUARS’ KEV MAXEN IS FIRST MALE ACH TO E OUT AS GAY US MEN’S PRO SPORTS

About the same time, the Wall Street Journal published a photo of Kagan playg softball on s ont page, a move wily terpreted as an implitn that she was gay.