Newly elected Virginia delegate Danica Roem after getting a congratulatory call from Joe Biden last night. Photo by The Washington Post’s @jaheezus. pic.twitter.com/bsEDQ38Xer
— Dan Zak (@MrDanZak) November 8, 2017
It’s been talked about here and elsewhere already, but I want to touch on the big win by Danica Roem, the transgender candidate who defeated “Bigot Bob” Marshall:
Virginia’s most socially conservative state lawmaker was ousted from office Tuesday by Danica Roem, a Democrat who will be one of the nation’s first openly transgender elected officials and who embodies much of what Del. Robert G. Marshall fought against in Richmond.
The race focused on traffic and other local issues in suburban Prince William County but also exposed the nation’s fault lines over gender identity. It pitted a 33-year-old former journalist who began her physical gender transition four years ago against a 13-term incumbent who called himself Virginia’s “chief homophobe” and earlier this year introduced a “bathroom bill” that died in committee.
“Discrimination is a disqualifier,” a jubilant Roem said Tuesday night as her margin of victory became clear. “This is about the people of the 13th District disregarding fear tactics, disregarding phobias . . . where we celebrate you because of who you are, not despite it.”
Marshall, 73, who refused to debate Roem and referred to her with male pronouns, declined an interview request but posted a concession message on Facebook.
What’s important here is how she was elected. She wasn’t elected because she was transgender, which would be bad, because that could just as easily swing the other way. She was elected because voters felt she was more competent and capable of fixing the god damned road.
And that’s precisely what LGBTQ, and for that matter, all minorities have wanted from day one- judge me on my character and competence. Because that is what equality means.
That she took down a retrograde scumbag is just the icing on the cake.