Tammy Baldwin’s groundbreaking Election Night victory has already been praised by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights advocates, who said the Wisconsin Democrat’s success in becoming the first openly gay person ever elected to the Senate in America’s history was evidence that “candidates should be judged on their qualifications for the job and not their sexual orientation.”
In addition to Baldwin, 2012 proved triumphant for a number of other LGBT politicians. New York Democrat Sean Patrick Maloney won a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives and became his state’s first openly gay member of Congress. Baldwin’s vacated seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in Wisconsin’s 2nd Congressional District was succeeded by Democrat Mark Pocan , making it the first time and openly LGBT member of Congress was succeeded by another in the same district.
While it’s too soon to tell for sure, California’s Mark Takano looks poised to win a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in his state’s 41st Congressional District and become the first openly gay member of Congress who’s also a person of color, the Washington Blade reports .