118th Congress Has Record Number Of LGB Members

The 118th Congress boasts the largest number of LGB lawmakers in history with 2 out senators and 11 members of the House of Representatives. Doing the math, that means 2% of Congress’s 534 members identify as LGB. Recent Gallup polling shows that 7.1% of Americans say they are LGBTQ, so we aren’t near equal representation. But it is progress. In fact, if you went back just a few years to the 112th Congress, there were only 4 out members of Congress – all of them in the House.

Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) became the first out senator when she was elected in 2012. And Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) is the first out bisexual member of the Senate. More from Pew Research:

In the House, all but one of the 11 openly gay or lesbian representatives are Democrats. The exception is Republican George Santos of New York, who in the 2022 midterm cycle became the first openly gay, non-incumbent Republican to win a congressional election.

Seven of the 11 openly gay or lesbian representatives in the House are returning members of Congress.

The four newly elected members include Santos; Robert Garcia, D-Calif., the first openly gay immigrant elected to Congress; Democrat Eric Sorensen, the first out gay congressperson to represent Illinois; and Democrat Becca Balint, the first woman and first openly LGB person to represent Vermont.

Eight of the 11 House members who identify as gay or lesbian are gay men and three are lesbians.

Read more at Pew Research. https://twitter.com/carlos_glezgtez/status/1613935669331759104