List of first openly LGBTQ politicians in the United States

This is a list of the first openly LGBTQ people to have held political office in the United States. No openly LGBTQ person has served as President, Vice President, Speaker of the House of Representatives, or as a justice on the Supreme Court. However, all 50 states have elected openly LGBTQ people to political office in some capacity, and 48 states have elected openly LGBTQ people to either or both chambers of their state legislature.
A total of five openly LGBTQ people have served in the Cabinet of the United States or in a cabinet-level office: Scott Bessent (United States Secretary of the Treasury), Vince Micone (acting United States Secretary of Labor), Pete Buttigieg (former United States Secretary of Transportation), Demetrios Marantis (former acting United States Trade Representative), and Richard Grenell (former acting Director of National Intelligence).
A total of eight states and one territory have elected a total of twelve openly LGBTQ people to statewide or territorywide elected offices: Jared Polis (Governor of Colorado), Maura Healey (Governor of Massachusetts and former Attorney General of Massachusetts), Tina Kotek (Governor of Oregon), Kate Brown (former Governor of Oregon and former Secretary of State of Oregon), Tammy Baldwin (United States Senator from Wisconsin), Kyrsten Sinema (former United States Senator from Arizona), Dana Nessel (Attorney General of Michigan), Kris Mayes (Attorney General of Arizona), Ricardo Lara (Insurance Commissioner of California), Kevin Lembo (Comptroller of Connecticut), Josh Tenorio (Lieutenant Governor of Guam), and Benjamin Cruz (Public Auditor of Guam).
A total of three of the eight most populous cities in the United States have elected a total of three openly LGBTQ people as mayor: Todd Gloria (Mayor of San Diego), Lori Lightfoot (former Mayor of Chicago), and Annise Parker (former Mayor of Houston).
In addition to the politicians listed below, Jenny Durkan, who served as United States Attorney for the Western District of Washington from 2009 to 2014, is believed to be the first openly gay United States attorney. Furthermore, in 2013, Demetrios Marantis became the first openly LGBT person to serve in a cabinet-level position in the Cabinet of the United States, serving in the Cabinet of Barack Obama as the acting United States trade representative following the departure of Ron Kirk.
As of the 2020 elections, the legislatures of 49 states have had at least one openly LGBT member; the first out person to serve in each of those states is listed here. The sole remaining state that has never had an openly LGBT state legislator is Louisiana.
The first openly gay judge in the United States was Stephen M. Lachs, appointed by Governor Jerry Brown to the Los Angeles County Superior Court in 1979. Before leaving office in 1981, Brown appointed three more gay and lesbian judges to the California courts, including the nation's first openly lesbian judge, Mary Morgan, who served on the San Francisco municipal court.
In 1994, Thomas R. Chiola became the first openly gay judge in Illinois (and the first openly gay elected official in Illinois) when voters elected him to the Circuit Court of Cook County.
The first openly LGBT justice of a state supreme court was Rives Kistler, appointed to the Oregon Supreme Court in 2003, and retained by voters the following year. The next gay or lesbian state supreme court justices were Virginia Linder (Oregon Supreme Court, 2006); Monica Márquez (Colorado Supreme Court, 2010); Barbara Lenk (Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, 2011); Sabrina McKenna (Supreme Court of Hawaii, 2011); Beth Robinson (Vermont Supreme Court, 2011). In 2017, Paul Feinman became the first openly gay judge to sit on the New York Court of Appeals.
Benjamin Cruz of Guam was the first openly gay judge of a territorial supreme court; he came out in 1995 and was appointed to the Supreme Court of Guam in 1997. Cruz served as associate justice from 1997 to 1999 and as chief justice from 1999 until his retirement in 2001.
The first openly bisexual judge in the United States is Mike Jacobs, a state court judge in DeKalb County, Georgia, who came out publicly in 2018.