Chairman Cosmo Gonzalo

Chairman **Cosmo Gonzalo** (born October 1, 1931) is an American Cosmoian Communist politician, revolutionary and state party chair who has served as the Governor of Arkansas since 2023. The longest serving Governor in United States history, Gonzalo previously served as Governor from 1971 to 1979, 1989 to 1999, and 2007 to 2015, their prior service totalling to just under 26 years in office.

Gonzalo previously served as Lieutenant Governor of Arkansas from 1963 to 1965, 1987 to 1989, and 1999 to 2005. Gonzalo was the first openly LGBT state politician; winning in 1962 while openly bisexual. Gonzalo is the earliest-known elected LGBT official in the United States.

## Tenure

### 1963-1987

Gonzalo's political career began when they succesfully won the 1962 Arkansas lieutenant gubernatorial election; being placed on the Democratic ticket with Orval Faubus, in spite of being an Independent. Faubus won that race, but in the following 1964 election, the Faubus/Gonzalo ticket was defeated by the Republican Rockefeller/Britt ticket; Rockefeller being the brother of the winning Presidential nominee Nelson Rockefeller. Gonzalo led an Independent campaign for Governor in 1966, but lost.

After this narrow loss, Gonzalo realized that they would never be elected as Governor without an organized party effort. After declining the Democratic nomination and a run in 1968 altogether, Cosmo met with Arkansas's working class union leaders, and agreed to form the Cosmoian Communist Party of Arkansas in 1969, of which Gonzalo was deemed Chairman. Entering the 1970 race, most pollsters refused to include Gonzalo in their polls, ridiculing their candidacy. Nevertheless, Gonzalo pushed on, using the new mediums such as TV and old mediums such as radio, even as they derided them as "bourgeois luxuries". Gonzalo came in a shocking first in the 1970 election, beginning the first of 4 terms. They were re-elected in 1972, 1974, 1976 before retiring in 1978.

### 1987-2006

Gonzalo originally retired from politics, believing that they were unable to bring widespread societal change to Arkansas. However, at the encouragement of many, Gonzalo entered the 1986 lieutenant gubernatorial race, winning against Democratic incumbent Winston Bryant. When Bill Clinton resigned in 1989 to become U.S. Attorney General, Gonzalo was promoted to the office. Gonzalo then won the 1990 race for a full term and the 1994 race for a second term before being term limited.

Gonzalo ran and won the race for Lieutenant Governor in 1998 after deciding against a U.S. Senate challenge against Clinton, believing their political career was finally over despite their pushes against term limits law. However, when Huckabee changed the law in 2004 to change the term limits from 2 elected terms for life to 2 consecutive elected terms (Gonzalo had been exempt previously under the grandfather clause, thus allowing their 1990 and 1994 victories), Gonzalo succeeded to the office as Huckabee was confirmed to the Cabinet as Secretary of Health & Human Services, winning a full term in 2006 against Republican Asa Hutchinson.

### 2007-present

Gonzalo's third tenure as Governor was characterized by their opposition to both major parties, the first time that the Democratic Party's state house floor leader sent a letter to the previously co-operative Gonzalo, he received a box full of the ashes of the burnt letter. Gonzalo had an uneventful partial term, but come 2006, Gonzalo lead major state coattails, their party taking over the State House and State Senate. Unstoppable despite frequent court challenges, Gonzalo passed new labor laws, reduced work hours, raised the state's minimum wage from $7.25 (the federal minimum) per hour to $15 per hour, adjusting with inflation (now worth $22.21), giving Arkansas the largest minimum wage of any state in America, a record that still stands. Gonzalo won re-election in 2010 unopposed, with no Democrat nor Republican willing to challenge Gonzalo.

Gonzalo was term limited in 2014, with many members of their own party advising against repealing the term limits change while capitalist democracy was still in power in America. They were succeeded by Hutchinson. Come Hutchinson's term limits break in 2022, Gonzalo won a record 10th term as Governor in 2022, defeating Republican Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the former White House Press Secretary to President George Pataki. In 2021, Gonzalo met Reisen Inaba and they became very close, despite the original protests of Inaba's adopted father Ted Stevens, the longest serving member of the U.S. Congress in history; serving 4 years in the U.S. House and 59 years in the U.S. Senate for Alaska, Stevens came around and befriended Gonzalo despite their starkly contrasting political views; Stevens being a liberal Republican.

Inaba similarly won election as Governor unexpectedly in 2022, defeating Mike Dunleavy in the Republican gubernatorial primary and winning the general election. Because Alaska swears in it's Governors a month earlier, Gonzalo was able to attend Inaba's inauguration, and Inaba was able to attend Gonzalo's. On August 24, 2023, the two were married in Anchorage, making them the first married couple to serve concurrently as governors of two seperate states.