In some ways, the pro-LGBTQ+ bonafides of Kamala Harris and Joe Biden should be cause for celebration. Of all 27 candidates who ran for this year’s Democratic presidential nomination, Harris came out in support of marriage equality before any of her primary opponents, and as California’s attorney general, she helped lead the fight to end the gay and trans panic defense, which has been used as legal justification for the murder of trans women. Joe Biden, meanwhile, has called transgender equality “the civil rights issue of our time” and helped push the Obama administration to accept gay marriage.
And yet, for many progressive queer voters and activists, the Democratic ticket has stirred up conflicted feelings. Both politicians have a history of supporting discriminatory policies that have harmed marginalized communities: Harris denied surgery to a trans inmate as a district attorney in San Francisco and targeted sex workers as attorney general in California, while Biden helped write a 1994 “tough on crime” bill that many reform advocates have called “a key contributor to mass incarceration.”
Even the most hardcore activists, though, recognize that this is a life-or-death moment for our democracy, as well as for the issues that progressives care most about. “It’s hard to imagine the pain and suffering that would be unleashed if Trump were to be elected,” says trans journalist Imara Jones. “We would have to go back into the depths of time to see a period that would be equal to what we are likely to face.“