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From Sidelines To Full Control: Democrats Swept Wisconsin Elections and LGBTQ Candidates Had Historic Wins

John Parker
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From Sidelines To Full Control: Democrats Swept Wisconsin Elections and LGBTQ Candidates Had Historic Wins

Elections in Wisconsin are famous for narrow margins with candidates winning by barely a percentage point. But as Wisconsin started counting its votes Tuesday night, the unthinkable happened: a rout.

Voters swept Republicans off the board in Wisconsin. They handed Democrats full control of every statewide office, as well as the Assembly and Senate. This on top of the fact that the state’s Supreme Court already has a liberal majority.

To understand the impact of Tuesday’s election for the LGBTQ community, we talked with Abigail Swetz, executive Director of Fair Wisconsin, as well as Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford who won her election for the Wisconsin Assembly. She will serve as Wisconsin’s first ever transgender state legislator.

Watch our conversation

A Landslide in a Land of Narrow Margins

Fair Wisconsin is the state’s statewide LGBTQ+ civil rights and political advocacy organization. Swetz took the helm in 2024 and her assessment of the 2026 midterms was clear.

“Unequivocal rejection of MAGA extremism,” said Swetz,  “Incredible pro-equality candidates elected up and down the ticket.”

The race for governor was a particular shock in terms of the scope of Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley’s victory over MAGA Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany. Governor-elect Crowley won by approximately eight points.

“The last time we saw a margin of victory like this in Wisconsin for a governor’s race was in the 1990s,” said Swetz.

In Wisconsin and across the country Republicans poured hundreds of millions into anti-trans attack ads. But voters in Wisconsin and across the country ignored it.

“Not only did we win when it comes to LGBTQ+ rights, but we won the way we needed to win,” said Swetz, “we won rejecting these disgusting anti-trans campaign ads that keep coming back, and let’s put that to bed. Let’s be done. It didn’t work, and thank God for that. So people showed up with empathy, and that’s the kind of way I want to win.”

Swetz pointed to Adam Hamilton who won his race for U.S. Senate in Kansas. Hamilton is a Methodist minister, yet when asked about transgender rights he cited scripture as for why he supports queer and trans people.

“A man of faith needing to say what he needed to say, and he did it instead of listening to some sort of campaign operative who would tell him it’s the wrong thing,” said Swetz. “That’s what I mean when we won our way. We won with empathy. We won showing up the way we should.”

History Making Election

On election night across America, LGBTQ candidates broke barriers at all levels of government. It was the same in Wisconsin.

JoCasta Zamarripa won her race for Secretary of State and she will become the first LGBTQ person and Latina to hold statewide office in Wisconsin.

And in Assembly District 76, Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford prevailed in her race and will be Wisconsin’s first openly transgender state legislator.

“We have a trifecta and we’re going to be able to actually accomplish some of the change for the people that we have been wanting to do for two decades. It’s exciting,” said Martinez-Rutherford. She will join the legislature’s LGBTQ caucus that added two new members after this election, herself and Ismael Luna.

With these new members Swetz said the entire LGBTQ community will now be represented in Madison.

“We’ve got the full acronym, which I just think is so important,” she said.

Vision for the future

Because Wisconsin was one of the most gerrymandered states in the country, Democrats haven’t been in the position to legislate. Now with full control, they are able to enact a new future.

“Meaningful protections for trans people,” said Martinez-Rutherford when asked about her vision for the upcoming legislative session. “Making sure they’re re-enfranchised and that they have access to healthcare, all of those things that have been so under attack for the trans community. But also pouring money into social services, homelessness services, making sure that we’re lowering the cost of housing and building more housing and getting healthcare.”

Martinez-Rutherford also underscored the need for public school funding and how that would be a priority for her.

“We should not have to go to referendum for schools or city because of funding,” she said. “Our Wisconsin Constitution says it’s our obligation to fully fund public schools and we haven’t been doing that, so we’re going to remedy that. I’m ready to dig in and start funding public schools and making things better for working people and people who’ve experienced poverty.”

Having served on the Madison’s Common Council, Martinez-Rutherford has had a front row seat to how Republicans used their majorities to shift the burden of funding schools, streets, and water mains to tax payers.

“It’s just unconscionable that the Republican Party would be so antagonistic,” she said. “We should be able to fund cities and fund education and stop asking our taxpayers to pay more for their property just because we can’t do our job.”

From Legislative Defense to Legislative Offense

The trifecta marks a complete reversal of mission for Swetz and Fair Wisconsin. For years, she watched her students go to the capitol to testify about the negative impacts Republican legislation was having on queer and trans communities.

“I saw my students literally taking the bus to go and sit in a committee hearing,” she said. “And as trans students, make people look at them when they were making their decisions about their own rights.”

Now, she gets to teach them how to make laws.

On November 11, Fair Wisconsin will host “The Path Ahead: LGBTQ Advocacy Post Election” for people of all ages to prepare for the upcoming session. Swetz said the webinar will focus on how policy proposals become bills and how bills become laws.

She said, the webinar will be a “little schoolhouse rock, but less singing, I promise.”

Fair Wisconsin will continue to plan and host events to organize and train LGBTQ people to ensure they have a say in Wisconsin’s future.

“Let’s hold onto this feeling because this is hope, and then let’s do something with it,” said Swetz. “Because elections aren’t the finish line, they’re only the start, and this is a great starting line to be in. It’s going to be fun work for the first time in a while.”

Visit Fair Wisconsin’s website to register for “The Path Ahead: LGBTQ Advocacy Post Election”.

Over A Dozen LGBTQ Candidates Win Seats In Minnesota Legislature

John Parker
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Over A Dozen LGBTQ Candidates Win Seats In Minnesota Legislature

This is an on-going story. Check back for updates.

On Tuesday November 3, Minnesota voters gave the Democratic-Farmer-Labor party another trifecta. Starting in January, and for the next two years, the DFL will have full control of state government. They secured majorities in the House and Senate. Senator Amy Klobuchar was elected Governor. Minnesotans re-elected Attorney General Keith Ellison and Secretary of Steve Simon. They also elected Steve Filipovich to serve as State Auditor.

Over a dozen LGBTQ candidates won their races to serve in the upcoming trifecta. Here are the races that have been called so far.

STATE HOUSE

DISTRICT 08B: Liish Kozlowski
DISTRICT 35A: Zack Stephenson
DISTRICT 36B: Brion Curran
DISTRICT 40B: David Gottfried
DISTRICT 43A: Kyrstin Schuette
DISTRICT 55B: Hunter Cantrell
DISTRICT 66A: Leigh Finke
DISTRICT 66B: Athena Hollins

STATE SENATE

DISTRICT 44: Sam Rosemark
DISTRICT 52: Liz Reyer
DISTRICT 56: Erin May Quade
DISTRICT 61: Scott Dibble (ran unopposed)
DISTRICT 66: Clare Oumou Verbetten

Historic Queer Wins in 2026 Midterms

John Parker
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Historic Queer Wins in 2026 Midterms

This is an on-going story. Check back for updates.

Analysts are already calling the 2026 midterm elections “historic” and “once in a generation.” Democrats not only won control of U.S. Congress but they also took full control of state government in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Arizona. They broke Republican super majorities and unseated long terms Republican legislators at all levels of government.

For the queer community it was a historic night as well, as several LGTBQ candidates made history. Here is our current list and we are still watching races that haven’t been called yet.

History Makers

Representative Chris Pappas made history when he won his race to become New Hampshire’s next Senator. He will be the first-ever out gay man to serve in the United States Senate.

Signs of the blue wave came immediately when the early vote for J.D. Ford in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District broke heavily for him. He went on to win his race, flipping the district to the Democrats. He will be the first out-LGBTQ person to represent Indiana in Congress.

Jeremy Moss won his election in Michigan’s 11th Congressional District and he will be the first out-LGBTQ person to represent Michigan in Congress.

Kim Ahern won her election for Rhode Island Attorney General and will be the first openly LGBTQ person, female, and mom to serve in that role.

Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford prevailed in her race to represent Wisconsin’s Assembly 76 District. She will be the first transgender person elected to the Wisconsin Legislature.

Joanna Whaley won her race for Michigan House District 2 become that state’s first transgender state legislator.

JoCasta Zamarripa won her race for Wisconsin’s next Secretary of State and becomes the first the first LGBTQ person and Latina to hold statewide office in Wisconsin.

Tim Hayes, the first LGBTQ person elected to the Dublin Borough Council in Pennsylvania, won his race for the 143rd Assembly District.

The Gaily Show’s Live Election Night Coverage With AM950 Radio and WCPT 820

John Parker
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The Gaily Show’s Live Election Night Coverage With AM950 Radio and WCPT 820

Tonight, we’ll be participating in the joint broadcast event with AM950 Radio, WCPT 820, and Heartland Signal.

We’ve been tracking the campaigns and interviewing candidates all season long.

The broadcast kicks off at 5pm with a special two-hour edition of Native Roots Radio.

At 7pm, AM950 Radio’s Matt McNeil will be joined by WCPT 820’s Richard Chew, Joan Esposito, and Patti Vasquez.

I’ll join the anchor desk at 9pm CST and staying there until midnight CST!

Throughout the broadcast, we’ll be providing LGBTQ coverage, Robert Pilot will cover races impacting Native Americans, and Ellie Krug will break down critical trans ballot initiatives and candidate races.

We’ll go beyond just reporting the winners to provide deep-dive analysis on what the results mean, tracking the balance of power across Congress, governorships, and the critical state legislative contests legacy media ignores. Throughout the evening, we will also monitor reports of voter suppression and actions that could challenge the results, while checking in with WCPT in Chicago for live regional updates.

How to watch or listen to the joint broadcast:

Watch on The Gaily Show’s YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/@thegailyshow

Watch on AM950 Radio’s YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/@am950radio

Watch on AM950 Radio’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AM950Radio

Watch on Heartland Signal’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@heartlandsignal

Listen Live: https://www.am950radio.com/listen-live/

I’ll be doing updates throughout the evening on my new TikTok channel: https://www.tiktok.com/@johnparkerwrites

Gender Justice Sues Essentia Health On Behalf of Transgender Teen and His Mother

John Parker
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Gender Justice Sues Essentia Health On Behalf of Transgender Teen and His Mother

Earlier this year, and without warning, Essentia Health stopped providing gender affirming care to transgender and non-binary youth. Last week, Gender Justice, and co-counsel Robins Kaplan LLP, filed a lawsuit against the healthcare system on behalf of the mother of a transgender teenager. The lawsuit alleges that Essentia Health has violated the Minnesota Human Rights Act. We sat down with Greta Wiessner, senior staff attorney at Gender Justice, to learn more about the case and what happens next.

Watch our conversation

A Family Left Without Answers

Gender Justice filed the case on behalf of Jane Doe and her son John Doe. To protect their identities they are using pseudonyms. Essentia Health had been providing John Doe with gender-affirming care since the onset of his puberty when he had been diagnosed with gender dysphoria. He had been receiving hormone therapy treatment for almost six years.

“It was absolutely life-changing for John and for his mother to see her son thrive,” said Wiessner. “He came out of his shell socially and emotionally. He was able to thrive in school, make friends, [and] participate in activities.”

But at an appointment in early 2026, his care provider informed Jane Doe that that was to be their final visit. The Does claim that Essentia Health provided them either conflicting information or no response at all about what was happening.

“It was absolutely devastating for John and terrifying for his mother,” said Wiessner. “They were scrambling to find alternative care, which is difficult when you’re in greater Minnesota. There are fewer providers for any type of healthcare.”

Wiessner added, “having these decisions be made on discriminatory lines where some people get access to healthcare and others don’t because of who they are and because of their identity, that’s discrimination.”

Essentia Health’s actions have impacted families across the upper Midwest. They provide healthcare services to people living in Minnesota, Michigan, North Dakota, and Wisconsin. These are rural communities that have few healthcare options.

In particular, Essentia Health had been a go-to provider for families living in North Dakota. That state’s Supreme Court just upheld a law that bans doctors and care providers from offering gender-affirming care to minors.

Gender Affirming Care Protected By Law

Earlier this year, almost two dozen state Attorneys General, including Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, sued Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over his attempts to ban gender affirming care. They won in court. The victory was so comprehensive that clinics who had paused their care programs immediately resumed services. This included Children’s Minnesota, one of the most prominent programs in the country.

Wiessner noted that “Essentia Health has not had any sort of transparency or accountability to their patients themselves or to the public.”

Essentia Health is headquartered in Minnesota which was the first state in the nation to provide anti-discrimination protections in its Human Rights Act. Since that time, various state courts have issued rulings that provide sweeping and comprehensive protections for transgender people.

In 2023, when the DFL had full control of state government, they passed legislation to make Minnesota a Trans Refuge State. The law protects transgender and non-binary youth from harmful laws and court orders issued in other states.

At a news conference after the House passed the bill, Rep. Leigh Finke said, “We have a responsibility to create more space for our community to live their fullest, authentic lives without fear of violence, rejection, abuse, or political attack.”

In our conversation, Weissner said, “Minnesota’s legislatures have chosen to protect LGBTQ people, including trans people and including youth, and those laws can be relied upon and invoked in these cases.”

Gender Justice has secured numerous legal victories, including most recently at the Minnesota Supreme Court in Cooper v. Powerhouse Lifting. In that case, the court issued a unanimous ruling declaring that all public accommodations must adhere to Minnesota’s human rights laws. The case was brought by JayCee Cooper, a transgender woman, after USA Powerlifting refused to let her participate in a lifting competition.

The St. Paul based legal nonprofit is currently pursuing a case regarding whether or not religious employers can fire queer people serving in non-religious positions such as librarians, information technology specialists, or administrative assistants.

What Happens Next

In September, Essentia Health and HealthPartners announced their boards approved an “affiliation agreement.” In a press release, HealthPartners said there are still customary regulatory approvals, but the new organization will be called HealthPartners. However, Essentia Health specific facilities will retain Essentia Health branding until the approvals are complete and the organizations are integrated.

When asked how this would impact Gender Justice’s lawsuit, Wiessner said, “It’s hard to tell—too soon to tell at this point. HealthPartners has been a strong proponent of gender-affirming care for trans youth, and we hope that they would continue to do so and would insist that any providers in their network continue to do so as well.”

However, Wiessner added, “we are at the very beginning of the case. It could resolve sooner rather than later, but we’re prepared to litigate this case all the way through trial and any appeals.”

For more information and updates, visit genderjustice.us.

Breaking Records: Richard Carlbom on Minnesota DFL’s 2026 Ground Game

John Parker
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Breaking Records: Richard Carlbom on Minnesota DFL’s 2026 Ground Game

In 2012, Richard Carlbom helmed the successful Minnesotans United For All Families campaign which led to Minnesota becoming the first state in the nation to vote down an anti-marriage equality constitutional amendment. At the time, it was the largest grassroots campaign in Minnesotan history.

Now as chair of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor party, he’s leading another record-breaking campaign. With one week left until the final day of voting, Carlbom joined us to break down the numbers and share how Minnesotans can volunteer to get out the vote.

Watch our conversation

New Door Knocking Record

On October 22, the DFL reported that they had knocked on 2.3 million doors in 2026 — the largest single-year field operation in their party history.

“We’re now at 2.36 million,” Carlbom told The Gaily Show on October 27. “We went up 140,000 doors since that press release. I’m hoping to get to close to three million by 8 p.m. on November 3rd.”

After the DFL elected him chairperson in March 2025, Carlbom immediately set about to hire and deploy organizers throughout the state. But it was Operation Metro Surge that sparked a massive influx of activity.

“We had precinct caucuses in the midst of [Operation Metro Surge] in February and we had 37,000 people show up,” said Carlbom.

Hundreds of thousands of Minnesotans took to the streets after the Trump administration sent 3,000 federal agents to the state. They served as constitutional observers, mutual aid providers, poll workers, and protestors as ICE agents arrested hundreds of legal residents, detained thousands without providing them access to medicine or legal support, deployed gas and other chemical irritants at constitutional observers, parked outside the homes of school board members to intimidate them, used children as bait to detain people, and killed Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti.

The DFL alone trained over 8,000 constitutional observers.

After Trump retreated in February, Minnesotans stayed engaged.

“They’ve stuck with us and now we have volunteer activity off the charts,” said Carlbom. “It was only because thousands of these people who got involved for the first time during Metro Surge are remaining involved today.”

When asked what have voters been discussing with DFL organizers, Carlbom said, “the number one issue we hear about is the affordability crisis caused by Donald Trump and his rubber stamp Republicans. The war in Iran, the tariffs and the cuts and the big ugly bill that are going to really hurt healthcare.”

He observed that affordability has cut across voter demographics, such as geography or age. He further noted that for independent voters, cost of living concerns has outweighed other topics three-to-one. To drive the affordability point home to voters, the DFL launched trumpiscostingyou.com.

“It really is surprising to me to see an electorate that is wholly focused on one issue and one issue caused by the other side of the aisle,” said Carlbom.

Early Voting Surges

Already more than 540,000 Minnesotans have voted in the 2026 midterms, which according to Carlbom is a 65.8% increase from this same point in the 2022 midterms. Part of this increase can be attributed to Minnesota’s best-in-the-nation election administration. MIT ranked the state number one in its most recent Election Performance Index. It also follows recent trends of Democrats choosing to vote earlier either by mail or in-person. States across the country including Texas, Georgia, and Maine have seen similar surges of Democratic early voters.

Carlbom said that in Minnesota, “when you compare the partisanship of who’s already voted compared to 2022, we’re up 11 percent more Democratic than in 2022 and 13 percent more Democratic than 2024,” said Carlbom.

He also noted that according to their internal data this advantage has not been limited to statewide races, but also to every legislative district the DFL has targeted this cycle.

Election Security

Earlier this month, President Trump enthusiastically endorsed Michele Tafoya hours after his DOJ raided the home of Rep. Ilhan Omar. Critics claim the two events were linked and this is bolstered by the fact that the DOJ refuses to unseal the search warrant.

In a campaign post earlier this week, Trump wrote that the only way Tafoya could lose is if there is election fraud.

On the topic of election security, Carlbom recently appeared on a local TV program with the Chair of the Minnesota GOP, Alex Plechash. The program hosts questioned Plechash on election security and he broke with his party, admitting that Minnesota’s elections are secure.

“It happened live on TV,” said Carlbom. “He seemed a bit befuddled. He was kind of forced to admit that we do indeed have safe and secure elections.”

Carlbom emphasized that Minnesota’s elections are secure because they are run locally.

“Our election judges are people in our neighborhood. They’re our neighbors, they’re our friends, they’re people we see in the grocery store,” he said.

Trump Loves Tafoya, But Does Tafoya Like Minnesota?

The President is bullish on Tafoya’s chances, despite the fact that Tafoya has claimed multiple times, as recently as last fall, that she doesn’t like living in the state. She has also repeatedly commented that she didn’t see herself residing long-term in Minnesota.

It’s a confusing stance for a candidate who also claims to be pro-choice, but in other statements has committed to voting for Trump’s judicial nominees. Republican Senators Murkowski and Collins took the same route, which led to them confirming the very Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v Wade.

“You can’t be pro-choice and then promise to support Donald Trump’s judges 100 percent of the time. You just can’t do that,” said Carlbom.

Like Republicans across the country, Tafoya has tried to give the appearance that she is independent of Trump — largely because he has historic disapproval ratings. The President has become such a liability that even the Republican candidate for governor in Florida, Byron Donalds, a staunch Trump supporter, has scrubbed all references to the President from his campaign website.

But like Trump, Tafoya has shown little sympathy for voters on cost of living issues. On the campaign trail he’s said he doesn’t care about affordability, while Tafoya has said people concerned about gas prices should take “one less trip to Starbucks.”

“She’s a typical politician who will try to be all things to all people,” said Carlbom. “She’s not going to be independent. She’s a rubber stamp for Trump. People need to elect Peggy Flanagan.”

The final seven days

The DFL’s Get Out The Vote operation has 7,000 volunteer shifts left throughout Minnesota.

“We cannot take anything for granted,” said Carlbom. “If we fill those shifts between now and November 3rd at 8 p.m., we will be able to turn out this vote and we will be able to claim that massive electoral defeat of Donald Trump.”

Interested volunteers can register at dfi.org/gotv to find shifts in their neighborhoodl. For more information on voting locations, registering to vote, and more visit iwillvote.com or mnvotes.gov.

‘Blood Is Medicine’: LGBTQ Centers Lead Nationwide Blood Donation Drive

John Parker
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‘Blood Is Medicine’: LGBTQ Centers Lead Nationwide Blood Donation Drive

A coalition of LGBTQ centers across the United States have joined together for a first-of-its-kind nationwide blood drive. In Minneapolis, Queermunity is a participant and will host their blood drive on October 29. In Chicago, the Center on Halsted will host their blood drive event on October 30. To learn more about this nationwide effort and the Queermunity event, we spoke with Hillary Otey, co-founder and general manager of Queermunity, Rodney Wilson, senior biomedical communications specialist for the American Red Cross National Headquarters, and Mario Brown, national partnership manager with the American Red Cross.

This is part of our Queermunity Spotlight series. It features queer stories, people, and events happening at Queermunity, a vibrant event venue, gathering space, and café in Minneapolis, dedicated to offering high-quality experiences for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC communities and their allies.

Watch our conversation

Only 3% of eligible people donate

“Blood is medicine,” said Otey. “We want everybody to have the medicine that they need when they’re sick, when they’re critically ill.”

As a member of the national coalition organizing this effort, the effort is personal for her.

“I have a child who was diagnosed with cancer at the age of three,” shared Otey. “Throughout the first six years of their lives, they were in cancer treatment and needed over a hundred units of blood to survive. So my child today is 11, is in guitar lessons, plays soccer, is having a regular 11-year-old life, and that would not be the case if it weren’t for over a hundred people contributing blood to save his life.”

Wilson underscored the urgency for donations. He said, “every two seconds, someone in the United States receives a blood transfusion. It could be accident victims, somebody you know that had cancer, a new mother who hemorrhages giving birth.”

According to American Red Cross data, approximately 29,000 units of red blood cells are needed every day in the United States, but only 3% of age eligible people donate blood every year.

To meet that need organizers launched Centers Lead. As of September, Centers Lead has mobilized 67 LGBTQ centers across the country, resulting in 103 blood drives and more than 2,000 donations. 450 of those donations came from first-time donors.

A history of exclusion

But not all queer people have been able to donate blood. During the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the Food and Drug Administration issued a blanket ban for all men who have sex with men, as well as women who had sex with bisexual men.

“The FDA put in some very strict rules that excluded men who have sex with men from blood donation to try to protect the blood supply,” said Wilson. “Obviously in the last 40 years we’ve developed new testing; we’ve got screening measures; we understand HIV much better than we did back in the 1980s. So the rules that the FDA put in place needed to change, and there was a lot of work behind the scenes to evolve those policies over time.”

Brown spoke to how the ban affected him even as an employee of the American Red Cross.

“When I first got a job at the Red Cross, I had to come home and tell my husband we had to abstain from sexual activity until the three-month deferral period had ended,” said Brown. “Thankfully, now that the federal government has changed their rules, we don’t have to wait like that anymore.”

Brown continued, “Anytime you set up a system in which there is a separate and yet unequal kind of balance, you’re creating a dynamic in which someone is valued and someone else may not necessarily be valued.”

The FDA’s ban was permanent, but in subsequent decades new research and data led the federal agency to institute a 12-month wait period to donate. That was eventually reduced to 3-months.

“Now what we have, we call it an individual donor assessment,” said Wilson. “Everybody is evaluated equally, male, female, regardless of your sexual orientation. Everybody gets the same questions. There’s no questions about your sexual orientation, and the questions are designed to evaluate your own potential individual risk factors for HIV exposure.”

Brown was emphatic about the impact of this change. He said, “If I say nothing else today, I want to say this: only three out of every 100 people donate. By opening the doors and allowing more people to donate, the only thing we’re going to do is make sure that more patients in hospitals have a chance to go home.”

The Nationwide Coalition

Brown said that for more than a year he has been working with CenterLink, a membership organization of over 350 LGBTQ centers.

“But we decided to step it up a bit,” he explained. “We invited a select group of leaders from across the country to Atlanta. Hillary was one. On the last day I had a homework assignment. I said, ‘Hey, if you were to design your ideal national push, what kind of major event would you do?’ And they all decided independently that we want to do October, which is LGBTQ History Month, and a lot of us have a very special relationship with Halloween.”

October became the primary month for the campaign, with February selected as a follow-up month, so that now there are two major donation pushes every year.

At Queermunity, Otey said the blood drive will feature custom t-shirts designed by the Queermunity team. There will be $10 gift cards available to donors. There will also be a special guest: Ms. Rosanna Hudgens who will offer free tarot card readings and divination to donors. Of note, if all donation appointments have been reserved, Otey shared that walk-ins are welcome.

The donation process takes about an hour, with the actual blood draw only lasting approximately five minutes.

Brown said that blood donations primarily stay in the communities it’s collected in. He explained, “when you participate at Queermunity’s Drive coming up, it’s going to help those patients in Minnesota.”

Donors can book appointments at redcrossblood.org/LGBTQ. To learn more about Queermunity’s event visit queermunitymn.com. Chicago donors can visit centeronhalsted.org.

The Keys to the Gates: How Castor MN Is Unlocking Healthcare for Queer People

John Parker
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The Keys to the Gates: How Castor MN Is Unlocking Healthcare for Queer People

Dr. Leonardo Candelario-Perez has worked at the three largest corporate healthcare nonprofits in Minnesota. Now they are board chair of Castor MN whose mission is to provide wellness and healthcare education to empower queer people to access the healthcare they deserve.

This is part of our Queermunity Spotlight series. It features queer stories, people, and events happening at Queermunity, a vibrant event venue, gathering space, and café in Minneapolis, dedicated to offering high-quality experiences for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC communities and their allies.

Watch our conversation

After 15 years working in healthcare and advocating for queer people navigating the healthcare system, Dr. Candelario-Perez had one question, “could we create something that helps these organizations fill in the blanks that they’re not able to fill for the LGBTQI community?”

Dr. Candelario-Perez is a Latinx Boricua and bilingual clinical psychologist licensed in Minnesota. The variety of healthcare organizations they have worked in has given them unique insight into the many ways the American healthcare system engages in gatekeeping.

“I make it akin to reproductive health,” said Dr. Candelario-Perez. “In Minnesota, it is completely legal for people to get access to reproductive health, yet there are many forms of gatekeeping.”

One example is access to insurance. Another is securing care appointments. Another is navigating the personal belief system of the provider, specifically whether they will treat queer people with the same equity and dignity as non-queer people.

Much of Castor MN’s programming focuses on giving queer folks the information they need to advocate for themselves.

“Because a lot of times the healthcare providers don’t have the time to be able to appropriately assess a person’s needs,” said Dr. Candelario-Perez. “So if we give them the language and the narrative to be able to go to their providers and say, ‘This is the problem, this is the possible solution, can you help me?’ That facilitates the process for everyone.”

According to Dr. Candelario-Perez, this is crucial because the American medical system operates from a “bioessentialist medical model.” Put more simply, it reduces human problems to biology. As an example, Dr. Candelario-Perez shared how erectile dysfunction has been oversimplified as a lack of testosterone.

“Men say, ‘I have a problem with my penis,’ so I’m going to go to the penis doctor,” explained Dr. Candelario-Perez. “And then those physicians […] they want to be doing complex urological stuff. They don’t want to be talking about ED. It’s not their fault, but the simplest way to get that patient in and out of the clinic, is to give them testosterone.”

But Dr. Candelario-Perez pointed out that that doesn’t necessarily mean testing for testosterone, just simply prescribing it. They shared, “It’s bioessentialist in the sense that the medical system and the medical philosophy does not explore holistic biopsychosocial understanding of people’s healthcare.”

Dr. Candelario-Perez, who worked at the HealthPartners urology clinic for five years, joked that “if we gave out birth control, like we give out testosterone, the reproductive health issue would be solidly solved.”

Queer, Cultural, and Environmental Systems Thinking

In their attempt to address the bioessentialist medical model, Dr. Candelario-Perez shared why its necessary to engage in a variety types of thinking to unlock all the gates that model puts in front of patients.

“I think the beauty of all queer people, wherever you land in the queer spectrum is that we inherently are born into a world in which if we don’t think outside the box, it’s going to not be good for us,” said Dr. Candelario-Perez.

Another type of thinking is cultural.

“There’s a saying in Spanish that translates to you can’t ask an elm tree to give you pears,” explained Dr. Candelario-Perez. “These [healthcare] systems are elm trees. We as a community cannot be expecting a pear from them. So what can we do? We can acknowledge the value of the tree, that elm tree is doing other things in our ecosystem, but we have to go find the actual resources that are wanting to meet our needs.”

And as a self-described “animal and plant nerd,” when it came time to name Castor MN, Dr. Candelario-Perez turned to environmental systems thinking, specifically the beaver. Castor is the Spanish word for beaver.

“It’s a Minnesota state animal,” they said. “And it’s a conservation success story because we almost killed them out of Minnesota back in the 1700s. And from a biology perspective, they are both an ecosystem engineer and a keystone species. Keystone species are those that the entire ecosystem depends on and ecosystem engineers are species that manipulate their environment and thus create more environment.”

Gatekeeping Happens in Refuge States

When asked why we see gatekeeping for queer healthcare even in blue states who have passed laws protecting the LGBTQ community, Dr. Candelario-Perez first offered a clarification.

“I want to say is queer healthcare is regular healthcare,” they said. “It’s just that for some reason we decided to call it queer healthcare. It’s like hormone therapy has existed for about seven decades, but for some reason people don’t realize that.”

Regarding the barriers to healthcare in blue states, they said, “why do I still see these problems in a blue state has been a very interesting experiment for me over the last decade. I think at the end of the day, one of the biggest problems that we are not talking about in healthcare is that in the United States, healthcare is a business. It is not a right. It is a business.”

For Dr. Candelario-Perez that means until the leadership of large corporate healthcare systems understand this they won’t be able to fully realize the disproportionate impacts their business is having.

“Oftentimes when a lot of these corporations, no matter how progressive, no matter how much money they give to Pride every year, until they recognize that their business decisions are inherently discriminatory because the system is built that way, we’re not going to get anywhere,” Dr. Candelario-Perez.

They noted that since we see gatekeeping in blue states, it can be ten times worse in red states.

“But,” said Dr. Candelario-Perez, “if we have a business model that centers humanity, ethics and wellbeing as opposed to profit, then we can just pack that up and tell people this is the instructions, this is how you do it.”

To connect with Castor MN visit castormn.org.

From Healthcare to Gun Safety: Brian Cohn Details His Vision for District 57B

John Parker
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From Healthcare to Gun Safety: Brian Cohn Details His Vision for District 57B

Minnesota’s House of Representatives has been tied between Democrats and Republicans for two years. But this November, if DFL candidate Brian Cohn wins his race for House District 57B that could flip power to the Democrats. This would be very influential to Minnesota’s queer community given the anti-LGBTQ bills MAGA has continued to push in the legislature.

We sat down with Cohn, who is not part of the LGBTQ community, to learn more about his candidacy. He has lived in the Lakeville, MN area for 13 years. He touts his over two decades of experience in engineering and business process improvement. According to his website, his goal is to bring practical problem-solving Minnesota’s capitol. Article continues below.

Watch our conversation

What is he hearing from voters?

Cohn told The Gaily Show that he isn’t hearing about the culture war issues MAGA wants to talk about, issues such as trans athletes.

“Mostly what I’m hearing is [voters are] sick and tired of filling their gas tank and they’re costing a hundred bucks and $100 bags of groceries,” said Cohn. “A lot of young families in the district that just can’t afford to send their kids to childcare and it’s really hurting.”

He highlighted healthcare as the most critical issue Minnesota residents have raised with him. Specifically, they’ve shared with Cohn the double-digit increases in health insurance premium they have to pay. And the out-of-pocket maximums that are preventing them from going to the doctor.

Cohn also pointed to the fact that insurance companies are taking roughly 20% overhead compared to Medicare, which is typically 3%.

“Having healthcare is something that shouldn’t depend on where you work,” said Cohn. “It shouldn’t depend on where you grew up. We need to get to a universal healthcare system.”

He specifically said he would support Minnesota State Senator’s John Marty’s Minnesota Health Plan which would provide universal healthcare to all Minnesotans.

Impacts of Operation Metro Surge

Earlier this year, the Trump administration deployed three thousand federal agents to the Twin Cities for what they dubbed as an immigration enforcement campaign. They enacted thousands of violent arrests. Individuals were taken from their cars leaving them abandoned in the street. Hundreds of people ICE detained were lawful immigrants, even citizens. They used children as bait to arrest people. They trailed legal observers and parked outside the homes of school board members to intimidate them. They deployed flash bangs and green gas at constitutional observers. They detained people in conditions that Democratic lawmakers alleged were violating the detainees’s rights to medical care and access to lawyers. Agents killed two U.S. citizens without cause: Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti.

“We’ve talked to also a lot of people in the community that have been affected by Operation Metro Surge and been afraid to leave their homes,” said Cohn. “One thing that’s real important is to get that transparency out there.”

He attended public safety hearings at the capitol when Rep. Leigh Finke introduced legislation that would prevent federal agents from wearing masks to hide their identities. If elected he said he would support that type of legislation.

“The other thing that we need to do,” said Cohn, “I don’t remember if it’s the Attorney General’s office, or the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, trying to prosecute the people who killed Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti. We really need to push those things forward to hold the Trump administration accountable.”

Addressing Fraud

On this issue, Cohn highlighted his background in business improvement.

“It starts by our processes to vet the people and the processes to be able to monitor what’s going on,” said Cohn. “How do we help our state government figure out how to improve those things so that we can vet people better so we can detect that?”

He called out MAGA for wanting to outsource government programs to the private sector. He said that was part of the problem that led to the fraud scandals in Minnesota.

“That fraud is happening by the middlemen,” said Cohn, “who are middle companies that are handling the money. And if we don’t have those middle people, there isn’t the incentive and the opportunity for the fraud.”

A focus on kids

When asked what his top legislative priority would be, Cohn said issues affecting children.

“We need to make sure we’re fully funding our schools,” he said. “I was just talking to a teacher last night who was frustrated that we are underfunding special education.”

He said part of this is not just funding education, but also “we need to work towards childcare for all.”

Gun violence is another issue he wants to address, citing the tragic shooting at Annunciation Catholic School last year.

“We’ve got to do things that can reduce the terrible events that can happen, like at Annunciation, by reducing large capacity magazine bans and an assault weapon ban,” said Cohn.

He added that he wants to see new laws to increase safe storage requirements and stronger straw purchase requirements.

“My focus is on protecting the kids,” said Cohn.

Housing

Cohn noted that Lakeville used to be an affordable community, including on housing.

“Well, it has certainly changed from that,” said Cohn. “The builders are building new housing stock and what they’re selling is half million dollar kinds of houses.”

He said that some reports claim Minnesota is roughly 100,000 housing units short of what it needs.

“I think there’s two things we need to do,” said Cohn. “I think we’re going to have to look at some zoning requirements for our communities that each community knows exactly what they want to do and it sort of optimizes that. Second thing is we need to continue to help with first time home buyer assistance.”

Cohn said addressing Minnesota’s housing shortage must also include improving its transportation infrastructure.

“We also need to improve and grow our mass transit system to make it more attractive to build apartment buildings and higher density around that so people can get around and help people lower their transportation costs so they have maybe a little more to spend on housing,” said Cohn.

Environmental Protection

When it comes to the environment, Cohn has a clear vision for the state.

“I think our biggest threat on the environment is the people that want to do mining up near the boundary waters. So we really got to put the kibosh on that,” said Cohn. “We also want to work with farmers, make sure that they’re using sustainable practices to reduce the pollution of the groundwater.”

He also said that if elected he would want to engage with environmental justice advocacy and legislation.

“With so many things living in this ‘not-in-my-backyard’ world, we’ve put some of our major polluters in places that primarily pollute to people that are disadvantaged,” said Cohn.

Connect with the campaign

To learn more about Cohn’s candidacy, including information on door-knocking and how to donate, visit briancohn4mn.com.

In Minnesota, the final day of voting is November 3, 2026. To early vote, register to vote, find a polling place, and learn what is on your ballot, visit mnvotes.gov.

We Help Us Project Tells Minnesota’s LGBTQ Mutual Aid Stories

John Parker
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We Help Us Project Tells Minnesota’s LGBTQ Mutual Aid Stories

Correction: The Intergenerational Queer and Trans Mutual Aid Storytelling Event at Queermunity begins at 4 p.m. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated 2 p.m.

For the past year, writer, podcaster, and Augsburg University Professor Chris Stedman has been collecting stories. Stories of queer people offering mutual aid to each other in Minnesota. The project is called We Help Us. The initiative will conclude at the Intergenerational Queer and Trans Mutual Aid Storytelling event at Queermunity on Saturday, October 17th, from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at Queermunity. We sat down with Stedman to learn more. Article continues below.

This is part of our Queermunity Spotlight series. It features queer stories, people, and events happening at Queermunity, a vibrant event venue, gathering space, and café in Minneapolis, dedicated to offering high-quality experiences for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC communities and their allies.

Watch our conversation

What is mutual aid?

Stedman explained that the difference between charity and mutual aid is that charity operates in one direction, “I have something that you need and I’m going to give it to you.”

Mutual aid on the other hand works both ways or as he put it, “people on both sides of that equation have something to offer.”

He observed that he and his friends joke about the fact that as queer people they share the same $20.

“You need it right now and I have it, so I’m going to share it with you,” said Stedman. “But there might come another time when I need the $20.”

It’s What History Misses

Stedman believes that mutual aid is essential to the queer and trans experience because of our history.

He was born in 1987 and grew up during the AIDS crisis. He said that because of the sheer number of people lost to AIDS, the thousands of stories of mutual aid from that time period were lost. Some say that history is written by the victors; but regardless of whom it is written by, Stedman believes that history has neglected to record the daily instances of how the queer community has supported itself.

That extends to documenting how when a crisis hits the LGBTQ community, existing institutions have historically not provided the support they were supposed to give.

“Whether it’s out of ignorance or neglect or outright hostility,” said Stedman, “these kind of systems that are supposed to help us in hard times, like when facing illness or other kinds of calamity, they don’t.”

We Help Us Project

His desire to capture stories of mutual aid led to the We Help Us project. It focuses on people who identify as part of the LGBTQ community and who are residents of Minnesota. To begin, Stedman collected the stories through a hotline. Participants called 1-844-WE-HLP-US and shared what he described as stories of how “their community has shown up for them or that they’ve shown up for someone else.”

But some participants wanted to write their stories. So Stedman setup the We Help Us website for folks to upload their personal narratives. He plans to have local actors record those stories for an upcoming podcast he will produce based on the project.

As the year progressed, Stedman found that some participants wanted to discuss their stories in conversation and in-person. To that end, he organized a number of events throughout Minnesota. The final one will be on Saturday, October 17 at Queermunity in Minneapolis. It’s called Intergenerational Queer and Trans Mutual Aid Storytelling. For this event, Stedman partnered with the Eli Coleman Institute for Sexual and Gender Health at the University of Minnesota, as well as The Aliveness Project.

The two-hour event starts at 4 p.m. and will feature a panel of intergenerational storytellers sharing their different experiences of mutual aid. Then attendees will have the opportunity to participate in a mutual aid activity with the Aliveness Project. And, of course, Stedman will be ready to record stories of mutual aid that attendees would like to share with him.

After the project ends, Stedman will not only produce a podcast. He plans to turn over all the materials to the Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies at the University of Minnesota.

He said, “We want all of these stories to be available for people and future generations in particular to learn from how queer and trans people have always done this.”

The Need for Social Connection

Stedman, author of Faitheist, noted the loss of social connections queer people experience when they step away from religious communities.

“A majority of Americans now say they’re not close to a single other person,” He said. “And if you break that down by religious demographics, it’s higher among people who are not religious.”

He explained that another connection people lose is intergenerational.

“One of the things that is interesting to me is one thing that people miss when they are not a part of a religious community is often intergenerational community,” said Stedman. “But I think that intergenerational community is something we really need. We learn things from our elders.”

One queer elder that he interviewed for the project went on to become a good friend. When that friend had health issues, and had to move to a new home with supportive care, Stedman was there to help him.

“He had been living alone for 40 years,” He said. “[I also helped] find a place for his books to go because he had this huge, amazing collection of LGBTQIA books. We were able to get those to the LGBT Books to Prison Project based in Madison, Wisconsin, which works to get books to incarcerated folks who are LGBTQIA.”

Searching for answers

When asked how he came to exploring stories of mutual aid, Stedman shared that it happened after losing a friend to suicide.

“Ultimately, that’s actually what led me to make my previous podcast series Unread, which is about the loss of this friend,” He said. “Because I just felt like I was looking for spaces to talk about the experience of losing someone to suicide and not finding them.”

He continued, “I think stories in general help guide us along the way during hard times, which is why I’m collecting these stories of trans and queer mutual aid, because I think we need stories as examples that maybe invite us to think about how we show up for others.”

For more information on the Intergenerational Queer and Trans Mutual Aid Storytelling event at Queermunity, visit queermunitymn.com/events.

To connect with Chris, head to chrisstedmanwriter.com or check out his Substack.

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