Connecticut legislator comes out

3/1/08Connecticut State Representative Jason Bartlett has made U.S. history by publicly disclosing his homosexuality, making him the nation's first openly gay African-American state legislator.

"I guess the question for me is, why not now?'" Bartlett said in a video statement posted online by the Greater Danbury News-Times. "I think we're at a time in this country when people don't care about that. They care that I've advocated for reformed health care. I've advocated for accountability in education. I've advocated for trying to preserve the environment. I have worked hard to bring millions of dollars to my district. I think that's really what people care about."

Since his election to the 2nd Assembly District in 2006, Bartlett, 41, has been a member of the state's committees for education, finance and revenue, and human services. He also served as the co-chair of Sen. Hillary Clinton's Connecticut Steering Committee for her presidential run.

Kamora Herrington, the director of the mentoring program at True Colors, a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) support and advocacy non-profit group in Connecticut, is confident that Bartlett's announcement will bring positive change to the youth communities that True Colors serves. "Jason coming out adds another gay face to the public eye, and we need to have as many in public office as we can," she said, "A lot of youth think that being gay is a 'white' thing. Now young, black teens have someone to look up to in their community."

Bartlett said in the video that, before becoming out publicly last month, he has been previously open about his sexuality with his close friends and family, including the two teenagers that Bartlett has raised, as a single parent, as sons, though the boys are actually the biological children of deceased relatives.

Herrington said that she is looking forward to garnering more visibility and understanding for both local and national LGBT communities, and that she's glad that it's Bartlett who is marking himself as a public representative of the gay, African-American community. "Jason is a wonderful man, and he's also politically conservative," she said, "The fact that we [the LGBT community] have non-liberal members of our community shows diversity. And Jason is a good, upstanding man. Period.