The First Openly Gay Governor?

by Michael Jones · 2009-01-11 12:13:00 UTC
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David CiccilineWe've talked a lot on this blog about which state would be the next to legalize same-sex marriage.  What we haven't done is look at what state might be the first to elect an openly LGBT governor.  But there may be one candidate ready to throw his name in the ring.

And he's the current mayor of Providence, Rhode Island, David Cicilline.

The Advocate features a great story on the current mayor and (perhaps) future Gubernatorial candidate in their February 2009 issue.  As The Advocate reports:

Cicilline’s star has risen rapidly since he became mayor of Providence, R.I., six years ago. When the 47-year-old Rhode Island native, son of a Jewish mother and Italian-American father, assumed the post in 2003 after winning a landslide 84% of the vote, he became the first openly gay mayor of a state capital...Cicilline then proceeded to draw over $3 billion worth of investments to the city, erasing a $59 million debt and reducing the crime rate to its lowest level in 30 years. He launched cultural programs, invested in education, and employed incentives to help revamp the once-downtrodden downtown.

Cicilline’s audacity has made him a very popular mayor and raised the city’s national profile. In 2007, The Wall Street Journal named Providence one of the world’s top 10 up-and-coming travel destinations; it was the only U.S. city to make the list.

That sounds like pretty good street cred for a potential Governor.  And Rhode Island's executive office is also something Cicciline has thought about.  "It's something I've been looking at in a serious way," Cicciline told The Advocate.

The next Gubernatorial election in Rhode Island is 2010.  Could that be the year we get our first openly gay elected Governor?

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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