Advocate.com – By Anne Stockwell – From The Advocate March 2009
Barely over a year since transgender activists labeled Barney Frank a turncoat, he’s hired the first openly transgender legislative staff member on Capitol Hill.
Before diego sanchez came to washington, d.c., he was a PR executive for Fortune 100 companies. “I introduced Diet Coke, which was an elation,” he says, “and then I introduced ‘new Coke,’ which wasn’t so hot.” Sanchez, U.S. representative Barney Frank’s new legislative assistant and the first openly transgender person to work in a federal congressional office, is charged with helping Frank pass an all-inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act — a bill that covers not just sexual orientation but gender identity as well — in the first Obama Congress.