For Immediate Release: Dated February 11, 2008
From: The National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC)
Contacts: Vanessa Edwards Foster; Houston, Texas
Chair, Ethan St. Pierre, Haverhill, MA
Contact Email: ntacmedia@aol.com
Website: The National Transgender Advocacy Coalition
NTAC Remembers a True Hero to the Transgender Community: Rep. Tom Lantos
The National Transgender Advocacy Coalition (NTAC) is saddened to report the passing of Rep. Tom Lantos on Monday (D-CA) from complications due to esophageal cancer. The longtime congressman from suburban San Francisco had recently announced he’d not seek re-election due to his illness. Rep. Lantos was 80.
While low-key, Rep. Lantos was a quiet but distinctive hero for the oppressed and voiceless of the world. It was befitting of a man who survived the holocaust after losing his family, and later emigrated to the United States from Hungary, virtually penniless.
Particular to the transgender community, Rep. Lantos authored and sponsored the very first legislative language introduced into Congress that mentioned “gender identity.” After an initial entry into the congressional session in 1998, Rep. Lantos introduced HR 259 in early 2000.
The resolution condemned human rights abuses internationally “on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.” In the session prior to the legislation, Lantos was also the first to note the same issues with the same language – including gender identity – into the congressional record.
NTAC co-founders and board members Sarah Fox and Vanessa Edwards Foster lobbied both Lantos’ office and other congressional offices seeking support for the legislation immediately following the 1999 GenderPac Lobby Days. NTAC is proud to have been part of that groundbreaking legislative effort.
“Though he’s not widely known for it, Rep. Lantos cemented a place in America’s transgender history by submitting that bill,” noted Foster, who served as chair of NTAC from 2002-2006. “I’m glad I missed my flight that morning and took the extra day to hit the Hill with Sarah and lobby for this. The following year I got to go back and lobby for it as a bill.”
It’s worth noting that even though domestic legislation in Congress was being submitted without gender identity at that time, Lantos’ International LGBT Human Rights bill was intently inclusive.
Foster commented that, “he exhibited quite a bit of courage” in authoring and presenting that bill in 2000. While it never made it out of subcommittee, Lantos’ bill still managed to pick up 56 co-sponsors.
“When I noted Rep. Lantos wasn’t on as a co-sponsor to the transgender-inclusive ENDA [HR 2015] in May of last year, I’d inquired of [legislative aide] Michael Beard about it. With no hesitation, that was rectified shortly thereafter as [Lantos] signed on as co-sponsor. Rep. Lantos was unfailingly principled and truly cared for the disenfranchised. Especially in the transgender community, Tom Lantos will be sorely missed.”
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Founded in 1999, NTAC – the National Transgender Advocacy Coalition – is a grassroots civil rights organization working to establish and maintain the right of all transgendered, intersexed, and gender-variant people to live and work without fear of violence or discrimination.