Julie Johnson may make history as first openly LGBTQ lawmaker from South

Texas state Rep. Julie Johnson, the early front-runner in the race for a U.S. House seat left open by departing Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas), is on track to become the first openly LGBTQ person elected to Congress from the Lone Star State.

She’d also be the first elected from the entire American South, where the bulk of anti-LGBTQ legislation was passed this year.

Johnson’s campaign announcement video, released last month, highlighted the 57-year-old’s experience as an attorney, an openly gay Texan and a state lawmaker who unseated former Republican state Rep. Matt Rinaldi — now the leader of the state Republican Party — in 2018.

“I already know how to get the job done and win the toughest battles,” she said in announcing her candidacy for Texas’s 32nd Congressional District. She’s part of a crowded Democratic primary to succeed Allred, who in May launched a challenge to Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-Texas) reelection bid, giving up his solidly blue seat in the House. 

Allred flipped the seat for Democrats in 2018 and won reelection last year with more than 65 percent of the general election vote. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates the House race as “solid Democrat.”

Johnson has already racked up a number of notable endorsements, including the Human Rights Campaign and the Equality PAC, the campaign arm of the Congressional Equality Caucus. Caucus co-chairs Reps. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), Becca Balint (D-Vt.) and Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) have also endorsed Johnson.

Johnson has made a name for herself in the state Legislature by collaborating and forming strong friendships with members on both sides of the aisle. She’s also been integral to defeating anti-LGBTQ legislation in Texas.

During her first year in office in 2019, Johnson joined four other openly gay women in the Texas House to form the state’s first LGBTQ caucus, now one of the nation’s largest. The same year, Johnson’s wife, Susan Moster, became the first same-sex spouse invited to join the Legislative Ladies Club, a social group made up of the husbands and wives of Texas House members.

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“She was so nervous about it,” Johnson said in an interview with The Hill, recalling Moster’s first meeting with the other spouses. Neither woman knew for certain how Moster, the body’s first same-sex spouse, would be received.

Weeks later, however, Johnson would be pulled aside by several of her male colleagues in the House, including some Republicans. “My wife just loves your wife,” she remembers them saying, “and that means you and I have to be friends.”

Those bipartisan friendships have proved valuable to Johnson, who has been able to advance key health care and criminal justice reform legislation during her time in the state House with support from both Democrats and Republicans. At least six of Johnson’s bills passed this year have been signed into law by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, a vocal supporter of policies criticized for targeting LGBTQ people.

“In politics, you have to have both a short-term and a long-term memory,” Johnson said. “You always want to know who’s with you and where people stand, but you can’t hold grudges that would prohibit you from passing legislation that will help some aspect of somebody’s life.”

“I’m willing to work with any member on good policy,” she said. “Not all Democrats author good bills, and not all Republicans author bad bills.”

‘Bad bills’

The Texas Legislature has still seen its fair share of what Johnson would call “bad bills” this year, especially when it comes to legislation threatening LGBTQ civil rights.

At least 53 bills targeting LGBTQ people have been introduced this year in Texas, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), accounting for more than 10 percent of proposed anti-LGBTQ legislation nationwide. Most of the Texas bills target transgender young people.

But the bulk of those bills — more than 90 percent, by the ACLU’s count — failed to advance through the Legislature this session. Most of them never even made it out of the state House, where the majority of them originated.

Johnson credits that success to her and her Democratic and LGBTQ colleagues’ relationships with Republicans, who currently control both chambers of the state Legislature. Nine openly LGBTQ lawmakers are currently serving in the Texas House, though an out LGBTQ person has yet to be elected to the state Senate.

Democrats and LGBTQ lawmakers in other Southern states, where anti-LGBTQ legislation is largely concentrated, have not been as lucky. In Arkansas, nine out of 10 proposed anti-LGBTQ bills became law this year, and in Tennessee, 10 out of 26 proposed measures targeting LGBTQ people were signed into law by the state’s Republican Gov. Bill Lee, including the nation’s first ban on drag performances.

Johnson recognizes the history-making potential of her campaign: If she’s elected in November, she’ll be the first openly LGBTQ person sent to Congress from any Southern state in the nation.

“To be the first one from Texas — to be the first one from any Southern state, where so much of this hate genesis is — is a clear policy statement and a political statement from voters that, ‘No, we don’t support these initiatives, and we value our LGBT members who are smart and talented and work hard for us,’” she said.

“It’s also a message to that LGBTQ teen in rural Texas, that they do have people that represent them,” Johnson added. “Their voice is heard. Somebody in their state legislative cohort, or their congressional cohort, understands them, sees them and is fighting for them. And that means something, too.”

The right candidate can win anywhere

Johnson said she hopes to change the conversation surrounding LGBTQ issues and identities in Congress, where House Republicans this year have advanced numerous pieces of legislation that could negatively impact the community.

But that sort of change takes time, said Annise Parker, president and chief executive of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, an organization dedicated to increasing the number of openly LGBTQ elected officials in the U.S.

“When you put one person in a legislative body, you don’t change the outcome of anything, but you change the dynamic in the room,” said Parker, a former mayor of Houston and the first openly LGBTQ person elected to lead a major city. “When you put three people in a legislative body, you begin to change the conversation, and when you build up more than that you really influence the outcome.”

The LGBTQ+ Victory Fund has endorsed Johnson in the race for Texas’s 32nd, but Johnson isn’t the only openly LGBTQ person running. Democrat Callie Butcher, a transgender woman and president of the Dallas LGBT Bar Association, launched her campaign earlier this month.

Twenty-five other openly LGBTQ members of Congress — 21 in the House and five in the Senate — would be needed to achieve equitable representation for LGBTQ people on Capitol Hill, according to the LGBTQ+ Victory Institute, a partner organization of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund.

There are just 12 out LGBTQ people are serving in the current Congress — 10 in the House and two in the Senate — despite more than 7 percent of the nation’s adult population identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or “something other than heterosexual,” according to a February Gallup poll.

Johnson faces a number of challenges in her race, not the least of which is that she’s running during a presidential election year. “Presidential campaigns can suck a lot of air out of the room — and a lot of money,” Parker said.

But geography and gender have also erected unique hurdles for Johnson to clear in a race that theoretically should be an easy win for Democrats. Nationwide, the number of openly gay women elected to public office has stalled, up only 0.8 percent in 2023 after a 2.2 percent decline between 2021 and 2022.

“The playing field is not even for women, for LGBTQ women, for people of color,” said Lisa Turner, the executive director of LPAC, which has also endorsed Johnson’s run for Congress. “If you aren’t ringing the bell and bringing resources and support on day one to these candidates — especially someone like Julie — when she tries to go to the next level, this race could be ended in March.”

There’s a misconception that “LGBTQ people can’t win in the south,” said Parker, of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, but “the right candidate with the right message can win anywhere. We prove that all the time.”