What It Means That a Black Woman Is Leading Julin Castro's Campaign for President

[sheshe2]

WASHINGTON, D.C.—When Maya Rupert walked into then-Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro’s office with a tricky problem to solve, she expected some resistance. It was November 2015, and the agency had long been mulling a rule that would require HUD-funded shelters to accept transgender people under their proper genders, not the ones they were assigned at birth. The rule had stalled inside HUD over concerns that cisgender men would falsely identify as female to enter shelters and assault female occupants, among other issues.

Before arriving at HUD, Rupert was working on the issue as policy director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights and felt HUD did not appreciate the dire situations homeless trans people faced. She was chief of staff at HUD’s general counsel’s office when she first sat down with Castro and his senior aides and still new to the bureaucracy when she made her argument.

“I started to explain why this was so important and the fact that trans women in particular, trans women of color especially, deal with so much violence and that being able to access homeless shelters was such a huge issue,” Rupert recalls telling Castro at their first meeting before he cut her off. “‘No, no, no. I understand that. The problem is this rule would only get to HUD-funded shelters, so how do we get to every shelter?’ Then, I had one of those moments where I was like, ‘Oh, he’s one of us.’”

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Rupert would work closely with Castro at HUD until January 2017. She went on to lead his PAC, Opportunity First, and then his presidential exploratory committee. So it came as no surprise when Castro asked her in December to be his campaign manager, making her one of the few black women to ever hold the position—and certainly one of the youngest, at 38 years old.

Read More: https://www.theroot.com/what-it-means-that-a-black-woman-is-leading-julian-cast-1832525865

I really like this man, sadly he has not gotten much notice.

[Honeycombe8]

1. Too many candidates. Too many. nt

[saidsimplesimon]

2. so true, an abundance of great candidates

is certainly something I prefer to multiple "pigs in a poke" (southern slang)

[PatrickforO]

3. This seems to be the year the Democratic party is truly embracing

diversity. I saw Castro on Bill Maher, and he's a great candidate. We've got a great bench. The top four seem to be Biden, Bernie, Warren and Mayor Pete, which is too bad because they are all white. Though Pete is gay.

Hmm. I never thought about that 'til just now.

The four top candidates are all white. Three males and a female.

Even if they stay in the lead, though - which may or may not happen. We're still in early days. But we can genuinely hope that if it is one of these four who is the nominee, they would pick someone who reflects the diversity of our party as VP.