Democratic U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley has been in office since he took over from Rahm Emanuel representing the 5th District in 2009. Quigley came from the Cook County Board of Commissioners, where he was a stalwart foe of both John and Todd Stroger and their tax policies.
Quigley has done much work to advance LGBT equality, and has posts on a number of task forces working on behalf of issues such as transgender rights and LGBT aging issues. He was inducted into the Chicago Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame ( now the LGBTQ Hall of Fame ) in 2007 as a Friend of the Community.
On Nov. 8, he will face two opponents at the polls: Republican candidate Vince Kolber and Green Party candidate Rob Sherman.
Windy City Times: Why should voters return you to office in this election?
Mike Quigley: First, my priorities are straightforward. I understand that the most important thing I can do is provide solid services and be available for my constituents—everything we do: social security, Medicare, Medicaid, veterans' benefits, what's happening in D.C., etc.
Second, they should focus on the committee work that I do. As the second highest-ranking member—and the only member from Illinois—of the appropriations committee, second ranking on transportation and housing and urban development, affords me a unique opportunity to drive resources back to my district, the city and the region. It's afforded me an opportunity to work on things everybody in my district cares about.
Specifically, related to this community, I was the only person in this race who was inducted into the Chicago Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame. I have a long history of working and getting things done as a county commissioner—domestic partnership ordinance, domestic partnership registry, the gender identity amendment to the Cook County human rights ordinance. That's all before I was in Congress.
When I got into Congress, the first bill I got onto was the hate-crimes bill. I'm an original co-sponsor of the Equality Act, vice-chair of the LGBT Equality Caucus in Congress and a founding member of the Transgender Equality Task Force and the LGBT Aging Issues Task Force. When we still had earmarks, my first earmark was nearly half a million dollars for the Center on Halsted. With all due respect, there's no one else in this race with a proven track record of accomplishment serving this district as a whole and the LGBT community in particular.
WCT: What do you see as being the most pertinent issues for the LGBT community in the years ahead?
MQ: It really depends on who gets in the White House and who controls the House and Senate. If everything was an ideal situation, and I could set off an agenda we could knock off one by one: Marriage equality is great but we have to codify it. The movement to greater equality is absolutely vital, but if you can still be fired because you're gay or lesbian, you can still be denied credit, housing or education opportunities because of who you love, we have a way to go. So with the Equality Act, you have a framework for everything else. It's sort of an infrastructure that other things can get attached to.
We've got to get the Veterans Administration on board for some things. My letter came out calling for medical care for transgender veterans, for example. On a personal level, it's been kind of a crusade for me to end the FDA's ban on blood donations by gay and bisexual men. There's a lot of other things to do, but that's a start for what I would put on the agenda.
WCT: What are some other challenges for your district?
MQ: For me, there are infrastructure issues that matter. We've got to rebuild the Red Line and the Blue Line. They go right through the heart of my district. We've got to address gun violence as well.
If I had unlimited power, resources and access, education is extraordinarily important to work on. We have to find a way to expand and rebuild some of our schools and get a steady revenue stream where everyone has access to a quality education at the elementary, high school and college levels.
Chicago is going to be hindered by long-term climate change. That's not just my district, but it will affect my district.
WCT: Congress has a low approval rating now, thanks in large part to inaction and obstruction on the part of many legislators during the Obama administration. What can you do to change that?
MQ: I'll continue to work on efforts requiring bipartisan cooperation. I'm in two bipartisan groups dealing with budget [issues]. I was able to accomplish a lot of things through the appropriations committee was frankly because I was willing to work on a bipartisan basis. Some of it is reducing the volume of the name-calling, and eliminating it, and trying to speak to people on a one-on-one basis and building cooperation. Building a bridge to accomplishing something, rather than just saying, this is all your fault. Those are the things we're trying to do. It's a minority of Republicans, the Tea Party, who've made it difficult for their speakers to get anything done. Their speakers could have exerted more leadership, but let's hope they do a little better next term.
WCT: What have you learned in your work with the LGBT community?
MQ: I was going to say, what I've learned about lawmakers. Familiarity breeds understanding, acceptance and eventually affection and change. I've seen lawmakers evolve and move towards an understanding that the arc of the moral universe should bend towards justice.
What I've seen in the LGBT community is that, like in every community, the minority of people unfortunately do the yeoman's work. There are some unheralded heroes who have been there all along fighting the good fight. There is a tenacious group of dedicated group of people there who deserve an extraordinary amount of the credit for the progress in the future.
When I got into this business, lawmakers were loathe to touch these issues. What's comforting to me now is that I have links in the community. It's important to me that they come forward and be recognized, people like Tunney. People can look up to him and say, "He's accomplished this, I can too." People like Larry McKeon and Kelly Cassidy and all the others you know. In Congress, the same is true: People aren't known as "gay or lesbian lawmakers," just effective lawmakers. That's as important an evolutionary aspect we've seen in the movement as it grows.
See QuigleyForCongress.com .
