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State Sen. Sarah McBride will be Delaware's next representative in Congress, becoming the first transgender person elected to federal office in the history of the United States. McBride, a Democrat and current state legislator, defeated Republican John Whalen in Tuesday's general election. “Tonight is a testament to Delawareans: that here in our state of neighbors, we judge candidates based on their ideas and not their identities,” McBride said in her victory address Tuesday night. (Wilson, 11/5)

Montana state Rep. Zooey Zephyr won reelection in a race that will allow the transgender lawmaker to return to the House floor nearly two years after she was silenced and sanctioned by her Republican colleagues. Zephyr, a Democrat, defeated Republican Barbara Starmer in her Democrat-leaning district in the college town of Missoula. Zephyr, who was in her first term, was last permitted to speak on the chamber floor in April 2023, when she refused to apologize for saying some lawmakers would have blood on their hands for supporting a ban on gender-affirming medical care for youth. (Schoenbaum and Hanson, 11/6)

Julie Johnson was projected to win her election Tuesday for Texas’s 32nd Congressional District, making history as the first openly LGBTQ person to represent Texas in Congress and the first elected from anywhere in the South, where legislation targeting LGBTQ rights is largely concentrated. (Migdon, 11/5)

Democrat Emily Randall was projected to win her bid for Washington’s 6th Congressional District Tuesday, making history as the first woman and openly LGBTQ person elected to represent the district in Congress. A former LGBTQ and abortion rights organizer, Randall credits the 2016 election of former President Trump with inspiring her to run for office. (Migdon, 11/6)

The California Constitution will no longer include outdated language that defines only marriages between a man and a woman as valid, after voters approved Proposition 3 on Tuesday. The measure amends the state Constitution to recognize a “fundamental right to marry, regardless of sex or race.” (Mays, 11/5)

Donald Trump has made no secret of his anti-LGBTQ+ views - but can the 47th president actually take away hard-fought LGBTQ+ rights? (Thiel and Hansford, 11/6)

If Trump wins the presidency, Casey says, the attacks succeeding now on the state level can be expected to graduate to the federal government, says Logan Casey, director of policy research for the Movement Advancement Project. In his first term, Trump already provided a model for targeting transgender people. He banned them from the military; permitted anti-trans discrimination in health care; rolled back protections for trans students; and created a broad license for businesses to discriminate based on “religious objections”—often against LGBTQ people. More clues for a second term come from Project 2025, much of which was written by former Trump administration members, which equates “transgender ideology” with pornography and declares that it should be banned. The blueprint for a second Trump administration proposes wiping the terms “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” completely out of all federal policy. (Pauly and Szilagy, 11/5)