Gay & Lesbian According to Jim - An openly gay candidate makes a historic run.

Gay & Lesbian According to Jim - An openly gay candidate makes a historic run.
By Jason A. Heidemann
Copyright by Time Out Chicago
Issue 233 : Aug 13–19, 2009
http://chicago.timeout.com/articles/gay/77393/jim-madigan


Jim Madigan’s humble start suggests the opening scenes of a biopic. He was born and raised in the Rust Belt town of Niles, Ohio, to a father who owned a cigar shop (and later ran a local chapter of AMVETS) and a mom who baby-sat. With his campaign for state Senate in District 7, Madigan looks to complete that biopic trajectory: If successful, he would become the Illinois Senate’s first openly gay member. Recently, we met with Madigan to discuss his political ambitions over Chinese food in Uptown, where he maintains a modest campaign office above Crew Bar and Grill. On Tuesday 18, he holds a fund-raiser at Wilde Bar.

Madigan, 35 (no relation to Attorney General Lisa or House Speaker Michael), greets me in pressed khakis and a polo, and like any good candidate (and lawyer), is ready to deliver his stump speech. As we settle in at Silver Seafood, he tells me about his 1997 move from Cleveland to pursue a law degree at the University of Chicago, where he focused on civil rights and studied constitutional law under Barack Obama. In 2000, he turned down an offer from a major law firm to become a U. of C. faculty member. Two years later, he was hired by the Chicago law firm Goldberg Kohn, where he worked on pro bono cases, and in ’05 joined Lambda Legal as staff attorney.

Last December, the Buena Park resident began serving as interim director for Equality Illinois, but by then, he’d already decided to run against incumbent Democrat Heather Steans in the 2010 election. To beat her, he’ll have to connect with an incredibly diverse constituency, as District 7 includes Uptown, Andersonville, Edgewater, Lincoln Square, Ravenswood and Rogers Park East. Since Democrats have a near lock on the district, it’s February’s primary battle that will be the hardest fought.

“We’re at a critical time in Chicago and Illinois,” Madigan says as he digs into chicken fried rice. “We have politicians who are being indicted for putting their private interests above the public interest. At the same time, we managed to send this brilliant man to Washington to help change America. We can clean up our own backyard if we choose based on merit rather than inside connections.”

Although single himself, Madigan, who helped draft Illinois’s still-stalled civil-unions act, plans to push for full marriage equality and also wants schools to enact anti-bullying policies that include both sexual orientation and gender identity. “Frankly, among the list of legislative priorities I have, LGBT equality is just one piece,” he says. “What shapes my perspective on life is not the fact that I’m gay; it’s much more the fact I grew up in a lower income bracket.” In rapid-fire succession, Madigan rattles off his to-do list: stopping the spread of gambling machines in the city, changing the state’s flat income-tax system, lowering the obesity rate in public schools and eliminating the death penalty (even though there’s a moratorium, taxpayers still shell out to have such cases litigated).

To help get his message across, he’s enlisted transgender activist June LaTrobe as his chief of staff. “June is incredibly hardworking,” Madigan says. “She’s in her sixties and a transgender woman. Neither of those might be the traditional pick for somebody who you want in charge on the ‘boots on the ground’ part of your campaign, but June is somebody who dedicates their entire life to a cause they believe in. It was an obvious choice.”

As lunch ends, Madigan says, “I spent a career trying to advocate on behalf of people who didn’t have a voice, who were mistreated by private entities and by government. This is a logical extension of what I did in the courtroom. It’s just doing it in the halls of government.” He cracks open his fortune cookie, which reads, “There are times when silence has the loudest voice.” Clearly, this isn’t one of those times.

A Wilde Affair happens Tuesday 18.