Jaelynn Scott is likely to represent the 37th District in the Washington state Legislature. (Photo courtesy of the Jaelynn Scott campaign)
Jaelynn Scott is set to become Washington’s first openly transgender legislator after sailing through last week’s primary.
She also could be one of only two members of the Democratic Socialists of America in the Legislature.
“I think it’s important that people see themselves in me, and the fact that they can run and they can win,” Scott said.
Scott, who leads the Black trans advocacy organization the Lavender Rights Project, will represent the 37th Legislative District in south Seattle. She’s received over 88% of the primary vote, facing only a college student running as an independent.
She feels being the first is a “heavy burden.”
“You sometimes feel like you have a weight on your shoulder because you’re carrying the sort of hopes, dreams, wishes, concerns,” Scott said.
“I don’t want to do it alone for long, and so I need people to join me,” she added.
Scott will also be the first Black openly trans state lawmaker elected in the country. In Massachusetts, Althea Garrison served one term in the 1990s, but was outed while in office and didn’t publicly confirm she was transgender until years later.
Scott is an ordained Buddhist minister, but isn’t practicing currently. She moved to the Central District in the 37th in late 2024, and has worked in the district for nearly a decade. She grew up in Mississippi.
The seat opened up with Rep. Chipalo Street seeking the state Senate position Rebecca Saldaña is vacating to run for King County Council.
Scott will be on the ballot in November alongside a conservative-backed initiative to bar transgender girls from competing in girls’ school sports. She recently spoke at the rally launching the “No Hate in WA State” campaign to defeat the Let’s Go Washington initiative.
The Trump administration has also tried through various means to restrict the ways transgender Americans can participate in society.
Scott says the Legislature has taken an “incrementalist approach and one that is too moderate.”
“This urgency of this moment actually kind of demanded that I try at least to go in to be a voice for the community,” she told the Standard this week.
Rep. Shaun Scott, the Legislature’s other democratic socialist, hopes Jaelynn Scott’s presence on the House floor can “change the ways issues related to the LGBTQ+ and the trans community are discussed.”
Some recent debates over parental rights have spiraled into diatribes about transgender people from conservative lawmakers. Let’s Go Washington also has a parental rights measure on the November ballot.
Shaun Scott also believes Jaelynn Scott will be an ally in his push to tax major corporations.
“When there are two different Rep. Scotts making that point, it helps,” he said, noting the two are not related.
The first-term Democrat from the 43rd District proposed a payroll tax on large employers, but it didn’t go anywhere this year as progressives instead forged a successful effort to pass an income tax on high earners.
Jaelynn Scott’s top focus is raising more revenue for state services via taxes.
“It’s a matter of life and death at this point and the moment for a very careful strategy is well beyond that,” she said.
She’d like that money to go toward investing in housing construction, education and healthcare. The Legislature’s cuts this year to state childcare funding troubled her. Scott’s Lavender Rights Project helped lead the charge to recently open a new supportive housing complex. She wants the state to build more public-owned housing.
She has also expressed support for legislation considered this year to bar law enforcement in the state from employing former federal immigration agents hired under President Donald Trump.
The 37th district’s other state House member faces a tough reelection campaign. Rep. Sharon Tomiko Santos, D-Seattle, trails in a two-candidate primary to Kelabe Tewolde, who is running to her left. Santos is the longest-serving active member of the Legislature. Jaelynn Scott supports Tewolde, despite having a “lot of love and respect” for Santos.
The district covers diverse south Seattle communities like Beacon Hill, Rainier Valley, Columbia City and the Central District.
Source: Washington State Standard
This article was originally published by Washington State Standard.
