Gus believes that there is still important progress that needs to be made for the LGBT community to achieve the full equality and protection that it deserves.  As a member of the New York State Assembly, Gus will work fervently to achieve this agenda. His’s progressive agenda across the spectrum of issues facing the LGBT community includes:

• A commitment to pass the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act (GENDA) to ensure that transgender and gender non-conforming New Yorkers have the same protections against employment and housing discrimination on a statewide basis that NYC already offers to them, and that New York’s hate-crimes law extend to violence against all members of the LGBT community.
• Increase funding for New York’s programs for runaway and homeless youth.
• Ban so-called “conversion therapy” for minors in New York State as the practice that has been shown to be actively harmful to those who undergo such “therapy”.
• Explicitly legalize second parent adoption for same-sex couples in New York to ensure that all parents have legal rights to their children, regardless of what local laws may be in other states or countries to which they may travel.
• Reform New York’s surrogacy laws so that LGBT (and other) couples have access to an important option for building their families safely and securely right here in New York.
• Work to remove barriers to healthcare access that currently exist for many members of the LGBT community including structural and legal factors, social discrimination, and a lack of culturally competent health care providers.

For his progressive stance on the issues effecting LGBT New Yorkers, Gus has won the support of the STONEWALL Veterans’ Association and the endorsements of the GLBT Political Coalition and PRIDE Democrats, some of New York’s longest-standing and most significant groups fighting for LGBT equality and other progressive causes.