Christine Hallquist, CEO of Vermont Electric Coop (VEC), wants to be the first transgender governor in the United States. Perfectly out and proud about her identity, she says she’s still hoping that if she ultimately decides to enter the race by February 20, her gender ID won’t be the first thing voters focus on.
After all, since taking the help of VEC in 2005 Hall brought the power company from the verge of collapse to an “A-plus rated company with a stable outlook,” she told Vermont’s NBC News Channel 5 yesterday. “We’re now in our fifth year without a rate increase, while others are raising theirs,” she said. And the power company is now 96-percent carbon free. “We’ve demonstrated you can have a clean electric grid and it’s not going to cost more money,” she says.
“I consider myself a very strong leader with a good history who happens to be transgender,” she said. “I mean I’d ask the voters who may be struggling with the fact I am transgender to try to look beyond that. Try to look at what I’ve done.”
And, of course, there’s what she would do for Vermont as its governor.
Hallquist supports universal health care at the national level and is fully committed to protecting and advancing civil rights everywhere. Her plans also involves energizing the state’s economy, helping Vermont’s poor, expanding broadband service into the state’s rural communities and raising the state’s minimum wage to $15.
While she rooted for Republican Governor Rick Scott’s election in 2016 and says, “I want this to be the nicest gubernatorial campaign the country’s ever seen. I like Phil Scott” — she says there will be “distinct differences” between their policies.
“I can’t be a Republican today,” she adds. “It’s like kissing the ring of your oppressor. The [national] GOP platform is anti-LGBT, and anti-other minorities.”
