Jarrett T. Barrios, the 40-year-old Cuban former Senator from Massachusetts will be taking over the helm of GLAAD, following Neil Giuliano recent exit. From GLAAD’s introductory press release:
The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) and GLAAD’s National Board of Directors today announced that Jarrett T. Barrios, a former State Senator from Massachusetts who now heads a leading health care foundation, will serve as GLAAD’s new President.
. . . At 40 years of age, Barrios will become the youngest leader of GLAAD and, as a Cuban-American, he will be the first head of a national LGBT organization fluent in English and Spanish. He was the first openly gay person and the first Latino elected to the Massachusetts State Senate, where he represented a largely white, Catholic, working-class district.
Barrios has been an advocate for LGBT equality since co-chairing Harvard’s LGBT student organization in the late 1980s and the Boston Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Project in the early 1990s. He has also served on the boards of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders and Greater Boston Lesbian and Gay Political Alliance.
As a State Senator, Barrios successfully helped lead the legislative effort to protect marriage equality in Massachusetts, and is best known for a globally televised speech where he spoke on discrimination faced by his own family.
Barrios is raising his two children with his husband, Doug Hattaway, a Democratic party consultant. Barrios is also one of the 24 founding members ofThe Dallas Principles.
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