The fierce team of trans women working to fight every anti-LGBTQ+ bill in the nation

In honor of Women’s History Month, we’re highlighting some of the many incredible LGBTQ+ women of both the past and present, women who overcame unimaginable obstacles to change the world.

“I hate bullies. I just hate bullies,” transgender activist Alejandra Caraballo tells LGBTQ Nation. “I was bullied a lot as a kid, I was called a f***ot.”

This difficult past fuels Caraballo’s unwavering dedication to fighting for trans rights. “I’m a trans Latina woman, I have a shared identity with so many of these folks. I just want to help and make sure they can live a life as good as anyone can.”

Related: LGBTQ+ women are often discouraged from running for office. They’re doing it anyway.

But along the way, they face a myriad of obstacles that gay and bi male candidates more easily avoid.

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Caraballo works day and night – alongside fellow activist Allison Chapman and journalist Erin Reed – to not only combat the increasingly harmful anti-trans legislation being proposed throughout the country but also to give LGBTQ+ people a sense of optimism for the future.

Spearheaded by Reed, the team tracks every piece of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation across the country. All three of their tracking efforts began individually, and they joined forces when they realized their work overlapped.

Together, their work has been instrumental in keeping people aware of harmful legislation that emerges nearly every day, with over 400 anti-LGBTQ+ bills already documented this year. The legislation tracker is regularly cited by prominent news outlets and has become a key resource for those involved in the fight for LGBTQ+ equality. LGBTQ Nation regularly cites these women for their work tracking legislation and also for the invaluable insights they bring to the state of LGBTQ+ rights.

1. An anti-transgender omnibus bill Hb1104 has passed the Georgia Senate. Republicans took several anti-trans bills that failed to pass, and shoved them into a single piece of legislation, avoiding state-require deadlines.

Subscribe to support my work. pic.twitter.com/5mZZe1dNT3

— Erin Reed (@ErinInTheMorn) March 26, 2024

“I help popularize quite a few instances of anti-LGBTQ violence that then get picked up and get national media attention by virtue of my having quite a big platform on social media,” Caraballo said. “That can help shine a light to these things.”

“Beyond that, I’ve been doing a lot of work with journalists and serving as an expert to talk about things like networked harassment, incitement and stochastic terrorism, specifically online around anti-LGBTQ hate speech, specifically in the ways that manifest into real world violence.”

The Kansas legislature just passed a bill that will require age verification to access LGBTQ content. It defines material harmful to minors as "acts of homosexuality."

Kansas residents may soon need their state ID's to access content that depicts LGBTQ people. pic.twitter.com/enWocCRsUm

— Alejandra Caraballo (@Esqueer_) March 27, 2024

In addition to her work for the LGBTQ+ community, Caraballo is a civil rights attorney and clinical instructor at Harvard Law School CyberLaw Clinic. While serving as a legal analyst for bills that pop up during legislative tracking, she also does quite a bit of work advocating against harmful bills and acting as an expert source for reporters. She spoke with journalists, for example, about Florida’s threat to punish trans folks who try to change the gender listed on their state-issued driver’s licenses. 

“Just over a year ago, I testified before Congress and submitted in-depth documentation on the levels of anti-LGBTQ violence that have manifested, and some of the origins of it,” she says. “Additionally, I’ve served as a background source for tons of journalists that are covering this and helping to shape stories and point journalists in the right direction.”

Caraballo names Puerto Rican liberation activist Pedro Albizu Campos as inspiration for her work, along with LGBTQ+ rights activists Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera. Paintings of these activists hang on her walls.

“I’m always the saddest that [Johnson and Rivera] are no longer with us and that they didn’t get to see so much of the progress we had,” she explains. “But at the same time, the fierceness – one of the things I found myself gravitating towards was Sylvia Rivera’s speech at the Christopher Street Gay Liberation March in 1972.”

“She just stormed the stage and completely took it over. She was just spitting truth up there, despite people booing her… I think in that way, it’s just to be fierce and fearless, and just go forth and do what I need to do and don’t care about what that means in terms of what others think of me in that way.”

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Chapman’s role on the tracking team is similar to Caraballo’s, but as a software developer, she has also created software that helps automate their work.

In addition to legislative tracking, Chapman alerts activists to issues that are immediately concerning.

“I coordinate with activists on the ground and in other states… I see myself in the position as being eyes across the nation on LGBTQ+ legislation and then being able to communicate patterns and things that I am seeing that an activist on the ground in one state might not,” she explains to LGBTQ Nation.

Having pastors in schools as student counselors will endanger LGBTQ+ students.

This could open the door for refusal of service or worse, potentially trying to convince them that they are not queer.

Vote NO on KY SB2 https://t.co/EkcsVdRRO1

— Allison Chapman