President Obama Appoints White House’s First Transgender Employee (Photo)

The Obama administration made history today by hiring the first openly transgender official in White House history.
Raffi Freedman-Gurspan, who formerly served as a policy advisor at the National Center for Transgender Equality, has been hired as an outreach and recruitment director in the White House Office of Personnel.

 President Obama made equality for the LGBT community a priority of his administration, and advocates are now praising the president for diversifying his White House. Mara Keisling, executive
director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, said:
“I am elated that Raffi Freedman-Gurspan will become the first openly transgender staff member at the White House. President Obama has long said he wants his Administration to look like the American people. I have understood this to include transgender Americans.

A transgender person was inevitably going to work in the White House. That the first transgender appointee is a transgender woman of color is itself significant. And that the first White House transgender appointee is of a friend is inspiring to me and to countless others who have been touched by Raffi’s advocacy.”