List of openly LGBTQ heads of state and government

Last updated • 2 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

Edgars Rinkevics as president-elect, 2023-05-31 (cropped).jpg
Xavier Espot Zamora in 2024 (cropped).jpg
Incumbent openly LGBTQ national leaders:

Politicians openly identifying themselves as members of the LGBTQ community have served as national leaders in nine sovereign states. Of those countries, two have had an openly LGBTQ head of state, who serves as the country's public persona. Seven other sovereign states have had an openly LGBTQ head of government, who is the highest official in that state's government. No country has had both an openly LGBTQ head of state and openly LGBTQ head of government, nor more than one openly LGBTQ national leader. Additionally, no sovereign state outside of Europe has had an openly LGBTQ national leader.

Contents

Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir became the first openly LGBTQ politician to serve as a country's head of government upon the start of her tenure as Prime Minister of Iceland in 2009. Two years later, Elio Di Rupo became the first openly gay head of government upon becoming Prime Minister of Belgium. Upon assuming the office of a captain regent of San Marino on 1 April 2022, Paolo Rondelli became the first openly LGBTQ head of state.

Gay men have been the majority of openly LGBTQ national leaders, with seven of the nine politicians in this role identifying as such. The other two openly LGBTQ heads of government identify as lesbian. Other identities in the LGBTQ community, including bisexual, transgender, and intersex, have therefore not been openly represented in world heads of state and heads of government.

The totals for this list include only openly identifying members of the LGBTQ community who have come out prior to the end of their term as head of state or head of government of a United Nations member state. Therefore, LGBTQ national leaders who were closeted or outed during their tenure as a national leader are not included. Moreover, openly LGBTQ politicians who have served in other positions, such as acting president, deputy prime minister, and leaders of subnational entities, are excluded from this list.

List

The following list includes all openly LGBTQ heads of state and government. Politicians are listed based on the start of their tenures as national leaders.

 *  denotes an incumbent leader of a sovereign state
NamePortraitCountryOfficeType of leaderTenure startTenure endTerm lengthSexual orientation [a]
Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir Johanna sigurdardottir official portrait trim.jpg Flag of Iceland.svg  Iceland Prime Minister Head of government 1 February 200923 May 20134 years, 111 days Lesbian [1]
Elio Di Rupo Elio Di Rupo PES-Kongress 2014.jpg Flag of Belgium (civil).svg  Belgium Prime Minister Head of government6 December 201111 October 20142 years, 309 days Gay [2]
Xavier Bettel Tallinn Digital Summit. Handshake Xavier Bettel and Juri Ratas (36718144533) CROP BETTEL.jpg Flag of Luxembourg.svg  Luxembourg Prime Minister Head of government4 December 201317 November 20239 years, 348 daysGay [3]
Leo Varadkar Leo Varadkar TD (cropped).jpg Flag of Ireland.svg  Ireland Taoiseach Head of government14 June 201727 June 20203 years, 13 daysGay [4]
17 December 20229 April 20241 year, 114 days
Ana Brnabić Ana Brnabic at the European Commission.jpg Flag of Serbia.svg  Serbia Prime Minister Head of government29 June 201720 March 20246 years, 265 daysLesbian [5]
Xavier Espot Zamora* Obisk predsednika vlade Andore Xavierja Espota Zamore na ministrstvu za finance. (53983187700) (cropped).jpg Flag of Andorra.svg  Andorra Prime Minister Head of government16 May 2019Incumbent5 years, 301 daysGay [6]
Paolo Rondelli Giuramento del Capitano reggente Paolo Rondelli.jpg Flag of San Marino.svg  San Marino Captain Regent Head of state 1 April 20221 October 2022183 daysGay [7]
Edgars Rinkēvičs* Edgars Rinkevics as president-elect, 2023-05-31 (cropped).jpg Flag of Latvia.svg  Latvia President Head of state8 July 2023Incumbent1 year, 248 daysGay [8] [9]
Gabriel Attal Gabriel Attal, February 2023.jpg Flag of France.svg  France Prime Minister Head of government9 January 20245 September 2024240 daysGay [10]

See also

Footnotes

Notes

  1. ↑ All openly LGBT national leaders have been cisgender and endosex.

Citations

  1. ↑ Gunnarsson, Valur (30 January 2009). "Iceland to elect world's first openly gay PM". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 June 2017.
  2. ↑ Vander Taelen, Luckas (10 December 2011). "Can Belgium's new prime minister keep living the dream?". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 June 2017.
  3. ↑ Gayle, Damien (15 May 2015). "Luxembourg's prime minister first EU leader to marry same-sex partner". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 June 2017.
  4. ↑ Dunne, Seán (2 June 2017). "Varadkar set to be 'first openly gay Irish PM', say world headlines". The Irish Times. Retrieved 3 June 2017.
  5. ↑ "Srbija ima novu vladu. Ana Brnabić postala premijerka. (Serbia has a new government. Ana Brnabić becomes prime minister". Dirketno.hr (in Serbian). 29 June 2017. Archived from the original on 24 August 2017. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
  6. ↑ "El presidente de Andorra sale del armario: "Yo soy gay y nunca me he escondido"". The Objective (in Spanish). 11 September 2023.
  7. ↑ Anarte, Enrique (12 January 2022). "Tiny European states play catch up on LGBT+ equality". news.trust.org. Retrieved 28 March 2022.
  8. ↑ "Par Valsts prezidentu ievēlēts ārlietu ministrs Edgars Rinkēvičs". LSM (in Latvian). 31 May 2023. Retrieved 31 May 2023.
  9. ↑ Eglitis, Aaron (31 May 2023). "EU's First Openly Gay Head of State Elected by Latvian Assembly". Bloomberg. Retrieved 31 May 2023.
  10. ↑ Biseau, Grégoire (31 October 2021). "Stéphane Séjourné and Gabriel Attal, a couple at the heart of power". Le Monde. Retrieved 9 January 2024.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.