Jarrett Barrios

Liz Malia (left) State Representative; Jarrett Barrios (left) State Senator. Photo by Ron Schlittler.

Jarrett T. Barrios, (D) Born October 16, 1960 State Representative, 28th District Cambridge, Massachusetts 40,000 constituents

Career Overview Elected November 1998 Reelected 2000, 2002

Liz Malia, (D) Born September 30, 1949 State Representative, 11th Suffolk Boston, Massachusetts 35,000 constituents

Career Overview Elected in a special election March 1998 Reelected November 1998 Reelected 2000, 2002, 2004, 2006

Barrios graduated from Harvard University with a degree in Social Studies, then from Georgetown University with a degree in law. Before being elected, Barrios practiced real estate law with a focus on affordable housing and government regulatory work. He was awarded the Pro Bono Attorney of the Year in 1997 by the Political Asylum and Immigrant Representation Project.

Interview with Jarrett Barrios from Out and Elected in the USA

Q: What is the general theme or message you try to deliver to your constituents and how do you do it?

A: I am sort of a salesman, a street peddler. I go door to door and I sell democracy to my constituents. The way politics works in Cambridge is that it is very hands on, and the way I was elected and the way I continue to function as an elected official is by peddling my ideas face to face. What I tell folks, in terms of how it is translated into a message, if you want to call it that, is – how would I say it – “if you’re are not participating, don’t complain.” (Chuckle.) It’s a sort of in-your-face type of politics. I’ll say, “You know, I really like your opinion about that – have you called your rep. about that? Have you called your city councilor about that?”

It is very important. The direct democracy piece of it crosses political viewpoints. I have a lot of very conservative people who support me because they are very attracted to the idea of being able to call their representative, get a call back, have me come to their door, of really being interested in their opinion, of responding, of basically taking care of business. You might call this like Al D’Amato, who had that reputation of being “Senator Pothole.” That’s one perspective on it – I think all in all that it is the same issue whether it is D’Amato or its me. Its about maintaining a direct link with the person you represent.

How does that translate when I talk to folks? You have a right to have a representative and you have a responsibility to let that representative hear from you. It’s that right you have hand in hand with that responsibility that makes democracy work. It is somewhat of a cerebral message, but it is one that at least in Cambridge, people both appreciate and support. So, that is sort of my shtick.

Q: Why is this important to you politically?

A: It is important to understand that I have a lot of Latinos in my constituency and African Americans who don’t participate in the process. So when I say I’m “selling democracy,” what I’m selling is the importance of participation to a variety of communities in my district. To pull members of my community – the people of color, especially within the Latino community, and me being Latino and one of the few Latinos who is elected in Massachusetts – it is very important.

Actually, it is something I spend a lot of time working on, not just in my district, but I travel around the state talking to Latino organizations in communities where they do not have Latinos who are elected to office. I encourage people to run for office, I encourage people to participate in local government to make their opinion heard, and that is why it has kind of become my mantra. I’m never going to be anything politically, that is my issues are not going to have even a fair hearing, aren’t going to be valued to the degree at which they merit being valued, until the people who benefit from those issues – the immigrants, the minorities, the poor – take the time to make their wishes heard. So, I spend a lot of my time getting them to be themselves and make their voices heard.

Q: Are there other ways you are encouraging participation?

A: We are doing a first-of-its-kind conference soon with the National Association of Latino Elected Officials, of which I am a member, and we are doing a campaign training institute for Latinos to get people to think about running for office. We are going to do all of the stuff that it takes to, you know, do a campaign plan. All the kinds of stuff that you maybe would take for granted if you’ve worked in a political office before. But, if you are from a community that doesn’t have a history of running candidates, that doesn’t have a history of elected officials, that certain skill bank doesn’t exist in your community, so were trying to enhance our community’s skills by encouraging this.

Liz Melia served as Chief of Staff to former Massachusetts State Representative John McDonough for eight years before she ran for office.

Interview with Liz Melia for Out and Elected in the USA

Q: How did you come to be involved in politics?

A: The one thing that is sort of basic is that I’ve gotten into gay politics indirectly through a general interest in political issues overall – being involved when I was younger particularly. The irony is that I was more-or-less involved with Catholics involved in social justice issues. I started to get involved in the political scene – the anti-war movement – while I was in college.

Coming out, I didn’t initially get involved in terms of issues in the gay community, but, very gradually, over a number of years – going to the local gay pride marches – in the mid-80s started to get interested in more organized politics. There was a lot starting to cook in Massachusetts at that point in time, so I had a chance to work starting at a really grassroots level in my own neighborhood with an activist Democratic Ward Committee. When I got involved there, there were a number of gay men who were active in that committee. It was a very diverse group – Black, White and Latino. And right around that time there was a push started to get the human rights legislation passed through the state legislature, so it sort of found me as much as I found it.

I became involved in terms of an expression, I guess, of my own interests. I guess that piece is kind of interesting to me when I think back on it. Some folks have a much more conscious introduction I think – my interest in progressive issues led me into it.

Q: Was there something specific that really hooked you?

A: There was a formative experience for me, again in the mid-80s, when I got involved with state politics. I was a co-founder of a group trying to open things up a little bit called Bay State Gay and Lesbian Democrats. We were working with the Democratic Party, which was a relatively progressive bunch of people compared to other parts of the country. But, we were having a lot of trouble getting support from what we saw as our natural allies, from the Democrats. So a few of us cautiously got involved in the state democratic party. There was a state convention at which 25-30 of us from across the state focused on getting language in the state Democratic Party Charter Preamble that recognized gay and lesbian issues as a human rights issue. We were kind of green and new at it, but we figured out what we had to do. The piece that still sticks in my mind clearly was the experience of going to the State Democratic Convention in Springfield with a few of us trying to collect signatures to get a motion on the floor to add gays and lesbians to the charter. We had a lot of allies, but people were not quite ready to talk about it, and it was not within the comfort level at that point for the organized Democratic machine – much like everywhere. The challenge was to get our motion onto the floor so we could get a vote on it and get it discussed in an open forum on state party policy. In order to do so, we really just had to go out and talk to all the other delegates. We had put together a “GAY VOTE” hat that, really, I kind of shudder when I look at it now – it was pretty hideous – one of those political hats that was lavender and it said GAY VOTE right across the front of it. This was not an issue on a lot of people’s radar, by choice I think.

You had to be prepared for a really broad range of responses. I was amazed at how much real support there was. We got enough votes to get the piece on the floor. We didn’t win. We felt like we didn’t win the battle, but I think, ultimately, won the war. It was sort of a watershed for a lot of us. It was the working together and getting the support we needed from ourselves and from other folks, and really identifying that as a necessity. And basically just saying, “Look, we are here. Were not going to go away.” The awareness we worked to focus on was that most of the activists in the party knew a good number of us because we were all active in different candidate’s campaigns. We all had track records of being activists, loyal Democrats, we were members of the party and we had worked on all kinds of issues together. I think one of the things that was a real challenge was to prompt folks to look at it and ask, “Are we now going to not acknowledge the issues these folks are bringing forward as Democrats?” and to do it honestly with the party we belonged to.

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