On May 24, 1993, Roberta Achtenberg became the first openly gay person confirmed by the United States Senate for a major political post when she was voted in by a 58-31 margin.  Achtenberg’s appointment to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development marked a historic turning point in American LGBTQ history.

The child of middle-class Jewish immigrants, Achtenberg was raised in a family that valued education. In 1971, she graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of California at Berkeley. She earned her JD from the University of Utah College of Law in 1975. She began her advocacy work shortly after, joining the National Lawyers’ Guild and founding the National Center for Lesbian Rights with fellow lawyer Donna Hitchens in 1978. 

A newly out lesbian, Achtenberg devoted herself to the National Lawyers’ Guild anti-sexism committee, where she created a manual to help attorneys represent their gay and lesbian clients. Her work there inspired her subsequent gay rights activism. In 1985, Achtenberg helped edit an expansive treatise on sexual orientation and the law. Working extensively with LGBTQ groups such as the Lesbian Rights Project and the Bay Area Lawyers for Individual Freedom, she quickly gained a reputation as a gay rights activist. 

In 1988, Achtenberg made her first run for office with a bid for a seat in the California State Assembly. Though she lost the election, she harnessed the momentum of her campaign to run for a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors a year later. She won the seat in 1990 and served the city for three years. 

A testament to her trailblazing power, Achtenberg’s 1993 appointment to the Office of Fair and Equal Housing Opportunity occurred at a time when gay rights were fiercely debated and widely contested in the public sphere. Just five months before her confirmation, the Clinton administration implemented the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, preventing LGBTQ service members from openly identifying as queer. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” encapsulated the anti-gay prejudice Achtenberg sought to combat. Her 1993 confirmation hearing reflected such biases. Deemed an “intolerant radical” and a “militant” activist, Achtenberg contended with the vitriol of the Religious Right. Despite such prejudice, she was ultimately confirmed by the Senate and achieved great success during her tenure in the Office of Fair and Equal Housing, where she tripled her staff’s training dollars, increased funding for housing initiatives, and fought lending discrimination. In 2011, President Barack Obama appointed her to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, another high point in her illustrious career as a public servant.

Sources:

“Achtenberg, Roberta (b. 1950),” GLBTQ Archive, accessed June 27, 2025, http://www.glbtqarchive.com/ssh/achtenberg_r_S.pdf. 

“Roberta Achtenberg,” U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, accessed June 27, 2025, https://www.usccr.gov/about/roberta-achtenberg. 

“Roberta Achtenberg: First out LGBTQ+ Senate-Confirmed Presidential Appointee,” Pride and Progress, accessed June 27, 2025, https://www.prideandprogress.org/hall-of-fame/roberta-achtenberg.