Christine Quinn
Christine Quinn
Christine Callaghan Quinnis an American politician. A member of the Democratic Party, she formerly served as the Speaker of the New York City Council. The third person to hold this office, she is the first female and first openly gay speaker. As City Council speaker, Quinn was New York City's third most powerful public servant, behind the mayor and public advocate. She ran to succeed Michael Bloomberg as the city's mayor in the 2013 mayoral election, but she came in...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth25 July 1966
CityGlen Cove, NY
CountryUnited States of America
We voted to make it so that people who are registered domestic partners, members of civil unions or gay marriages from other jurisdictions, will now be recognized as registered New York city domestic partners,
I think 'having it all' is a phrase I don't particularly like. You need to have what you want. 'All' seems to me to be an imposed list, an imposed definition by society of what 'all' is supposed to be.
I think it's a big deal symbolically because it's New York kind of going as far as we can in relationship law, ... It's also a big deal because it's New York City trying to make relations as equal as we possibly can.
Let me say that I am incredibly proud that in the most diverse city in the world, diversity is seen as a strength, and not an impediment.
There will be a moment in life, whether you're forceful or not, where someone will label you something that is negative.
I'm a lesbian. Yup. Hundred percent. Hundred percent. I remember being in college, and I had fallen in love with this woman, and I remember sitting in my dorm room saying out loud to myself, like, 'You have enough problems. You are not gonna let this happen.' You just kinda, like, stuff it away until - well, some people stuff it away forever.
Congressmember Weiner has shown just a pattern of reckless behavior, an inability to tell the truth, and what New Yorkers deserve is a mayor with a record of delivering for them, of vision, and a level of maturity and responsibility.
When I was running for speaker, people would go out of their way to point out why I wasn't going to win: 'You're a woman, you're too liberal, you're gay, you're from the West Side of Manhattan,' which in that context was an insult.
Bike lanes are clearly controversial. And one of the problems with bike lanes - and I'm generally a supporter of bike lanes - but one of the problems with bike lanes has been not the concept of them, which I support, but the way the Department of Transportation has implemented them without consultation with communities and community boards.
You might as well go through life the way you want to. If what you want is to be engaged and forceful, to 'lean in,' well, do that.
To get things done, you have to get people together.
Bike lanes - I put that now in the category of things you shouldn't discuss at dinner parties, right? It used to be money and politics and religion. Now, in New York, you should add bike lanes.
I try to not think too much about how stuff gets seen as it's being done by a woman. Because if you think about it, then you end up thinking about how you're acting, and if you are thinking about how you're acting, then you are preoccupied and you're going to end up being insincere. You're kind of not present.
I feel very proud and honored, and I feel like it's a wonderful thing, and I feel a little overwhelmed by the responsibility my colleagues are going to give me, and I feel like I want to work very, very hard to make all of my colleagues on the City Council proud, and I hope that I'll be able to live up to the trust that they put in my hands.