PHOTO ESSAY BY DONNA ACETO | On a spectacular early summer evening June 22, Mayor Bill de Blasio and First Lady Chirlane McCray played host to several hundred LGBTQ New Yorkers in a salute to Pride and, specifically, to Laverne Cox, the first out transgender television star (“Orange Is the New Black”).
Cox not only wowed the crowd, she also earned her stripes as an advocate, taking her chance at the microphone to endorse the Right to Know Act, a City Council proposal that would require police to get informed consent from any New Yorker they wish to search without specific legal authority — something the mayor has been unwilling to endorse.
