During his final week as a state lawmaker, incoming Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal penned a farewell letter reflecting on New York’s progress on LGBTQ rights and other areas since he was first elected to the State Senate in 2012.
Hoylman-Sigal, who represented Manhattan’s District 47 and chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee, made a significant impact on LGBTQ rights during his decade-plus tenure in the State Legislature, serving as a lead sponsor in many of the most critical pieces of legislation. One of the most consequential bills he spearheaded in the upper chamber was the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act, or GENDA, which added gender identity and expression as protected classes in New York State’s human rights and hate crimes laws. But Hoylman-Sigal also successfully championed numerous other LGBTQ-related bills, as well, including legislation barring conversion therapy for minors, repealing a discriminatory state loitering law known as a ban on “walking while trans,” and ushering in the so-called “Shield Law 2.0,” which improved on the existing Trans Safe Haven Act in an effort to protect transgender New Yorkers from the Trump administration. He also legalized gestational surrogacy — an issue that hit close to home for him since his children were born through surrogacy.
Some of Hoylman-Sigal’s other legislative campaigns passed through both houses of the State Legislature, but died at the desk of Gov. Kathy Hochul, who vetoed one of his bills a year ago that would have protected users of peer-to-peer money transfer apps — a measure that was proposed in response to a string of deadly attacks targeting gay men in nightlife establishments. In recent weeks, Hochul also vetoed Hoylman-Sigal’s bill prohibiting Medicaid service providers from requiring prior authorization for prescription drugs for the treatment or prevention of HIV and AIDS.
In addition to legislation, Hoylman-Sigal also pushed educational institutions and local leaders to stand up for LGBTQ rights. When Yeshiva University, for example, sought to deny recognition of the YU Pride Alliance, an undergraduate student group, Hoylman-Sigal wrote a letter calling on the New York State Inspector General Lucy Lang to investigate that school’s use of government funds for potential violations of state regulations.
In September of 2025, when Mayor Eric Adams vowed to evaluate his authority to change the city’s policy protecting bathroom access on the basis of gender identity, Hoylman-Sigal denounced those comments in an interview with Gay City News.
“It’s extremely disappointing that any candidate would throw trans kids under the bus out of an attempt to restart their political campaign,” said Hoylman-Sigal, who added that the LGBTQ community had concerns about Adams “almost from day one when he appointed an avowed anti-LGBT member to his transition committee — and it turns out we were right to be suspicious about his support for the transgender community.”
As a state senator, Hoylman-Sigal often used his voice at demonstrations and other events for LGBTQ-related causes. In the days following the 2024 presidential election, Hoylman-Sigal joined other lawmakers at the LGBT Community Center for a town hall to discuss how to protect LGBTQ rights in the second Trump era, In January of 2024, Hoylman-Sigal also joined lawmakers and advocates at a demonstration protesting Moms for Liberty, a group known for aligning with far-right conservatives and promoting book bans on LGBTQ rights, race, and other topics.
In his farewell letter, Hoylman-Sigal called it a “profound privilege” to represent his district in Albany.
“I am forever grateful for the opportunity to represent our West Side district, which runs from the iconic Stonewall Inn to West 103rd Street, or as I like to say (maybe too often), from ‘the gay bars to Zabar’s,'” Hoylman-Sigal wrote.
Speaking to Gay City News on election night in November, Hoylman-Sigal committed to standing up for LGBTQ youth in his new role as borough president.
“I, as Manhattan borough president, am going to make it part of my mission to protect the most vulnerable in our borough and certainly, queer homeless youth are at the top of that list because they need help,” Hoylman-Sigal said. “We know there’s a war on transgender young people and LGBTQ kids, and sadly that’s reflected in rates of suicide ideation, poverty and homelessness.”
