UPDATE: She won! True, she only edged out her main opponent, Melinda Katz (dubbed the "establishment favorite" by The New York Post), by 1.3 percent, but that total was enough to avoid a mandatory recount. She'll face a Republican opponent in November.
QUEENS, N.Y.—The movement to legalize and/or decriminalize sex work is growing in this country by leaps and bounds—and few places seem to be more sex-work-friendly than New York, which as AVN reported introduced a bill earlier this month that would abolish criminal penalties for selling and purchasing sexual services and make other changes to laws that target sex workers.
But while that bill is being discussed in Albany, residents of the NYC borough of Queens may find decriminalization moving even faster if the current leading progressive candidate for borough district attorney, Tiffany Cabàn, is victorious in tomorrow's primary election.
Like U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, whose 14th District includes portions of north-central Queens, Cabàn is a Democratic Socialist—and gay—and the famous AOC has endorsed her candidacy, which should hold some sway with the overwhelming majority of voters who elected AOC last fall.
Cabàn, a former defense attorney, also has the endorsements of two major presidential candidates.
"I am pleased to endorse Tiffany Cabàn, who is running for district attorney in Queens, New York," said Bernie Sanders. "Like our campaign, Tiffany is taking on virtually the entire political establishment. And like our campaign, Tiffany has put together the kind of grassroots effort it takes to win."
"I’m proud to endorse Tiffany Cabán for Queens DA in New York," echoed Elizabeth Warren. "Tiffany Cabàn will fight for working families and work to end mass incarceration. Make sure you get out and vote for Tiffany next Tuesday, June 25."
According to an article in the UK's The Guardian, "The New York Times ... argu[ed] in an editorial that Cabán was the Democrat best poised to become 'one of a growing number of prosecutors to show what can be done without infringing on civil liberties, criminalizing black and Hispanic Americans and mistaking punishment for the only form of justice"—and it's those stances that led to the New York Post publishing a hit piece on Cabàn on Saturday.
"With the front-runners in Tuesday’s Queens DA primary vowing to not prosecute hookers—and the leading progressive candidate saying she’ll let johns and pimps walk, too—some critics worry the borough will become the world’s biggest brothel," began the inflammatory article, which suggested that either of her opponents, Queens Borough President Melinda Katz or former State Supreme Court Judge Greg Lasak, would be a better choice.
But no matter who wins, sex work in Queens will undoubtedly continue, notably in what's been described as "the red-light district along Roosevelt Avenue."
"It’s here, on any given night, that the city’s LGBT sex workers ply their trade," The Guardian's Edward Helmore reported. "It’s a notoriously insecure and problematic line of work, and none more so than for immigrant transsexual sex workers, thanks to elevated levels of police harassment, lack of access to the system of bail bonds, and the threat of roundups by the Immigration Customs Enforcement agency."
And that's just what Cabàn aims to change. At a rally for transgender sex work rights held last week, Cabàn said that, as DA, she would "not ask for cash bail for any charges and would not prosecute sex workers or their customers."
"If Tiffany Cabán wins the Democratic primary in late June and general election in November—and actually puts her plan in place—it would mark one of the biggest successes for the sex work decriminalization movement that, after years of struggling to gain mainstream traction, has growing popularity and political influence across the country," wrote Otillia Steadman on BuzzFeed News on June 14.
And it's important that Cabàn work to reform the laws targeting sex workers—especially transgender ones. In recent months, TG sex workers have been held for many months in Rikers Island because they've been unable to raise bail in amounts as much as $25,000—and one TG worker, the African-Latina Layleen Polanca, was found dead in her solitary confinement cell two weeks ago.
Quoth Helmore, "Polanco’s death highlights three discriminatory aspects of the legal system, according to Decrim NY, a group campaigning for the decriminalization of sex work: 'She was criminalized for sex work. She was held on $500 bail for misdemeanor charges. And she was placed in solitary confinement.'"
"We’ve been punching public health issues through our criminal justice system and they don’t belong in the system, especially when we’re talking about communities that have been historically marginalized,” Cabán told the Observer, an online news publication. "Her candidacy, she said, represented 'a clean break from the status quo. So I understand that people who are resistant to change might be a little bit nervous.'"
Hopefully, not so nervous that they fail to vote for Cabàn tomorrow—and in November if she wins the primary!
