Tina Kotek (She/Her)
By Angel-Axel Macharia (He/Him)
In 2022, Tina Kotek became one of the country’s first two openly lesbian governors elected to office in the United States, and Oregon’s very first. But those who have paid attention to Oregon politics during the last twenty years understand that her influence began well before then. A strong and unyielding presence within state government, Kotek’s narrative is one of compassion, identity, and abiding faith in justice, and inspiring a life of public service.
Born in 1966 and raised in Pennsylvania, Kotek grew up with a twin brother and older sister. In high school she ran track and also played basketball and tennis. She went to Georgetown University in Washington DC after high school but dropped out after two years as she didn’t feel comfortable coming out, as a lesbian, at a Catholic private school. She didn’t make it to Eugene, Oregon until about four years later trying to finish her bachelors degree. After graduating from the University of Oregon and then the University of Washington, she landed back in Oregon, this time in Portland. As a young woman trying to find her voice and build her new life, she found both a political identity and a sense of community. She began her public service career focusing on hunger and poverty issues, quickly developing a reputation for her quick policy mind and moral compass.
Kotek first ran for the state of Oregon House of Representatives in 2004. In 2006, she was elected to the Oregon House of Representatives running as a Democrat. While serving in the House, Kotek was co-speaker pro tempore in 2011, House Democratic Leader in 2012, and Speaker of the House 2013-2022, which made her then the longest-serving Oregon Speaker of the House. Kotek became Speaker of the House in 2013, making her the first out lesbian to lead a legislative chamber in the United States. She oversaw one of the nation’s most liberal state legislatures for nearly a decade. She got elected as governor in 2023. She made history once more as she is only Oregon’s second woman governor. Her mark is on a wide range of policy triumphs: expanded access to health care, boosted minimum wages, improved mental health access, and advocated for LGBTQ+ members rights. Kotek has been given praise for facing down Oregon’s housing and homelessness crisis of urgent despair, even when the world was affected by the pandemic.
Outside of politics, Kotek shares a home in Portland with her wife, Aimee Wilson. Kotek has been praised for living a very modest and conventionally similar life to other Oregonians. Her household income has hovered around $100,000, according to her past three tax returns, and her one-story house in North Portland is valued at $580,000 by the county assessor. That is almost to-the-dollar Portland’s median home price over the summer. During her free time, she enjoys thrifting, antiquing and checking out different local coffee shops around Oregon.
