Stu_Rasmussen
Stu Rasmussen
American politician (1948–2021)
Stu Rasmussen (September 9, 1948 – November 17, 2021) was an American politician. He became the nation's first openly transgender mayor when he was elected as the mayor of Silverton, Oregon in November 2008.[1][2]
He had previously been elected twice in the 1990s as mayor of Willamette Valley before coming out as transgender.[3] He was also three times a member of the city council.[4] He was assigned male at birth, identified as a man, preferred masculine pronouns, had breast implants, and had a feminine gender expression.[5] He sometimes went by the name Carla Fong.[5]
Rasmussen unsuccessfully ran for a seat in the Oregon House of Representatives in 1994 as an independent, and a seat in the Oregon State Senate in 1996 as a Democrat. He ran for the House again in 1998 as a Democrat, losing with 41% of the vote.[6]
In 2013 a musical about Rasmussen, Stu for Silverton, premiered at Seattle's Intiman Theatre.[5][7][8]
Rasmussen, a self-described fiscal conservative and social liberal,[2][4] served as city councilor until January 2009.[9]
He co-owned Silverton's 1936 Palace Theater, which shows first-run movies, since 1974.[10]
Rasmussen died from prostate cancer on November 17, 2021, at the age of 73.[11]