Poland's first openly gay elected
mayor, Robert Biedron, is an official candidate for president.
Biedron made headlines in 2014 when he
became mayor of the northern city of Slupsk. In 2011, Biedron became
Poland's first openly gay lawmaker in parliament. Last year, he was
elected a Member of the European Parliament (MEP).
On Tuesday, The Left (Lewica), a
political alliance that includes the Democratic Left Alliance, the
Left Together (Lewica Razem), and Spring, which Biedron launched last
year, approved Biedron as their candidate in the upcoming
presidential election.
Biedron “has clear views on the
secular state, on social affairs, on the EU, on matters of freedom,
including women's issues,” Wlodzimierz Czarzasty, leader of the
Democratic Left Alliance, is quoted as saying by the Paris-based news
agency Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The 44-year-old Biedron will face
incumbent right-wing President Andrzej Duda in the May election. Duda
has previously said that gay people are “destroying the traditional
family” and supports banning “gay propaganda.” Such laws
prohibit positive portrayals of the LGBT community in public spaces.
Biedron's Spring Party supports the
legalization of same-sex marriage in Poland.