San Diego City Councilmember Marni von Wilpert says her run for Congress isn’t about ambition, it’s about survival. The bisexual Democrat is challenging Republican Representative Darrell Issa in California’s 48th District, driven by what she calls an urgent need to protect democracy and LGBTQ+ rights under a second Trump presidency.
von Wilpert told The Advocate, “I’m watching things that I’ve built my career on, my life on, be crushed by President Trump…As a young woman in this fight, I’ve lost my rights under Roe v. Wade… and as an LGBTQ woman, I’m worried about losing my rights to equality under the law.” A former Peace Corps volunteer and civil rights attorney, von Wilpert has spent her career advancing labor rights and consumer protections.
On the San Diego City Council, she championed housing affordability and authored California’s first law banning untraceable ghost guns. She added, “Living our lives as LGBTQ individuals has always, unfortunately, been a brave act in America…If we don’t do it now… I don’t know what democracy we might have left to fight for three years from now.” Her campaign, she says, is grounded in love: “The antidote to hate is not tolerance, it’s love.”
