Assemblymember voices anti-LGBTQ remarks at community board meeting

Assemblymember Alec Brook-Krasny of Brooklyn’s District 46 hurled anti-trans and anti-gay rhetoric during a speech to Community Board 10 on June 15, prompting backlash from local political clubs.

“Now, who knows what self-evident truth is? Who is [a] boy, who is [a] girl? But I am not going to go political,” he said in his speech, which was recorded and posted on social media. “It is just absolutely, incredibly, wrong.”

Brook-Krasny’s district includes the southwestern corner of Brooklyn — including Dyker Heights, Seagate, Coney Island, and parts of Brighton Beach.

The Community Board publicly denounced his anti-trans rhetoric, while Bay Ridge Democrats quickly followed suit, blasting the assemblymember in a statement. Lambda Independent Democrats of Brooklyn, which is an LGBTQ political club in the borough, posted a tweet with three points: “Pride is inherently about our right to exist,” “Trans athletes are athletes,” and “To SPEAK about our community like this inspires violence. It is unacceptable coming from an elected official.”

In response to this public denunciation, Assemblymember Brook-Krasny responded on his Twitter account with further hateful and condemning speech against the LGBTQ community, Pride events, and, particularly, transgender individuals. 

“The LGBTQ+ community and even ‘pride’ itself is inherently sexual,” Brook-Krasny wrote. “Every letter literally represents a sexual orientation. I would even go as far as to say that it’s hyper-sexual. Anyone can go to a Pride parade and see for themselves that it is very sexualized. There are many participants there that are wearing things such as bondage gear or even wearing nothing at all.” Brook-Krasny went on to insist that Pride events expose children to “sexual” events and people. 

Brook-Krasny continued by saying that he was not hateful, citing his own background as a refugee from the Soviet Union.

“But certain things have gone too far in my opinion and I believe many people who are part of the LGBTQ+ community agree with that as well,” he wrote. “For example I don’t believe it’s ‘normal’ for someone to live their whole life as a male, compete in men’s sports, not do as well as they want to, conveniently change genders, and start crushing the girls they compete against.”

He went on to defend himself by repeating much of the anti-transgender rhetoric that has been prevalent throughout the country, going back to locker rooms and how he would not want his daughters to have to come “home from school when they were growing up” and tell him “that a boy was naked in the same locker room.”

The Bay Ridge Democrats issued a statement denouncing the words of Brook-Krasny, as well as his attempt to “revise history,” as the statement suggested. 

“We could go into all of the little details of why that statement is wrong — like that he actually said nothing about any specific bill or votes he took, that he is misrepresenting the bill that he now falsely claims he was discussing, or that he is using the imaginary problem of children being ‘trafficked’ to New York for ‘gender reassignment surgery’ as a boogieman to make people fear gender-affirming policies that will help save trans kids’ lives,” the statement said. 

His words — both what he said and the publicity around it — are dangerous, false, and harmful, the statement said.

“His words give people reason and permission to reject our queer neighbors and to try to drive them back into the closet, or worse,” Bay Ridge Democrats added. “There are people who will believe the lie that Brook-Krasny and other Republicans across the country are selling: that queer people are a danger to our children. That’s the danger of radicalization. If you believed this lie, what would you be willing to do?”

Bay Ridge Democrats ended their statement by expressing their active support and dedication to helping their constituents, from the seniors, children, and small business owners that Brook-Krasny expressed his support for, to “working families, students, young professionals, essential workers, first responders, and more”.

“And we do this in a deeper and more honest way than Brook-Krasny does, because when we stand for all these people, we mean all of them, including the queer people, people of color, immigrants, and others Brook-Krasny would leave out among them. We are unwavering in this commitment, as well as in our efforts to defeat Alec Brook-Krasny in November 2024.”