WHEELING, W.Va. (AP) — When Rosemary Ketchum gets introduced as the first openly transgender person to win elective office in West Virginia, there’s often a shocked look that comes across people’s faces.
“Folks will be like, ‘How did that happen?’ As if it’s like I won the lottery or solved a Rubik’s Cube in front of them or something,” she said. “They think it’s magic.”
To her, it doesn’t feel like magic. But in some ways, she can understand their surprise. Out of the handful of transgender officials in the U.S., only a few were elected in similarly rural, GOP-controlled states.
Ketchum, 29, is one of them. And next week, she could be elected again — this time as mayor of Wheeling, a former coal and steel production hub that’s about 60 miles (97 kilometers) outside Pittsburgh.
Growing up, she said she saw businesses shutter, and people struggle to find housing and mental health support amid the opioid epidemic. Her spirit is optimistic though, and she often comes back to a memory of first encountering “the friendly city” motto of Wheeling on a welcome sign.