2024 Transgender Pioneer Award Recipient
The Board of Directors of International Transgender Education Organization is happy to announce the 2024 recipient of the distinguished Transgender Pioneer Award.
Shannon Price Minter is a native East Texan. He was born on February 14, 1961. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Texas at Austin and a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree from Cornell Law School. He is the long time Legal Director of the nonprofit National Center for Lesbian Rights. NCLR was established in 1977 by legal scholar Donna Hitchens and for nearly fifty years has been committed to advancing the civil and human rights of LGBTQ people via litigation, legislation, policy, and public education.
Shannon came to national attention in 2001 when he represented Diane Whipple, whose partner had died after being attacked by a dog. He won the case, which extended tort claims to same-sex domestic partners in California. Two years later, in 2003, he represented trans man Michael Kantaras in a child custody case featured on Court TV. In 2008, he successfully argued before the California Supreme Court on behalf of same-sex couples seeking the freedom to marry. When that victory was reversed by a ballot initiative, Shannon successfully defended the validity of existing marriages; Ken Starr was the opposing council. In 2015, he represented married same-sex couples from Tennessee in one of the four cases consolidated in Obergefell v. Hodges, which established marriage equality for LGBTQ individuals nationwide. Shannon has taught law at numerous universities and is the recipient of a 2006 Ford Foundation Leadership for a Changing World award. In 2017, Shannon successfully challenged President Trump’s transgender military ban. Today he continues to litigate on behalf of transgender people and their families including challenges to medical bans in Alabama, Florida, and Kentucky and to sports bans in Arizona and Utah.
When Shannon came out at age seventeen as a lesbian, his parents did not take it well. When he later told his family he was trans “they told me that I should not come home anymore.” Of this, Shannon said “During all those years when I was not able to be with my family, it was the worst pain I can imagine. Because I love them so much” (Funk, 2016). Other family members came to accept him, but it took the better part of a decade for his parents to come around.
In 2001, Shannon and his longtime partner Robin were married. They moved from the West Coast to the small Texas town where Shannon was born and managed to purchase his grandmother’s 1937 house.
On March 2, 2023, a tornado struck Shannon and Robin’s home, damaging it badly. Of immediate concern were the four dogs and ten cats they cared for, all rescued near their property; all were fine. The area’s residents, many of whom had known Shannon for his entire life, were wonderful. Friends started a GoFundMe campaign and raised $80,000, which went a long way toward restoration of the property. Without the fund, Robin told the Bay Area Reporter, it would have been impossible to save the house (Laird, 2023).
Despite it all, Shannon did not miss one day of work.
References
Funk, Mason. (2016, August 7). Interview with Shannon Minter. Outwords, (Accessed 23 May, 2024).
The Transgender Pioneer Award will be presented on October 26, 2024 in Provincetown during Transgender Week.
The Pioneer Award is the transgender community’s longest established award. It is honors lifetime achievements of those who have changed the world so trans people could come together in safety and comfort. We meet in Provincetown, Massachusetts each year to honor their work and thank them for all they have done for us.
For more information on the Transgender Pioneer Award and a list of past recipients, visit https://transweek.org/pioneer-award/.
