Tag Archives: Tracy Thorne-Begland

After a lengthy battle against local and national hate groups, yesterday former prosecutor and Navy jet pilot Tracy Thorne-Begland (above right) kissed his husband after being sworn in as Virginia’s first openly gay judge. That process took its toll on Thorne-Begland. In fact, he said the long nomination process left him physically and mentally exhausted. Thorne-Begland said the history-making moment …

After more than a year of GOP obstruction, today the Virginia House elected openly gay Judge Tracy Thorne-Begland, a formal naval aviator dismissed under DADT, to a six-year term on the Richmond District state bench. The interim Manchester General District Court judge — a respected former Richmond prosecutor and decorated Naval aviator who in 1992 challenged the military’s now defunct …