'The experience of being stopped and frisked just for being transgender was so traumatic for me. I was afraid of walking down the street'
Photo: Andrew Burton/Getty Images Since he began his run for president ten weeks ago, Mike Bloomberg has turned against the stop and frisk policy that marked a major part of his legacy as New York City mayor. Under his leadership, millions of black and Hispanic New Yorkers, especially LGBT people of color, were racially profiled, searched, and detained by police — actions which a federal judge later ruled were a violation of their constitutional rights.
When I was around 18 or 19, I had a friend who was transitioning, and she asked me to come with her to have fun for the first time at a gay club here in Jackson Heights. It was the first time I decided to use women’s clothes and makeup and high heels and dress up sexy for my boyfriend. I was so happy.
They pushed me in the van and I was in there for about three hours. It was freezing. Some other transgender individuals were in the van, other women wearing sexy clothing. At that time I was undocumented, and one thing that came to my mind is that they could literally deport me. I really was afraid of losing my freedom of being in this country. For three hours they drove us around and around looking for other women. Then eventually they took me to the precinct.
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