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February 20, 2021 5:30 pm
Please join the Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity to celebrate the exceptional accomplishments of our 2021 Honorees.
HON. SABRINA S. MCKENNA
SUPREME COURT OF HAWAI’I
Upon her appointment to the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court in March 2011, Sabrina Shizue McKenna became the
first openly LGBTQ Asian Pacific American (APA) to serve on a state court of last resort. She previously
served as a Hawaiʻi state trial court judge for 17 years.
Justice McKenna regularly addresses LGBTQ and civil rights issues in Hawaii, the continental U.S., and
Asia, especially in Japan in her native Japanese language. In February 2020, she delivered a nationwide live
stream presentation from Tokyo on the history and law of same sex marriage for Marriage for All Japan. In
the Hawaiʻi judiciary, in recent years, she has been involved in the inclusion of gender identity and gender
expression as protected categories in the judiciary’s anti-bias and harassment policies and as additional
categories for which judicial bias or prejudice is prohibited under Rule 2.3 of the Hawaiʻi Revised Code of
Judicial Conduct. She has also rendered her written opinions non-binary.
HON. MARTIN J. JENKINS
SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA
Justice Martin J. Jenkins was confirmed as an Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court on
November 10, 2020 following his appointment by Gov. Newsom. Previously, he served as Senior Judicial
Appointments Advisor to Gov. Newsom. Preceding his work for Governor Newsom, he served as an
Associate Justice of the California Court of Appeal. Justice Jenkins’ judicial experience includes service as a
federal district judge for the Northern District of California; he was appointed by Pres. William Clinton in May
1997 and confirmed by the United States Senate in November 1997. After graduating from Santa Clara
University and before entering the University of San Francisco (USF) School of Law, Justice Jenkins was
briefly employed as a player by the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks. He obtained his law degree from USF in May
1980, when he received the Judge Harold J. Haley Award for “exceptional distinction in scholarship,
character, and activities.” After graduation, Justice Jenkins worked as a prosecutor for the Alameda County
District Attorney’s Office. He subsequently served as a trial attorney for the United States Department of
Justice, Civil Rights Division-Criminal Section in Washington D.C., and later was an attorney in Pacific Bell’s
Legal Department where he handled a wide variety of litigation matters.
U.S. SENATOR TAMMY BALDWIN
WISCONSIN
Tammy was elected to the U.S. Senate on November 6, 2012, winning a hard fought race and making
history as Wisconsin’s first woman to serve in the U.S. Senate and the first openly gay member elected to
the Senate. In the Senate she has worked across the aisle, to ensure that our veterans, military families and
wounded warriors receive the support and care that they have earned and deserve. The Jason Simcakoski
Memorial Opioid Safety Act, bipartisan legislation authored by Senator Baldwin in close consultation with
medical professionals, veteran’s service organizations, and the Simcakoski family, focuses on providing safer
and more effective pain management services to our nation’s veterans. Senator Baldwin believes that more
must be done to build an economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthy few. Tammy has worked to
strengthen our manufacturing economy and is a leader in the Senate of the Manufacturing Jobs for America
campaign to rally bipartisan support for legislation that would help manufacturers grow and create jobs.
The American Bar Association’s Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI), as one of the four ABA Goal III Entities, leads the Association’s commitment to diversity, inclusion and full and equal participation by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons in the Association, legal profession, and society.