10 Gay City News Impact Awards 2020
HONOREE
JARED ARADER
PRESIDENT, LAMBDA INDEPENDENT DEMOCRATS
Jared Arader, a native of the Hudson Valley, is a Brooklyn-based attorney,
advocate, and public servant who is president of the Lambda Independent
Democrats of Brooklyn (LID), the borough’s only LGBTQ political organization.
of the youngest members of Brooklyn’s LGBTQ community active in local
politics. Since his election as president last year, Jared, with the support of
LID’s leadership team, has rebranded the 42-year-old club’s image, drawing
When Jared joined LID in 2015, he observed that, at 30, he was one
from his own rolodex of younger, diverse, and well-connected LGBTQ Brooklynites.
The result: the club’s membership has ballooned, particularly among young Democrats. This year, the club organized heavily
around out LGBTQ district leader candidates Jesse Pierce and Samy Nemir Olivares, helping elect both of them and increasing the
community’s representation in the Brooklyn Democratic Party.
In March 2019, during a panel organized by LID, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez publicly supported the decriminalization
of sex work, becoming the fi rst of the city’s fi ve district attorneys to do so. Jared is also an advocate for the inclusion of non-binary
people on the Brooklyn Democratic Party’s County Committee, where they are currently excluded due to the requirement that
candidates run either for the male position or the female position in each district. He is an appointee to a panel formed by the county
party leader to examine how to reform the rules to cure the exclusion of non-binary Brooklynites looking to serve.
Last year, he was honored by City and State magazine as a “40 under 40” rising star, and has been named to City and State’s
LGBTQ Power 100 list in both 2019 and 2020.
Jared is noted for a risk-averse approach to politics, but his personal style has helped him build strategic relationships and alliances
across Brooklyn’s diverse political community. Being risk-averse does not mean that he isn’t persistently pressuring politicians,
policymakers, and other local Democratic clubs to be more inclusive of LGBTQ people and their concerns in their activities and
decisions.
Jared attempted to launch a Democratic club for gay Jews in 2016, but the effort did not catch fi re. Still, that experience did lead
him into seeking out a leadership role at LID.
Beyond his post at LID, Jared is a a rank-and-fi le member of both the Stonewall Democratic Club of New York City and the Jim
Owles Liberal Democratic Club.
Jared fi rst got involved in political issues as an intern reporter for the Legislative Gazette, Albany’s in-house newspaper, in 2007.
He also covered politics for the Purchase College Dispatch. Reporting on the state’s policymakers inspired Jared to pursue a career
as an attorney.
Jared has practiced as a litigator and worked for the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, UJA-Federation of New York, and the New
York Offi ce of Management and Budget. He is currently an in-house attorney for the city’s Department of Education.
Jared lives in Bedford-Stuyvesant with his partner David and their cat Gracie.