Meet Rachel Levine, one of the very few transgender public officials in America; Washington Post, 6/1/16

Katie Zezima, Washington Post; Meet Rachel Levine, one of the very few transgender public officials in America:

"Levine, 58, is one of the appointed state officials, and her foray into politics was more of a fluke than a concerted effort to work in government. In 2014, she was a top doctor at Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center and served on the board of Equality Pennsylvania, a statewide gay rights group, when Gov.-elect Tom Wolf (D) asked her to co-chair his transition team for health matters.

Wolf later asked her to serve as physician general. After a few days of debate, she decided to do it, mostly because she thought she could “make a difference from a broader point of view, from a broader brush...”

But first she had to get confirmed by the Pennsylvania Senate. Levine had been openly living as a transgender woman for a few years, and felt she could move past the issue simply by sitting down one-on-one with officials and talking about medicine and public health. Levine was unanimously confirmed."