Dulce Quintero: “They/Them” Secretary of IDHS

Written by David E. Smith

JB Pritzker appointed Dulce Quintero in September 2023 as Secretary of the Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS), making Quintero the first gender-confused appointee to lead a statewide agency in Illinois. Quintero is an LGBTQIA+ activist who was inducted into the Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame in 2017 in recognition of her advocacy and leadership on behalf of LGBTQIA+ youth in Chicago. She is listed as

one of the first Latina organizers of the Dyke March in 2008 and was at the forefront of expanding visibility of the social justice rally citywide by moving the march from Andersonville to Pilsen and Humboldt Park.