Sheila Kuehl
When Kuehl was elected as a Democrat to the California Assembly in 1994 a Republican majority was seated for the first time in 20 years. This was due largely as an out-flowing of the enthusiasm stoked up by Newt Gingrich's strategy supporting Republicans for the Federal Legislature. Kuehl recalled "The Republican majority was quite a different kind of Republican, not a moderate, not a Rockefeller Republican. They were primarily Bible-thumpers and very right-wing. So it was not the most welcoming Republican group, though they loved Zelda Gilroy, and it was very difficult for them because they already liked me so much…. And to their surprise, we all got along very well. ...The Republicans were pretty horrible about LGBT stuff. They all virtually said stuff like, 'Well, they're all spawn of the devil, oh, but not you, Sheila….'"
Kathleen Lynch (politician)
She first became involved in politics in 1985 when she was elected to Cork Corporation for the Workers' Party. She came to prominence as a campaigner against service charges being introduced by the corporation. When that party split in 1992, Lynch and other members of the Cork organisation were initially undecided as to their stance, but she subsequently decided to follow former party president Proinsias De Rossa and the bulk of the party's TDs into the new organisation which later took the name Democratic Left. Lynch was first elected to Dáil Éireann as Democratic Left TD for Cork North-Central at a by-election in 1994 caused by the death of Labour Party TD Gerry O'Sullivan. She lost her Dáil seat at the 1997 general election but was re-elected again at the 2002 general election, this time for the Labour Party following the merger of Democratic Left with that party in 1999.