quijano is the first woman and first minority to represent the 20th district. quijano was selected by a convention of union county democrats over patricia perkins-auguste by a vote of 87-82 to replace the vacant seat of neil cohen who resigned. cohen resigned after staffers for then assemblyman joseph cryan and then senator raymond lesniak found child pornography on cohen's computer. she was sworn in on september 25, 2008. she has been serving as general assembly deputy majority leader and chairwoman of the assembly homeland security and state preparedness committee. this is in addition to serving as a member of the labor committee. in june 2017, quijano introduced a bill to designate "streptomyces griseus" as new jersey's state microbe, to be added to the state's other state symbols. "s. griseus" was chosen for this honor because it is a new jersey native that made unique contributions to healthcare and scientific research worldwide. a strain of "s. griseus" that produced the antibiotic streptomycin was discovered in new jersey in 1916 and developed into an antibiotic by a rutgers university team by albert schatz and selman waksman in 1943. a companion bill was introduced in the senate in may 2017 by samuel d. thompson.