Houston on Saturday became the first major US city to elect an openly gay mayor, Annise Parker, after a hotly contested run-off election that gave gay and lesbian supporters a symbolic victory following defeats over legalising same-sex marriages in California and Maine.
"The voters of Houston have opened the door to history," Parker told supporters at a convention center in Houston. "I know what this win means to many of us who never thought we could achieve high office." A Democrat who is now the city controller, Parker will face a $130 million budget deficit when her term as mayor begins in early January.
She won the run-off against fellow Democrat Gene Locke, an African-American lawyer and former city attorney, after a four-way primary in November came up inconclusive.
Last year California passed a same-sex marriage ban known as Proposition 8 and Maine voters in November overturned a state law allowing same-sex marriages.
Other big US cities like Portland, Oregon and Providence, Rhode Island have openly gay mayors, but none the size of Houston - the fourth-biggest city in the nation with over 2 million residents. Abroad, Berlin and Paris are among cities with gay mayors.
"Most peoples' understanding of Texas would not be this open and this welcoming," said Chuck Wolfe, president of the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund. "But the people of Houston obviously don't feel that way."
Parker was opposed by conservative religious groups and anti-gay activists. Houston voters are concerned less with lifestyle issues and more with bread-and-butter issues like the budget, public safety and city services, said Bob Stein, a political science professor at Rice University in Houston.
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