San Francisco’s GLBT Historical Society Museum welcomed Taiga Ishikawa, Japan’s first gay member of parliament, during his recent visit to San Francisco. Ishikawa, 48, is Japan’s highest-ranking and only LGBTQ politician currently serving in the House of Councilors, the upper house of Japan’s parliament, known as the Diet. Elected in 2019, he is a member of the Constitutional Democratic Party, the country’s largest opposition party. Ishikawa was the second out LGBTQ member to be elected to the nearly 700-member parliament. Kanako Otsuji, 47, a lesbian, served in parliament from 2017 to 2021. San Francisco was the last stop on Ishikawa’s tour of the United States. He toured the GLBT Historical Society Museum for an hour August 30. Ishikawa paused for a long time in front of the exhibit of gay men in a Japanese internment camp during World War II.