Born in Panama, Dusty Aráujo has been an activist in the LGBT community in San Francisco since 1991. Together with his partner of 20 years he has adopted two children through the department of Social Services.

Mr. Aráujo is one of the founding members of the Lesbian and Gay Parents Association (LGPA) and contributed to the production of the video "Both of my Mom's names are Judy" which is part of a teacher training on homophobia in elementary schools. He also did these workshops in at least fifteen elementary schools of the San Francisco Unified School District.

Mr. Aráujo has been involved in HIV prevention work in the Latino LGBT community though the Latino Men and AIDS Project as an interpreter, transcriber and interviewer with different research projects. He has also been a volunteer with Community United Against Violence (CUAV) since 1994, serving as a speaker to youth in middle and high schools, colleges and universities.

Mr. Aráujo has been the Asylum Documentation Program Coordinator at the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) since 1997. The ADP supports claims for political asylum made by those who fear persecution based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and/or HIV/AIDS status through documenting human right abuses and through advocating on immigration issues with government institutions, service providers and others. The ADP at IGLHRC has supported over 5,800 asylum cases worldwide and knows of at least 600 asylums based on sexual orientation and/or HIV status cases that have been granted. Among those, possibly the first US Convention Against Torture claim granted of a transgender woman from Nicaragua.

In collaboration with other organizations and activists he has worked on advocacy around the April 1st dateline, organized around conditions in US INS detention for LGBT immigrants as well as done trainings about LGBT/HIV issues for the INS asylum office in San Francisco.