National
Pro-LGBT Republican endorses Romney
Ros-Lehtinen co-sponsor of DOMA repeal

A Republican U.S. House member known for holding the most pro-LGBT views in her caucus has endorsed former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in his bid for president.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), who also serves as chair of the House Foreign Relations Committee, announced her support for Romney in a statement on Tuesday that also criticized President Obama.
“The policies of the past three years have put America’s standing in the world at risk,” Ros-Lehtinen said. “It is time we had a president who understands that our country must lead. Mitt Romney believes that America is an exceptional nation and has a strategy to restore our country’s greatness.”
On the Romney economic plan, which, among other things, would cut the corporate income tax to 25 percent, Ros-Lehtinen said, “The Romney jobs plan will create jobs and opportunity for all especially in South Florida where we are passionate in the pursuit of the American dream.”
Ros-Lehtinen’s endorsement of Romney is noteworthy to the LGBT community because she’s among the most pro-LGBT Republicans in Congress. In September, she became the first Republican to co-sponsor legislation to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act — much to the consternation of social conservatives.
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She’s also an original co-sponsor of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and the Domestic Partnership & Benefits Obligations Act. Last year, she was among five Republicans to vote for “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal in May even before the Pentagon report was published.
Ros-Lehtinen endorsed Romney along with Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.) and his brother former Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, who also represented a district in Florida before he retired early this year. All three were also designated as Romney’s foreign policy advisers and made part of his Latin American Working Group.
The three Floridians are Cuban-Americans and come from a state with a large population of people of Cuban descent. The endorsement could be a boost to Romney in winning a state primary that is seen as critical for securing the Republican nomination.
In a statement, Romney thanked Ros-Lehtinen and the Diaz-Balart brothers for supporting his campaign.
“I am proud to be working with Ileana, Mario, and Lincoln,” Romney said. “They’re conservative leaders who will help me articulate my vision to make America more prosperous at home and respected throughout the world.”
Romney, seen as the establishment candidate among GOP presidential hopefuls, has distinguished himself among other Republicans pursuing the White House for saying he’s open to the idea of LGBT rights.
Last week, he told the Nashua Telegraph, “I favor gay rights,” and said he doesn’t “believe in discriminating in employment or opportunity for gay individuals.” Still, Romney said he doesn’t support same-sex marriage.
His comments recall a letter his signed as a U.S. Senate candidate in 1994 pledging to co-sponsor ENDA and to be a better advocate on LGBT rights than the late Sen. Edward Kennedy.
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But in August, he was among the presidential candidates who signed a pledge to back a U.S. constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage and to defend DOMA in court.
Also last week, the Romney campaign distributed a flier in Iowa emphasizing his social conservative values — including his opposition to same-sex marriage.
“As governor, Mitt Romney fought against gay marriage in Massachusetts,” the mailer reads. “He supports a federal amendment to define marriage as between one man and one woman.”
Ros-Lehtinen’s endorsement of Romney inspired mixed reactions among LGBT groups — largely depending on the political affiliation of the organizations.
R. Clarke Cooper, executive director of Log Cabin Republicans, said Ros-Lehtinen’s endorsement doesn’t reflect the views of his organization, although he’s pleased Romney welcomed her support.
“Log Cabin Republicans does not issue endorsements until the RNC convention, but we are pleased to see Gov. Romney welcomed the endorsement of Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a strong conservative advocate for the gay community,” Cooper said.
Fred Sainz, vice president of communications for the Human Rights Campaign, said he isn’t surprised that a Republican lawmaker — pro-LGBT or otherwise — would back a pro-LGBT candidate.
“Her endorsement of a Republican presidential candidate was not a surprise,” Sainz said. “Rep. Ros-Lehtinen has proven that you can totally square being a Republican and wholeheartedly support LGBT issues.”
But Jerame Davis, interim executive director of the National Stonewall Democrats, took a dig at the multiple positions that Romney has held on LGBT issues in response to the Ros-Lehtinen endorsement.
“It’s hard to say what Rep. Ros-Lehtinen’s endorsement of Mitt Romney says about her relationship with the LGBT community,” Davis said. “Which Mitt Romney did she endorse? Was it the Mitt Romney who just last week signed the National Organization for Marriage’s draconian anti-equality pledge? Or was it the Mitt Romney who claimed in 1994 that he’d be a better advocate for LGBT equality than the late Sen. Ted Kennedy?”
Davis concluded, “So many choices — I’m sure she picked the one that was closest to her own views.”
U.S. Supreme Court
Activists rally for Andry Hernández Romero in front of Supreme Court
Gay asylum seeker ‘forcibly deported’ to El Salvador, described as political prisoner

More than 200 people gathered in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday and demanded the Trump-Vance administration return to the U.S. a gay Venezuelan asylum seeker who it “forcibly disappeared” to El Salvador.
Lindsay Toczylowski, president of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, a Los Angeles-based organization that represents Andry Hernández Romero, is among those who spoke alongside U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) and Human Rights Campaign Campaigns and Communications Vice President Jonathan Lovitz. Sarah Longwell of the Bulwark, Pod Save America’s Jon Lovett, and Tim Miller are among those who also participated in the rally.
“Andry is a son, a brother. He’s an actor, a makeup artist,” said Toczylowski. “He is a gay man who fled Venezuela because it was not safe for him to live there as his authentic self.”
(Video by Michael K. Lavers)
The White House on Feb. 20 designated Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang, as an “international terrorist organization.”
President Donald Trump on March 15 invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which the Associated Press notes allows the U.S. to deport “noncitizens without any legal recourse.” The Trump-Vance administration subsequently “forcibly removed” Hernández and hundreds of other Venezuelans to El Salvador.
Toczylowski said she believes Hernández remains at El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, a maximum-security prison known by the Spanish acronym CECOT. Toczylowski also disputed claims that Hernández is a Tren de Aragua member.
“Andry fled persecution in Venezuela and came to the U.S. to seek protection. He has no criminal history. He is not a member of the Tren de Aragua gang. Yet because of his crown tattoos, we believe at this moment that he sits in a torture prison, a gulag, in El Salvador,” said Toczylowski. “I say we believe because we have not had any proof of life for him since the day he was put on a U.S. government-funded plane and forcibly disappeared to El Salvador.”
“Andry is not alone,” she added.
Takano noted the federal government sent his parents, grandparents, and other Japanese Americans to internment camps during World War II under the Alien Enemies Act. The gay California Democrat also described Hernández as “a political prisoner, denied basic rights under a law that should have stayed in the past.”
“He is not a case number,” said Takano. “He is a person.”
Hernández had been pursuing his asylum case while at the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego.
A hearing had been scheduled to take place on May 30, but an immigration judge the day before dismissed his case. Immigrant Defenders Law Center has said it will appeal the decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals, which the Justice Department oversees.
“We will not stop fighting for Andry, and I know neither will you,” said Toczylowski.
Friday’s rally took place hours after Attorney General Pam Bondi said Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who the Trump-Vance administration wrongfully deported to El Salvador, had returned to the U.S. Abrego will face federal human trafficking charges in Tennessee.
National
A husband’s story: Michael Carroll reflects on life with Edmund White
Iconic author died this week; ‘no sunnier human in the world’

Unlike most gay men of my generation, I’ve only been to Fire Island twice. Even so, the memory of my first visit has never left me. The scenery was lovely, and the boys were sublime — but what stood out wasn’t the beach or the parties. It was a quiet afternoon spent sipping gin and tonics in a mid-century modern cottage tucked away from the sand and sun.
Despite Fire Island’s reputation for hedonism, our meeting was more accident than escapade. Michael Carroll — a Facebook friend I’d chatted with but never met — mentioned that he and his husband, Ed, would be there that weekend, too. We agreed to meet for a drink. On a whim, I checked his profile and froze. Ed was author Edmund White.
I packed a signed copy of Carroll’s “Little Reef” and a dog-eared hardback of “A Boy’s Own Story,” its spine nearly broken from rereads. I was excited to meet both men and talk about writing, even briefly.
Yesterday, I woke to the news that Ed had passed away. Ironically, my first thought was of Michael.
This week, tributes to Edmund White are everywhere — rightly celebrating his towering legacy as a novelist, essayist, and cultural icon. I’ve read all of his books, and I could never do justice to the scope of a career that defined and chronicled queer life for more than half a century. I’ll leave that to better-prepared journalists.
But in those many memorials, I’ve noticed something missing. When Michael Carroll is mentioned, it’s usually just a passing reference: “White’s partner of thirty years, twenty-five years his junior.” And yet, in the brief time I spent with this couple on Fire Island, it was clear to me that Michael was more than a footnote — he was Ed’s anchor, editor, companion, and champion. He was the one who knew his husband best.
They met in 1995 after Michael wrote Ed a fan letter to tell him he was coming to Paris. “He’d lost the great love of his life a year before,” Michael told me. “In one way, I filled a space. Understand, I worshiped this man and still do.”
When I asked whether there was a version of Ed only he knew, Michael answered without hesitation: “No sunnier human in the world, obvious to us and to people who’ve only just or never met him. No dark side. Psychology had helped erase that, I think, or buffed it smooth.”
Despite the age difference and divergent career arcs, their relationship was intellectually and emotionally symbiotic. “He made me want to be elegant and brainy; I didn’t quite reach that, so it led me to a slightly pastel minimalism,” Michael said. “He made me question my received ideas. He set me free to have sex with whoever I wanted. He vouchsafed my moods when they didn’t wobble off axis. Ultimately, I encouraged him to write more minimalistically, keep up the emotional complexity, and sleep with anyone he wanted to — partly because I wanted to do that too.”
Fully open, it was a committed relationship that defied conventional categories. Ed once described it as “probably like an 18th-century marriage in France.” Michael elaborated: “It means marriage with strong emotion — or at least a tolerance for one another — but no sex; sex with others. I think.”
That freedom, though, was always anchored in deep devotion and care — and a mutual understanding that went far beyond art, philosophy, or sex. “He believed in freedom and desire,” Michael said, “and the two’s relationship.”
When I asked what all the essays and articles hadn’t yet captured, Michael paused. “Maybe that his writing was tightly knotted, but that his true personality was vulnerable, and that he had the defense mechanisms of cheer and optimism to conceal that vulnerability. But it was in his eyes.”
The moment that captured who Ed was to him came at the end. “When he was dying, his second-to-last sentence (garbled then repeated) was, ‘Don’t forget to pay Merci,’ the cleaning lady coming the next day. We had had a rough day, and I was popping off like a coach or dad about getting angry at his weakness and pushing through it. He took it almost like a pack mule.”
Edmund White’s work shaped generations — it gave us language for desire, shame, wit, and liberation. But what lingers just as powerfully is the extraordinary life Ed lived with a man who saw him not only as a literary giant but as a real person: sunny, complex, vulnerable, generous.
In the end, Ed’s final words to his husband weren’t about his books or his legacy. They were about care, decency, and love. “You’re good,” he told Michael—a benediction, a farewell, maybe even a thank-you.
And now, as the world celebrates the prolific writer and cultural icon Edmund White, it feels just as important to remember the man and the person who knew him best. Not just the story but the characters who stayed to see it through to the end.
District of Columbia
In town for WorldPride? Take a D.C. LGBTQ walking tour
Scenes of protest, celebration, and mourning

As Washington welcomes the world for WorldPride, it’s essential to honor the city’s deep-rooted LGBTQ history—an integral part of the broader story of the nation’s capital. The following locations have served as cornerstones of queer life and activism in D.C., shaping both local and national movements for LGBTQ rights. So take a walk around “the gayest city in America” and check out these sites.
DUPONT CIRCLE AREA
Dupont Circle
Central hub of LGBTQ life since the early 20th century, hosting Pride parades, Dyke Marches, and cruising culture. A long-standing site of protests and celebrations.
Washington Hilton – 1919 Connecticut Ave NW
Hosted D.C.’s first major hotel drag event in 1968 and the iconic Miss Adams Morgan Pageant. Protested in 1978 during Anita Bryant’s appearance.
Lesbian Avengers – 1426 21st St NW
Formed in 1992, the group empowered lesbians through bold direct actions. They met in Dupont Circle and launched the city’s first Dyke March.
Lambda Rising Bookstore (former) – 1724 20th Street NW
D.C.’s first LGBTQ bookstore and the birthplace of the city’s inaugural Pride celebration in 1975.
Women In The Life (former office) – 1623 Connecticut Ave NW
Founded in 1993 by Sheila Alexander-Reid as a safe space and support network for lesbians of color.
17th Street NW Corridor – Between P & R Streets NW
Core of the LGBTQ business district, home to the annual High Heel Race in October and the June Block Party celebrating the origins of D.C. Pride.
CAPITOL HILL / SOUTHEAST
Tracks (former) – 80 M St SE
Once D.C.’s largest gay club, famous for inclusive parties, RuPaul shows, and foam nights from 1984 to 2000.
Ziegfeld’s / The Other Side – 1345 Half Street SE
Legendary drag venue since 1978, hosting famed performers like Ella Fitzgerald.
Club 55 / Waaay Off Broadway – 55 K Street SE
Converted theater central to D.C.’s early drag and Academy pageant scenes.
Congressional Cemetery – 1801 E Street SE
Resting place of LGBTQ figures like Sgt. Leonard Matlovich and Peter Doyle. Offers queer history tours.
Mr. Henry’s – 601 Pennsylvania Ave SE
LGBTQ-friendly bar since 1966 and the launching stage for Roberta Flack’s career.
The Furies Collective House – 219 11th Street SE
Home to a 1970s lesbian feminist collective that published “The Furies.” Members included Rita Mae Brown.
ARCHIVES / PENN QUARTER
Archives Metro & Center Market Site – 7th St & Pennsylvania Ave NW
Where Walt Whitman met Peter Doyle in 1865, commemorated by a sculpture linking Whitman and poet Fernando Pessoa.
COLUMBIA HEIGHTS / PETWORTH
Palm Ballroom (former) – 4211 9th Street NW
Mid-20th century venue for Black drag balls and LGBTQ events during segregation.
NATIONAL MALL AREA
National Mall / Washington Monument Grounds
Historic site of LGBTQ activism and remembrance, including the 1987 display of the AIDS Memorial Quilt and a mass same-sex wedding. Hosted major civil rights marches in 1979, 1987, and 1993.
NORTHWEST DC
Dr. Franklin E. Kameny House – 5020 Cathedral Ave NW
Home of gay rights pioneer Frank Kameny and the Mattachine Society of Washington; now a national landmark.
LAFAYETTE SQUARE / WHITE HOUSE
Lafayette Park – Pennsylvania Ave & 16th St NW
Historic gay cruising area and epicenter of government surveillance during the Lavender Scare.
Data from: SSecret City by James Kirchick, The Deviant’s War by Frank Kameny, Brett Beemyn, The Rainbow History Project, NPS Archives, Washington Blade Archives.
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