Local
Md. marriage equality group opposes suspension of Gallaudet administrator
Diversity provost placed on leave for signing anti-gay marriage petition
Angela McCaskill was placed on Administrative leave when it was revealed she’d signed the Maryland marriage petition, after names of the petition signers were obtained and published by the Washington Blade.
The leader of the campaign supporting Maryland’s same-sex marriage law in a Nov. 6 voter referendum is calling on D.C.’s Gallaudet University to reverse a decision to suspend a campus diversity officer for signing a petition calling for overturning the marriage equality law.
Josh Levin, campaign manager for Marylanders for Marriage Equality, released a statement Wednesday evening expressing opposition to Gallaudet’s decision to place Dr. Angela McCaskill, a Maryland resident and the school’s Associate Provost of Diversity and Inclusion, on paid administrative leave.
“We strongly disagree with the decision to put the chief diversity officer on leave and hope she is reinstated immediately,” Levin said in his statement. “Everyone is entitled to free speech and to their own opinion about Question 6, which is about treating everyone fairly and equally under the law.”
Levin’s statement followed by several hours a statement from Derek McCoy, chair of the Maryland Marriage Alliance, one of the leading groups calling on voters to defeat the same-sex marriage law in the referendum.
“I join an ever-growing number of Marylanders in expressing my complete dismay over Gallaudet University’s decision to place Dr. Angela McCaskill on administrative leave for signing the marriage referendum petition,” McCoy said.
The statements by Levin and McCoy marked a rare turn of events that placed the two opposing leaders and their organizations in agreement over McCaskill’s situation.
Gallaudet University is one of the nation’s most prominent colleges for the deaf and hard of hearing.
The news that McCaskill had been placed on paid administrative leave came from a statement issued on Wednesday by Gallaudet President T. Alan Hurwitz.
“It recently came to my attention that Dr. McCaskill has participated in a legislative initiative that some feel is inappropriate for an individual serving as Chief Diversity Officer; however, other individuals feel differently,” Hurwitz said.
“I will use the extended time while she is on administrative leave to determine the appropriate next steps taking into consideration the duties of this position at the university,” he said. “In the meantime an interim chief Diversity Officer will be announced in the near future.”
McCaskill’s decision to sign the referendum petition was first reported by the blog Planet DeafQueer, a news site widely read in the LGBT deaf community throughout the country.
The blog reported that an unidentified Gallaudet faculty member filed a complaint against McCaskill with the university last week after discovering McCaskill had signed the petition that called for a referendum on the same-sex marriage law in Maryland.
Opponents of the marriage law gathered more than 200,000 petition signatures, far more than needed to place the law on the ballot in November after the Maryland General Assembly passed it and Gov. Martin O’Malley signed the marriage equality measure in March.
In July, the Maryland board of elections made available to the public a database of all those who signed the petition. The Washington Blade published the database.
The unidentified faculty member at Gallaudet reportedly accessed the information from the Blade and discovered that Angela Patrice McCaskill of Upper Marlboro in Prince George’s County was among those who signed the petition.
Planet DeafQueer reports that McCaskill’s decision to sign the petition came as a shock to the school’s LGBT students because she was a strong supporter of the school’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Ally (LGBTQA) Resource Center, which opened on National Coming Out day on Oct. 11, 2011.
The school’s website says her duties include promoting diversity and inclusiveness in all of the university’s programs and activities for all groups, including LGBT people.
“LGBT students, faculty and staff we spoke to said they felt shock, disappointment, anger and betrayal upon learning of the signed petition,” Planet DeafQueer reported in an Oct. 8 posting. “Some are calling for Dr. McCaskill’s resignation. Others are waiting for an official response from Dr. McCaskill and wondering if it will be possible for her to regain her trust,” the blog reported.
McCaskill could not immediately be reached for comment. Gallaudet’s official spokesperson, Catherine Murphy, didn’t return a call seeking comment as of late Wednesday.
According to Planet DeafQueer, prior to filing the complaint, the faculty member who discovered the signature confronted McCaskill about why she signed the anti-gay petition.
“Dr. McCaskill confirmed that she had in fact signed the petition and explained that she had done so while at church, after her preacher had preached against gay marriage,” Planet DeafQueer reported the faculty member as saying. “As she was leaving, her husband pointed to the petition and she signed it without giving it further thought.”
The blog report added, “Dr. McCaskill is expected to issue an apology.”
A source familiar with Gallaudet University, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told the Blade Hurwitz’s decision to place McCaskill on administrative leave has aggravated what the source called longstanding racial and gay-straight tensions within the campus community.
“There is a long history of competition between black and white deaf people and gays and straights on this campus,” said the source.
McCaskill became the first deaf African-American female to earn a Ph.D. from Gallaudet, according to her official biography on the university website.
The source noted that LGBT students and faculty members at Gallaudet were genuinely upset that someone they viewed as a supporter and ally would sign an anti-gay petition, especially in her role as head of the school’s diversity and inclusion program.
But others, the source said, view the development as an overly hasty decision by Hurwitz, who is white, to remove one of the university’s few high-level black administrators over her decision to exercise her First Amendment right to sign a petition in her role as a private citizen of Maryland.
The source said members of an anonymous email network of people affiliated with Gallaudet known as the “Gallynet” denounced the decision to place McCaskill on administrative leave.
“Angela is tarred and feathered and lynched without ever having a chance to defend herself. Shame,” one anonymous person said in an email sent through the network. “So now it’s the LGBT community vs. us black deaf. Sigh!”
The source who spoke to the Blade expressed disagreement with this person’s claim that LGBT deaf people and black deaf people at Gallaudet were at odds with each other.
“The deaf gays, both black and white, are often caught in the middle of this,” the source said.
District of Columbia
HIV/AIDS activists block intersection near White House
World AIDS Day provided backdrop for calls to fully fund PEPFAR
Upwards of 100 HIV/AIDS activists on Monday blocked an intersection near the White House and demanded the Trump-Vance administration fully fund PEPFAR.
Housing Works, Health GAP, Treatment Action Group, AIDS United, ACT UP Philadelphia, and the National Minority AIDS Council organized the protest that took place at the intersection of 16th and I Streets, N.W. The activists then marched to Lafayette Park.
(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
Activists since the Trump-Vance administration took office in January have demanded full PEPFAR funding.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio Jan. 28 issued a waiver that allowed PEPFAR and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during the freeze on nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending. HIV/AIDS service providers around the world with whom the Washington Blade has spoken say PEPFAR cuts and the loss of funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, which officially closed on July 1, has severely impacted their work.
The State Department in September announced PEPFAR will distribute lenacapavir in countries with high prevalence rates. The first doses of the breakthrough HIV prevention drug arrived in Eswatini and Zambia last month.
The New York Times in August reported Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought “apportioned” only $2.9 billion of $6 billion that Congress set aside for PEPFAR for fiscal year 2025. (PEPFAR in the coming fiscal year will use funds allocated in fiscal year 2024.)
Bipartisan opposition in the U.S. Senate prompted the Trump-Vance administration in July withdraw a proposal to cut $400 million from PEPFAR’s budget. Vought on Aug. 29 said he would use a “pocket rescission” to cancel $4.9 billion for HIV/AIDS prevention and global health programs and other foreign aid assistance initiatives that Congress had already approved.
“Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, has defied the appropriations authority of Congress, slashing the budget for the program despite full funding enacted by lawmakers, stealing $1.6 billion despite the direction of Congress that PEPFAR be fully funded,” notes a press release that detailed Monday’s protest. “As a result, lifesaving treatment and prevention programs have closed across dozens of sub-Saharan African countries, while Vought has refused to release money ringfenced by Congress to save lives.”
Monday’s protest coincided with World AIDS Day.
The White House has not publicly acknowledged World AIDS Day. A State Department directive the New York Times obtained last week mandated employees and grantees “to refrain from messaging on any commemorative days, including World AIDS Day.”
“Trump thinks by banning commemoration of World AIDS Day, he can hide from the death and destruction that he’s causing around the world,” said Health GAP Executive Director Asia Russell in Lafayette Square. “But we’re here to say, we can see him. We see him stealing medicine, stealing support services, stealing HIV testing, stealing life-saving care from communities all around the world suffering and dying without access.”
The Clinton Health Access Initiative in a report it published last month said more people with HIV or are at risk of contracting the virus because of “HIV treatment and prevention cascades” during the first half of 2025. Specific figures include:
• 3.4 million fewer adults tested for HIV
• 24,000 fewer infants tested for HIV
• A 22 percent decline in new HIV diagnoses due to a reduction in testing among the most vulnerable, highest-risk people
• An 8 percent decline in people living with HIV receiving CD4 tests to diagnose advanced HIV disease
• 2,000 fewer infants and children with HIV started on life-saving medication
• A 37 percent reduction in PrEP initiations for people at risk for HIV
• 26,000 fewer infants and children on antiretroviral medications
• A 5 percent reduction in adults starting antiretroviral medications
• A 10 percent increase in people living with HIV disengaging from treatment
The Clinton Health Access Initiative also said more children around the world will die “due to undiagnosed and un- or under-treated HIV infection” if “these trends persist.”
The Human Rights Campaign Foundation in its 2025 Annual LGBTQ+ Community Survey notes more than 20 percent of adults said “policies the federal government have made accessing HIV prevention and treatment care more difficult in the last year.” The report indicates 30 percent of respondents identify as LGBTQ.
The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
Congratulations to RODRIGO HENG-LEHTINEN on his new role as Trevor Project Senior Vice President of Public Engagement Campaigns. On accepting the position, he said, “My mission has long been to stop LGBTQ, and especially trans, people from being perceived as political footballs and start getting us seen as real people – your friends, your families, your neighbors. Now I get to focus on that 100% at The Trevor Project.”
Prior to this, he was executive director, Advocates for Trans Equality (A4TE), where he co-led the merger of two national transgender rights organizations, NCTE and TDLEF, to create the new organization. He had served as executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, leading that organization through a period of growth, restoring organizational size and stability. He had served as deputy executive director prior to that. Previously he served as vice president of Public Education, Freedom for All Americans, where he led a successful campaign for transgender nondiscrimination protections in New Hampshire. He oversaw a full range of legislative lobbying, field organizing, and communications strategies and oganized a leadership coalition, established structure, and divided roles for key committees of 17 state and national partner organizations and local activists.
Heng-Lehtinen conducted English-language interviews with outlets such as The New York Times, CNN, MSNBC, and Politico. He planned a Transgender Leadership Summit for the Transgender Law Center and served as Development & Donor Services Assistant, Liberty Hill Foundation. He earned his bachelor’s degree in Latin American Studies from Brown University.
Local
D.C., Va., Md. to commemorate World AIDS Day
Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle will hold a Mass, candlelight prayer vigil
The D.C. area will observe World AIDS Day on Dec. 1 through a variety of community events.
Established by the World Health Organization in 1988, World AIDS Day aims to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS and honor the individuals affected by the epidemic. The global theme for 2025 is “overcoming disruption, transforming the AIDS response.”
Washington
DC Health will host a World AIDS Day event at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Library from noon to 9 p.m on Dec. 1. Attendees can expect live performances, free food and free HIV testing.
The all-day event will also feature community resources from DC Health, DC Public Library, DC Health Link, Serve DC, and the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs.
The Lily and Earle M. Pilgrim Art Foundation is partnering with Visual AIDS, a New York-based non-profit that uses art to fight AIDS, to reflect on World AIDS Day with a film screening on Dec. 1.
The David Bethuel Jamieson Studio House at Walbridge in Mount Pleasant will premiere “Meet Us Where We’re At,” an hour-long collection of six videos. The free screening highlights the complexity of drug use in intersection with the global HIV epidemic.
The videos, commissioned by artists in Brazil, Germany, Nigeria, Puerto Rico and Vietnam, showcase the firsthand experience of drug users, harm reduction programs, and personal narratives. The program intends to showcase drug users as key individuals in the global response to HIV.
In addition to streaming the videos, the event will include an evening potluck and conversation led by Peter Stebbins from 6-8 p.m.
The Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle will hold a 5:30 p.m. Mass and candlelight prayer vigil at 6 p.m. in honor of World AIDS Day on Dec. 1. The event is open to all and includes a subsequent reception at 6:30 p.m.
The Capital Jewish Museum is hosting a speaker series on Dec. 2 from 6:30-8 p.m. that explores the response to AIDS within the Jewish community. Speakers include LGBTQ psychiatrist Jeffrey Akman, physician assistant Barbara Lewis and Larry Neff, lay service leader at Bet Mishpachah, a synagogue founded by LGBTQ Washingtonians. Heather Alt, deputy director of nursing at Whitman-Walker Health, will moderate the event.
The program is free for museum members. General admission is $10 and Chai tickets, which help subsidize the cost of general admission, are $18. Tickets include access to LGBT Jews in the Federal City, a temporary exhibition that collectively explores Washington, Judaism, and LGBTQ history. The exhibition is on view through Jan. 4, 2026.
Virginia
Alexandria Mayor Alyia Gaskins and local residents will commemorate World AIDS Day on Dec. 1 at the Lee Center.
The event, which is free to attend, will include music, choir performances, educational moments and more. The commemoration will be held from 6:30-8:30 p.m.
Maryland
The Frederick Center will host talks, tabling and a raffle in honor of World AIDS Day. The Frederick County Health Department will conduct free HIV testing.
The event, which is free to attend, will be held on Nov. 30 from 1-4 p.m. The Frederick County Health Department always offers free, walk-in HIV testing on Tuesdays and Fridays from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
The Prince George’s County Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority will host a community day of awareness in honor of World AIDS Day on Dec. 6 from 1 a.m. to 2 p.m. The free event will feature free, confidential HIV testing, private talks with medical professionals and health workshops.
The event will be held at Suitland Community Center in Forestville and will include breakfast and snacks.
Damien Ministries is commemorating World AIDS Day on Dec. 1 through the grand opening of the We the People Community & Wellness Collaborative. The event, held at 11:30 a.m. at 4061 Minnesota Avenue, N.E., is free to attend.
Damien Ministries is a faith-based non-profit committed to supporting those with HIV/AIDS.
Begin Anew, a Baltimore non-profit that provides education, outreach and resources to improve public health, wellness and economic stability, is hosting its 4th Annual World AIDS Day Community Celebration on Dec. 1 alongside community partners.
Hosted at the University of Maryland BioPark from noon to 3 p.m., the program will feature keynote speaker Jason E. Farley of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. The celebration will also dedicate awards to local heroes focused on fighting HIV/AIDS and promoting health equity.
The free event includes lunch, live entertainment and networking opportunities with health advocates and partners.
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Tokyo court upholds Japan’s same-sex marriage ban
White House halts World AIDS Day recognition amid HIV funding cuts
Comings & Goings
Impulse Group DC to host fundraiser
Calendar: November 28-December 4
India’s Jharkhand state works to improve trans people’s access to health care
