Local
D.C. gays mobilize to re-elect Obama
Supporters traveling to help in Colorado, Virginia, Ohio
Crosby Burns will travel to Colorado next week to campaign for President Obama. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
With only a few weeks remaining before Election Day, several members of D.C.’s LGBT community are literally going to great lengths to ensure President Obama wins another four years in the White House.
Opportunities to help push Obama over the edge in battleground states are driving local LGBT supporters to travel to far off places — including Colorado and Ohio — where the results on Nov. 6 could decide the election.
Crosby Burns, 25, a gay D.C. resident, said he agreed to travel to Colorado to help the Obama campaign — an expedition he made during Obama’s first campaign in 2008 — after looking at polls showing a tightening race between Obama and Mitt Romney.
“A couple of weeks ago, I was just looking at polls and seeing Mitt Romney speak, and I was just thinking the president needs us more than ever,” Burns said. “That’s what I did back in 2008, I’m going to do the exact same thing, if not more, to ensure that the president is re-elected and that Colorado stays ‘blue’ for him in 2012.”
Burns, a research associate on LGBT issues at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, said the Obama campaign is sending him Monday to West Denver, Colo. — a predominately Latino area — where he intends to employ his Spanish-speaking skills to help with get-out-the-vote efforts.
“I’m going to be going door-to-door using my Spanish skills and talking with people about the election and making sure they know where their polling place is and making sure they support the president,” Burns said.
Collin Burton, 32, a gay D.C. resident, said he’s taking personal leave from his job to make a similar trip to his hometown of Columbus, Ohio, on Monday to help manage out-of-state volunteers coming into the battleground state to campaign for Obama.
“As we get closer to Election Day, we’ll be running some GOTV operations and helping out with the regional work, so it’ll be good,” Burton said. “We will hopefully get a lot of people through and get a lot of voters contacted, make sure that they know they need to turn out.”
Burton, who handles government relations as an appointee to the Corporation for National & Community Service, estimated that he would manage between 20 and 100 Obama supporters coming into the state from more assuredly Democratic parts of the country, such as D.C., New York and Eastern Pennsylvania.
It’s not the first time Burton has helped with Democratic Party efforts. In 2010 for the mid-term elections, he was designated the LGBT caucus director for the Ohio Democratic Party.
But Burton said he hopes the outcome is different this time around as opposed to the mid-term election, when an anti-incumbent wave swept a sea of Republicans into office, including in Ohio.
“I hope it’s a hell of a lot better, I’ll be honest, because the outcome in 2010 in Ohio was pretty bad,” Burton said. “It went from a wonderfully “blue” state to an incredibly red state. I’m confident that it will [be better this time]. I’m certain that the Obama ground game is up and running and will be rocking it for Ohio.”
Some LGBT Obama supporters in D.C. are taking advantage of opportunities within the area to campaign for the president, especially because the battleground state of Virginia is just across the Potomac River.
Clarence Fluker, 33 and a gay D.C. resident, said he’s been participating in LGBT phone banking each Thursday night at the Democratic National Committee to talk with potential voters — mainly in Virginia — and educate them about Obama’s record.
“Sometimes people say that they’re undecided, but we talk to them and log all of the information from the calls and send it over at the end of the night to the person who’s running the phone bank,” Fluker said.
Clarence Fluker is participating in weekly phone banks at the Democratic National Committee (Photo by Cesar Vence Photography)
Fluker, who works for the D.C. Commission on National and Community Service, said he also plans to make a trip during an upcoming weekend to Virginia to knock on doors and talk about Obama personally with voters.
“I think it’s helpful because this campaign is really going to be won on the ground, and it’s going to be won by reaching out to everyday Americans and asking for their support, educating them about all the wonderful things the Obama administration has done and all the things that we know that they’re going to do in the second term,” Fluker said.
Clo Ewing, an Obama campaign spokesperson, said Obama’s LGBT supporters recognize the president “has done more to advance gay rights than any other president” — citing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal, mandating hospital visitation rights and calling for repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act as among his accomplishments.
“That record stands in stark contrast to Mitt Romney’s, who promised to be to the left of Sen. [Ted] Kennedy on gay rights and then made clear he would have left ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ in place and is working to enshrine discrimination into the Constitution by passing a federal marriage amendment,” Ewing said. “From grassroots organizing to phone banking to registering voters, LGBT supporters are working hard because there’s too much at stake to sit on the sidelines.”
The Washington Blade was unable to find local LGBT supporters of Mitt Romney’s campaign who are undertaking efforts to help the Republican nominee win the White House.
Each of the Obama LGBT supporters who spoke with the Washington Blade said the president’s work on LGBT issues was deeply personal for them and a motiving factor in helping them decide to contribute to the campaign.
Burton said he was particularly grateful Obama took action to benefit LGBT people through administrative steps, such as the hospital visitation rights memo he issued for same-sex partners.
As a federal employee, Burton took particular note of the memorandum Obama signed in 2009 granting limited domestic partner benefits to government workers.
“Extending those rights, it matters quite a bit, and it’s incredible to see him actually move the pen for that,” Burton said.
Fluker said he was moved when Obama announced in May he had completed his evolution to support marriage equality — particularly because those words came from the nation’s first black president.
“When President Obama talked about his own personal walk, how he got to the point where he also supports same-sex marriage, that meant a lot to me not just as black gay man, but as an American, to have a leader who felt that way,” Fluker said.
For Burns, the president’s announcement that he now supports marriage equality was important, as well as Obama’s other work in advancing gay rights.
“That’s an issue that’s near and dear to my heart and to see him fully evolve on this issue was just very validating as an Obama supporter and as a gay man,” Burns said.
District of Columbia
Blade editor to be inducted into D.C. Society of Professional Journalists Hall of Fame
Kevin Naff marks 24 years with publication this year
Longtime Washington Blade Editor Kevin Naff will be inducted into D.C.’s Society of Professional Journalists Hall of Fame in June, the group announced this week.
Hall of Fame honorees are chosen by the Society of Professional Journalists’ Washington, D.C., Pro Chapter. Naff and two other inductees — Seth Borenstein, a Washington-based national science writer for the AP and Cheryl W. Thompson, an award-winning correspondent for National Public Radio — will be celebrated at the chapter’s Dateline Awards dinner on Tuesday, June 9, at the National Press Club. The dinner’s emcee will be Kojo Nnamdi, host of WAMU radio’s weekly “Politics Hour.”
“I am tremendously honored by this recognition,” Naff said. “I have spent a lifetime in the D.C. area learning from so many talented journalists and am humbled to be considered in their company. Thank you to SPJ and to all the LGBTQ pioneers who came before me who made this possible.”
Naff joined the Blade in 2002 after years in print and digital journalism. He worked as a financial reporter for Reuters in New York before moving to Baltimore in 1996 to launch the Baltimore Sun’s website. He spent four years at the Sun before leaving for an internet startup and later joining the mobile data group at Verizon Wireless working on the first generation of mobile apps.
He then moved to the Blade and has served as the publication’s longest-tenured editor. In 2023, Naff published his first book, “How We Won the War for LGBTQ Equality — And How Our Enemies Could Take It All Away.”
Previous Hall of Fame inductees include luminaries in journalism like Wolf Blitzer, Benjamin Bradlee, Bob Woodward, Andrea Mitchell, and Edgar Allen Poe. The Blade’s senior news reporter Lou Chibbaro Jr. was inducted in 2015.
Maryland
Supreme Court ruling against conversion therapy bans could affect Md. law
Then-Gov. Larry Hogan signed statute in 2018
By PAMELA WOOD, JOHN-JOHN WILLIAMS IV, and MADELEINE O’NEILL | The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled against a law banning “conversion therapy” for LGBTQ kids in Colorado, a ruling that also could apply to Maryland’s ban on the discredited practice.
An 8-1 high court majority sided with a Christian counselor who argues the law banning talk therapy violates the First Amendment. The justices agreed that the law raises free speech concerns and sent it back to a lower court to decide whether it meets a legal standard that few laws pass.
Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the court’s majority, said the law “censors speech based on viewpoint.” The First Amendment, he wrote, “stands as a shield against any effort to enforce orthodoxy in thought or speech in this country.”
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
District of Columbia
As mayor’s race takes shape, candidates endorse LGBTQ equality
Like nearly all recent D.C. elections, LGBTQ voters will be choosing a candidate for mayor in 2026 from a list of mostly strong LGBTQ rights supporters in the city’s June 16 primary.
As of March 30, the D.C. Board of Elections’ list of candidates who submitted the required number of petition signatures for the June 16 primary ballot included 10 mayoral candidates: nine Democrats and one Statehood Green Party candidate.
Among those candidates, six, all Democrats, have issued statements expressing strong support for LGBTQ rights, including the two leading Democratic contenders, former D.C. Council member Kenyan McDuffie and current Council member Janeese Lewis George, who represents Ward 4.
One of the lesser-known Democratic candidates who released an LGBTQ supportive statement, Rini Sampath, a cyber security consultant, told the Washington Blade she identifies as queer, becoming one of the first known LGBTQ D.C. mayoral candidates to gain access to a major party primary ballot.
“We’re living in an extremely diverse community, an extremely unique community,” she told the Blade. “And being able to self-label, self-identify as queer is something that I just want to take pride in.”
Similar to McDuffie and Lewis George, Sampath released statements to the Blade and the Capital Stonewall Democrats, the city’s largest LGBTQ local political group, expressing support for LGBTQ rights and outlining plans for LGBTQ supportive policies if elected mayor.
Although many D.C. LGBTQ activists have said they have yet to decide whom to support for mayor, those who have decided appear to be divided between McDuffie and Lewis George. Most D.C. political observers consider McDuffie and Lewis George to be the two leading candidates in the mayoral race.
The other Democratic mayoral contenders who have released statements expressing support on LGBTQ issues include Gary Goodweather, a local real estate manager and developer who has been actively campaigning at LGBTQ events; Vincent Orange, a former At-Large and Ward 5 D.C. Council member; and Kathy Henderson, a longtime Ward 5 community activist and elected Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner.
The remaining two Democratic mayoral candidates, Hope Solomon, a former U.S. Department of Homeland Security contractor and Dupont Circle civic activist; and Ernest Johnson, a real estate broker and Ward 1 community activist, did not respond to inquiries from the Blade and Capital Stonewall Democrats seeking information about their position on LGBTQ related issues.
Robert Gross, the Statehood Green Party candidate who is running unopposed in the June 16 primary, also didn’t respond to inquires from the Blade about his position on LGBTQ issues.
D.C. Board of Elections records show that at least five Republican candidates filed papers to run for mayor in the June 16 GOP primary, but none of them remained as candidates as of March 30, when the election board issued its updated candidate list.
Just one of the five Republican candidates replied to an email message from the Washington Blade sent to all mayoral candidates in early March seeking their position on LGBTQ issues. That candidate, Esa Muhammad, whose website identifies him as an engineer, consultant, and local business owner, sent a reply expressing opposition to LGBTQ rights.
“Unfortunately, I do not support LGBTQ because The God only created 2 genders (Adam/Eve),” he wrote. “Anyway, I will be fair to you all despite your sick way of looking at life,” he stated.
Capital Stonewall Democrats President Stevie McCarty said his group sent questionnaires to all the Democratic mayoral candidates as well as to Democrats running for other offices such as D.C. Council. Information posted on the group’s website shows only four of the mayoral candidates returned a complete questionnaire: McDuffie, Lewis George, Goodweather, and Sampath.
Each of them provides detailed information of their plans for supporting LGBTQ policies if elected and their record of support on LGBTQ issues. McCarty said the questionnaire responses for all candidates that submitted them can be accessed at outvotedc.org.
He said Capital Stonewall Democrats will hold virtual LGBTQ forums in April, including a mayoral forum on April 8. He said the group’s members will vote on the candidate endorsements online from April 20 through May 11, and the group expects to announce its endorsements May 14.
GLAA DC, formerly known as the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance of Washington, has issued candidate ratings for most D.C. elections since the 1970s, and the nonpartisan LGBTQ group was expected to issue ratings for mayoral candidates this year. But like in recent years, the group is expected to base its ratings on mostly non-LGBTQ issues, with a progressive, left-leaning perspective, according to a nine-page “Back to Basics GLAA Policy Brief 2026” that the group released in March.
The LGBTQ activists who are backing McDuffie or Lewis George appear to be gravitating to the two based on their political leanings separate from LGBTQ issues, just like voters in general. Lewis George, who identifies as a democratic socialist, is popular among LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ “progressives.”
McDuffie, who is seen as a more moderate candidate along the lines of current D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, is being supported by LGBTQ activists who hold those views, some of whom currently work in the Bowser administration.
Among Lewis George’s LGBTQ supporters are longtime Ward 8 community leader Philip Pannell and former Capital Stonewall Democrats president Howard Garrett. Among the LGBTQ McDuffie backers are longtime D.C. Democratic activists John Fanning and David Meadows.
Longtime D.C. LGBTQ Democratic Party activist Peter Rosenstein, who is supporting McDuffie, has raised concerns about Lewis George’s backing by the national group Democratic Socialists of America. In Facebook postings, Rosenstein points to the Democratic Socialists of America’s opposition to Israel as a country and said it is viewed by many in the Jewish community as promoting antisemitism. He has criticized Lewis George for not speaking out against that and for accepting the DSA’s endorsement.
In an interview with the Blade, Lewis George strongly disputed that assessment, saying she has been a strong ally and supporter of the Jewish community.
“I’m a member of the Metro DSA here in D.C. that I work with to fight for labor and for tenant rights,” she said. “I’m also a member of the Democratic Party,” she added, saying, “There are things that the Democratic Party does that I don’t agree with. There are things that the national DSA does that I don’t agree with. That’s a group that I work with.”
“But I want to be clear that I am running for mayor to represent all of our community, and that includes our amazing and historical Jewish community here in D.C.,” she said. “I have had the amazing opportunity to spend time at synagogues and talking to Jewish leaders and groups and institutions. And so, there should be no worry here.”
Following are short excerpts from the detailed statements five of the nine Democratic mayoral candidates submitted to the Capital Stonewall Democrats or the Washington Blade.
Kenyan McDuffie: “As mayor, every piece of legislation I sign, craft, or endorse should also encompass the interest and input of the LGBTQ community members and advocates…From housing to health care and everything in between… We have a dire crisis regarding the rise in homelessness especially among the youth in our LGBTQ communities. In my administration that simply cannot be the status quo and will not be…I have been a consistent champion for our LGBTQ community and will remain so as Mayor of D.C.’
Janeese Lewis George: “As mayor, I will protect our LGBTQ+ neighbors against federal attacks on their identity, including their health care…On the Council I have been a strong supporter of pro-LGBTQ+ bills, including making D.C. a sanctuary for people seeking gender-affirming health care as well as addressing discrimination and harassment in nightlife and hospitality…And as mayor, I am prepared to move up and win those fights – a fight for D.C. statehood, a fight for our true economy, and a real opportunity to uplift our Black queer and trans youth.”
Gary Goodweather: “A Goodweather administration will defend every D.C. law protecting LGBTQ residents. I will establish a Defend DC office to coordinate the District’s legal and public response to federal overreach, with LGBTQ+ protections explicitly within its mandate…My affordable D.C. plan will produce 50,000 new homes with 36,000 affordable units, and I will ensure LGBTQ+ youth housing programs are funded as a budget priority.”
Rini Sampath: “I am an immigrant, proud queer woman, and a 10-year resident of Washington, D.C…For me, LGBTQ+ voters including transgender and nonbinary residents, are not a separate or symbolic constituency; they are a core part of a broader, multiracial, cross-ward coalition rooted in in equity and opportunity.”
Vincent Orange: “I have a long and consistent record of supporting LGBTQ+ equality and inclusion in the District of Columbia, grounded in both policy and personal commitment. As the District’s Democratic Committeeman from 2006 to 2015, I publicly supported marriage equality and voted accordingly … During my time on the D.C. Council, I worked to advance protections for LGBTQ+ residents, including authoring and passing legislation to prohibit discrimination against transgender individuals in the workplace.”
Kathy Henderson: Kathy Henderson has maintained a consistent record of treating all members of the community with dignity, compassion, and respect, regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, identity, political party, national origin, or ideology. Kathy Henderson embraced the late Wanda Alston as a colleague and good friend…Alston was the first director of the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs and Henderson helped to organize and facilitate the first LGBTQ citizens summit.”
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