National
Fla. gay Republicans hail Romney victory
Log Cabin warns of ‘anti-gay pandering’
Mitt Romney won a decisive victory in Florida this week, as Newt Gingrich appeared to lose momentum. (Blade file photo by MIchael Key)
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Gay Republicans joined many of their straight counterparts in Florida Tuesday night in congratulating former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney for his decisive victory in the Florida Republican primary.
But R. Clarke Cooper, executive director of the national Log Cabin Republicans, while also congratulating Romney, cautioned him against engaging in “anti-gay pandering or divisive social politics.”
Cooper told the Blade his comment was a reference to statements Romney has made in news media interviews over the past several months in which he appeared to be appealing to conservative voters hostile to gay rights.
Officials with Log Cabin’s chapters in the Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa areas said support for Romney was strong among LGBT Republicans in the state. Romney won by a lopsided margin in a Jan. 28 straw poll of Log Cabin members at an informal gay Republican caucus in Miami.
“I’m pleased that Romney won,” said Andy Eddy, board member of Log Cabin Republicans of Broward County, which includes the city of Fort Lauderdale and the nearby gay enclave Wilton Manors.
“Many of our members support him and believe he has the best chance of beating Obama,” he said.
With 100 percent of the election precincts counted, Romney captured 46 percent of the vote. His closest rival, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich received 32 percent, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum received 13 percent, and Texas Congressman Ron Paul received 7 percent.
In Florida’s winner take all primary, Romney captured 50 delegates, giving him a boost going into a series of upcoming primaries and caucuses leading up to Super Tuesday on March 6, when 10 states hold primaries.
“This big win for Gov. Romney makes it all but certain that he will emerge as the nominee of the Republican Party,” said Jimmy LaSalvia, executive director of the gay conservative group GOProud.
“Gov. Romney’s win tonight is particularly pivotal given the size of the state and the importance Florida will have in electing the next president,” he said. “Gov. Romney’s message of economic hope and renewal has clearly resonated with the voters of Florida.
“The truth that neither Barack Obama nor his friends in the liberal media want to discuss is that most Americans, gay or straight, are no better off than they were in 2008 and that is a product of Obama’s failed big government policies,” said LaSalvia, who personally endorsed Romney earlier this month.
Cooper said Log Cabin has a longstanding rule of not endorsing presidential candidates until the time of the Republican National Convention. He said on Tuesday night that the timing of the club’s endorsement vote is strictly “administrative” in nature and has no bearing on the group’s views of Romney.
During the Log Cabin caucus in Miami on Jan. 28, which followed a national Log Cabin board meeting, Cooper and officials with Log Cabin chapters in Florida said the group’s members clearly were leaning toward backing Romney.
Hastings Wyman, editor of Southern Political Report, a newsletter specializing in reporting on politics in the South, characterized as “remarkable” Romney’s dramatic rise in popularity in Florida. He noted that Romney had been trailing Gingrich in the Sunshine State by double digits in the days following Gingrich’s win in the South Carolina primary.
“I think the biggest single factor was money,” said Wyman, in referring to Romney’s lopsided lead over Gingrich and the other three GOP contenders in money raised for his campaign.
Newt Gingrich has vowed to fight on after losing big to Mitt Romney in Florida’s primary this week. (Blade photo by Michael Key)
“I also think Romney did much better in the last two debates in Florida,” Wyman said. “Gingrich just didn’t look as strong. The performance and appearance in the debates by Romney was much better.”
Wyman, who is gay, said it’s hard to predict how Romney will deal with gay issues if he’s elected president.
“I think he would be perfectly comfortable in supporting civil rights for gays,” he said. “But I don’t’ think he would do anything to hurt him politically. I think he would be somewhat better than the others, but he’s not going to do anything to upset his base.”
In his election night statement, Cooper of Log Cabin Republicans cautioned Romney and the other GOP presidential candidates that adopting a “big tent” policy inclusive of gays would be the best tactic for the Republican presidential nominee to defeat Obama in November.
“Our local chapter leaders report that, like Florida voters overall, Log Cabin members in the Sunshine State were drawn to Romney’s business sense and clear plan to return America to prosperity through a strong private sector,” Cooper said.
“Still, there remain serious reservations about recent statements by Romney to so-called ‘pro-family’ groups,” Cooper said. “The real question now is whether Romney can win a majority of Americans, including younger voters, independents and disaffected Democrats,” he said. “Log Cabin Republicans are looking for a candidate who can rebuild the big tent, unite our party and claim a mandate to restore liberty and fiscal responsibility to the United States. Whether that candidate is Romney remains to be seen.”
Jerame Davis, executive director of National Stonewall Democrats, an LGBT group that is backing Obama, said Romney’s win in the Florida primary was due to his ability to “outspend and throw more mud than all of his opponents combined.”
He called Romney “a very unpopular frontrunner” whose support is not as strong as the “not-Romney” wing of the Republican Party.
Although the conservative GOProud and more moderate Log Cabin leaders often disagree over how the LGBT community should interact with the Republican Party, the two groups appeared to be in agreement this week over how to secure LGBT votes for Romney if he wins the nomination for president.
Both LaSalvia and Log Cabin members in Florida said they would stress that LGBT people, like all other voters, care about issues beyond gay rights. While Romney may not be as supportive or outspoken on LGBT issues as Obama, they said they will stress that Romney’s economic policies would help gays where it counts the most, “in their wallets and pocketbooks,” as Log Cabin’s Tampa chapter president Jim Pease said.
“So why do I think gays will do well under Romney?” asked gay Republican activist Jim Driscoll, a former Bush administration appointee to the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS. “Romney’s opposition to discrimination against gays in jobs, etc., is genuine. He is not uncomfortable with gay people.”
Gay Democrats argue that unlike Obama, Romney hasn’t taken a position on whether he would support and sign the Employment Non-Discrimination, or ENDA, which would ban job discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Attempts by the Blade this week to reach a Romney campaign spokesperson to determine Romney’s position on ENDA and other pending LGBT-related bills in Congress were unsuccessful.
LaSalvia notes that Obama has said he doesn’t support same-sex marriage. Gay Democrats respond by saying Obama has supported virtually all other items on the LGBT rights agenda, including repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which bans the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages performed in states that have legalized them.
In what will likely emerge as the gay Republicans’ key talking point in the fall general election, LaSalvia said gays are not “one-issue” voters.
“Something I say a lot, is especially true when contrasting Obama’s policies with any of the Republican candidates, is that I believe that free market solutions benefit all Americans, but especially gay Americans,” he said.
“Whether it’s Social Security reform that includes private inheritable accounts, free market health care reform that would allow same-sex partners to go on the open market and purchase family plans, or tax reform to make the tax code simpler and fairer, Romney and the other Republican candidates are offering solutions to problems facing all of us that are far better for our country than Obama’s failed policies,” LaSalvia said.
Davis from National Stonewall Democrats said most LGBT voters will dismiss such arguments as “ridiculous.” He said NSD and the Democratic Party has and will continue to show that Obama comes out far ahead on LGBT and non-LGBT issues.
Davis said both Log Cabin and GOProud were downplaying what he called Romney’s most anti-gay stand – his agreement to sign a pledge issued by the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage to support a U.S. constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage.
“It’s the height of hypocrisy” that gay Republicans would attempt to excuse Romney’s support for the NOM pledge, Davis said.
“They should be ashamed for excusing any of these GOP swindlers for pandering to these regressive demagogues who seek to not only take away our rights, but persecute us back into the closet,” he said.
A random, unscientific sample of interviews with 14 gay men at Fort Lauderdale’s gay beach on Tuesday appeared to confirm the longstanding leanings of that city’s LGBT community. All 14 said they strongly support the re-election of Barack Obama and would be unlikely to vote for any Republican.
“As a gay man, I won’t vote for any Republican, said Al Adamczyk, a longtime Fort Lauderdale resident. I’m gay and I’m proud of it. Gay Republicans are idiots.”
Daniel Jeffers, a gay Air Force veteran who just moved to Fort Lauderdale with his partner, Jerry Finster, said the two believe Obama has been good on both gay and non-gay issues and would never consider voting for a Republican candidate for president.
“Some gays want him to do more,” said Finster of Obama. “He is doing everything possible. I think independents will vote for him. The Republicans are a joke. Out of a scale of five stars, I have six stars for Obama.”
National
Blade reporters reflect on covering Pulse massacre 10 years ago
Orlando stepped up to comfort and support its LGBTQ community
Friday marks 10 years since a gunman killed 49 people inside the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Fla.
The massacre, which, at the time was the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, left the LGBTQ community in this country and around the world reeling. It also prompted renewed calls for gun control.
The OnePulse Foundation, which Pulse owner Barbara Poma founded after the massacre, raised upwards of $20 million for a memorial that never materialized.
The city of Orlando in 2023 purchased the Pulse property for $2 million. Crews earlier this year demolished the former nightclub. The city of Orlando has pledged $12 million for a permanent memorial that is scheduled to open in 2027.
Washington Blade Editor Kevin Naff and International News Editor Michael K. Lavers reported from Orlando in the days after the massacre. Here are their reflections a decade later.
Describe the scene when you arrived in Orlando. Where did you go first?
NAFF: Most mainstream reporters headed for the Pulse nightclub, but it was already roped off with police keeping bystanders at least a full city block away. Instead, I hurried to The Center, Orlando’s LGBTQ community center, downtown. I expected to find it locked down with tight security but instead the doors were flung open and everyone inside was busy at work. No tears, just dedicated staff and volunteers working the phones to secure visas and free plane tickets for relatives of the victims. The director gave me a tour and in the back storage room were pallets and pallets of bottled water stacked to the ceiling. When I asked what all the water was for, he said the city had issued a call for blood donations and the lines to donate were 1,500 deep in 100-degree heat. So The Center drove around to all the sites to deliver water to all those standing in line.
That scene was so inspiring and a testament to the strength and resiliency of the LGBTQ community. We’d seen tragedy before and knew how to respond.
LAVERS: I arrived in Orlando about 14 hours after the massacre took place. The city was shellshocked.
Equality Florida, the state’s LGBTQ advocacy group, and other organizations held a press conference at The Center shortly after my flight from D.C. landed. I drove there from the airport. Terry DeCarlo, who was The Center’s executive director at the time, along with then-Equality Florida Executive Director Nadine Smith and others spoke on behalf of a community that was reeling. The Center at the press conference handed out business cards that read, “You matter.” I had it in my wallet when I drove to a makeshift memorial that was a block from Pulse — the police had cordoned off the area immediately around the nightclub. A local resident who I interviewed told me that she did not know if her friends who were at Pulse when the gunman opened fire survived. Another person with whom I spoke shared a similar story.
A torrential downpour began shortly after I arrived. The storm was an apt metaphor for the raw emotion of that horrific day.
What’s your most prominent memory of covering the Pulse massacre?
NAFF: I was covering a vigil in downtown Orlando when then-Florida Gov. Rick Scott’s motorcade arrived unannounced. To that point, he had not addressed the LGBTQ angle and seemed to be downplaying the fact that this was an attack on our community. I hurried to the front row as he held an impromptu news conference. To my dismay, he took only three short questions from TV reporters then rushed away. I grabbed his communications director and insisted that Scott take a question from the LGBTQ media. She agreed and told me to wait next to the SUV. When Scott approached, I asked him, “What is your message to LGBTQ Floridians?”
To my surprise, he sputtered, stammered, and broke into tears before telling me, “This was an attack, what else can you say? This was an attack against the gays, an attack against Hispanics, an attack against our country, our nation and it’s disgusting. The biggest thing we do now is ask how to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
It was his first public acknowledgment that the LGBTQ community was the target of the attack.
LAVERS: Two moments stand out for me.
The first moment is when then-President Barack Obama and then-Vice President Joe Biden traveled to Orlando on June 16, four days after the massacre. I was one of the reporters who the White House asked to be part of the local press pool. I was about 50 feet away from Obama and Biden when they placed bouquets with 49 flowers — one for each of the victims — at a makeshift memorial between City Hall and the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Orlando. Obama in remarks he made to the press pool mentioned one of the gay victims who had once said, “We cannot be afraid.” The emotions of the last four days simply became too much, and I broke down. Another reporter who was part of the press pool who was standing next to me realized I had broken down. She put her hand on my back to console me.
The second moment came a few weeks later when I was in Puerto Rico to cover the community’s response to the massacre and to interview victims’ relatives. Orlando has a very large Puerto Rican community, and nearly half of those who died at Pulse were of Puerto Rican descent.
I drove to Caguas, a city that is roughly 20 miles south of San Juan, the island’s capital, on July 7, and interviewed Aida Velázquez in her small apartment. Her son, Frankie “Jimmy” de Jesús, died at Pulse. Aida talked about her son, and she showed me pictures of him. Jimmy also danced Jíbaro, a Puerto Rican folk dance. The interview took place less than a month after the massacre — Jimmy’s funeral took place in Caguas less than two weeks earlier.
I sat in my car after the interview and sobbed uncontrollably for nearly five minutes. Nothing can possibly prepare you for interviewing a mother who had just lost her child in the most horrific way possible.
How did the local community respond and what about their response gave you hope or inspiration?
NAFF: In addition to the staff at The Center working to assist victims and their families, everyday Orlando residents stepped up to help however they could. At the downtown vigils, straight mothers and fathers carried signs offering hugs to anyone who needed them. I encountered a group of young teenage males who approached a group of law enforcement officers and appeared to perform for them. When they finished, I asked what they were doing and they told me that they were straight friends who lived in Orlando and wanted to do something to help so they composed an uplifting rap song and walked around performing it for anyone who needed cheering up.
LAVERS: The way that Orlando rallied around the LGBTQ community was simply inspiring.
Imam Muhammad Musri, president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, at a memorial service that took place at the Dr. Phillips Performing Arts Center on June 13 said his organization was “united as Americans when it comes to standing with the LGBT community and their rights to live freely and to practice their lives here.” This comment underscored the outpouring of support that Orlando showed its LGBTQ community after Pulse. It was also a call for the better angels among us to reject hate in all of its forms.
What surprised you most about the experience?
NAFF: I was most surprised — and moved — after talking to Rev. Debreita Taylor of Oasis Fellowship Ministries, an LGBTQ-affirming ministry.
“My message is love. Period. Love. Period. There’s nothing in the word of God that faith leaders can go to that teaches hate,” she told me. “Have faith and believe that evil and hate can be eradicated one person at a time. How do you treat someone? How do you embrace someone who treats you wrong? We all bleed, laugh, hope and have great victories and major defeats. And so, you know me, even if you don’t know my name — I’m you.”
LAVERS: It admittedly took me quite a while to fully process what I experienced in Orlando — I was focused on doing my job as a reporter, which was to cover the story, and, most importantly, show the human impact of what had happened. I suppose one surprising aspect of the time I spent in Orlando was that I found myself feeling more defiant against those who seek to destroy our community. They want us to live in fear, and I refuse to give them that satisfaction.
What, if anything, changed as a result of Pulse?
NAFF: In the immediate aftermath of the attack, queer spaces began rethinking their approach to security, which has served us well in the years since. Sadly, just a year later, Pulse was bumped to the No. 2 deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history when a gunman opened fire on the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas, killing 60 people. Americans and their politicians never learn from these largely preventable tragedies. The carnage continues.
LAVERS: Gun violence remains a shameful scourge in this country. Our community remains vulnerable to violence and discrimination. President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and other politicians here in Washington, around the country, and overseas continue to use our community to advance an anti-equality agenda. The carnage continues, as my colleague correctly notes, but our community remains strong and defiant. That gives me hope.
National
Queen Jean is Tony’s first transgender winner
Designer/activist wins for work on ‘Cats: The Jellicle Ball’
It was a historic night at the 79th annual Tony Awards on Sunday as Queen Jean won the award for Best Costume Design of a Musical, making her the first out transgender person to win a Tony.
“This experience has been monumental. We are here for the legacy of queer people, trans people,” she said. “We are taking up space in ways we have to take up space. We have to shift the paradigm. So I just want to say, thank you all so much for this incredible honor. The world right now is deeply, deeply combating so many ailments, and we know as a society that when we come together, we can make real, permanent change.”
She won the award for her work on “Cats: The Jellicle Ball” and was also nominated for best costume design of a play for “Liberation.”
In addition to her stage work, Queen Jean is the founder of Black Trans Liberation, an organization that supports trans and gender-nonconforming people in New York City.
National
Madonna turns Times Square into massive dance floor
Pop icon celebrates Pride month with surprise performance
Pop icon Madonna celebrated Pride month with a pop-up performance in New York City’s Times Square on Thursday to the delight of 50,000 fans.
She performed for about 15 minutes high above street level, including several songs from her new album “Confessions II” due on July 3, along with a trio of songs from the first “Confessions on a Dance Floor.”
In addition to the brand new “Love Sensation,” she performed “I Feel So Free” and “Bring Your Love,” plus “Hung Up,” “Get Together” and “I Love New York.” She wished the crowd a happy Pride season; the event was shared with audiences through Grindr’s first-ever livestream.
Congressional Cemetery hosts Gays & Graves
Baltimore Pride is here
Calendar: June 12-18
Gender-bending buddy film gets 4K restoration for 25th anniversary
German group slams White House’s LGBTQ rights record ahead of World Cup
‘Mighty Real’ explores history of LGBTQ music
D.C.’s housing reality: Cautious optimism meets landlord strain
Hundreds of thousands expected to attend D.C. Pride events
PHOTOS: Pride Run
