Local
LGBT activists saddened, angry over Kwame Brown resignation, criminal charge
Catania calls on mayor to ‘provide answers’ or resign
Eleanor Holmes Norton & openly gay City Council member David Catania speak with Kwame Brown. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)
LGBT activists joined fellow D.C. residents in expressing sadness and anger over an ongoing city corruption investigation that led to the resignation Wednesday night of D.C. Council Chair Kwame Brown (D-At-Large).
Brown’s resignation came hours after federal prosecutors charged him with committing felony bank fraud. Sources familiar with the case said he was expected to plead guilty to the charge at a hearing scheduled for 11 a.m. Friday at the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
An atmosphere of tension and uncertainty within the city government over Brown’s predicament intensified when gay D.C. Council member David Catania (I-At-Large) called on Mayor Vincent Gray to resign if he continues to refuse to publicly answer questions about a separate investigation into alleged wrong-doing in his 2010 election campaign.
In an interview with Fox 5 TV News, Catania said, “The time has come, especially in light of what we expect to happen with the chairman today, for the mayor to provide answers to the questions that people have regarding his campaign or return as a private citizen and address those issues.”
Catania appeared to express what many observers at the Wilson Building, which serves as D.C.’s City Hall, were saying privately.
“The Wilson Building has been transformed into a rumor mill and, you know, people simply speculate as to when the next shoe will drop,” he told Fox 5 News. “Enough is enough.”
Brown’s resignation came five months after D.C. Council member Harry Thomas (D-Ward 5) resigned less than a week before he was charged with embezzling $350,000 in city funds. Thomas pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced in May to 38 months in jail.
Last month, two high-level officials in Gray’s 2010 mayoral election campaign pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations. The violations involved illegally diverting campaign funds to pay a minor mayoral candidate to stay in the race and harass and heckle then Mayor Adrian Fenty, Gray’s main rival in the election.
Gray has said he knew nothing about the scheme, and no evidence has surfaced to indicate he engaged in an illegal act in connection with the payoff to candidate Sulaimon Brown. But sources familiar with the case say federal prosecutors continue to investigate whether Gray and others were involved in the scheme.
On Wednesday, prosecutors with the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia filed a charging document called a criminal information against Council Chair Brown accusing him of engaging in bank fraud.
The document says that between August 2005 and August 2007 Brown “knowingly and willfully devised a scheme and artifice to defraud Industrial Bank, N.A.” It says the alleged scheme involved obtaining a home equity loan from the bank to buy a boat by falsifying loan application documents that overstated his income by “tens of thousands of dollars.”
Sources familiar with the case said Brown consented to the criminal information and waived his right to have the allegation brought before a grand jury. Defendants who select the criminal information option almost always agree to an offer by the government to plead guilty in exchange for a less severe charge or a promise by the government to seek a more lenient sentence, according to court observers.
“I hereby resign my position as Chairman of the Council of the District of Columbia effective immediately,” Brown said in a letter he submitted to the Council’s secretary at 4:29 p.m. Wednesday.
“I have made some very serious mistakes in judgment for which I will take full responsibility,” he said in the letter. “I have behaved in ways that I should not have. I was wrong, and I will face the consequences of that conduct,” he said.
“This is a grim day,” said Rick Rosendall, vice president for political affairs of the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance. “Kwame Brown was an ally of the LGBT community, if not in the top rank.”
Rosendall noted that Brown wasn’t an early supporter of same-sex marriage and he didn’t support a bill to allow gay clubs displaced by the Washington Nationals baseball stadium to move to new locations. But Rosendall said Brown “redeemed himself in recent years, including by co-introducing the marriage equality bill.”
Gay Democratic and Ward 8 activist Phil Pannell called Brown’s resignation “heart breaking,” saying he worked on all of Brown’s election campaigns. When Brown ran for the Council Chair position Pannell arranged for him to visit gay bars across the city, helping Brown build support from LGBT voters.
Pannell and Lateefah Williams, president of the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, the city’s largest LGBT political group, said Brown’s departure from the Council would not change the Council’s overall strong support for LGBT related issues.
“My immediate reaction is this won’t have an impact on our community,” Williams said in referring to LGBT support on the Council.
“It is always sad when someone people trust and respect does something to betray that,” said gay Democratic activist Peter Rosenstein. “Kwame Brown will have to pay the consequences but the District is doing well and we need to focus on that and esure that whatever the result of his transgressions are they don’t impact the greater good of the people.”
Council members Phil Mendelson and Vincent Orange, both At-Large Democrats, are believed to be the two candidates in contention for the post of interim chair. Under the city’s Home Rule Charter, the Council has authority to elect an interim chair if the Council chair position becomes vacant. Under the charter, the Council’s four at-large members are the only ones eligible for the interim chair position.
The interim chair serves until a new permanent chair is chosen in a special city election. Sources familiar with the Council have said Mendelson appears to be the favorite for the interim post.
Under the Home Rule Charter, Council member Mary Cheh, who holds the position of president pro tempore of the Council, became the Council’s acting chair until the Council elects the interim chair. Cheh said she has called a special Council meeting for June 13 for the purpose of allowing the Council to elect the interim chair.
Cheh is a strong support of LGBT rights.
Like other political activists, gay Democratic activist Brad Lewis, a former Stein Club president and resident of Ward 8, said he was angered as well as saddened over the Kwame Brown resignation.
“In a short period of time we have had two elected officials resign after being charged with a felony,” Lewis said. “This doesn’t look good for us as a city. It doesn’t help us in our effort to expand home rule and obtain budget autonomy,” he said in referring to longstanding efforts by the city to end Congress’s power to give final approval to the city’s budget.
Pointing to ongoing investigations of other Council members and the mayor, Lewis added, “It seems like half of our officials are under investigation. It all stems from greed and ego. People feel they are above the law.”
D.C. gay Republican leaders Bob Kabel and Robert Turner echoed Lewis’s sentiment. Kabel is chair of the D.C. Republican Party. Turner is president of the D.C. Log Cabin Republicans, a gay political group.
“Our city deserves better than this,” Kabel said in a statement. “The charges against Kwame Brown are serious and are a result of elected officials feeling entitled to benefits they don’t deserve.”
Kabel added, “Until District residents begin electing Republican officials, our city will continue to endure similar embarrassments and unethical behavior from our elected officials.”
Turner said he was troubled that two members of the City Council have resigned over corruption scandals within a period of barely six months.
“Kwame Brown says he wants to take the honorable course by resigning,” Turner said. “The honorable course is not to commit fraud in the first place…Sadly, the question on everybody’s mind is ‘who’s next?’”
Rehoboth Beach
Officials raise troubling concerns about Rehoboth mayoral candidate Suzanne Goode
Homophobic emails, ‘aggressive’ behavior cited: ‘It just seems to be getting worse’
As Rehoboth Beach voters prepare to elect a new mayor on Aug. 8, some city officials and local residents are raising new concerns about the behavior of City Commissioner and mayoral candidate Suzanne Goode.
In addition to a history of troubling emails in which she has used homophobic language and criticized the city’s rainbow crosswalks, Goode is being accused of inappropriate behavior by a neighbor and a fellow Commissioner related to a dispute on the Nextdoor online platform.
The Blade spoke to City Manager Taylour Tedder, Commissioner Chris Galanty, and others about Goode’s behavior during her time as commissioner.
Goode was elected commissioner in August 2024. Fellow commissioner Susan Stewart, who is also running for mayor, criticized Goode’s behavior in a March 9, 2026 meeting, bringing up emails outlining Goode’s offensive conduct toward city staff.
In one email, Goode wrote to Rehoboth Beach City Solicitor Lisa Borin Ogden: “I am sorry that I learned from Google when you were first interviewed [in the] spring [of] 2025 that you are Jewish. My opinion of my fellow Jews declined significantly thanks to you since last summer. Actually would have thought you would have more compassion than the average person, based on your late brother. Except you don’t. I am sick of your haughty attitude toward me.”
In other emails, Goode questions why city officials encouraged CAMP Rehoboth and Clear Space Theatre to apply for grant funds. She has denigrated both institutions, referring to CAMP as a “questionable non-profit” and Clear Space as “second rate” with a “woke, drag queen bent” at times. She accuses Rehoboth’s LGBTQ community of displaying “their sex lives in public view” and fears physical violence from LGBTQ activists.
Goode disputed the claims and called for the city to remove Stewart’s remarks from the website.
The following statements were included in the emails sent by Goode:
• “Gays and theatre aficionados can donate as much as they like to these pet causes. Some taxpayers think the theatre is second-rate as community theatres go, and many dislike the RB emphasis on LGBTQ when heterosexuals don’t demand equivalent display of their sex lives in public view.”
• “Just because the LGBTQ community feels oppressed and discriminated against, that doesn’t mean that those who identify as LGBTQ are better able to recognize racial discrimination than someone like myself. It might surprise some of you to learn that I briefly dated an African American fellow college student.”
• “A performing arts and LGBTQ agenda isn’t appropriate for BOC spending when the city faces over $60M in debt.”
• “But there are some folks in town, who ironically have to remain in the closet (conservatives now have to do what gays had to do in the 20th century — ah, the irony) who object to the woke, drag queen bent of Clear Space at times. They have confided this in me, and thanked me for fighting for their tax dollars. Maybe I will regret speaking up, as some LGBTQ activist will attack me physically, even though I am a complete supporter of gay rights, and have as many gay male friends as female friends now that I live in RB with a large gay population.”
In the emails, Goode also referred to City Manager Tedder as “the mayor’s whore.”
Stewart told the Blade that the troubling behavior has since escalated.
Commissioner Chris Galanty spoke to the Blade about Goode’s behavior as commissioner and her issues with the rainbow crosswalks in town.
“Suzanne told me on two separate occasions that she didn’t like the rainbow crosswalks, and she said that she didn’t understand why they had to exist, and she didn’t understand why gay people had to advertise their sexuality, and she said straight people don’t have to do that.”
Galanty said that when he challenged her on this, she “moved very quickly to another topic.” He said that she has now shifted her perspective and is more concerned that the rainbow crosswalks are an issue of labor costs.
Goode told the Blade that, “Unfortunately, the rainbow crosswalks have potentially reduced the upkeep of the conventional crosswalks. But the rainbow crosswalks are attractive in and of themselves, and they do add to our recognition of Rehoboth’s longstanding status as a gay-friendly town.”
Accusations of “aggressive” behavior by Goode aren’t limited to emails. Last summer, Goode came to the home of Diana Jones, a property owner in Rehoboth Beach who is a neighbor of Galanty’s. Jones spoke to the Blade to share her experience with Goode.
Jones is active on Nextdoor, an online social network for neighborhoods. She said that she got involved on the platform during the time of the commissioners election last summer, in which her neighbor, Chris Galanty, was elected as commissioner.
Jones said that she made posts supporting Galanty. She said that someone posted a link of a lawsuit that involved Goode’s husband, Jeffrey Goode, who lost his race for commissioner last summer. Jones said that she reposted the link after it was taken down.
Jones said that the lawsuit was “very relevant to somebody who is running for city commissioner.”
Jones said that Suzanne Goode showed up at her house as a result of the post. Jones was out walking her dog nearby so Goode briefly spoke with Jones’s husband who was home.
“She came over to my house because she was saying I was doxing him,” said Jones. Jones said that Goode then found her as she was walking her dog and tried to talk to her about her Nextdoor posts, saying that she “brought up a very painful time in her life.”
Jones said that she has not had any communication with Goode since.
When asked for comment on the situation with Jones, Goode responded by saying “Diana Jones’s behavior toward me was despicable, and the way she has chosen to give her side of the story to news media says more about her than it will ever say about me.”
Galanty told the Blade that Goode came to his house in late June of this year when he was not home. She then called him about Jones.
“She relayed to me that she was having a disagreement with my neighbor on the Nextdoor platform, and she asked me to intercede with the neighbor,” said Galanty. “She said, ‘Please speak to her because I am frustrated with what she is saying. She needs to stop, and you need to say something to her.'”
Galanty said that Goode called him four times and texted him 32 times in the span of three and a half hours the next day.
Galanty said that he responded the next day, telling her that her behavior was inappropriate.
“Eventually it took a couple of weeks, but she apologized in her own way. She just said we just need to let it go.”
From his perspective as commissioner, Galanty said, “She likes to re-litigate things that have happened, six months ago, nine months ago. She likes to rehash issues that are in the past.”
“She can be really aggressive, and people are just really turned off by her,” said Galanty.
Tedder, who has accused Goode of creating a “hostile work environment,” told the Blade about his experiences working with Goode.
“She does not support the staff, and constantly tells us to resign,” said Tedder.
Tedder said that Goode texted City Solicitor Ogden at 7:45 a.m. on a Saturday, telling her to resign.
“Sometimes she does have good ideas. It’s just it gets so lost in these pages and pages of emails and thousands of emails that she sends,” said Tedder.
In regards to Goode’s behavior, Tedder said it has been going on since the beginning. “It just seems to be getting worse.”
Maryland
Advocates for trans students urge Md. to fight White House threats
Four school districts under federal investigation
By JESSICA CALEFATI | Allies of transgender children are urging state education officials to fight back against the Trump-Vance administration, which has threatened to punish a growing number of Maryland school districts over local policies that affirm students’ gender identities.
The advocates testified Tuesday morning before the Maryland State Board of Education — one day after the U.S. Education and Justice departments alleged that Anne Arundel County’s school system violated federal student privacy law by withholding a student’s gender identity from their parents. A spokesperson for the district said Monday legal counsel had not yet reviewed the claims and that the district had no further comment.
School districts in Prince George’s, Montgomery, and Frederick Counties were already under investigation for allegedly violating Title IX, the civil rights law that prohibits sex-based discrimination. The federal government last month threatened to revoke funding from the districts because they allow trans students to use restrooms and locker rooms that align with their identities.
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
Maryland
White House threatens Anne Arundel schools over gender identity policy
District faces possible legal action or loss of federal funding
By JESSICA CALEFATI | The Trump-Vance administration on Monday threatened to punish Anne Arundel County’s school system with legal action or the loss of federal funding for allegedly withholding information about a student’s gender identity and transition from the child’s parents.
The U.S. Education and Justice Departments together determined that the suburban Maryland district treats students’ gender identities as confidential medical information that cannot be shared with parents, in violation of federal student privacy law, according to a news release. A federal lawsuit filed against the district earlier this month made similar claims.
“As a mother and a grandmother, it is unconscionable that any school district would hide the most sensitive information about children in their care from their own parents,” U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in a statement. “This is not only an affront to basic moral principles, but also to parents’ rights under federal law.”
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
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