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D.C. Log Cabin calls for Romney endorsement with ‘qualifier’

Little noticed letter to LCR board calls for Romney-Cooper meeting

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Robert Turner II, Log Cabin Republicans
Robert Turner II, Log Cabin Republicans

The letter signed by D.C. Log Cabin Republicans President Robert Turner II came to light one day before the national Log Cabin group was expected to announce its decision on whether or not it would endorse Romney following a lengthy period of internal deliberations. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

In an Aug. 27 letter to Log Cabin Republicans’ national board of directors, the D.C. Log Cabin Republicans chapter called on the national gay GOP group to endorse Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney with a “qualifier” that points out the differences the group has with Romney’s “anti-gay” positions.

The letter, signed by D.C. Log Cabin Republicans President Robert Turner II, was posted on the D.C. group’s website but was not publicly announced through a press release and wasn’t widely seen by activists and the media, Turner told the Washington Blade on Wednesday.

Turner’s discussion of the letter with the Blade on Wednesday came one day before the national Log Cabin group was expected to announce its decision on whether or not it would endorse Romney following a lengthy period of internal deliberations that sources have described as painful and contentious.

Turner sent his letter to Log Cabin Republicans’ national board on the opening day of the Republican National Convention in Tampa.

“After a lengthy, wide-ranging, and honest discussion, our members voted overwhelmingly to encourage you to endorse the Romney-Ryan ticket,” Turner states in the letter. “However, the remaining few, as well as some members of the majority, expressed legitimate concerns as to the anti-gay positions the candidates have assumed on certain issues of significance to our community generally, and gay Republicans specifically,” Turner says in the letter.

“We realize that you are aware of these issues and assume that these will be part of your discussion as you decide the endorsement question,” Turner wrote.

“If you favor our recommendation, we ask that you accompany an endorsement with a qualifier noting the significant differences we have with the ticket on some social and civil liberties issues and an expression of Log Cabin’s intention of continuing to vigorously encourage the ticket and the party to revise their positions to more directly reflect the true values of our Grand Old Party,” Turner says in the letter.

“We also feel that our national Executive Director, who we firmly stand behind, as well as other ambassadors of the organization, should seek a private meeting with the Governor, much in the way the Austin-12 did with George W. Bush in 2000 in order to create a dialogue about our issues outside of the spotlight of the media,” Turner states in the letter.

Turner was referring to national Log Cabin Republicans Executive Director R. Clarke Cooper, who reportedly has been facilitating discussion between board members and leaders of the group’s chapter across the country over whether a Romney endorsement should be made.

Some of the group’s members have called for withholding an endorsement of Romney due to his anti-gay positions similar to the course the organization took in 2004. At that time, under the direction of its then president Patrick Guerrero, Log Cabin chose not to endorse the re-election of President George W. Bush in response to Bush’s support for a federal constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Cooper didn’t immediately respond to an email from the Blade seeking comment on the D.C. Log Cabin group’s letter and whether the national group plans to announce its decision on an endorsement Thursday night, when it holds a national dinner in Washington.

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Virginia

Virginia High School League reverses policy on transgender athletes

Trans athletes previously allowed to compete on teams that corresponded with gender identity

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Virginia flag flies over the state Capitol. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

The Virginia High School League on Monday announced it will no longer allow transgender athletes to compete on teams that correspond with their gender identity following another executive order signed by President Donald Trump targeting trans people.

The VHSL announced their policy change on their X account. It undoes a 2023 announcement that said it would not change their policy that allowed trans athletes to compete on teams that affirmed their identities.

Following a Jan. 28 executive order signed that stopped hospitals and other medical institutions from providing gender-affirming care to minors under that age of 19, Trump on Feb. 5 signed another executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.”

The ban seeks “to rescind all funds from educational programs that deprive women and girls of fair athletic opportunities, which results in the endangerment, humiliation, and silencing of women and girls.” The NCAA and many other educational institutions agreed to implement the ban in fear of losing federal funding.

“The VHSL is an association comprising 318 member schools with more than 177,000 students participating yearly in sports and academic activities. The VHSL is the governing body, and our member schools look to and rely on the VHSL for policy and guidance. To that end, the VHSL will comply with the executive order,” said VHSL Executive Director John W. “Billy” Haun. “The compliance will provide membership clear and consistent direction.”

The VHSL also said staff will be making changes to their handbook and policy manual in the coming days, reminiscent of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scrubbing all of the papers in its database of any now-banned language regarding LGBTQ people and attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion.

The VHSL’s own data indicates only 29 of the student athletes it oversees have been reported as trans since 2022.

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District of Columbia

Booz Allen withdraws as WorldPride corporate sponsor

Company updated programs to comply with Trump executive orders

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(Screenshot courtesy of WorldPride's website)

The U.S. technology company Booz Allen Hamilton has confirmed it has withdrawn as a corporate sponsor for the international LGBTQ WorldPride events scheduled to take place in D.C. from May 17-June 8, according to a report by the Washington Business Journal.

In an exclusive story published Feb.10, the business publication reports that Booz Allen Hamilton disclosed in a statement that its decision to withdraw as a WorldPride sponsor was based on its need to comply with “recently issued presidential executive orders.”

Although the statement did not say so directly, it is referring to executive orders issued since Jan. 20 by President Donald Trump that, among other things, ban government agencies and companies doing business with the government through contracts from promoting or carrying out diversity, equity, and inclusion or “DEI” programs.

On its website, Booz Allen Hamilton describes itself as an “advanced technology company delivering outcomes with speed for America’s most critical defense, civil, and national securities priorities.” Among the government agencies it does business with, the website statement says, are the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Navy, and the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

“We take this responsibility to our nation seriously,” Washington Business Journal quoted the Booz Allen Hamilton statement regarding WorldPride as saying. “It demands from us commitment to their best principle to flawless execution and to full compliance with all laws and regulations, including executive orders,” Washington Business Journal quotes the statement as saying.

The Washington Business Journal article includes a photo of more than a dozen of Booz Allen Hamilton employees marching in D.C.’s Capital Pride parade in 2017.

The company did not immediately respond to a request from Washington Blade seeking comment on its WorldPride decision.

Capital Pride Alliance, the group that organizes most D.C. LGBTQ Pride events and is the lead organizer of WorldPride 2025, in response to a request by the Blade released a statement responding to Booz Allen Hamilton’s sponsorship withdrawal.

“Booz Allen Hamilton is the only organization that has withdrawn its committed financial support for WorldPride,” the statement says. “CPA is proud of its many longstanding legacy sponsors, many of whom have already reaffirmed their commitments to participate in WorldPride this summer,” the statement continues.

“Just like many American companies and LGBTQ+ organizations, we are navigating current challenges and many unknowns,” the statement says. “We are confident, however, that we will have the support necessary to have a successful and safe WorldPride that meets this moment,” it says.

“That support includes families, organizations, and businesses from across our community and corporations that truly celebrate diversity and value equity and inclusion for all,” the statement concludes.

The Capital Pride Alliance website last year listed Booz Allen Hamilton as a corporate sponsor for the 2024 Capital Pride events in the category of a “True Colors” sponsor, which it said represented a donation of $75,000. But the Capital Pride Alliance statement to the Blade this week says, “We are not going to share they’re previously planned commitment for 2025.”

The statement adds, “Many in our community are extremely vulnerable right now, and standing up for them, standing with them, standing with us, in this movement is what we all need.”

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District of Columbia

Trump executive order prompts local hospitals to stop gender-affirming care for youth

Activists marched outside Children’s National on Feb. 2

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A protester stands outside Children's National Hospital in Northwest D.C. on Feb. 2, 2025. (Washington Blade photo by Linus Berggren)

Hospitals in the D.C. area are putting a prompt stop to aiding transgender youth and their families continue their transition after President Donald Trump signed an executive order that bans all gender-affirming care nationwide for minors under 19.

On Jan. 28, days after Trump took office, signed the executive order, “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation,” which immediately halted the prescription and medical treatment of gender-affirming care for all minors under the age of 19 across the country. The order use of “chemical and surgical mutilation” is in reference to the various kinds of gender-affirming care that youth may receive when in the care of a medical practice.

“Today, medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions.” says the executive order. “This dangerous trend will be a stain on our nation’s history, and it must end.”

The executive order laid out various guidelines for medical practices to follow that must be implemented within the coming months. These include “ending reliance on junk science,” in referring to following the World Professional Association for Transgender Health’s guidelines for youth, and “defunding chemical and surgical mutilation,” which seeks to ban hospitals and medical schools to use federal funding for gender-affirming care.

Hospitals, medical schools, and clinics across the country have begun to abide by the executive order and drop trans and gender diverse youth as they dismantled programs that provided care of any kind that treated a child’s gender dysphoria. Children’s National Hospital in Northwest Washington is one of those institutions.

“Children’s National is committed to providing compassionate and comprehensive care in accordance with the law,” said Children’s National in a Jan. 30 press release. “As a result, we are currently pausing all puberty blockers and hormone therapy prescriptions for transgender youth patients, per the guidelines in the executive order issued by the White House this week. Children’s National already does not perform gender affirming surgery for minors.”

“We recognize the impact this change will have, and our commitment to creating a better future for children and families remains at the forefront of our mission,” it added. “We will do everything we can to ensure the same uninterrupted access to mental health counseling, social support, and holistic and respectful care for every patient at Children’s National. We are working directly with patients and providers to ensure every patient has access to the information and support services they need, and we appreciate their continued trust and understanding as we work through these changes.”

The hospital did not provide the Washington Blade with additional comment.

Activists in response to the decision organized a march that took place outside Children’s Hospital. on Feb. 2. D.C. Safe Haven, a group founded to “provide TLGBQ people in the DMV area with opportunities to transform their lives,” helped organize the march.

Similar protests have taken place across the country.

The Gender Liberation Movement organized the “Rise Up for Trans Youth” march in New York’s Union Square on Saturday. The group was one of the organizers of a march that took place in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 4 when the justices heard oral arguments in the U.S. v. Skrmetti case, which challenges a Tennessee law that bans gender-affirming care for minors under 18.

“VCU Health and Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU have suspended gender-affirming medications and gender-affirming surgical procedures for patients under 19-years-old in response to an executive order issued by the White House on Jan. 28, 2025, and related state guidance received by VCU on Jan. 30, 2025,” the hospital said in a statement. “Our doors remain open to all patients and their families for screening, counseling, mental health care, and all other health care needs.”

Equality Virginia, a queer advocacy group that works across the state, in a statement to the Blade criticized the executive order and response to it.

“Executive orders are not legislation, they are not law, and they do not supersede state laws,” said Narissa Rahaman, the group’s executive director. “The General Assembly has taken up bills on both transgender athletes and gender-affirming care, and in both cases, the general assembly has declined to pursue bans on either. State law is clear; what is unclear is why the Youngkin administration is spending its final year cozying up to the Trump administration and repeatedly singling out transgender Virginians for discrimination.”

“To the transgender and nonbinary athletes and youth seeking healthcare in Virginia who are feeling scared: Equality Virginia will not stop fighting for you, no matter who occupies the Governor’s Mansion or the White House,” added Rahaman.

Petitions are urging D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb, Health and Human Services, and Children’s National to use D.C.’s human rights law to challenge the executive orders. Lambda Legal, along with the American Civil Liberties Union and the law firms Jenner & Block and Hogan Lovells have filed lawsuits against Trump’s mandate on behalf of families of trans youth.

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