Local
Md. state senator says casino firm paid for NGLTF gambling mailer
LGBT advocacy group says ballot measure on gambling will hurt marriage equality vote
A state senator in Maryland told the Washington Post that the Penn National Gaming company paid more than $340,000 for a mailing that the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force sent to Maryland households in August opposing a bill to expand gambling in the state.
According to the Post, Sen. C. Anthony Muse (D-Prince George’s County), who voted against Maryland’s same-sex marriage law, said a Penn National vice president told him the casino company gave the money for the mailer to the DCI Group, a D.C. based consulting firm. The Post reported that Muse said the DCI Group then gave the money to the Task Force.
At that time, Monique Hall, a member of the NGLTF Action Fund board of directors, also served as a vice president for the DCI Group, a Republican-leaning consulting firm. Sources familiar with DCI Group told the Blade in August that DCI had been retained by one of the Maryland casinos to campaign against the gambling bill.
Hall, DCI Group, and Penn National have not responded to calls from the Blade seeking comment. NGLTF spokesperson Inga Sarda-Sorenson could not be immediately reached for comment.
The gambling bill calls for allowing a sixth casino to operate in the state in Prince George’s county and would allow casinos approved for five existing sites in Maryland as well as the one in P.G. County to operate table games. The existing sites are currently required to operate only slot machines.
Casino owners involved with the five existing sites, including Penn National, are vehemently opposed to allowing a new casino to open in P.G. County, saying the new casino would take away customers from their locations. They have spent millions of dollars on TV commercials calling on voters to vote no on the gambling expansion measure on the November ballot.
At the time it sent out its mailing in August, NGLTF said the gambling bill, introduced by Gov. Martin O’Malley, would be detrimental to efforts to save the state’s same-sex marriage law, which will come before voters in a referendum in the November election.
NGLTF noted that if the Maryland General Assembly approved the gambling bill – which it did in late August — it would come before voters in a referendum in November at the same time that the state’s marriage equality law appears on the ballot in a separate referendum.
The group noted that a gambling referendum would likely attract a larger than usual number of conservative voters to the polls who oppose both gambling and gay marriage. This would make it more difficult for marriage equality advocates to persuade voters to cast their ballot in support of same-sex marriage, the Task Force argued.
“We do not have a position on gambling, but rather on marriage equality,” NGLTF Deputy Executive Director Darlene Nipper said in a statement released in August.
“The purpose of the marriage equality mailer, funded by the Task Force Action Fund, which like other nonprofits includes many donors, some named and some who are not, is to get marriage equality over the finish line,” Nipper said. “It was sent to a portion of registered Democratic households in Maryland.”
NGLT has declined to disclose who paid for the expensive mailer, saying only that it was funded by contributors to its Action Fund, which gets involved in political campaigns in support of LGBT equality.
Josh Levin, campaign manager for Marylanders for Marriage Equality, the organization leading the effort to uphold the same-sex marriage law, said the group’s internal polling has shown that a gambling referendum would have no impact on the marriage equality vote.
“We’ve been looking at this carefully for a long time and have yet to see any data that suggest there are any voters who would come out in the election because of the gaming initiative who were not already going to be out for a presidential election or to vote on the question of marriage equality,” he told the Blade.
However, at least one pollster, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a gambling referendum could bring out more conservative voters than usual, despite the relatively high turnout expected for a presidential election.
Gay Republican strategist Tom Synhorst, the founder and chair of the DCI Group, also did not respond to a request by the Blade for comment on what specific role DCI is playing in the campaign to oppose the gambling bill or whether it acted as a conduit for transferring funds for the NGLTF mailer from a gaming company.
The DCI website describes it as a public affairs company that “Helps corporations navigate their most challenging political, legislative and regulatory problems anywhere in the world.”
Virginia
DOJ seeks to join lawsuit against Loudoun County over trans student in locker room
Three male high school students suspended after complaining about classmate
The Justice Department has asked to join a federal lawsuit against Loudoun County Public Schools over the way it handled the case of three male high school students who complained about a transgender student in a boys’ locker room.
The Washington Blade earlier this year reported Loudoun County public schools suspended the three boys and launched a Title IX investigation into whether they sexually harassed the student after they said they felt uncomfortable with their classmate in the locker room at Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn.
The parents of two of the boys filed a lawsuit against Loudoun County public schools in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in Alexandria. The Richmond-based Founding Freedoms Law Center and America First Legal, which White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller co-founded, represent them.
The Justice Department in a Dec. 8 press release announced that “it filed legal action against the Loudoun County (Va.) School Board (Loudoun County) for its denial of equal protection based on religion.”
“The suit alleges that Loudoun County applied Policy 8040, which requires students and faculty to accept and promote gender ideology, to two Christian, male students in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution,” reads the press release.
Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division in the press release said “students do not shed their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse gate.”
“Loudoun County’s decision to advance and promote gender ideology tramples on the rights of religious students who cannot embrace ideas that deny biological reality,” said Dhillon.
Outgoing Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and outgoing Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares in May announced an investigation into the case.
The Virginia Department of Education in 2023 announced the new guidelines for trans and nonbinary students for which Youngkin asked. Equality Virginia and other advocacy groups claim they, among other things, forcibly out trans and nonbinary students.
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights in February launched an investigation into whether Loudoun County and four other Northern Virginia school districts’ policies in support of trans and nonbinary students violate Title IX and President Donald Trump’s executive order that prohibits federally funded educational institutions from promoting “gender ideology.”
District of Columbia
Capital Pride announces change in date for 2026 D.C. Pride parade and festival
Events related to U.S. 250th anniversary and Trump birthday cited as reasons for change
The Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C. based group that organizes the city’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, has announced it is changing the dates for the 2026 Capital Pride Parade and Festival from the second weekend in June to the third weekend.
“For over a decade, Capital Pride has taken place during the second weekend in June, but in 2026, we are shifting our dates in response to the city’s capacity due to major events and preparations for the 250th anniversary of the United States,” according to a Dec. 9 statement released by Capital Pride Alliance.
The statement says the parade will take place on Saturday, June 20, 2026, with the festival and related concert taking place on June 21.
“This change ensures our community can gather safely and without unnecessary barriers,” the statement says. “By moving the celebration, we are protecting our space and preserving Pride as a powerful act of visibility, solidarity, and resistance,” it says.
Ryan Bos, the Capital Pride Alliance CEO and President, told the Washington Blade the change in dates came after the group conferred with D.C. government officials regarding plans for a number of events in the city on the second weekend in June. Among them, he noted, is a planned White House celebration of President Donald Trump’s 80th birthday and other events related to the U.S. 250th anniversary, which are expected to take place from early June through Independence Day on July 4.
The White House has announced plans for a large June 14, 2026 celebration on the White House south lawn of Trump’s 80th birthday that will include a large-scale Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) event involving boxing and wrestling competition.
Bos said the Capital Pride Parade will take place along the same route it has in the past number of years, starting at 14th and T Streets, N.W. and traveling along 14th Street to Pennsylvania Ave., where it will end. He said the festival set for the following day will also take place at its usual location on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., between 2nd Street near the U.S. Capitol, to around 7th Street, N.W.
“Our Pride events thrive because of the passion and support of the community,” Capital Pride Board Chair Anna Jinkerson said in the statement. “In 2026, your involvement is more important than ever,” she said.
District of Columbia
Three women elected leaders of Capital Pride Alliance board
Restructured body includes chair rather than president as top leader
The Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C.-based group that organizes the city’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, announced it has restructured its board of directors and elected for the first time three women to serve as leaders of the board’s Executive Committee.
“Congratulations to our newly elected Executive Officers, making history as Capital Pride Alliance’s first all-women Board leadership,” the group said in a statement.
“As we head into 2026 with a bold new leadership structure, we’re proud to welcome Anna Jinkerson as Board Chair, Kim Baker as Board Treasurer, and Taylor Lianne Chandler as Board Secretary,” the statement says.
In a separate statement released on Nov. 20, Capital Pride Alliance says the restructured Board now includes the top leadership posts of Chair, Treasurer, and Secretary, replacing the previous structure of President and Vice President as the top board leaders.
It says an additional update to the leadership structure includes a change in title for longtime Capital Pride official Ryan Bos from executive director to chief executive officer and president.
According to the statement, June Crenshaw, who served as acting deputy director during the time the group organized WorldPride 2025 in D.C., will now continue in that role as permanent deputy director.
The statement provides background information on the three newly elected women Board leaders.
• Anna Jinkerson (chair), who joined the Capital Pride Alliance board in 2022, previously served as the group’s vice president for operations and acting president. “A seasoned non-profit executive, she currently serves as Assistant to the President and CEO and Chief of Staff at Living Cities, a national member collaborative of leading philanthropic foundations and financial institutions committed to closing income and wealth gaps in the United States and building an economy that works for everyone.”
• Kim Baker (treasurer) is a “biracial Filipino American and queer leader,” a “retired, disabled U.S. Army veteran with more than 20 years of service and extensive experience in finance, security, and risk management.” She has served on the Capital Pride Board since 2018, “bringing a proven track record of steady, principled leadership and unwavering dedication to the LGBTQ+ community.”
• Taylor Lianne Chandler (Secretary) is a former sign language interpreter and crisis management consultant. She “takes office as the first intersex and trans-identifying member of the Executive Committee.” She joined the Capital Pride Board in 2019 and previously served as executive producer from 2016 to 2018.
Bos told the Washington Blade in a Dec. 2 interview that the Capital Pride board currently has 12 members, and is in the process of interviewing additional potential board members.
“In January we will be announcing in another likely press release the full board,” Bos said. “We are finishing the interview process of new board members this month,” he said. “And they will take office to join the board in January.”
Bos said the organization’s rules set a cap of 25 total board members, but the board, which elects its members, has not yet decided how many additional members it will select and a full 25-member board is not required.
The Nov. 20 Capital Pride statement says the new board executive members will succeed the organization’s previous leadership team, which included Ashley Smith, who served as president for eight years before he resigned earlier this year; Anthony Musa, who served for seven years as vice president of board engagement; Natalie Thompson, who served eight years on the executive committee; and Vince Micone, who served for eight years as vice president of operations.
“I am grateful for the leadership, dedication, and commitment shown by our former executive officers — Ashley, Natalie, Anthony, and Vince — who have been instrumental in CPA’s growth and the exceptional success of WorldPride 2025,” Bos said in the statement.
“I look forward to collaborating with Anna in her new role, as well as Kim and Taylor in theirs, as we take on the important work ahead, prepare for Capital Pride 2026, and expand our platform and voice through Pride365,” Bos said.
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