National
Quinn loses historic bid for NYC mayor
Lesbian City Council speaker finishes third; de Blasio wins
Christine Quinn finished third in the New York Democratic primary for mayor behind Bill de Blasio and William Thompson. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn lost her bid to become New York’s first openly gay and first female mayor on Tuesday, finishing third in a bruising Democratic primary in which she was assailed on issues unrelated to her sexual orientation.
With pro-LGBT candidate Bill de Blasio, who holds the city’s elected post of Public Advocate, holding a commanding lead in the final weeks of the campaign, Quinn struggled to come in second.
A second place finish could have placed her in an Oct. 1 runoff election against de Blasio if de Blasio failed to reach a 40 percent threshold needed to win the Democratic nomination outright.
But with 98 percent of the voter precincts counted shortly after 1 a.m. Wednesday, Quinn was in third place with 15.5 percent of the vote, trailing former city comptroller William Thompson, who had 26 percent of the vote.
De Blasio had 40.2 percent. However city election board officials said it could take a week before they count absentee and challenged ballots to determine whether de Blasio’s vote count remains at 40 percent or higher.
“I want to congratulate my opponents Bill Thompson and Bill de Blasio on a hard-earned victory,” Politicker.com blog quoted Quinn as saying at her election night gathering at a hotel in Chelsea.
“This was a hard-fought race, we took a lot of knocks, we were up against a lot of odds, but I’m proud of the race we all ran,” Politicker quoted her as saying. “There’s a young girl out there who was inspired by the thought of New York’s first woman mayor and said to herself, ‘You know what? I can do that.’”
The New York Times reported that an exit poll showed LGBT voters comprised 9 percent of the Democratic primary electorate on Tuesday. According to the Times, the exit poll showed de Blasio beating Quinn among LGBT voters by a margin of 47 percent to 34 percent. Thompson received 9 percent of the LGBT vote, former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner received 4 percent, and city comptroller John Liu received 3 percent of the LGBT vote, the exit poll showed.
Many political observers view Quinn’s third-place finish as an astonishing turn of events following her status as the frontrunner in the nine-candidate race during the first several months of the campaign. At one point Quinn approached the 40 percent mark in public opinion polls, placing her far ahead of de Blasio both in potential votes and in money raised.
Kenneth Sherrill, a political science professor emeritus at New York’s Hunter College, said a number of factors contributed to Quinn’s stunning decline in the polls and de Blasio’s dramatic rise. Among them, he said, were Quinn and her campaign advisers’ failure to recognize early on the intensity of voter animus toward incumbent Mayor Michael Bloomberg, with whom Quinn was perceived as a strong ally.
Sherrill said the negative impact of Quinn’s perceived association with Bloomberg was compounded by her decision to wage a campaign geared more for a general election than a Democratic primary.
“In the general election you have to appeal to the broader centrist voters,” he said. “In a primary, the best strategy is to appeal to the most ideological and activist voters.”
According to Sherrill, de Blasio skillfully took the latter approach, positioning himself as a progressive champion of New Yorkers struggling to retain their hold on the middle class. He said de Blasio capitalized on Bloomberg’s unpopularity and succeeded in defining Quinn as a Bloomberg crony, stressing Quinn’s key role in 2009 in backing a change in the city charter that allowed Bloomberg to run for a third term.
Sherrill and other political observers say Quinn’s campaign was also hurt badly by an independent expenditure organization formed by labor and animal rights activists called “Anybody But Quinn.” Among other things, the group produced attack ads denouncing Quinn for not supporting legislation to ban horse drawn carriages in New York’s Central Park.
Although Quinn sought to distance herself from some of Bloomberg’s positions, especially the mayor’s support for a “stop and frisk” policy initiated by the city’s police commissioner, which civil rights groups said targeted minority communities, her reluctance to more aggressively oppose the policy subjected her to strong criticism by de Blasio and some of the other candidates.
Sherrill said the litany of problems Quinn encountered in her campaign had “absolutely nothing” to do with her sexual orientation.
“It didn’t matter one bit,” he said of Quinn’s status as an out lesbian. “What mattered was her proximity to the mayor.”
Quinn won the endorsement of the city’s three major daily newspapers – the New York Times, Daily News, and New York Post. She also received the endorsement of Gay City News, the city’s LGBT newspaper, along with endorsements from most of the city’s prominent LGBT leaders.
The national LGBT groups Human Rights Campaign and Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund contributed thousands of dollars to her campaign and dispatched volunteers and field organizers to help in locations throughout the city.
Victory Fund President and CEO Chuck Wolfe issued a statement Tuesday night noting that eight of its 10 endorsed candidates in New York races, including City Council candidates, won their races in the New York primary.
“As you know by now, Council Speaker Christine Quinn was not successful in her bid for the Democratic nomination for mayor,” Wolfe said. “There’s no sugar-coating what an emotional loss this is for her, her many supporters and all of us here at the Victory Fund,” he said.
“I’ve known Chris for a long time,” he added. “She has been a remarkably effective and passionate advocate for LGBT equality and, most importantly, for everyone who calls New York City home.”
Political observers said the LGBT vote appeared to be divided, with many activists supporting de Blasio over Quinn.
Sherrill said that while de Blasio and Quinn emerged as rivals in a heated political campaign both made great strides to normalize what have been viewed as non-traditional families. He noted that de Blasio, who is white, put his black wife and bi-racial son and daughter in the forefront of his campaign.
“Quinn and her wife were around all the time,” Sherrill said. “She talked about her wife. She talked about her in-laws.”
Added Sherrill, “This was a campaign in which families that never were talked about before were being portrayed as normal, everyday, wholesome, all-American real New Yorkers. And it’s not causing a stir. It’s an amazing breakthrough.”
Finishing behind Quinn in the New York primary on Tuesday were New York City Comptroller John Liu, who received 7 percent of the vote and former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), who received 4.9 percent. Four other lesser known candidates received less than 4 percent each.
Joseph J. Lhota, a top aide to GOP former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, won the Republican nomination in Tuesday’s primary. Although Democrats outnumber Republicans in New York City by a 6 to 1 margin, no Democrat has won the city’s mayoralty since 1989 when Democrat David Dinkins became the city’s first black mayor.
Four years later, Dinkins lost big to Giuliani, and Giuliani and Republican-turned-independent Bloomberg have dominated the general elections for mayor ever since that time.
Now, Lhota, who supports same-sex marriage, is viewed as progressive on social issues while, like Bloomberg, he is a strong ally to New York’s business interests. With de Blasio being perceived by many in the business sector as anti-business, some political observers think Lhota has a shot at winning in the November general election.
National
Man charged in Mall of America shooting plot inspired by Pulse massacre: report
Suspect exchanged hundreds of messages, pledged loyalty to ISIS
The U.S. Department of Justice charged Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud, 18, of Richfield, Minn., on Oct. 7 with one count of knowingly receiving a firearm and ammunition in order to commit a federal crime of terrorism. Mohamud allegedly planned to carry out a mass-casualty attack in support of ISIS, inspired in part by the Pulse nightclub massacre that took place on June 12, 2016 when then-29-year-old Omar Mateen murdered 49 people and wounded 58 – one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history, and the deadliest targeting the LGBTQ+ community.
According to a DOJ statement release, Mohamud was arrested on Oct. 6 by the FBI, which had arranged to sell him an AK-47 assault rifle, magazines, and ammunition through an undercover FBI employee. Mohamud was arrested shortly after paying $600 in cash and taking possession of those items; he reaffirmed his intention to shoot people at the Mall of America during the transaction.
“Mohamud allegedly sought to carry out a mass-casualty shooting at the Mall of America, expressing a desire to emulate some of the most horrific ISIS-inspired attacks in the United States, including the atrocities at Pulse Nightclub and 2025 New Year’s Day attack in New Orleans,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg in the statement by the DOJ. “The National Security Division will continue to work closely with the FBI and Joint Terrorism Task Force to track down and prosecute ISIS-inspired terrorists in the United States.”
According to the complaint, beginning on or about December 2024, Mohamud had exchanged hundreds of messages through multiple social media and messaging apps with a confidential source, and expressed a desire to travel to Somalia to join a designated foreign terrorist organization to fight on their behalf.
The defendant stated many times that if he was unable to travel overseas because of a lack of funds, he planned to carry out a mass-casualty event in Minnesota in support of ISIS.
According to the DOJ, “In July 2026, Mohamud sent messages discussing his intent to carry out a mass-casualty shooting attack at the Mall of America because he claimed it was owned by Jews. He wrote that [he] wanted to kill 30 to 60 people so no one would go there.”
“During the course of his communications, Mohamud stated that he wanted to commit an attack similar to those of the Pulse Nightclub mass-shooting in Orlando, the Bondi Beach mass-shooting in Australia, and the New Year’s Day vehicle-ramming attack in New Orleans.”
This case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Ryan White of the National Security Division’s Counterterrorism Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Benjamin Bejar for the District of Minnesota.
California
Calif. GOP gubernatorial candidate ad ‘disgusting attempt to exploit lesbian intimacy’
Activists, anti-LGBTQ religious leaders criticized Steve Hilton spot
Two women sit on a bed, a Pride flag hanging behind them. One is nervous; the other tells her to be calm and that she’ll do “all the work.” The music swells. The two hold hands and — fill out a ballot voting for Steve Hilton?
This is the new advertisement from the Hilton gubernatorial campaign that is drawing rebuke from both sides of the aisle, but for very different reasons.
Jorge Reyes Salinas, the communications director at Equality California, said the ad was an insult to the queer community.
“This ad is a disgusting attempt to exploit lesbian intimacy for political attention,” he said. The advertisement plays on media tropes that Salinas says “reduce lesbian and bisexual women … to sexual entertainment,” rather than showing them as well-rounded characters. “Any group of the LGBTQ+ community deserves the same dignity and respect as everyone else,” he said.
The ad is truly hyper-sexualized. It ends with one woman telling the other, “Now lick it.” The two pause and stare before she reveals an envelope to send the ballot, and large text pops up saying, “Just try it!”
Salinas characterized the ad as a desperate attempt to get attention from a candidate who is trailing far behind in the polls in heavily Democratic California. The Democratic candidate Xavier Becerra, who is endorsed by Equality California, holds a 25-point lead over Hilton according to recent polling by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies.
Conservatives have also criticized the ad.
Influential evangelical Pastor Jack Hibbs thought the ad was distasteful and said, “lesbianism among college girls and some high school girls that right now is an actual pandemic of social ill.” Republican attorney general candidate Michael Gates said it undermines “the sanctity of the relationship between parents and their children.” This criticism is rather confusing because although the ad features two relatively young women, they both appear to be adults, not minors.
“The comments from Pastor Jack Hibbs should be criticized because there is nothing wrong with two women being attracted to each other,” Salinas said. “We’re calling out the ad’s stereotypes, while also rejecting the homophobia in the response to it … by other Republicans.”
The backlash from Hilton’s own party and supporters shows that an advertisement full of queer innuendo was ill-considered, considering the national GOP’s attacks on LGBTQ people in recent years. Hilton himself has been campaigning against transgender girls and women competing in school sports and using locker rooms that correspond with their gender identity. This context might be why Hilton’s political base responded to the ad just as poorly as the liberal voters he was attempting to court.
Hilton says the ad is part of a new series rolling out before Election Day, showing stereotypical California liberal archetypes voting for Hilton. He claims these ads are authentically filmed with real actors, as opposed to being A.I. generated, like many of his previous ads. One other advertisement has been released so far by the campaign showing a man at a spiritual retreat also being swayed to vote for Hilton, although it is notably absent of sexual innuendo.
Caleb Kaufman is a California Local News Fellow placed with the Los Angeles Blade. The California Local News Fellowship is a state-funded initiative to support and strengthen local news reporting. Learn more about it at fellowships.journalism.berkeley.edu/cafellows.
2026 Midterm Elections
Trump uses anti-trans slur against Democratic Senate candidate
President mocked Annie Andrews
President Donald Trump used an anti-trans slur against Democratic South Carolina Senate candidate Annie Andrews on Monday as he sought to rally support for Republicans in the state’s Senate race.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump attacked Andrews three times, referring to her as “trannie” while promoting U.S. Sen. Darline Graham (R-S.C.)’s campaign.
Andrews is running against Graham for a Senate seat in the solidly Republican state.
Earlier this year, Graham was specially appointed to the seat following the death of her brother, Lindsey Graham, who represented South Carolina in the Senate from 2003 to 2026.
Andrews, the Democratic nominee from the state, is a pediatrician that lives in Charleston with her three children. She told NBC News that she will “work with anyone to put South Carolina first.”
“As a mom and a pediatrician, I’m in this race to fight for my patients, my three kids, and South Carolina,” Andrews said, adding that “lowering costs and making life better for families across our state is going to take all of us working together.”
Andrews used the attention from the president’s attack to emphasize what she described as a focus on policy issues rather than the culture wars that have dominated much of the political debate.
“If you care more about your bills than the politics in Washington, this campaign is for you,” she added.
Trump’s remarks have drawn criticism from leaders on both sides of the aisle.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) condemned Trump’s words Monday night on social media, calling his attacks on Andrews “despicable.”
“Annie Andrews is a mom and pediatrician who’s always put her community first — and she’s exactly who South Carolina needs representing them in the Senate,” Schumer said on X.
Former South Carolina Gov. David Beasley, a Republican, also criticized the president’s attack on Andrews, urging voters to “reject politics based on division and hate.”
“This is abhorrent. Elections don’t have to be about cruelty and lies. South Carolina deserves better,” Beasley wrote Monday night on X.
South Carolina has not elected a Democratic senator in nearly three decades.
Andrews’s campaign website does not mention her positions on LGBTQ issues.
The Washington Blade reached out to Andrews’s campaign for comment on Trump’s attack and her positions on transgender rights but did not hear back by time of publication.
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