The 28th annual Delaware Pride Festival is back this weekend in the capital city of Dover. 

The Saturday event will take place from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. on the Legislative Green outside of the state capitol building in Dover. The festival is hosted by drag queen Scarlet Masters.

The schedule includes a policy panel with State Representatives Eric Morrison and DeShanna Neal, a performance from the Rainbow Chorale of Delaware, and drag shows. There will also be food vendors, a kids zone, beer garden, and 21+ after party. 

“Pride season is a riot, a time to advocate, and a time to remember those that came before us to take us as far as we are today, especially our trans and BIPOC siblings,” wrote Delaware Pride President Zach Workman in a letter on its website. “Always remember that when one member of our community is under attack, we come together to support them. We remember the sacrifices of our ancestors in order to fuel our push into the future. We are here, we have always been here, and we will be here for the future to come no matter how many times others try to erase us … This festival is a testament to the strength of queer Delawareans as it has stood the test of time over the last 28 iterations, becoming a lasting tradition.”

A prominent LGBTQ activist who lives in the U.K. said she could not travel to D.C. for the WorldPride 2025 Human Rights Conference because the U.S. revoked her eligibility to enter the country without a visa.

Phyll Opoku-Gyimah, the co-founder of UK Black Pride known as Lady Phyll, was supposed to speak at the conference’s opening plenary at the National Theater. Opoku-Gyimah instead spoke remotely.

She said the U.S. “revoked” her eligibility to participate in the Visa Waiver Program and use an Electronic System for Travel Authorization, or ESTA, to enter the country without a visa because she traveled to Cuba earlier this year.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection website notes the State Department on Jan. 12, 2021, designated Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism.

President Donald Trump’s first administration ended eight days after he made the designation. Then-President Joe Biden in the final days of his administration said the U.S. would move to lift the designation as part of a Vatican-brokered deal that secured the release of prisoners on the Communist island. Brenda Díaz, a transgender woman with HIV who participated in an anti-government protest in 2021, is among those who the Cuban government released from prison.

The CBP website notes that with “limited exceptions, a traveler who is found to have visited Cuba on or after this date is not eligible for travel under the Visa Waiver Program (VWP) using an Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) and must apply for a visa to travel to the United States.”

“Additionally, a traveler who at the time of application for an ESTA holds dual nationality with both a VWP country and Cuba is not eligible for travel under the VWP using an ESTA and must apply for a visa to travel to the United States,” it reads. “If an ESTA has already been approved and it is later determined that the traveler has been present in Cuba or holds dual nationality with both a VWP country and Cuba, the ESTA will be revoked.”

“Ineligibility for an ESTA is not a bar to travel to the United States,” notes the CBP website. “Individuals who are not eligible to travel under the VWP may apply for a visa at any U.S. embassy or consulate.”

Opoku-Gyimah said she learned of the revocation “as I preparing to be with you.” Opoku-Gyimah in her remarks said she applied for a visa that would have allowed her to enter the U.S., but the first available appointment was not until later this year.

“Yet from afar, I’m here,” she said. “We don’t abandon our people.”

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees CBP, has yet to respond to the Washington Blade’s request for comment.

D.C.’s Walker Memorial Baptist Church located on 13^th Street, N.W., just off U Street had one of its workers on June 3 remove an arrangement of Pride flags and banners displayed on the front fence of a townhouse the church owns that were put up by a gay couple who rent an apartment in the house.

Jay Richards, who along with his partner lives in a rented apartment at the house at 2014 13^th Street, N.W., said he was contacted by a rental agency working for the church a few hours after he put up the decorations on May 30 asking that the decorations be taken down.

The church is located next door to the townhouse, which has three apartments that are rented to tenants, including Richards and his partner. Richards said the tenants in the other two apartments were fully supportive of the Pride decorations.

“We kindly ask that any decorations or items be removed by Tuesday, June 3, 2025, at 1:00 p.m.,” a follow-up message sent to Richards by the rental agency says. “If items are still in place after this time, our team will remove them, and please note that a fee may apply for this service,” the message said.

Richards said the rental company, EJF Real Estate Services, pointed to a provision in his apartment’s rental lease that does not allow exterior decorations to be placed on or in front of the house. He said he asked if an exception could be made to allow him to keep the Pride decorations up until Monday, June 9, the day after WorldPride 2025, ends on Sunday, June 8.

In a statement released this week to the online publication DC News Now, EJF said it was proud to support the LGBTQ community and decided to allow the tenants to keep the decorations up until June 9 as requested by Richards.

“While we remain mindful of our responsibility to both the lease and our client, we believe this is a respectful and reasonable approach,” the statement says. “EJF will not be removing the decorations ourselves and is honoring the residents’ plan, trusting they will follow through as promised,” DC News Now quotes the statement as saying.

Richards told the Washington Blade he was hopeful that the church would also allow the decorations to remain up through the end of the WorldPride festivities. “I wanted to leave them up all month for Pride month,” he said. “But we were willing to take them down on Monday, after Pride weekend.”

Much to his disappointment, Richards said the church’s custodian early Tuesday evening, May 3, came to the house and pulled down the decorations and left them next to the front steps of the house.

A photo that Richards provided for the Blade taken before they were taken down shows the decorations included several rainbow flags and banners draped over an iron fence in front of the house and two long ropes extending from the front wall of the house to the fence on which multiple small rainbow flags were suspended.

Rev. Ademuyiwa T. Bamiduro, the pastor of Walker Memorial Baptist Church, did not immediately respond to a phone message left for him by the Blade seeking comment from the church about the removal of the Pride decorations.

Richards said he and the other tenants in the house received an email message from the church Tuesday night, June 3, shortly after the decorations were removed explaining why they were taken down, which he provided to the Blade.

“Decorations on the outside of the property or common areas regardless of the event, holiday, season, occasion, or reason violate the lease terms,” the message states.

“This is not about subject matter,” the message says. “The mission of Walker Memorial Baptist Church is a prayerful congregation, walking in the spirit, bringing souls to Christ. That is our focus. We seek unity, not division, through our lease requirement that there be no decorations on the outside of the property or common areas,” the message continues.

“In doing so, we avoid arbitrary decision-making and the need to distinguish between the content or subject matter of any decorations,” it states.

Local LGBTQ rights attorney Mindy Daniels, when told by the Blade of the content of the lease in question, which bans external decorations, said it appears that the church is within its legal rights to not allow those decorations.

Daniels said the church could be in violation of the D.C. Human Rights Act, which bans discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, among other categories, if it were to make an exception and not enforce its lease requirements for some types of decorations while enforcing them for others such as Pride flags.

“The email they sent me said we can’t put decorations up for any holidays,” Richards told the Blade. “But I do feel like if I had put something up for the holidays for Christmas that they wouldn’t have taken it down. But now they’re saying that no decorations can be put up.”