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April Fools’ Day and the Dem primary

Post, U.S. Attorney bring down a mayor; questions arise for Catania

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Vincent Gray, Democratic Party, District of Columbia, primary, gay news, Washington Blade
Ronald C. Machen Jr., U.S. Attorney of the District of Columbia, gay news, Washington Blade

U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Ronald C. Machen, Jr. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)

The April Fools’ Day primary, the result of the Council’s intransigence and refusing to move it to a later date, is now history. Muriel Bowser garnered the votes and defeated Mayor Vince Gray with all the other candidates far behind. Bowser lost Wards five, seven and eight and a careful analysis of the votes will be done over the next few weeks. Surely, votes will be scrutinized by Ward, age, gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation, among other traits.

What is clear is that the biggest player in the primary was not the candidates but the U.S. Attorney who did everything in his power to influence the election against the mayor. He had help from the Washington Post but before he indicted Jeffrey Thompson and made what many consider inappropriate statements, the Post wasn’t swaying that many voters.

So while Gray lost his reelection bid, we now wait to see what the U.S. Attorney does. With Bowser as the Democratic nominee, he will have much less ability to influence the general election.

We know the attack campaign run by Tommy Wells failed to ignite voters’ interest in him and the $1.3 million that Jack Evans spent swung even fewer voters. I hope the minor candidates like Vincent Orange, Andy Shallal and Rita Jo Lewis enjoyed all the debates and attention, because they were clearly out of the race early on.

The race to be the next mayor now heads toward the general election and what could have been a long and very nasty seven months will be less so with Bowser as the Democratic candidate. I assume that Republican turned independent David Catania will still try to upend generally accepted dogma that in D.C. it is almost impossible to beat a Democrat. If the most recent polls are correct, then Catania received bad news and worse news this week. The bad news was that after the relentless attacks on the mayor led by the U.S. Attorney, Catania couldn’t make up much ground from an original poll that showed him trailing Gray. The worse news is that he will likely get swamped by Bowser.

I would still suggest that voters fasten their seatbelts as we could still be in for a bumpy ride during the next seven months. It could be a nasty campaign as Catania can be a nasty guy. Some have referred to him as “David Chris Christie Catania,” D.C.’s own bully. If you watch old Council hearings and see Catania’s interactions with city officials and citizens it has to be considered a very appropriate appellation.

Yet that won’t be the major issue in the campaign. There will a number of overriding issues. One that will continue even with Gray out of the race will be the mayor’s 2010 campaign. Only Ron Machen knows how that will end. Then there will be a need for Bowser to prove that she is up to the job and that will require her to put some meat and substance on the vision she has put forth. But I predict two other issues will receive a lot of attention. First, sorting out which of the Democratic Party’s principles Catania doesn’t support and why he doesn’t just become a Democrat. And second is the question of just how much he was paid — and for what — by law firms and others during all the years he served in his part-time Council member job. Most would agree it clearly wasn’t for his charm.

There is general consensus that the District is doing well and the majority of people feel we are moving forward and going in the right direction. The Washington Post, when endorsing Bowser agreed that crime is down, student test scores are up, finances are the best they have ever been and economic development is booming in all eight wards. Services are being delivered on time and well in nearly all areas. One issue all will agree on is that we must deal with fire and EMS issues. I would suggest we relook at a promise made by Adrian Fenty in his first campaign, broken when he became mayor, to separate fire/EMS into two agencies as done in Maryland.

My prediction is that the winners of the April Fools’ Day Democratic Party primary for all positions, including mayor, will be elected on Nov. 4 and sworn in on Jan. 1, 2015.

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Gay man details secret struggle with bulimia

February is Eating Disorder Awareness Month

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Kyle Ridley (Photo courtesy of Kaptured By Kasper)

I was a “chubby” kid. A “husky” kid. Horrible terms that still make me cringe. Food issues stem through the family tree. I remember hearing a family member vomit when I was in elementary school; the residual scraps left floating in the toilet. I tried sticking my finger down my throat as a teen — an easy purge after a buffet binge. “Easy” being a sick way of looking at such a violent act to oneself, but the swiftness of an occasional act turning to addiction is frighteningly simple. 

I was in my early 20s when I went on another diet in a series of crash diets, but this one hit different. I barely ate and worked out intensely each day. I decided to reward myself at the end of the week with a large pizza and breadsticks. Devouring a whole pizza (and more) was not new to me. I could down an alarming amount of food and hit the pillow in a haze. I didn’t know about nutrition, calories, or balance for many years to come. The meal went down the toilet, and I resumed my starvation diet. The calorie deficit pushed me closer to addiction’s ledge, and the hunger sent me over. 

The sporadic binge turned to several a week — running to the local country store for a smattering of chips, candy, soda, honey buns, cookies, anything to fill me up. Soon, it was a regular appointment, arranging a home buffet to mindlessly stuff my body for hours ‘til I knelt over the ceramic bowl. 

The binge-n-purge cycle turned twice daily. If I couldn’t binge at home in private, I would gorge at buffets or in my car — throwing up in restaurants, grocery stores, lobby restrooms. I lived in a house with a septic tank at the start of my illness. I clogged the tank, causing vomit to rise to the surface of the soil. Fearing further damage, I started throwing up in trash bags, collecting them in large bins, and driving them to public toilets to dispose of them. This went on for seven years, all through college, internships, and my first corporate job. 

The older man I was with was losing himself at the same time, falling deeper into the abyss of severe depression he’d battled lifelong. We saw the best in each other at the start, and the worst by the demise. His bouts of darkness were beyond my repair, no matter how hard I tried to tackle the impossible fix. How is a 21-year-old supposed to convince a 46-year-old to seek treatment, talk him down from suicidal tendencies, get him to understand people love him? I couldn’t navigate it, and food seemed to be the one thing in my control.

It also became my reward and my excuse to treat myself in the face of any stress or accomplishment. He wants to kill himself: binge. I aced a test: binge. Work was rough: binge. Food was all I lived for. Friends, family, love all took a backseat. I was ruled by a hidden hunger I kept secret from nearly everyone, though my emaciated frame didn’t go unnoticed. 

I was productive through the battle, working full time, graduating college summa cum laude, landing a solid job and moving up the ladder. All common addict attributes. Bulimia consumed me ‘til I was nearly 30 — four years after splitting from my first love, two years after he killed himself, and three years into a relationship with the man who would become my husband, and later my ex-husband.  

They say the difference between privacy and secrecy is that privacy is about respect, whereas secrecy has shame attached. So, let’s drop the shame and the secrets held far too long. It’s been 12 years since I spent my days, nights, and thousands of dollars gorging and purging for hours. Twelve years since I was face down in a toilet at my own will. 

I was a TV producer for a decade, booking more than 15,000 segments through the years. I often received pitches for February’s Eating Disorder Awareness Month and made a point to share these stories every year. Still, every pitch and every spokesperson I booked was with a woman. The stigma surrounding body dysmorphia in men continues despite men representing up to 25 percent of people with eating disorders, with members of the LGBTQ+ community at a higher risk, according to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders. Men are also more likely to not recognize a problem, and their cases tend to be more severe by the time they see a doctor. 

Living in secret and hiding is not living. It’s shame-based and the ultimate red flag that something needs to change. It will haunt you ‘til you are unrecognizable to yourself and everyone around you. You don’t need to share your story with the world, but opening up to someone is a crucial step in recovery and healing. Living in lies and maintaining deception is the heaviest of burdens

Addiction is blinding. You are unable to see the joys, the freedoms, and opportunities awaiting when you’re solely focused on soothing your addiction’s rage. Living for the fix pushes every other interest out of focus. When you start to release the devil on your back, you make room for wings to spread and space to fly into passions suffocated far too long.

It’s taken a lot of work, therapy, reflection and learning. Not to say I’m recovered, not to say I’m healed. I’ll forever have this devil on my back. It’s about learning to quiet his rage, soothe his anxiety, and ensure his safety and love. It’s a lifelong path of healing more with each day, each year. 

And there is always hope. Even in the deepest depths of despair and isolation and ‘I’ll-never-get-better-ness.’ Whatever your circumstances, those tinges of hope are worth clinging to. They’ll carry you through. 

I don’t know where I’ll be next year, let alone a future once so clear. And I’m okay. You’re okay. The other side isn’t perfect. Nothing is. But what a gift to make it there and experience life unshackled from your ghost. 

There’s so much to see.  

Kyle Ridley is an Emmy Award winning journalist with more than two decades in print and television.

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Why trans suffering is more palatable than trans ambition

We are most readily accepted when framed as victims

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(Photo by nito/Bigstock)

In the current media and political climate, stories of trans suffering move quickly. Stories of trans ambition do not.

A trans teenager denied healthcare. A trans woman attacked on public transit. A trans man struggling with homelessness. These narratives circulate widely, often accompanied by solemn op-eds, viral posts, and carefully worded statements of concern. The pain is real. The coverage is necessary. But there is a quieter pattern beneath it: trans people are most readily accepted when they are framed as victims—and most resisted when they present themselves as agents with desire, confidence, and upward momentum.

This distinction has sharpened in recent years. As anti-trans legislation has proliferated across statehouses and election cycles have turned trans lives into talking points, the public script has narrowed. Trans people are legible as objects of harm, but far less comfortable to many audiences as subjects of ambition. Survival is tolerated. Aspiration is destabilizing.

The reason suffering travels more easily is not mysterious. Pain reassures the audience. It positions trans people as recipients of concern rather than participants in competition. A suffering subject does not threaten status hierarchies; they confirm them. Sympathy can be extended without requiring a recalibration of power, space, or expectations. In this framing, acceptance remains conditional and charitable.

Ambition disrupts that arrangement. A trans person who wants more than safety—who wants money, authority, visibility, creative control, or institutional influence—forces a different reckoning. Ambition implies permanence. It implies entitlement. It implies that trans people are not passing through society’s margins but intend to occupy its center alongside everyone else.

You can see this discomfort play out in real time. When trans people speak about wanting success rather than safety, the response often shifts. Confidence is scrutinized. Assertiveness is reframed as arrogance. Desire is recoded as delusion. The language changes quickly: “unstable,” “narcissistic,” “out of touch,” “ungrateful.” In public discourse, confidence in trans people is frequently treated not as a strength, but as a warning sign.

Media narratives reinforce this dynamic. Even ostensibly positive coverage often relies on redemption arcs that center suffering first and ambition second—if at all. Success is framed as overcoming transness rather than inhabiting it. A trans person can be praised for resilience, but rarely for dominance, excellence, or command. Achievement must be softened, contextualized, and made reassuring.

This is especially visible in cultural reactions to trans people who refuse modesty. Trans figures who express sexual confidence, professional competitiveness, or political authority routinely face backlash that their cis counterparts do not. They are accused of being “too much,” of asking for too much space, of wanting too much too fast. The underlying anxiety is not about tone; it is about proximity. Ambition collapses the safe distance between observer and observed.

Politically, this preference for suffering over ambition is costly. Movements anchored primarily in pain narratives struggle to articulate futures beyond harm reduction. They mobilize sympathy but have difficulty sustaining leadership. A politics that can only argue from injury is perpetually reactive, always responding to the next threat rather than shaping the terrain itself.

This matters in a moment when trans rights are no longer debated only in cultural terms but in administrative, legal, and economic ones. Influence now depends on institutional literacy, long-term strategy, and the willingness to occupy decision-making spaces that were never designed with trans people in mind. Ambition is not a luxury; it is a prerequisite for durability.

Yet ambition remains suspect. Trans people are encouraged to be grateful rather than demanding, visible rather than powerful, resilient rather than authoritative. Even within progressive spaces, there is often an unspoken expectation that trans people justify their presence through pain rather than through competence or vision.

This is not liberation. It is containment.

A society that can tolerate trans suffering but recoils at trans ambition is not offering equality; it is managing discomfort. It is willing to mourn trans deaths but uneasy about trans dominance, trans leadership, or trans desire that does not ask permission. It prefers trans people as evidence of harm rather than as evidence of possibility.

None of this is an argument against documenting suffering. That work remains essential, particularly as legal protections erode and violence persists. But suffering cannot be the only admissible register of trans life. A politics that cannot imagine trans people as ambitious cannot sustain trans people as free.

Ambition does not negate vulnerability. Desire does not erase harm. Wanting more than survival is not ingratitude—it is the baseline condition of citizenship. The question is not whether trans people deserve ambition. The question is why it remains so unsettling when they claim it.

Until that discomfort is confronted, acceptance will remain conditional. Sympathy will remain cheap. And trans futures will continue to be negotiated on terms that stop just short of power.


Isaac Amend is a writer based in the D.C. area. He is a transgender man and was featured in National Geographic’s ‘Gender Revolution’ documentary. He serves on the board of the LGBT Democrats of Virginia. Contact him on Instagram at @isaacamend

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Snow, ice, and politics: what is (and isn’t) happening

Let the National Guard dig us out

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17th Street, N.W., in Dupont Circle on Jan. 26, 2026, after Winter Storm Fern dumped upwards of 7" of snow and sleet on the city. (Washington Blade photo by Michael K. Lavers)

First what isn’t. That would be snow removal in D.C. I understand the inches of sleet that fell on the nearly four inches of snow, and historic days of freezing weather, make it very difficult. But it took three days until they brought out the bigger equipment. Then businesses and homeowners were told they wouldn’t be fined for not clearing their sidewalks, which they have to do by law. That clearly made things worse. The elderly and disabled have an exemption from that, others shouldn’t be given one. Then there was no focus on crosswalks, so pedestrians couldn’t get around, and no apparent early coordination with the BIDS. 

Then there are about 2,200 National Guard troops strolling D.C., yes strolling, at least before the snow. Why weren’t they given immediate snow removal duty. If the president gave a damn about our city he would have assigned them all to help dig out the city. We could have used their equipment, handed out shovels, and put the Guard to use immediately. Maybe the mayor put in her request for the Guard a little late. 

I have met and chatted with many Guard members across the city. A group from Indiana regularly come to my coffee shop, though I haven’t seen them since the snow. I always thank them for their service — I just wish it wasn’t here. Nearly all agree with me, saying they would rather be home with their families, at jobs, or in school. I’ve met Guard members from D.C., West Virginia, Indiana, Mississippi, and Louisiana. My most poignant meeting was with one Guard member from West Virginia the day after his fellow Guard member was murdered. Incredibly sad, but avoidable; she should never have been assigned here to begin with. The government estimates it costs taxpayers $95,000 a year for each deployment. So, again, instead of strolling the streets, they should have been immediately assigned to assist with snow removal. Clearly the felon, his fascist aides, and incompetent Cabinet, are too busy supporting the killing of American citizens in Minneapolis, to care about this. I thank those Guard members now helping nearly a week after the snow began to fall. I recognize this was a difficult storm. I hope the city will learn from this for the future. 

Now for something happening in D.C. that shouldn’t be. A host of retreads have announced they are candidates for office in both the June Democratic primary, and general election. Some are names you might remember but hoped were long gone. Two left the Council under ethical clouds. One is Jack Evans. He announced his candidacy for City Council president. I like Jack personally, having known him since he served on a Dupont ANC. This race is a massive waste of time and money, as he will surely lose. Even before his ethics issues were made public, and his leaving the Council under a cloud in 2020, he ran for mayor in 2014. At that time, he received only 5% of the vote, even in his own Ward. At 73, he should accept his electoral career is over. Another person who left the Council over questionable ethics, Vincent Orange, who is nearly 70, announced he is running for mayor. He did that last in 2014, when he got only 2% of the vote in the primary. He is another one who will surely lose. Both will likely qualify for city funding, wasting taxpayer money. I know I will be called an ageist. But reality is, in most cases, it’s time for a new generation to take the lead. Another person who has served before, was defeated for reelection, is now trying for a comeback on the Council. I think the outsized egos of these individuals should not be foisted on the voters. If they are really interested in serving the community, there are many ways to do it without holding elective office.

Then there is ICE and the continuing situation in Minneapolis. I applaud Democrats in Congress for holding up long-term funding for ICE for at least two weeks and getting the felon to negotiate. Now not every ICE agent behaves like the gestapo, but their bosses condone the behavior of the ones who do. Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, who shot her dog, and Trump’s Goebbels, Stephen Miller, seem to think nothing of causing the deaths of American citizens. 

Now the felon’s FBI and DOJ are arresting journalists; then going to Georgia and removing stored ballots from the 2020 election, all because the felon is still obsessed with that loss. His disappearing DNI, Tulsi Gabbard, was involved in that for some reason. The felon is a sick, demented, old man. They must all be stopped before they completely destroy our democracy.


Peter Rosenstein is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist.

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