News
Washington Blade reporter ejected from DOJ Pride event
Similar celebrations open to media during Obama years


Washington Blade reporter Chris Johnson was ejected from the DOJ Pride event at the Justice Department.
A Washington Blade reporter was ejected from an event Wednesday at the U.S. Justice Department observing June as Pride month — among the last of the events hosted by LGBT affinity groups for federal workers. Similar celebrations under the Obama administration were open to the media.
Dozens of employees — among them LGBT attorneys within the Justice Department and federal law enforcement officials — attended the event, which was titled “Solidarity through Pride” and held in the Great Hall of the Justice Department building.
Representing the Justice Department was acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security Dana Boente, an Obama administration hold-over who also serves as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.
“Whatever an individual’s background, Americans come together to support one another,” Boente said. “In this country, we know that our unity makes us stronger. We’re united in our respect for the rule of law and the preservation of the freedoms of all of us. Americans understand that in this country liberty means liberty for all. Freedom belongs not to any one race, gender or orientation.”
Boente also invoked the shooting at the congressional baseball practice earlier this month in which House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) was severely wounded. Lesbian Capitol Police officer Crystal Griner, who was on the scene and helped take down the attacker but was wounded herself, is a hero, Boente said.
“Officer Griner is rightly a hero of the LGBT community; she is also a hero for the entire country,” Boente said.
Under U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Boente said a top priority would be “combatting the rise of violent crime” and the Justice Department was already taking steps to pursue that goal.
At about that point in Boente’s remarks, a Justice Department official approached and said the Blade had to be escorted out because the DOJ Pride event was closed to the press. The Blade complied.
The closed-press rule for the event is unusual. The Blade attended and covered DOJ Pride events as a member of the press numerous times during the Obama administration — under both former U.S. Attorneys General Eric Holder and Loretta Lynch.
The Blade was also allowed under the Trump administration to cover a Pride event for LGBT service members and civilians at the Pentagon with full cooperation of officials. Washington Blade Editor Kevin Naff delivered the keynote address last week at the Small Business Administration’s Pride event.
Naff criticized the decision to close the event to media outlets.
“These events have historically been open to the media and this action at DOJ today is an unfortunate break with tradition,” Naff said. “Holding Pride celebrations behind closed doors violates the very spirit of such events and we urge all government agencies to let the sun shine in.”
A Justice Department official responded to Blade inquiries about the DOJ Pride event via email shortly before it began and said the event would be closed to press, but by that time — less than 30 minutes before the event was set to begin — the Blade was already entering the event after being informed second-hand the event was cleared by public affairs. The email was unseen until after the Blade was escorted out.
As Buzzfeed reported, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions spoke positively about the DOJ Pride event on video when an intern asked him about it last week during another event.
“We are going to have a pride group, in this very room, I think next week, I believe it is, and so that’s perfectly appropriate, and we will protect and defend and celebrate that — and protect the rights of all transgender persons,” Sessions said.
Sessions has a long anti-LGBT history as a U.S. senator from Alabama. Along with Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, he revoked guidance to schools assuring transgender students have access to the bathroom consistent with their gender identity.
Set to deliver keynote addresses at the DOJ Pride event — and unseen by the Blade — were Michelle Benecke, executive director for management integration for the Immediate Office of the Undersecretary for Management at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and Sultan Shakir, executive director of the D.C.-based youth group SMYAL, or Supporting & Mentoring Youth Advocates & Leaders.
Set to deliver the closing remarks was Granette Trent, assistant director for affirmative employment on the Equal Employment Opportunity Staff at the Justice Management Division.
Attending in person to receive the Gerald B. Roemer Community Service Award — and with a newly dyed green streak in his hair — was Gavin Grimm, the transgender student suing his Gloucester County high school for not allowing him to use the restroom consistent with his gender identity.
Attorneys at the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division were set to the receive the James R. Douglass Award for litigation started under the Obama administration in favor of transgender rights.
One recipient of the award was the Civil Rights Division team that challenged North Carolina anti-LGBT House Bill 2 (which has since been withdrawn under Sessions after Gov. Roy Cooper replaced HB2 with a different law LGBT advocates say is still discriminatory). The other was the Civil Rights Division team that sued Southeastern Oklahoma State University for allegedly discriminating against a transgender professor.
Singing the National Anthem at the event was Garrick Jordan, a member of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington. The emcee was Robert Koch, vice president of DOJ Pride and attorney for the appellate section of the Civil Rights Division.
Hungary
Upwards of 100K people march in Budapest Pride
Participants defined Hungarian government’s ban on public LGBTQ events

More than 100,000 people on Saturday defied the Hungarian government’s ban on public LGBTQ events and participated in the 30th annual Budapest Pride parade.
The New York Times published a picture that shows throngs of people marching on Budapest’s Erzsébet Bridge over the Danube River. Openly gay MEP Krzysztof Śmiszek, who was previously Poland’s deputy justice minister, is among the dozens of European lawmakers who participated in the march that began at Budapest City Hall.
The New York Times reported Hungarian police officers stood along the march, but they did not try to stop it. Śmiszek described the march to the Washington Blade as “beautiful and huge.”
“[It was] very peaceful and political,” he said.
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz-KDNP coalition government have faced widespread criticism over its anti-LGBTQ crackdown.
Hungarian lawmakers in March passed a bill that bans Pride events and allow authorities to use facial recognition technology to identify those who participate in them. MPs in April amended the Hungarian constitution to ban public LGBTQ events.
Budapest Mayor Gergely Karácsony endorsed the march, even though Orbán’s government threatened to arrest him and fine participants.
“Today a country shows that no ruling party can tell it on what topic, for what cause it is allowed to march and why not,” said Budapest Pride President Viktória Radványi on Saturday in a Facebook post. “A country demonstrates that whoever will be in government can count on us: dedicated, persistent citizens intolerant to oppression, who will organize themselves and stand against tyranny with their heads held high.”
More than two dozen activists in D.C. who protested outside the Hungarian Embassy on Friday expressed their support for Budapest Pride.
(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
Virginia
Spanberger touts equality, reproductive rights in Arlington
Democratic Va. gubernatorial nominee made campaign stop at Freddie’s Beach Bar

With the general election heating up and LGBTQ rights under increasing threat nationwide, Virginia gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger brought her “Span Virginia Bus Tour” to Arlington’s Freddie’s Beach Bar for a campaign stop filled with cheers, policy pledges, and community spirit.
Spanberger, who served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2019 through early 2025 for Virginia’s 7th Congressional District, also served as a federal law enforcement officer specializing in narcotics and money laundering cases, and as a CIA case officer working on counterterrorism and nuclear counterproliferation.
Spanberger is running against Republican nominee Winsome Earle-Sears, the current lieutenant governor of Virginia, who said she was “morally opposed” to a bill protecting marriage equality in the commonwealth.
She was joined by other Democratic candidates and supporters: lieutenant gubernatorial candidate Ghazala Hashmi, attorney general candidate Jay Jones, Virginia state Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria), and Congressman Don Beyer.

Freddie’s was packed wall-to-wall with supporters, many of whom wore “Spanberger for Virginia” shirts in the progressive Pride flag colors. In her speech, she made it clear that LGBTQ Virginians’ rights are on the ballot this year.
“I’m so excited to be here, and I am so grateful to the entire staff of Freddy’s for letting us overtake this incredible venue that is not just an awesome place to come together in community, but is a symbol to so many people of joy, of happiness, of community and of celebrating our friends and our neighbors,” Spanberger told the packed restaurant. “It is exciting to be here, and particularly during this Pride month, and particularly as we reflect on the 10-year anniversary of Obergefell and the reality that we still have so much work to do.”
“The reality is there are so many people who still would be inclined to take us backwards,” she said. “In this moment when we see attacks on people’s rights, on people’s humanity, on Virginia, on our economy, on research, on public education, on food security, on health care, on Virginians, on their jobs, on public service and on people — it can get heavy.”
“What it does for me is it makes me want to double down, because once upon a time, when I was talking to my mother about some horror show or sequence of activities coming out of a particular administration, she did not really have the patience to listen to me and said ‘Abigail, let your rage fuel you’ — and the conversation was over. And so I reflect on that, because, in fact, every day there is so much fuel to be had in this world and in this moment.”
One of the points Spanberger continued to emphasize was the importance of steadfast state government officials following the election of President Donald Trump, which has led to rollbacks of LGBTQ and bodily autonomy rights as a result of the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court.
“What the past few years have shown us is that a Supreme Court decision, no matter how many years we have celebrated its existence, does not protect us in the long term. And so as governor, I will work to make sure that every protection we can put in place for the dignity, the value, and the equal rights of all Virginians is a priority.”
During her speech, Spanberger highlighted several of the key values driving her campaign — protecting reproductive freedom and human rights, lowering healthcare costs, safeguarding Virginia’s environment, and ensuring that public education is affordable, accessible, and rooted in truth, not politics.
Spanberger went as far as to say that she wants to amend the state’s constitution to remove Section 15-A. “The reality is that in Virginia, we still have a ban in our state constitution on marriage equality. It is of the utmost urgency that we move forward with our constitutional amendment.”
“We will work to ensure that that terrible constitutional amendment, that was put in years ago, is taken out and updated and ensuring that Virginia is reflective in our most essential documents of who we are as a commonwealth, which is an accepting place that celebrates the vibrancy of every single person and recognizes that all Virginians have a place, both in that constitution and in law,” she added.
Following the event, two supporters spoke to the Washington Blade about why they had come out to support Spanberger.
“I came out because I needed to show support for this ticket, because it has been a particularly rough week, but a long few years for our rights in this country, in this state, with this governor, and it’s — we need to flip it around, because queer people need protection,” said Samantha Perez, who lives in Ballston. “Trans people need protection. Trans kids need protection. And it’s not gonna happen with who’s in Richmond right now, and we just need to get it turned around.”

“The whole neighborhood’s here. All our friends are here,” said Annie Styles of Pentagon City. “It means the world to me to take care of each other. That’s what a good community does. That’s not what we’ve had with the Republicans here or across the nation for a really long time. It’s time to show that care. It’s time to make sure that good people are in a position to do good things.”
District of Columbia
Activists protest outside Hungarian Embassy in DC
Budapest Pride scheduled to take place Saturday, despite ban

More than two dozen activists gathered in front of the Hungarian Embassy in D.C. on Friday to protest the country’s ban on Budapest Pride and other LGBTQ-specific events.
Amnesty International USA Executive Director Paul O’Brien read a letter that Dávid Vig, executive director of Amnesty International Hungary, wrote.
“For 30 years Budapest Pride has been a celebration of hope, courage, and love,” said Vig in the letter that O’Brien read. “Each march through the streets of Budapest has been a powerful testament to the resilience of those who dare to demand equality, but a new law threatens to erase Pride and silence everyone who demands equal rights for LGBTI people.”
“The Hungarian government’s relentless campaign against LGBTI rights represents a worrying trend that can spread normalizing division and hatred,” added Vig. “Thank you for standing with us when we refuse to be intimidated.”
Council for Global Equality Chair Mark Bromley and two of his colleagues — Stephen Leonelli and Keifer Buckingham — also spoke. Health GAP Executive Director Asia Russell and Chloe Schwenke, a political appointee in the Obama-Biden administration who worked for the U.S. Agency for International Development, and Planned Parenthood staffers are among those who attended the protest.
(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
Hungarian lawmakers in March passed a bill that bans Pride events and allow authorities to use facial recognition technology to identify those who participate in them. MPs in April amended the Hungarian constitution to ban public LGBTQ events.
Budapest Pride is scheduled to take place on Saturday, despite the ban. Hundreds of European lawmakers are expected to participate.
“Sending strength to the patriotic Hungarians marching tomorrow to advance human dignity and fundamental rights in a country they love,” said David Pressman, the gay former U.S. Ambassador to Hungary, on Friday on social media.
Sending strength to the patriotic Hungarians marching tomorrow to advance human dignity and fundamental rights in a country they love. Szabadság és szerelem. My past remarks on Budapest Pride: https://t.co/y1QhA9QouA
— David Pressman (@AmbPressman) June 27, 2025
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