Local
D.C., Rehoboth officials misgender trans women
Sgt. Hawkins among those told to use men’s facilities
Sgt. Jessica Hawkins (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
In separate incidents that activists say they hope were rare occurrences, city government employees in D.C. and Rehoboth Beach, Del., during the past week directed transgender women to use the men’s bathroom or locker room at a public facility.
In the D.C. case, an employee of the city’s Department of Parks and Recreation told several trans women entering the city’s Banneker Pool on Georgia Avenue, N.W., on July 1 that they needed to access the pool through the men’s locker room, according to an account of the incident by the local online news blog dcist.
Among the trans women asked to use the men’s locker room, dcist reported, was D.C. police Sgt. Jessica Hawkins, who serves as supervisor for the department’s LGBT Liaison Unit. Rebecca Kling, an official with the National Center for Transgender Equality, said the trans people came to the pool to participate in the second annual D.C. Trans Pool Party that Kling organized.
Kling said she didn’t directly witness a female desk clerk at the pool asking the trans women to use the men’s locker room and who reportedly addressed Sgt. Hawkins as “sir.” But Kling said she spoke to several people who informed her of that taking place.
Kling noted that once she brought the matter to the attention of the manager of the Banneker Pool he immediately assigned another employee to the front desk and that employee treated the trans visitors with respect and had no objections to their using the locker room that matched their gender identity – the women’s locker room.
Kling and transgender advocate Ruby Corado also noted that the “misgendering” by the pool employee of the trans women marked the second year in a row in which attendees of the annual Trans Pool Party were treated improperly by a DPR employee assigned to work at the Banneker Pool.
DPR officials responded to last year’s incident by promising to provide additional training for all DPR employees on LGBT-related issues, including the fact that the D.C. Human Rights Act bans discrimination against LGBT people. The Human Rights Act, among other things, requires that transgender people be allowed to use public bathrooms or other facilities, including locker rooms, that match their gender identity.
“As far as trans persons being mistreated, as far as I could see once everyone got into the pool everyone had a great time and everyone was treated appropriately,” Kling told the Blade in discussing this year’s Trans Pool Party on July 1.
“We take all concerns seriously and we address them immediately,” DPR spokesperson Gwen Crump said in a statement. “DPR has and will continue to train employees regarding sensitivity to LGBTQ guests,” she said, adding, “[W]e want every DPR facility to be a welcoming experience for all guests.”
In the Rehoboth Beach incident, Rehoboth Police Chief Keith Banks told the Blade a female transgender visitor called police in the afternoon of Sunday, July 9, to report being mistreated by a city attendant working at one of the public bathrooms located next to a bandstand near the boardwalk.
Similar to the D.C. pool incident, Banks said the trans visitor complained to police officers who arrived on the scene that the attendant directed her to use the men’s bathroom instead of the women’s bathroom, a development that violates Delaware’s human rights law. The Delaware human rights law, similar to D.C.’s law, bans discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and allows trans people to use the bathroom that matches their gender identity.
Steve Elkins, president of CAMP Rehoboth, an LGBT community center, said Banks invited him to attend a meeting on Monday with him, the Rehoboth city manager, and other city officials to discuss the bathroom incident. Among other things, Elkins said City Manager Sharon Lynn, who’s a lesbian, said she would arrange for city employees to be briefed on the state human rights law and its application to issues affecting transgender people.
“The police acted appropriately in the way they handled this,” Elkins said. “The bathroom attendant is being counseled.”
Virginia
Gay Va. State Sen. Ebbin resigns for role in Spanberger administration
Veteran lawmaker will step down in February
Alexandria Democrat Adam Ebbin, who has served as an openly gay member of the Virginia Legislature since 2004, announced on Jan. 7 that he is resigning from his seat in the State Senate to take a job in the administration of Gov.-Elect Abigail Spanberger.
Since 2012, Ebbin has been a member of the Virginia Senate for the 39th District representing parts of Alexandria, Arlington, and Fairfax counties. He served in the Virginia House of Delegates representing Alexandria from 2004 to 2012, becoming the state’s first out gay lawmaker.
His announcement says he submitted his resignation from his Senate position effective Feb. 18 to join the Spanberger administration as a senior adviser at the Virginia Cannabis Control Authority.
“I’m grateful to have the benefit of Senator Ebbin’s policy expertise continuing to serve the people of Virginia, and I look forward to working with him to prioritize public safety and public health,” Spanberger said in Ebbin’s announcement statement.
She was referring to the lead role Ebbin has played in the Virginia Legislature’s approval in 2020 of legislation decriminalizing marijuana and the subsequent approval in 2021of a bill legalizing recreational use and possession of marijuana for adults 21 years of age and older. But the Virginia Legislature has yet to pass legislation facilitating the retail sale of marijuana for recreational use and limits sales to purchases at licensed medical marijuana dispensaries.
“I share Governor-elect Spanberger’s goal that adults 21 and over who choose to use cannabis, and those who use it for medical treatment, have access to a well-tested, accurately labeled product, free from contamination,” Ebbin said in his statement. “2026 is the year we will move cannabis sales off the street corner and behind the age-verified counter,” he said.
Maryland
Steny Hoyer, the longest-serving House Democrat, to retire from Congress
Md. congressman served for years in party leadership
By ASSOCIATED PRESS and LISA MASCARO | Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the longest-serving Democrat in Congress and once a rival to become House speaker, will announce Thursday he is set to retire at the end of his term.
Hoyer, who served for years in party leadership and helped steer Democrats through some of their most significant legislative victories, is set to deliver a House floor speech about his decision, according to a person familiar with the situation and granted anonymity to discuss it.
“Tune in,” Hoyer said on social media. He confirmed his retirement plans in an interview with the Washington Post.
The rest of this article can be found on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
District of Columbia
Kennedy Center renaming triggers backlash
Artists who cancel shows threatened; calls for funding boycott grow
Efforts to rename the Kennedy Center to add President Trump’s name to the D.C. arts institution continue to spark backlash.
A new petition from Qommittee , a national network of drag artists and allies led by survivors of hate crimes, calls on Kennedy Center donors to suspend funding to the center until “artistic independence is restored, and to redirect support to banned or censored artists.”
“While Trump won’t back down, the donors who contribute nearly $100 million annually to the Kennedy Center can afford to take a stand,” the petition reads. “Money talks. When donors fund censorship, they don’t just harm one institution – they tell marginalized communities their stories don’t deserve to be told.”
The petition can be found here.
Meanwhile, a decision by several prominent musicians and jazz performers to cancel their shows at the recently renamed Trump-Kennedy Center in D.C. planned for Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve has drawn the ire of the Center’s president, Richard Grenell.
Grenell, a gay supporter of President Donald Trump who served as U.S. ambassador to Germany during Trump’s first term as president, was named Kennedy Center president last year by its board of directors that had been appointed by Trump.
Last month the board voted to change the official name of the center from the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center For The Performing Arts to the Donald J. Trump And The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center For The Performing Arts. The revised name has been installed on the outside wall of the center’s building but is not official because any name change would require congressional action.
According to a report by the New York Times, Grenell informed jazz musician Chuck Redd, who cancelled a 2025 Christmas Eve concert that he has hosted at the Kennedy Center for nearly 20 years in response to the name change, that Grenell planned to arrange for the center to file a lawsuit against him for the cancellation.
“Your decision to withdraw at the last moment — explicitly in response to the Center’s recent renaming, which honors President Trump’s extraordinary efforts to save this national treasure — is classic intolerance and very costly to a non-profit arts institution,” the Times quoted Grenell as saying in a letter to Redd.
“This is your official notice that we will seek $1 million in damages from you for this political stunt,” the Times quoted Grenell’s letter as saying.
A spokesperson for the Trump-Kennedy Center did not immediately respond to an inquiry from the Washington Blade asking if the center still planned to file that lawsuit and whether it planned to file suits against some of the other musicians who recently cancelled their performances following the name change.
In a follow-up story published on Dec. 29, the New York Times reported that a prominent jazz ensemble and a New York dance company had canceled performances scheduled to take place on New Year’s Eve at the Kennedy Center.
The Times reported the jazz ensemble called The Cookers did not give a reason for the cancellation in a statement it released, but its drummer, Billy Hart, told the Times the center’s name change “evidently” played a role in the decision to cancel the performance.
Grenell released a statement on Dec. 29 calling these and other performers who cancelled their shows “far left political activists” who he said had been booked by the Kennedy Center’s previous leadership.
“Boycotting the arts to show you support the arts is a form of derangement syndrome,” the Times quoted him as saying in his statement.
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