Opinions
Media portrayal of Trayon White does him no justice
Washington Post’s unfair coverage ignores record of good deeds
D.C. Council member Trayon White (D-Ward 8) (Photo via Facebook)
Over the past few weeks, there has been immense focus on Ward 8 Council member Trayon White’s comments in a Facebook video that the Rothschilds are manipulating the weather. Once The Washington Post discovered the video, it began running articles with headlines that White said “Jews control the weather,” which he never said. The distinction between saying “Rothschilds” versus saying “Jews” is important because The Post went from merely reporting facts to ascribing intent to White’s statements.
Media outlets worldwide then picked up the story. White did not know that his statement about the Rothschilds could be construed as targeting Jews as a group. To reach that conclusion, he would have needed to know that conspiracies about the Rothschilds are long-running anti-Semitic themes, which he and numerous others, including local Jewish leaders, acknowledge that he did not know.
Upon hearing of the history of Rothschilds conspiracy theories and the impact that they have on the Jewish community, White sincerely apologized, and met with his Jewish Council colleagues and Jewish community leaders, including Rabbi Batya Glazer. The Jewish leaders he met with believed his apology was sincere and expressed a willingness to work with him. White then attended Passover Seder with his Council colleague Elissa Silverman, who is Jewish, and D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine. After that, he attended a guided tour of the Holocaust Museum, set up by the Jewish Community Relations Council.
In response to criticism about White’s tour of the Holocaust Museum, after another Washington Post article, Jews United for Justice, a D.C.-based progressive organization, noted in a statement that, “We have spoken with several people who were present for the museum visit, including a Jewish leader, who say the Post article isn’t an accurate picture. They describe Trayon as sincere in his desire to learn, and that the vast gaps in knowledge and understanding between Black and Jewish communities became evident again and again during the tour.”
These are not the actions of someone who is anti-Semitic and not interested in learning more about Jewish history. White admits in a Facebook Live video that he was “ignorant” about Jewish history and never learned about the Holocaust in school, so disparaging him for asking sincere questions is counter-productive and serves no one. It’s also insensitive and elitist, as many people learn best by asking questions and engaging in dialogue. White should not have been derided by a Washington Post reporter for asking questions in a sincere attempt to learn about a topic that is new to him.
Jews United for Justice’s statement further said that, “Councilmember White closed his Council office to ensure that the entire staff would be present for the museum visit. This in itself shows the depth of his seriousness.” Nonetheless, he was criticized for “leaving early” when he walked away from the group to explore the museum on his own, which he said he did to avoid the uninvited reporter who was following him.
Last week, The Washington Post wrote an article about a $500 donation that White made to the Nation of Islam back in January because local members, who provide much-needed community support in Ward 8, asked him. The donation was made before Louis Farrakhan made anti-Semitic and homophobic comments at a February event that has garnered recent attention. The donation was also made months before the Rothschilds comment was made, so it has no bearing on the sincerity of White’s outreach efforts with the Jewish community. However, the media just became aware of the donation when White filed his April campaign finance report, so a donation that was made months prior to his attempts to make amends with the Jewish community is being used to assert that his efforts are not heartfelt.
Trayon White was born and raised in Ward 8, the District’s poorest ward. Markita Bryant, 31, a youth activist and paralegal, grew up with Trayon in Southeast and went to college with him. The media coverage of White particularly bothers her because “that’s not who Trayon is. If he feels that he hurt or offended someone, he internalizes it, acknowledges it and works on it. He takes in criticism and he will improve himself.”
“He sacrifices a lot to serve the community, including food and sleep,” she said. “He has literally given a neighborhood child the shoes off his feet at a community event when the child’s shoes were stolen.” Bryant further noted, “Trayon’s brilliant because he takes the time to sit there and understand the information in front of them. If he’s not learning, he’s helping others. That’s why he graduated with a 3.7 from the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. He’s the biggest listener and he’s so patient. He works his butt off for the people.”
Star Bennett, 28, is a transgender woman and one of the founders of Check It, a former LGBT gang turned entrepreneurs. When discussing White’s openness to all people, Bennett said, “Trayon was always cool and very respectful. He never had a problem with me being transgender. He’s always smiling every time he sees me.” Bennett mentioned that White was at the grand opening for the Check It Enterprises store in Ward 8. “He always comes and supports us.”
Wendy Glenn, 50, a community engagement specialist and longtime ward 8 resident, said, “Councilmember White has gone out and galvanized a group of marginalized folks. He’s given the youth something to aspire to. They know that he came from meager beginnings and now represents everyone. He is a young man that has grown up in the same way as they have, and he hasn’t let that stop him.”
Glenn, who has known White since he was a teenager, was “impressed with him as a teen and more impressed with him on the Council. I saw his growth,” she said. “I had a group of LGBTQ youth that did modeling at Barry Farm Rec Center and he was very supportive of them.”
Glenn described the recent media coverage of White as a “false depiction. It’s sensational journalism. To know Trayon is to know him in love. He’s a church boy. He has shown no level of hate. He hates injustice in any form.”
(Editor’s note: The author and Trayon White were previously colleagues at the D.C. Office of the Attorney General, Community Outreach.)
Lateefah Williams is an attorney and a former president of the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, the District’s largest LGBT political organization.
There is no question that Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr. had a significant impact on the civil rights movement, Democratic Party politics and D.C.’s struggle for statehood. After I heard of his death, I took some time to reflect on how our lives had intersected although I met him only once in person.
During the 1970s, sickle cell disease was a celebrated cause in the African-American community. Rev. Jackson was in the vanguard of that advocacy because he had the sickle cell trait. My mother had sickle cell disease and I have the trait. I responded to Rev. Jackson’s exhortation to be involved with fighting the disease and was blessed to have worked for seven years at the Howard University Center for Sickle Disease in its community outreach program.
In 1983, the March on Washington for Jobs, Peace & Freedom was held to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington. Local organizing committees called Coalitions of Conscience were formed to get people involved with the march. I attended the first meeting in D.C. and introduced a resolution that the 20th anniversary program held on the National Mall include a speaker representing the LGBT community. The resolution passed unanimously but the response from the chief organizer of the march, Rev. Walter Fauntroy, was that no such speaker would be permitted. Fauntroy was also the District of Columbia delegate to Congress. Three days before the march, four gay men – all D.C. residents, three of whom were Black – went to meet with Del. Fauntroy to discuss his opposition to having a LGBT speaker on the day of the march. He refused to meet with them and had them arrested. I was one of those arrested.
Our arrests made local and national news. While we were in jail, a conference call was held consisting of representatives of most of the major national civil rights leaders in the nation to discuss having an LGBT speaker at the march. Among those on that call were Coretta Scott King, Ralph Abernathy, Mayor Marion Barry, Dorothy Height; Reverends Joseph Lowery, Walter Fauntroy and Jesse Jackson. The decision was made to give three minutes to a speaker representing the LGBT community. The speaker was Audre Lorde, the African-American lesbian writer, poet, professor and civil rights activist. Jesse Jackson’s presence on that call was critical to her being chosen as a speaker.
In 1984, I was a volunteer in the Jesse Jackson for president campaign in his quest for the Democratic Party nomination. I, along with dozens of volunteers, boarded the bus that left from Union Temple Baptist Church to journey to Alabama to campaign for Rev. Jackson in that state’s primary. My involvement with Jackson’s D.C. campaign led me to visit the Players Lounge for the first time in order to get signatures for Jackson’s D.C. presidential delegate slate and to do voter registration.
Jackson did not win the Democratic presidential nomination in either his 1984 or 1988 campaigns. But his efforts along with Congresswoman Shirley Chisolm’s and Rev. Al Sharpton’s presidential campaigns paved the way for Barack Obama’s historic nomination and victory for president in 2008.
In 1990, Jesse Jackson was elected to be one of D.C.’s United States Senators or what is known as a “shadow senator.” He made it clear that D.C.’s struggle for statehood is not just a political issue but a salient civil and human rights issue. His involvement helped make D.C. statehood a national issue.
I cannot remember the exact year that I finally met Jesse Jackson in person but it was around the turn of the millennium. There was an event taking place in the Panorama Room at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Roman Catholic Church. Rev. Jackson was standing alone on the hill taking in the breathtaking view of D.C. I walked over, introduced myself and thanked him for what he had done for the D.C. statehood, LGBT rights, and the Democratic Party. Even though he was a major celebrity he gave me a hug as if we were longtime friends. It was a brief conversation but we both agreed to keep praying for a cure for sickle cell disease. That hope is still being kept alive.
Philip Pannell is a longtime Ward 8 community activist. Reach him at [email protected].
When we’re out with friends, we ask a question that sometimes surprises people: Are you on PrEP?
PrEP is a medication that reduces the risk of getting HIV by about 99 percent when taken as prescribed. We’re both on it. And we both talk about it openly because too many people in our communities still haven’t heard of it, can’t access it, or have been made to feel like asking for it says something about who they are.
It doesn’t. Taking PrEP is about taking control of your health. It’s that simple.
But getting there wasn’t simple for either of us. Our paths to PrEP looked different.
Del. Martinez learned this firsthand. When he asked his primary care doctor about PrEP, the response wasn’t medical — it was judgment. Instead of a prescription, he got a lecture. He had to leave Maryland entirely and go to Whitman-Walker in D.C. just to get basic preventive care. He serves on the Health Committee and sits on the public health subcommittee. Even he couldn’t access HIV prevention in his own state. That reality was soul-crushing, not just for him, but because he immediately thought about every person in his community who doesn’t have the resources to find another way.
Phillip came to PrEP through his work at FreeState Justice, where he was learning about HIV transmission rates and the gap in PrEP access for queer people of color. Black Marylanders account for 65 percent of new HIV diagnoses but only about 35 percent of PrEP users. Latino Marylanders account for nearly 19 percent of new diagnoses but fewer than 8 percent of PrEP users.
Seeing those numbers, he had to ask himself why he wasn’t on it. When he walked into Chase Brexton’s HIV Prevention clinic in Baltimore, the experience was easy and affirming, exactly what it should be for everyone. No judgment, just care. That’s the kind of experience every Marylander deserves.
A proposed bill would make it the standard in Maryland. HB 1114 would let people walk into their neighborhood pharmacy and access PrEP without waiting months for a doctor’s appointment, remove insurance barriers that slow things down, and connect them to ongoing care.
Our stories are not unusual. When we talk to friends about PrEP — and we do, regularly — we hear the same things. People who didn’t know about it. People who tried and gave up. People who assumed it wasn’t for them. People who couldn’t afford it or couldn’t find a provider. There’s still misinformation out there, and there’s still stigma. Among women in Maryland, most new HIV diagnoses come from heterosexual contact, but PrEP is still rarely part of the conversation from their doctors.
When we talk to our friends about PrEP, we lead with honesty. Here’s what it does, here’s what it costs, here’s where to go. We talk about the different options: daily pills or long-acting shots. Generic options are available, and in many cases, free. If you’re sexually active, it might be right for you. It’s not a morality question. It’s a health question.
We try to make it feel approachable, because it should be. We answer every question, because sometimes we’re the first person someone has had this conversation with. It’s a conversation between people who trust each other. And it works, but it can only go so far when the system itself is still in the way.
We have the medical tools to virtually end new HIV transmissions. What we need now are the policies to make sure everyone can reach them. At a time when the future of federal HIV prevention programs is under attack, Maryland has both the opportunity and the responsibility to lead.
We’re asking our friends to take charge of their health. We’re asking Maryland to make it possible.
If PrEP sounds right for you, talk to your provider. If you know someone who could benefit, share what you know. And if you want to see Maryland get this right, tell your legislators to support HB 1114.
State Del. Ashanti Martinez represents District 22 in Prince George’s County in the Maryland House of Delegates, where he serves as Majority Whip and sits on the Health Committee. Phillip Westry is the executive director of FreeState Justice, Maryland’s statewide LGBTQ+ advocacy organization.
Opinions
A dream: Democrats focus on candidates who can win
Defeating every Republican has to be the goal in 2026, 2028
I know this is just a dream, but I am a dreamer and continue to hope Democrats can get beyond Black or white, gay or straight, man or woman; to look at who can win in 2026, and then in 2028. It’s often said each election is the most consequential in our lifetime. The next two actually are.
The reality is without change; we face losing our democracy. We have a racist, sexist, homophobic, lying felon, in the White House. He has a Cabinet of vile incompetents, and a cadre of fascist advisers, controlling our government. They threaten our freedoms, and even our health. They think the military is theirs to use at will, without restrictions. Again, my dream for elections in 2026 and 2028, is we put our personal desires aside, for the good of the nation.
Everyone is being hurt by Trump. Black women being fired in huge numbers. Transgender people literally having their lives threatened. The LGBTQ community facing new threats. Civil rights are being undermined, and the Latino community across the country is targeted. Women are losing the right to control their bodies. Our voting rights are being threatened, and all this is happening with the consent of the Republican sycophants in Congress who are either in complete agreement with the felon, or threatened into submission by him, and his fascist cohorts. This is what we are facing in the next two election cycles as we try to take back our country. As the opposition party, we must first take back Congress in 2026. If we succeed, we must replicate that success as we work to reclaim the White House in 2028.
I believe we must all be represented in our elected officials. For years I felt comfortable looking at the equality issue in choosing a candidate, as even in the worst-case scenarios, when losing meant the election of the likes of a Richard Nixon or Ronald Reagan, I never believed my country’s existence was threatened. They, and others like them, may have been vile, but none professed wanting to be king. They didn’t go to court seeking full immunity for anything they did and getting it from judges they appointed.
I am a proud gay man but will not automatically vote for an LGBTQ candidate in the next elections. In 2024, I worked hard, and proudly, to see two strong Black women elected to the United States Senate. In the 2008 primary I was proud to stand with Hillary Clinton, then support Barack Obama when he won the nomination. In 2016, I again stood with Hillary. In 2020, I proudly supported Kamala Harris as vice president and then supported her for president in 2024.
Today, I am looking at the next two election cycles differently. I have written the only way to win back my country is to look at which Democrat can win in a particular race. I will support a Democrat committed to voting for the Democratic leadership in the House and the Senate, and in their state legislature, even if they don’t support fully everything I want. Because when Democrats win the leadership, they set the agenda. The Democratic platform has been about the same for many years. It stands for equality in every area. Have we accomplished all we stand for, clearly NO. Have we made progress, clearly YES.
In these upcoming elections each Democrat may win their race with a different set of issues at the forefront. I have suggested in the morning they go to the diners in their district, and in the evening to the bars, to find out what people are talking about, and concerned about. Then respond to that by running on those issues. If there is a primary, demand each candidate pledge to fully support the winner. Think about what is said about Democrats and Republicans, “Democrats fall in love; Republicans fall in line.” Well in the next two election cycles, Democrats need to fall in line with every Democrat on the ballot in the general election willing to say, “if elected I will vote for, and support, the Democratic leadership.”
If we don’t commit to doing that in the next two election cycles, we may actually not have future elections. It is the only way we can stop the felon, and his fascist government, from winning. Defeating every Republican in 2026 and 2028, has to be the goal for all who care about our country, and moving on to the next 250 years. Not winning is not an option.
Peter Rosenstein is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist.
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