Connect with us

Opinions

Vote Brooke Pinto for Ward 2 Council

A progressive pragmatist who embraces bold ideas

Published

on

Brooke Pinto, gay news, Washington Blade
D.C. Council member Brooke Pinto (D-Ward 2)

We find ourselves trying to navigate challenging times. Size and scope are hard to fathom. Our restaurants and bars provide half of the District’s sales tax revenue and have taken a Tonya Harding like blow, and many will close and not reopen. The Council faces shrinking revenues and diminishing rainy-day funds, with the budget headed for an inevitable crisis with the hard choices still to come. And it’s worth saying the obvious: There is no recovery without small business recovery.

It’s essential for the District, but that’s not everything we are facing — the death of George Floyd has once again shown racial injustice. If it wasn’t obvious before, it’s blatantly obvious now that part of our community is still suffering, frustrated, and hurting — Black lives matter. We see the effects of economic inequities on someone’s fragile health and health care, the growing numbers of gay homeless youth, the District’s LGBTQ elderly living quiet lives of isolation, and the increasing depression and suicide rate. Undoing the damage done by Trump’s pandemic and the after-effects of the endemic are overwhelming challenges. If the Gods from Mount Olympus wanted to punish us, it’s hard to think of a more perfect scenario, and that is why I’m voting for Council member Brooke Pinto.

I want you to know Brooke like I know Brooke. She’s a progressive pragmatist that’s unquestionably qualified. Her granular understanding of the D.C. budget and its process is outstanding and can’t be emphasized enough. She’s dedicated and embraces bold ideas, and as a creative pragmatist, she’s grounded in the reality of the steps to deliver those ideas. After all, a big idea that can’t be turned into reality will remain a dream.

And Brooke is smart, very smart. Her educational background in hospitality at Cornell, a law degree from Georgetown University, and the unglamorous position as a tax attorney in Attorney General Karl Racine’s office provided the experience that makes her ideal to work on the critical recovery for small businesses, including restaurants and bars. Expertise is valuable.

Brooke’s dedication to our economic recovery’s urgent reality has her working late nights and early mornings. That’s not political puffery, it’s her work ethic and drive. And I’ve experienced her pace, as I’ve had text conversations on advocacy issues past 11 p.m. on several nights, and she’s even called on a Saturday evening to have a substantive discussion on items like dram shop reform. After listening to our restaurant’s concerns, Brooke co-sponsored a bill with Council member McDuffie to provide clarity to licensees on expanded outdoor seating for our restaurants, allowing them to plan for the future.

I also want you to know Brooke as the LGBTQ ally like I know Brooke. Going way back to her youth, she was president of her high school Gay-Straight Alliance and the first person her trans friend came out to. Brooke fought with the administration at the all-girls school they attended to ensure he didn’t have to wear the quilt uniform or a dress at graduation. Brooke learned at the age of 16 that things that seemed inevitable or comfortable for some are daily stressors for others. At an age when most of us were desperately trying to fit in, Brooke spoke out about how rules and society impact people differently. This action wasn’t to gain political capital for a Council member run; it’s just who Brooke has always been.

When Brooke was working on Capitol Hill and the landmark case giving us the right to marry, Brooke canceled work with two other important Senate offices to celebrate this moment in front of the Supreme Court with her best friend from college who had privately come out to her.

Brooke knows our community is under siege these days. The equality the LGBTQ community has gained is going to be challenged in court, and she will vigorously defend our rights as fundamental human values and needs: the ability for all of us to pursue health and happiness, earn a living, be safe in our communities, serve in the military regardless of gender identity, have access to health care, take care of the ones we love. And to help protect those fundamental values, Brooke worked on drafting hate crimes legislation to ensure that the D.C. Attorney General’s office could prosecute hate crimes. She continues to work with the Judicial Committee to ban “the gay panic and trans panic” defense.

Coming from Laramie, Wyo., this is close to my heart. On Oct. 10, 1998, Matthew Shepard, a University of Wyoming student, was tortured, tied to a barbed-wire fence, and left to suffer and die outside Laramie. And using a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity as an excuse for murder or violence is still a valid defense 22 years later in the District. Council member Pinto has committed to our community and me to push and ensure the bill moves through the final stages to become law this Council period. Council member Pinto is committed to our beliefs, vigorously defends our values, and will promote our political needs because that is who Brooke is.

Each election, I ask myself one question: Who is the most qualified person to represent Ward 2? And without a doubt, I know it’s Council member Pinto. It’s why she has the endorsement of the majority of the SMD commissioners from ANC (2F) Logan Circle, the endorsement of Council Chairman Mendelson, and why the Washington Post endorsed her run again.

It’s not lost on me that I’m not endorsing the gay candidate, but to all my friends that feel being a member of the LGBTQ community is important: I say this is what I know for sure, a friend is a friend, an ally is an ally, and Brooke is both.

Although she didn’t need the big windup, as a 31-year resident of Logan Circle, a lifelong proud member of the LGBTQ community from Laramie, and a 30-year small business owner, I’m proud to enthusiastically endorse our Democratic nominee for Ward 2, Council member Brooke Pinto.

John Guggenmos is a longtime D.C. resident and local business owner.

Advertisement
FUND LGBTQ JOURNALISM
SIGN UP FOR E-BLAST

Opinions

The power of queer community: When aid is cut, we don’t disappear. We organize

US funding withdrawal has had global impact

Published

on

HIV/AIDS activists place Black Styrofoam coffins in front of the State Department on April 17, 2025. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

The global LGBTIQ+ movement is being systematically undermined, not just by eroding legal protections and escalating political harassment, but by the sudden withdrawal of vital funding. What began in the U.S. as a flurry of policy changes under Donald Trump has become a global flood of cuts, bans, and deliberate dehumanization. This week in Nairobi, prominent ultra-conservative campaigners from around the world, who are against abortion, transgender and LGBTIQ+ rights, and sexuality education, are speaking at the Pan-African Conference on Family Values.

Grassroots organizations, which are the backbone of queer survival and resistance around the world, are struggling to stay afloat. The global funding squeeze will and has already started to directly impact frontline organizations, forcing them to scale back, shut down programs, or close entirely.  

In South Africa, support groups have slashed services due to the sudden disappearance of U.S. aid. In Mali, new laws criminalize LGBTIQ+ identities altogether. These regressions are not organic, they are engineered as American evangelicals continue to export anti-LGBTIQ+ ideologies across Africa. 

In Europe, trans rights are being rolled back under the guise of biological essentialism, most recently validated by the U.K. Supreme Court’s ruling to exclude trans women from the legal definition of “woman.” In Hungary, LGBTIQ+ events have been constitutionally banned. 

In the U.S., Trump is once again weaponizing his platform to push bans on gender-affirming care for minors and cut LGBTIQ+ research funding, all under the banner of “protecting children.” Elon Musk, once a corporate ally for LGBTIQ+ rights, now echoes far-right voices and launches transphobic tirades in tandem with personal attacks against his own daughter. 

This is a coordinated, well-funded, and transnational anti-rights campaign to strip queer people of rights, dignity, and resources. At Hivos, we see this backlash as a call to deepen our commitment to centering queer voices, challenging harmful narratives with data and lived experiences, and working to strengthen the LGBTIQ+ movement globally. 

We cannot fight this movement with performative IDAHOBIT posts on social media alone. We need action, international solidarity, and a recommitment to protecting queer lives.

What’s at stake? 

This isn’t about identity politics. It’s about survival.

When the USAID funding freeze came into effect in early 2025, the Hivos-led EU SEE network conducted a survey on the impact of the freeze on civil society organizations around the world. Most surveyed organizations are reducing staff, scaling down programs, or reallocating budgets

Outright International had to cut more than 120 grants to LGBTIQ+ organizations in 42 countries following U.S. aid freezes with devastating consequences: Lost access to trauma care for survivors of gender-based violence, the dismantling of HIV prevention networks, and increased discrimination, arrests, and violence. Outright International is only one of many organizations that have had to cut grants and funding.

Grassroots mutual aid groups in East Africa, working with minimal resources, have pioneered radical community models by providing housing, legal aid, and emergency support in the absence of government protection. These groups don’t just serve communities; they are the communities. Their defunding is not only cruel; it is a death sentence for countless individuals.

Economic justice and LGBTIQ+ liberation

Justice isn’t just legal, it’s economic. In most contemporary societies, justice is also closely tied to economic power. Around the world, LGBTIQ+ people face disproportionate levels of poverty, unemployment, housing insecurity, and workplace discrimination. Economic inclusion shouldn’t be an afterthought to queer rights around the world – it is foundational to their survival and dignity. 

And yet, reports from Outright International, the Williams Institute, and the World Bank affirm that LGBTIQ+ economic inclusion benefits society as a whole. When the queer community is excluded, the human and financial costs are steep. The economic marginalization of LGBTIQ+ people lowers GDP, deepens inequality, and entrenches cycles of sexual and gender-based violence. So we also need systemic change that includes LGBTIQ+ people in broader economic opportunities — from education to employment and entrepreneurship opportunities. 

There are strategies to bring LGBTIQ+ inclusion to the forefront. At Hivos, through the Free to be Me program, we have seen successes in LGBTIQ+ economic inclusion from the establishment of the Queer and Allied Chamber of Commerce of Africa to our partners in the Philippines successfully supporting the Lapu-Lapu city council’s Anti-Discrimination Ordinance. Positive developments like these are just one part of creating safer social, political, and legal environments allowing LGBTIQ+ people to have equal access to resources, opportunities, and decision-making. 

What do we do now? 

If governments won’t lead, then LGBTIQ+ communities and our allies must.

  • Philanthropic foundations must step up. Some foundations have pledged to increase support, but the momentum pales in comparison to the urgency. Funding must be flexible, long-term, and led by community input.
  • Media and influential individuals must confront hate speech head-on. Political leaders like Donald Trump aren’t “debating” gender identity — they’re inciting division and violence. Do not let bigotry define the narrative. Bigotry is not a “debate” its incitement
  • Corporations must put money where their rainbows are. Pride-themed products without meaningful reinvestment into queer causes are nothing more than branding and pinkwashing. Corporations must ensure LGBTIQ+ employees are supported and protected.
  • Solidarity demands more than words, donating directly to grassroots organizations and mutual aid funds. Speak up. Pressure local leaders. Boycott non-inclusive organizations and corporations. Demand change.
  • Bring LGBTIQ+ voices into policymaking spaces. When the LGBTIQ+ community participates in the legislative process — and when advocates and organizations receive the funding they need to support long-term, transformative impact — the potential for positive change and inclusivity is endless.  

Continuing the fight from previous generations 

Queer communities have always faced adversity with grit, love, and radical imagination. But resilience is not infinite. Without funding, protection, and political will, resilience can end up in burnout. 

Let’s do more than celebrate the queer community — let’s mobilize. We can take inspiration from the 2024 protests in Peru against a law classifying transgender people and other LGBTIQ+ people as mentally ill, which succeeded in getting the law scrapped within a month. The future of LGBTIQ+ rights will not be decided in courtrooms or campaign rallies alone. It will also depend on whether we show up right now, with our money, our voices, and our actions. Because when aid is cut, we don’t disappear. We organize.

Susan Githaiga is a Pan-African, feminist and human rights defender grounded in the belief that none of us are free until all of us are free as inspired by Lilla Watson and collective Black feminist thought. As the Global Program Manager of Free to Be Me Hivos, she leads a transformative initiative across 12 countries in Africa, MENA, and Southeast Asia, partnering with over 160 LGBTIQ+ CSOs and movements to advance human and economic rights and resilience. A strategist, bridge-builder and movement weaver, Susan thrives at the intersection of advocacy and grassroots power. 

Susan Githaiga (Photo courtesy of Hivos International)
Continue Reading

Opinions

My chance encounter with a pope and why goodness still matters

Early morning Vatican stroll turns into unforgettable memory

Published

on

Basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican. (Photo by TatyanaGl/Bigstock)

It’s not every day you meet a pope. Mine was Pope John Paul. In the recent passing of Pope Francis, and all the love and generosity of this ”People’s Pope,” I was reminded of a similar man, with a similar heart, who I had the fortune to one day meet. 

There’s no real yardstick for measuring a man who’s the head of an institution that has been around since the Romans, who commands the respect of more than a billion people, and whose job it is to keep alive a 2,000-year-old message of love, hope, generosity, and salvation. 

I wasn’t planning on meeting him. More like it was fated, or I’d like to believe that.

I was on a spiritual journey of my own. My schoolwork was over in Norway, and I was headed to Lebanon to write about the war there. I was a young man of 17, trying to figure out the world and how it worked — or didn’t.

It was a week before Easter when I found myself in Rome, standing at the far edge of St. Peter’s Square. As I remember, it was very early and a very beautiful morning, sometime around six or so. Even at that age, I found great solace in the solitude of the early morning. It’s as if I had the entire Square to myself, reflecting on this singular moment in time that I was alone in one of the greatest places of spiritual gathering in the world. 

But I wasn’t alone. Next to the fountain where I had parked my backpack laid a man, curled up next to the stone wall, in the gentle universal snore of inebriation. I quietly cupped some water to wash my face and neck, which apparently was enough to stir the man from his sleep.

I nodded my head at him, smiled, and gave a short wave in the universal sign that we were all good and passing fellows. He groggily waved back. I was about to gather up my rucksack and head out when I saw a man strolling across the far side of the Square, about 100 yards away  He was in no hurry, which intrigued me. Another soul in search of morning quietude, I thought to myself.  He sauntered along, thoroughly enjoying the morning air, occasionally looking up at the sky, which was equally as intriguing.

He was a happy man who was happy to be alive. I thought it was remarkable that on that morning, there were two happy people in the world, and they were both in St. Peter’s Square.

As if a bee to a flower, the man took a direction to a small group of people, three or four more souls walking together who stopped as the man approached them. I saw one of them reach out for the man’s hand and then he kissed it. Now my curiosity turned to wonderment, trying to understand what was taking place.

My Roman fountain friend began a slow drunken babble to me as he gestured toward the small cluster that I was evidently staring at. His Italian was as good as my English, and that was the end of it. Though he continued to say, “Papa, Papa.” I queried him back, having no clue what his Papa was. Then he sat up as if to collect every ounce of clarity that still inhabited him and said, “Pope-a.” I pointed to the group. “The Pope?”   He nodded his head and said, “Si. Il Pope-a” (which I later understood was a combination of the affectionate and respectful use of Papa for the Pope, combined with our English version — thus, “Pope-a”).

He smiled. I smiled. The apostle of the fountain had conveyed his message, and I was on my way to meet the pope. 

Quickly, I made my way to the small gathering. I was a little unsure of how to add myself to the procession, as small as it was. My mind started to whirl with pope-laden imaginings. Would he be talking in Latin? Wearing silk robes? Would he be holding some relic of St. Peter’s golden staff?   

I then slowed my walk, brought myself to the edge of the group, and there he was — the pope, John Paul himself. He was smaller than I had imagined. No staff or silk robes. He was chatting up the small group as if they were neighbors meeting in the middle of the sidewalk, exchanging news of the neighborhood or the latest sport’s scores, all in a breezy mixture of Italian and English. 

He then spotted me and waved me over. I froze for a moment. With no time to study the Pope Manual of Papal Etiquettecy, I had no clue if I should kiss the ring or the hand, or shake it, or what? Not being Catholic, I was not versed on how to properly greet a pope.  

I then did what any non-Catholic American 17-year-old kid on a spiritual journey would do: I combined a handshake with a nod/kiss on the hand and the biggest kid-smile I could muster. He smiled back, with the understanding of what it was to be a pope and meet a kid like me both in awe and in happiness at being together there on the Sunday morning in St. Peter’s Square. 

He asked me a few questions for which I have no memory of my answers. It didn’t matter. I was talking with the pope.  

There was no Instagram, or Facebook, or selfie-taking back then. Everyone somehow understood that this was a moment you stored in your mind and in your heart.  To take pictures would have somehow sullied it, and everyone knew it. 

John Paul was a man on a morning stroll, who shared his intimate time with a group of fellow morning seekers. He was warm, kind, and cordial — a prince of a fellow in my book. The type of man you could talk to in a bar, or on a train, or on a park bench.  He practiced the generosity that is the best of the human spirit — to give without expecting anything in return. A gift of love that needs no bartering or transaction to fulfill it.  

Lately, and with the recent passing of Pope Francis, I thought I needed to commemorate this memory of this day on paper. Watching how generous Pope Francis was with his love, to the children, to the sick and poor, to the downtrodden, to those who are so easily trampled over in the modern day haste to make civilization “better” and “faster,” it was no stretch to remember another man who so equally and mightily gave his heart and soul to others.

In a world where so many are seemingly trying to figure out who to hate and how to hate them, I find great solace in knowing that there are those who understand that the better angels of our nature are to be better. 

On a beautiful Sunday morning, in the small tide of the oceans of history, I met with a man who helped me to remember once again that the Golden Rule is golden because it shines with goodness, grace, and generosity, and that is no small endeavor for all of us to journey toward in all of our lives.


Carew Papritz is the award-winning author of ‘The Legacy Letters’ who inspires kids to read through his ‘I Love to Read’ and ‘First-Ever Book Signing’ YouTube series.

Continue Reading

Commentary

‘A New Alliance for a New Millenium, 2003-2020’

Revisiting the history of gay Pride in Washington

Published

on

A scene from the 2001 Capital Pride Festival. (Washington Blade archive photo by Clint Steib)

In conjunction with WorldPride 2025, the Rainbow History Project is creating an exhibit on the evolution of Pride: “Pickets, Protests, and Parades: The History of Gay Pride in Washington.” It will be on Freedom Plaza from May 17-July 7. This is the ninth in a series of 10 articles that share the research themes and invite public participation. In “A New Alliance for a New Millenium” we discuss how Whitman-Walker’s stewardship of Pride led to the creation of the Capital Pride Alliance and how the 1960s demands of the Mattachine Society of Washington were seen as major victories under the Obama administration.

This section of the exhibit explores how the Whitman-Walker Clinic, a cornerstone of the community since the 1970s, stepped up to rescue Pride from a serious financial crisis. The Clinic not only stabilized Pride but also helped it expand, guiding the festival through its 30th anniversary and cementing its role as a unifying force for the city’s LGBTQ population. As Whitman-Walker shifted its focus to primary healthcare, rebranding as Whitman-Walker Health, a new era began with the formation of the Capital Pride Alliance (CPA). Born from the volunteers and community partners who had kept Pride going, CPA took the reins and transformed Capital Pride into one of the largest free LGBTQ festivals in the country. Under CPA’s stewardship, the festival grew to attract hundreds of thousands, with multi-day celebrations, headline performers, and a vibrant parade. 

This period saw Pride become a true cross-section of the community, as former Capital Pride Alliance executive director Dyana Mason recalled: “It was wonderfully diverse and had a true cross section of our community… Everybody was there and just being themselves.” The festival’s expansion created space for more people to find a sense of belonging and affirmation. This growth was made possible through the support of sponsors, volunteers, and a city eager to celebrate-but it also sparked ongoing debates about the role of corporate funding and the meaning of Pride in a changing world.

National politics are woven throughout this era. In a powerful moment of recognition, Frank Kameny — the architect of D.C.’s first White House picket for gay rights and a founder of the Mattachine Society — was invited to the White House in 2009. There, President Obama and the U.S. government formally apologized for Kameny’s firing from federal service in 1957, a symbolic act that echoed the earliest demands of DC’s own Mattachine Society, the city’s first gay civil rights organization founded in 1961. The 2009 National Equality March revived the spirit of earlier mass mobilizations, linking LGBTQ rights to broader movements for social justice. The 2010s brought landmark victories: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was repealed, marriage equality became law. These wins suggested decades of protest had borne fruit, yet new generations continued to debate the meaning of true liberation and inclusion.

Our exhibit examines how the political edge of Pride has softened as the event has grown. As the festival expanded in scale and visibility, the focus on protest and activism has sometimes faded into the background, even as new challenges and divisions have emerged. Some voices have called for a return to Pride’s more radical roots. The 2017 Equality March for Unity and Pride drew 80,000 people to D.C., centering intersectional struggles — police violence, immigrant rights, trans inclusion — and exposing the widening rift between mainstream LGBTQ progress and the lived realities of the most vulnerable. The question remains: Are LGBTQ officers marching in uniform a sign of progress or a painful reminder of Pride’s roots in resistance to state violence? During Capital Pride 2017, activists blocked the parade, targeting floats sponsored by corporations linked to weapons manufacturing, pipeline financing, and other forms of oppression. 

As we prepare for WorldPride and the anniversaries of D.C.’s first Gay Pride Day Block Party and the White House picket, the Rainbow History Project invites you to experience this living history at Freedom Plaza. Through archival images and the voices of organizers and participants, you’ll discover how Pride in DC has been shaped by resilience, reinvention, and the ongoing struggle to ensure every voice is heard. 


Zoey O’Donnell is a member of the Rainbow History Project. Vincent Slatt is RHP’s senior curator. 

Continue Reading

Popular