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Three D.C. women named winners of LGBTQ Legendary Elders Wisdom Award

11 honored by National Black Justice Coalition, AARP

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Earline Budd was honored with a mural last year; she’s now been named a recipient of the LGBTQ Legendary Elders Wisdom Award. (Washington Blade photo by Lou Chibbaro, Jr.)

Veteran D.C. transgender rights advocate Earline Budd and D.C.-based LGBTQ rights advocates Donna Payne-Hardy and Dr. Imani Woody are among 11 prominent African-American women named winners of the National Black Justice Coalition’s 3rd Annual Legendary Elders Wisdom Awards.

The awards were to be officially given at a virtual ceremony scheduled for Tuesday, May 16.

“The Legendary Wisdom Awards will honor Black LGBTQ+/SGL women elders and their contributions to America, the Black community, and the LGBTQ+ liberation movement,” a statement released on Monday by the NBJC says.

“The award ceremony will premiere live on NBJC’s website, YouTube, and social media platforms,” the statement says.

NBJC spokesperson Brett Abrams said the Wisdom Awards is a joint project of NBJC and the AARP.

“Too often, Black LGBTQ+/SGL elders are rendered invisible, the process of aging is hidden, and our existence is frozen in photos of young people at Pride parades,” said NBJC Executive Director David Johns in the statement. “If we’re supported, in loving community, and protected by policies designed to facilitate participation in democratic processes, we—Black LGBTQ+/SGL people grow old,” Johns said.

“The Wisdom Awards…are designed to give flowers to Black queer, trans, and non-binary/non-conforming leaders; celebrate the process of aging, preserve the lessons learned over time, and facilitate intergenerational connections that enable Black people to get closer to freedom — collectively,” Johns said.

Victoria Kirby York, NBJC’s Director of Public Policy and Programs, called her organization’s Wisdom Awards the Black LGBTQ+ equivalent of Oprah Winfrey’s Legends Ball.

“Oprah’s Ball, like our event, was an opportunity for legendary icons to be given flowers from soon-to-be legendary icons who benefited from their labor,” York said in the NBJC’s statement.

The NBJC statement announcing the award ceremony listed the awardees in alphabetical order with short biographical descriptions of their contributions to the LGBTQ community and beyond:

• Mary Anne Adams is the founder and Executive Director of ZAMKI NOBLA (National Organization of Black Lesbians on Aging, the first organization in the country building power for Black lesbian elders.

• Simone Bell is the first Black, openly lesbian legislator to serve in a state legislature in the United States. She was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives four times.

• Earline Budd is the founder of Transgender Health Empowerment, one of the first transgender advocacy organizations in Washington, D.C., where she has worked in local LGBTQ advocacy for more than 35 years. She played an essential role in challenging systemic abuses against trans sex workers by police and in prisons, and has helped countless people through illness, homelessness, family rejection, and violence.

• Roz Lee is a trailblazer for Black LGBTQ+/SGL people in philanthropy, recently serving as the Vice President of Philanthropy at the Equality Fund, a global organization committed to funding feminist causes. She is the first-ever Professor of Practice for the gender and women’s studies program at the University of Pennsylvania.

• Darlene Nipper is the CEO of the Rockwood Leadership Institute and the first Black LGBTQ+/SGL senior executive at a mainstream LGBTQ+ organization in her role as Deputy Executive Director of the National LGBTQ+ Task Force.

• Donna Payne-Hardy co-founded the National Black Justice Coalition and was a trailblazer for Black LGBTQ+/SGL leadership at the Human Rights Campaign within the organization and the broader LGBTQ+ movement. She currently works as the Diversity and Inclusion/Equal Employment Opportunity Specialist at the Federal Reserve board in Washington, D.C.

• E. Denise Simmons is the former mayor of Cambridge, Mass., and the first Black, openly lesbian mayor in the U.S. She is a justice of the peace, notary public, photo archivist, and family historian.

• Nadine Smith is the co-founder and Executive Director of Equality Florida, the statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization; a Time 100 honoree, and one of four national co-chairs of the 1993 LGBTQ March on Washington.

• Wanda Sykes is an award-winning stand-up comedian, late-night talk show host, actress, and writer. After officially coming out, she has been a vocal advocate for marriage equality and LGBTQ rights.

• Beverly Tillery is the Executive Director of the New York City Anti-Violence Project and an experienced thought leader, advocate, and national organizer with nearly three decades of experience working in social justice movements.

• Dr. Imani Woody is the President and CEO of Mary’s House for Older Adults in Washington, D.C., and a trailblazing advocate for the needs of Black LGBTQ+LGL elders. She has served on the board of directors of the Mautner Project, the Women in the Life Association, and the Whitman-Walker Health Lesbian Services program. She recently obtained a commitment from the D.C. government of $1.2 million to begin construction of the first Mary’s House dwelling—a 15-room residence for LGBTQ seniors in Southeast D.C.

The Legendary Elders Wisdom Award ceremony can be accessed nbjc.org/wisdomawards

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District of Columbia

Laverne Cox, Reneé Rapp, Deacon Maccubbin named WorldPride grand marshals

Three LGBTQ icons to lead parade

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Deacon Maccubbin attends the 2024 Capital Pride Parade. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

WorldPride organizers announced Thursday that actress and trans activist Laverne Cox, powerhouse performer Reneé Rapp, and LGBTQ trailblazer Deacon Maccubbin will serve as grand marshals for this year’s WorldPride parade.

The Capital Pride Alliance, which is organizing WorldPride 2025 in Washington, D.C., revealed the honorees in a press release, noting that each has made a unique contribution to the fabric of the LGBTQ community.

Laverne Cox (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)

Cox made history in 2014 as the first openly transgender person nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award in an acting category for her role in Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black.” She went on to win a Daytime Emmy in 2015 for her documentary “Laverne Cox Presents: The T Word,” which followed seven young trans people as they navigated coming out.

Rapp, a singer and actress who identifies as a lesbian, rose to prominence as Regina George in the Broadway musical “Mean Girls.” She reprised the role in the 2024 film adaptation and also stars in Max’s “The Sex Lives of College Girls,” portraying a character coming to terms with her sexuality. Rapp has released an EP, “Everything to Everyone,” and an album, “Snow Angel.” She announced her sophomore album, “Bite Me,” on May 21 and is slated to perform at the WorldPride Music Festival at the RFK Festival Grounds.

Deacon Maccubbin, widely regarded as a cornerstone of Washington’s LGBTQ+ history, helped organize D.C.’s first Gay Pride Party in 1975. The event took place outside Lambda Rising, one of the first LGBTQ bookstores in the nation, which Maccubbin founded. For his decades of advocacy and activism, he is often referred to as “the patriarch of D.C. Pride.”

“I am so honored to serve as one of the grand marshals for WorldPride this year. This has been one of the most difficult times in recent history for queer and trans people globally,” Cox said. “But in the face of all the rhetorical, legislative and physical attacks, we continue to have the courage to embrace who we truly are, to celebrate our beauty, resilience and bravery as a community. We refuse to allow fear to keep us from ourselves and each other. We remain out loud and proud.”

“Pride is everything. It is protection, it is visibility, it is intersectional. But most importantly, it is a celebration of existence and protest,” Rapp said.

The three will march down 14th Street for the WorldPride Parade in Washington on June 7.

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District of Columbia

LGBTQ leaders celebrate Frank Kameny’s 100th birthday at Supreme Court

Advocates march, deliver speeches to remember activist’s many contributions

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Jim Obergefell speaks outside of the United States Supreme Court on Wednesday, May 21. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

More than 100 people joined the leaders of a dozen prominent national LGBTQ rights organizations on May 21 to celebrate the 100th birthday of iconic D.C. gay rights pioneer Frank Kameny on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court building in the nation’s capital.

Kameny, who passed away on Oct. 11, 2011, on National Coming Out Day, has been hailed as one of the founding leaders of the modern LGBTQ rights movement.

Among other things, he became the first openly gay man to file an appeal about gay rights to the U.S. Supreme Court, which was among the reasons organizers of his birthday celebration chose to hold it at the Supreme Court.  

“Today is the 100th birthday of Frank Kameny, the founder of the LGBTQ civil rights movement,” said Malcolm Lazin, who served as national chair of the committee that organized the Kameny 100th birthday event. Frank is one of the nation’s most consequential civil rights leaders,” Lazin told the gathering in opening remarks.

“We are in front of the Supreme Court because Frank believed in the Constitution’s promise of equality for all Americans,” he said. “He based his liberation strategy against systemic homophobia on that promise.”

More than 100 people turned out for a celebration of Frank Kameny’s 100th birthday on Wednesday. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Participants in the event, many of whom were young LGBTQ activists from New York City, carried 100 candles to commemorate Kameny’s birthday.

They were joined by the national LGBTQ organization leaders who formed a ceremonial picket line carrying replicas of the  “homosexual rights” signs used in the 1965 historic first gay protest outside the White House organized by Kameny and his supporters from the Mattachine Society of Washington, a gay rights group that Kameny helped to form.

Among speakers at the event was Jim Obergefell, the lead plaintiff in the same-sex marriage lawsuit that resulted in the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide. Obergefell noted that the Kameny birthday celebration marks the 10th anniversary of the high court’s marriage decision and recalls for him Kameny’s role as a strong supporter of legalizing same-sex marriage.

Obergefell and U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), the Senate’s first openly lesbian member, served as national honorary co-chairs of the Kameny 100th birthday celebration.  

Ross Murray, a vice president of GLAAD, told how Kameny used an effective strategy to fight homophobia both for the public and to many in the LGBTQ community who experienced internalized homophobia due to societal pressure.

“So, using the model of ‘Black is Beautiful,’ Frank turned perceptions upside down when he coined ‘Gay is Good,’” Murray said. “And he carried that on a picket sign in 1970 at the first New York Pride Parade.”

Washington Blade editor Kevin Naff told the gathering that the early 1960s era newsletter of the Mattachine Society of Washington, that Kameny helped to start, evolved into the early version of the Washington Blade in 1969.

“Frank recognized the importance of community building and engagement by having a reliable community news source,” Naff said. “We are honored to join in the 100th birthday tribute to one of our founders, Frank Kameny.”

Kevin Naff, editor of the Washington Blade, speaks outside of the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday, May 21. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Japer Bowles, director of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, said the mayor’s office is proud that the city hosted Kameny’s 100th birthday celebration. Bowles announced that Bowser issued an official mayoral proclamation declaring May 21, 2025, Frank Kameny Centennial Day.

In her proclamation Bowser recites many of Kameny’s accomplishments in advancing LGBTQ rights in D.C. and across the nation and concludes by stating she  commends “this observance to all Washingtonians with a reminder to always remember, as Frank Kameny often said, ‘Gay is Good.’”

Others who spoke included Keith Joseph of the LGBTQ group Equality Forum, Ben Garcia of the American LGBTQ+ Museum, Saul Levin of the American Psychiatric Association, Kevin Jennings of LGBTQ attorneys’ group Lambda Legal, Elliot Imse of the LGBTQ Victory Institute, Jay Brown of the Human Rights Campaign, Philadelphia City Council member Rue Landau, D.C. Capital Pride Alliance and WorldPride organizer June Crenshaw, Anya Marino of Advocates for Transgender Rights, Sultan Shakir of PFLAG, and Aaron Tax of SAGE. 

(Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.), who is gay, was scheduled to speak at the event but had to cancel due to a House committee vote scheduled around the same time, Lazin told the Blade. Rep. Mark Takano, who’s gay, spoke at a lunch after the event to the LGBTQ leaders and praised Kameny’s many contributions to the LGBTQ movement.

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Blade’s Lou Chibbaro subject of new film premiering May 29

‘Lou’s Legacy’ looks back at 50-year career

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‘Lou’s Legacy’ premieres next week in D.C.

Longtime Washington Blade reporter Lou Chibbaro Jr. is the subject of a new documentary film premiering on May 29 in D.C.

The world premiere of the film by Emmy-nominated director Patrick Sammon will take place at the Martin Luther King Jr. Library auditorium in D.C. on May 29 at 6:30 p.m.  

“Lou’s Legacy: A Reporter’s Life at the Washington Blade”(29 minutes) tells the story of D.C.’s tumultuous and inspiring LGBTQ history through the lens of veteran reporter Lou Chibbaro’s reporting during nearly five decades at the Blade. The film features renowned D.C. drag performer Donnell Robinson who has been entertaining Washington’s LGBTQ community since 1975 as “Ella Fitzgerald.” Chibbaro and Robinson reflect on their careers and discuss the rising backlash against the LGBTQ community, including laws targeting drag performers.

As a reporter, Chibbaro made a point of focusing on the people and issues that were regularly ignored or distorted by mainstream outlets: the HIV/AIDS epidemic, hate crimes, and the fight for LGBTQ civil rights.

“Lou and Donnell are cornerstones of D.C.’s LGBTQ community,” said Sammon, the film’s director and producer. “I have great respect for both of them and hope this film celebrates in some small way their contribution to our city. It’s especially appropriate to premiere this documentary during WorldPride as people from all over the world gather in D.C. to celebrate our community and find inspiration to continue fighting for LGBTQ equality.” 

Sammon and his production team were given unprecedented access to more than 300 archival boxes of meticulously kept reporter’s files, documents, and audio tapes that Chibbaro saved and donated to George Washington University’s Gelman Special Collections Library. In addition, the Washington Blade granted Sammon access to its photo archive of compelling and emotional images, most of which have not been seen for decades.

Charles Francis, president of Mattachine Society said, “The Mattachine Society is so proud to have played a role in making this film happen, especially in this time of total erasure and efforts across the country to rewrite our history. With our work and support, Lou was able to preserve, donate, and help curate his thousands of pages of papers at George Washington University. That history cannot be erased. This film tells the story.”

Pate Felts, co-founder of the Mattachine Society, said, ”Lou’s archive, including more than 300 cartons of reporter’s files, holds thousands of stories of the men and women who suffered and fought for LGBTQ dignity and equality, at great professional and personal cost. Patrick’s film focuses on some of the most powerful ones to help educate all of us, especially younger generations, about the dues paid, the courage displayed and the hope that we all carry forward today.” 

A panel discussion will follow the premiere screening of “Lou’s Legacy.” Aside from Chibbaro, Robinson, and Sammon, the conversation will feature Bladepublisher and co-owner Lynne Brown. D.C. journalist Rebekah Robinson will moderate the conversation.

“Lou’s Legacy: A Reporter’s Life at the Washington Blade” will broadcast in late June on MPT and WETA, the region’s leading PBS stations. The WETA broadcasts are set for Saturday, June 21 at 8 p.m. and Monday, June 23 at 9:30 p.m. The film will also stream on PBS.org starting June 21. 

“Lou has had a front-row seat to 50 years of historic events; from covering the trial of Matthew Shepard’s murderers to observing the inauguration of President Obama from the Capitol Steps, Lou has seen it all,” said Blade editor Kevin Naff who has worked with Chibbaro for more than 20 years. “The film captures Lou’s dedication and tenacity and reminds us how far we’ve come as a community.”

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