In what appears to be an unprecedented development in local D.C. elections, three known LGBTQ candidates are now running for the open Ward 1 D.C. Council seat in the city’s June 16, 2026, Democratic primary.

Longtime Ward 1 community organizer Aparna Raj, a bisexual woman who identifies herself on her campaign website as a “queer woman of color,” announced her candidacy for the Ward 1 Council seat on Aug. 12 of this year.

The Washington Blade didn’t learn of her status as an out-LGBTQ candidate until late last month when one of her supporters contacted the Blade after publication of the Blade’s story about the second of two gay male candidates running for the Ward 1 Council seat – Ward 1 Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Miguel Trindade Deramo.

Trindade Deramo’s candidacy announcement on Nov. 18 followed the announcement in July by fellow gay Ward 1 ANC commissioner Brian Footer that Footer is running for the Ward 1 Council seat in the upcoming Democratic primary.

If any of the three Ward 1 LGBTQ candidates were to win the primary and win in the November general election, they would likely become the second LGBTQ member of the D.C. Council. Then gay D.C. Board of Education member Zachary Parker, a Democrat, won election to the Ward 5 Council seat in 2022. Parker, who is up for re-election in 2026, is considered by political observers to have a strong chance of winning the upcoming election.

“Aparna Raj is a community organizer, union member and proud daughter of immigrants,” her campaign website states. “She is running for D.C. Council in Ward 1 because she believes everyone – from Adams Morgan to Park View, from Spring Road to U Street – can and should have what they need to survive and thrive,” the statement on her website continues.

It adds, “Aparna is a renter, a queer woman of color, and a democratic socialist fighting for a better world … She lives in Columbia Heights with her husband, Stuart, and their little dog, Frank.”

In a Dec. 5 interview with the Blade, Raj said she identifies as a bisexual woman and has been a longtime supporter of D.C.’s “queer and trans communities” on a wide range of issues that she says she will continue to address if elected to the Council.

She said she currently works as a communications manager for a nonprofit organization that supports local elected officials across the country on issues related to economic justice.  

As the daughter of parents who immigrated to the U.S. from India, Raj said she will continue her work as an advocate for D.C.’s immigrant communities, especially those who live in Ward 1.

 “And I feel very strongly that we need someone who will organize and fight for the working class, who will fight for renters and workers and immigrants and families, to not just be able to get by but to be able to live a full life here,”  she told the Blade. “Making sure that we’re providing enough for renters and for workers means that is an LGBTQ+ issue,” she said. “That is an issue that benefits the LGBTQ+ community.”

Among the things she will also address as a Council member, Raj said, will be to push for the city to do all it can to counter the policies of the administration of President Donald Trump.

 “When the LGBTQ community is so under attack right now and when queer and trans folks are facing homelessness, are making less money on the job than their cis counterparts – when folks are scared about whether they will be able to continue healthcare or be able to hold on to their job through this period, having someone that takes on their landlord, that will stand on picket lines with workers and will certainly fight the Trump administration – all that is an LGBTQ justice issue,” she told the Blade.

Raj, Trindade Deramo, and Footer are among a total of six known candidates so far who are competing in the June 16 Democratic primary for the Ward 1 Council seat.

The other three, who are not LGBTQ, are Ward 1 ANC member Rashida Brown, longtime Ward 1 community activist Terry Lynch, and Jackie Reyes-Yanes, the former director of the Mayor’s Office of Community Affairs.

Similar to Raj, Trindade Deramo and Footer have been involved as community activists in a wide range of local LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ issues as described on their respective campaign websites.

And like all candidates on the ballot for the city’s 2026 primary, the three LGBTQ Ward 1 candidates will be competing for voters under the city’s newly implemented rank choice voting system. Under that system, voters will have the option of designating one of the LGBTQ candidates as their first, second, or third choice for the Council seat,

“I’m really excited about ranked choice voting,” Raj said. “And I think it’s great that there’s so many incredible candidates who are dropping into the Ward 1 race,” she said. “We’ll also be including a lot of voter education into our campaign materials as well since this will be the first year that D.C. is doing ranked choice voting.”

The three LGBTQ Ward 1 candidates are running at a time when local political observers are predicting the largest change in local D.C. elected officials, including the office of mayor and D.C. Council, in decades following the 2026 election. Longtime D.C. Council member Anita Bonds (D-At-Large), announced on Dec. 5 that she will not run for re-election in 2026.

Her announcement came shortly after Mayor Muriel Bowser announced she too is not running for a fourth term in office as mayor and about a month after incumbent Ward 1 Council member Brienne Nadeau (D) announced she is not running for re-election. 

Bowser’s announcement prompted speculation that more Council members will run for mayor, some of whom will give up their Council seats if they either win or lose the mayoral race because their respective Council seats are also up for election in 2026. 

Thus the 2026 D.C. election shakeup, in addition to bringing about a new mayor, could result in five or six new Council members on the 13-member Council.  

Members of D.C.’s LGBTQ community offered their thoughts on the impact Mayor Muriel Bowser has had on them, the city,  and LGBTQ people in statements and interviews with the Washington Blade in the week following Bowser’s announcement that she will not run for re-election in 2026.

Bowser’s Nov. 25 announcement came during the third year of her third four-year term in office as mayor and after she served as a member of the D.C. Council representing Ward 4 from 2007 to Jan. 2, 2015, when she took office as mayor.

The LGBTQ activists and mayoral staffers who spoke to the Blade agreed that Bowser has been an outspoken and dedicated supporter on a wide range of LGBTQ-related issues starting from her time as a Council member and throughout her years as mayor.

Among them is one of the mayor’s numerous openly LGBTQ staff members, Jim Slattery, who has served in the Cabinet-level position as the Mayor’s Correspondence Officer since Bowser first became mayor. 

“As Mayor Muriel Bowser’s longest serving LGBTQIA+ staffer – dating back to her first term as the Ward 4 Council member – and a proud member of her Cabinet since day one of her administration, I have had the opportunity to witness her at work for the people she serves and leads,” Slattery said in a statement. “Noteworthy is that throughout the entirety of my 27 years in District government, I have always been able to do so as an out and proud gay man,” he stated.

Slattery added that he has witnessed first-hand Bowser’s “absolute belief” in supporting the LGBTQ community. 

“She has led on HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment, on shelter for vulnerable members of our community, housing for older members of the community, and has been a reliable and constant presence at events to LGBTQIA+ residents,” Slattery said. Among those events, he said, have been World AIDS Day, the D.C. Pride Parade, the 17^th Street LGBTQ High Heel Race, and WorldPride 2025, which D.C. hosted with strong support from the mayor’s office.

Ryan Bos, CEO & president of Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C. group that organizes the city’s annual LGBTQ Pride events and served as lead organizer of WorldPride 2025, praised Bowser for being a longtime supporter of that organization.

“She played a very supportive role in helping us as an organization grow and to be able to bring WorldPride to Washington, D.C.,” Bos told the Blade. “And we commend her years of service, And our hope is that she helps us to continue to advocate for the support from the D.C. government of the LGBTQ+ community, especially during these times,” Bos said.

Bos, who was referring to the Trump administration’s hostility toward LGBTQ issues and sharp cutbacks in federal funds for nonprofit organizations, including LGBTQ organizations, said Capital Pride Alliance appreciated  Bowser’s efforts to provide city funding for events like WorldPride.

“She provided support through the event process of WorldPride and ultimately along with the D.C. Council provided necessary funding to ensure WorldPride was a success,” Bos said. “And we are proud that we are able to show that Capital Pride and WorldPride had such a large economic impact for D.C. and the D.C. government,” he added. 

Marvin Bowser, Mayor Bowser’s gay brother who operates a local photography business and has been active in the D.C. LGBTQ community for many years,  said he has also witnessed first-hand his sister’s support for the LGBTQ community and all D.C. residents since the time she became a Council member and even before that.

Among his vivid memories, he said, was his sister’s strong support for the marriage equality law legalizing same-sex marriage in D.C. that the Council approved in 2009 under then-Mayor Adrian Fenty.

“I remember the first time she was standing up and giving clear and unequivocal support to the community when that law passed,” Marvin Bowser told the Blade. “And she was front and center in speaking very strongly in support of marriage equality,” he said.

Marvin Bowser also credits his sister with expanding and strengthening the then-Mayor’s Office of GLBT Affairs, among other things, by appointing advocate Sheila Alexander Reid as the office’s director in 2015. 

Reid, who for many years prior to becoming director of the GLBT Affairs office was founder and publisher of the national lesbian publication Women In The Life, had the reputation of a “rock star,” according to Marvin Bowser.

He recalls that Mayor Bowser also played a lead role in D.C.’s bid to host to the quadrennial international LGBTQ sports competition Gay Games for 2022.

D.C lost its bid for the 2022 Gay Games after the Federation of Gay Games selected Hong Kong to host the event in an action that Marvin Bowser says was unfair and based on the effort to hold the Gay Games for the first time in Asia even though D.C. had a stronger bid for carrying out the event.

“Everything she’s done for the community has been very visible and from the heart,” he said of Muriel Bowser. “And in my personal relationship with her, she has also been nothing but absolutely supportive of me and my partner over the years,” he said.

“And we were just at her house helping her put up Christmas decorations,” he added. “And so, it’s been wonderful having her as a sister.”

Veteran D.C. LGBTQ advocate Japer Bowles, who serves as the current director of the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, discussed the mayor’s record on LGBTQ issues in his own statement to the Blade. 

“Mayor Muriel Bowser has been an unwavering champion for D.C.’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and asexual community and movement,” he said. “Her more than 20 years of leadership brought consistent and historic investments for our LGBTQIA+ youth, seniors, veterans, and residents experiencing homelessness as well as impactful violence-prevention initiatives,” he added.

 “Under her leadership, the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs grew into a national leader, delivering more than $10 million in community grants for LGBTQIA+ programs and managing 110 Housing Choice vouchers,” Bowles said in his statement.

“Because of her work, we are stronger, safer, more visible, and, proudly, ‘the gayest city in the world,’” he said in quoting Bowser’s often stated comment at LGBTQ events about D.C. being the world’s gayest city.  

In a statement that might surprise some in the LGBTQ community, gay D.C. small business owner Salah Czapary, who served from 2022 to 2024 as director of the Mayor’s Office of Nightlife and Culture as a Bowser appointee, criticized some of the city’s non-LGBTQ related polices under the Bowser administration as being harmful to small businesses.

Bowser appointed Czapary, a former D.C. police officer, to the nightlife office position shortly after he lost his race as an openly gay candidate for the Ward 1 D.C. Council seat held by incumbent Brianne Nadeau.

“Mayor Bowser led D.C. through turbulent years and major growth, and we can all be proud of her leadership on many fronts,”  Czapary said in a statement to the Blade. “She is also setting an example that more leaders should follow by stepping aside to allow a new generation to lead,” he said. “But as we turn the page, we must be honest about what the next mayor should deliver,” he says in his statement.

Without mentioning Bowser by name, he went on to list at least four things the next mayor should do that implied that Bowser did not do or did wrong. Among them were treating the D.C. Council as a “true governing partner,” not letting residents and small businesses “feel the weight of outdated, slow, and unresponsive systems,” and the need for leadership that “values competence over loyalty.”

He added that a “reversal” by the city of the city’s streetery program that was put in place during the COVID pandemic to allow restaurants to install outdoor seating into street parking lanes, was a “roll it back” on progress for small businesses.

He concluded by stating, “LGBTQ rights and inclusion are among the many fronts on which we can be very proud of the mayor’s leadership.” 

The mayor’s office did not immediately respond to an offer by the Blade to give the office an opportunity to respond to Czapary’s statement.  

A significantly different perspective was given by Sheila Alexander Reid, who said she was proud to serve as director of the Mayor’s LGBTQ Affairs Office during the first six-and-a-half years of Bowser’s tenure as mayor.

“I watched her evolve from a newly elected mayor finding her footing into a confident, seasoned leader who met every challenge head-on and time after time slayed the competition,” Alexander Reid said in a statement to the Blade.

“With each year in office, her voice grew stronger, more grounded, and more fearless,” her statement continues. “And she needed that strength, because being a Black woman mayor is not for the faint of heart, But Mayor Bowser never backed down. Instead, she showed the city what courageous, compassionate leadership truly looks like.”

Alexander Reid added that Bowser funded a new LGBTQ Community Center facility, expanded a workforce development program for the transgender community, and “made D.C. the first jurisdiction in the nation to require LGBTQ+ cultural competency training for healthcare providers.” 

She also pointed to the mayor’s LGBTQ “safety nets” through low-barrier shelters and housing vouchers and her support for LGBTQ celebrations like the 17^th Street High Heel Race.

“But what inspired me most was this,” Alexander Reid stated. “At a time when some elected officials across the country were retreating from LGBTQ support, Mayor Bowser was doing the opposite. She leaned in, she doubled down. She made sure LGBTQ residents knew they were seen, valued, protected, and loved by their city.”

Upwards of 100 HIV/AIDS activists on Monday blocked an intersection near the White House and demanded the Trump-Vance administration fully fund PEPFAR.

Housing Works, Health GAP, Treatment Action Group, AIDS United, ACT UP Philadelphia, and the National Minority AIDS Council organized the protest that took place at the intersection of 16th and I Streets, N.W. The activists then marched to Lafayette Park.

(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)

(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)

Activists since the Trump-Vance administration took office in January have demanded full PEPFAR funding.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio Jan. 28 issued a waiver that allowed PEPFAR and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during the freeze on nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending. HIV/AIDS service providers around the world with whom the Washington Blade has spoken say PEPFAR cuts and the loss of funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, which officially closed on July 1, has severely impacted their work.

The State Department in September announced PEPFAR will distribute lenacapavir in countries with high prevalence rates. The first doses of the breakthrough HIV prevention drug arrived in Eswatini and Zambia last month.

The New York Times in August reported Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought “apportioned” only $2.9 billion of $6 billion that Congress set aside for PEPFAR for fiscal year 2025. (PEPFAR in the coming fiscal year will use funds allocated in fiscal year 2024.)

Bipartisan opposition in the U.S. Senate prompted the Trump-Vance administration in July withdraw a proposal to cut $400 million from PEPFAR’s budget. Vought on Aug. 29 said he would use a “pocket rescission” to cancel $4.9 billion for HIV/AIDS prevention and global health programs and other foreign aid assistance initiatives that Congress had already approved.

“Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, has defied the appropriations authority of Congress, slashing the budget for the program despite full funding enacted by lawmakers, stealing $1.6 billion despite the direction of Congress that PEPFAR be fully funded,” notes a press release that detailed Monday’s protest. “As a result, lifesaving treatment and prevention programs have closed across dozens of sub-Saharan African countries, while Vought has refused to release money ringfenced by Congress to save lives.” 

Monday’s protest coincided with World AIDS Day.

The White House has not publicly acknowledged World AIDS Day. A State Department directive the New York Times obtained last week mandated employees and grantees “to refrain from messaging on any commemorative days, including World AIDS Day.”

“Trump thinks by banning commemoration of World AIDS Day, he can hide from the death and destruction that he’s causing around the world,” said Health GAP Executive Director Asia Russell in Lafayette Square. “But we’re here to say, we can see him. We see him stealing medicine, stealing support services, stealing HIV testing, stealing life-saving care from communities all around the world suffering and dying without access.”

The Clinton Health Access Initiative in a report it published last month said more people with HIV or are at risk of contracting the virus because of “HIV treatment and prevention cascades” during the first half of 2025. Specific figures include:

• 3.4 million fewer adults tested for HIV

• 24,000 fewer infants tested for HIV

• A 22 percent decline in new HIV diagnoses due to a reduction in testing among the most vulnerable, highest-risk people

• An 8 percent decline in people living with HIV receiving CD4 tests to diagnose advanced HIV disease

• 2,000 fewer infants and children with HIV started on life-saving medication

• A 37 percent reduction in PrEP initiations for people at risk for HIV

• 26,000 fewer infants and children on antiretroviral medications

• A 5 percent reduction in adults starting antiretroviral medications

• A 10 percent increase in people living with HIV disengaging from treatment

The Clinton Health Access Initiative also said more children around the world will die “due to undiagnosed and un- or under-treated HIV infection” if “these trends persist.”

The Human Rights Campaign Foundation in its 2025 Annual LGBTQ+ Community Survey notes more than 20 percent of adults said “policies the federal government have made accessing HIV prevention and treatment care more difficult in the last year.” The report indicates 30 percent of respondents identify as LGBTQ.