Local
Bill Clinton, Pelosi bring AIDS conference to a close
Former president seeks universal access to treatment for people with HIV
Former President Bill Clinton speaks at AIDS 2012 (Blade photo by Michael Key)
Former President Bill Clinton on Friday called for a more effective use of resources in the fight against HIV/AIDS.
“We need a new level of openness about how every last dollar is spent by countries, by governments, by NGOs,” he said during the International AIDS Conference’s closing session at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center.
The Clinton Health Access Initiative through the former president’s foundation in 2010 announced a partnership with the South African government to expand access to HIV testing and antiretroviral treatment. More than 400,000 additional South Africans with HIV had received these drugs within a year of the program’s inception. Clinton further pointed out that the initiative has saved the country roughly $700 million over the last two years.
A CHAI and Center for Global Development study of more than 100 health facilities in Ethiopia, Malawi, Rwanda and Zambia in 2011 found it cost an average of $200 — $682 annually in South Africa because of higher health and labor costs — a year to treat a person with HIV. A President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief analysis that was released during the 2010 International AIDS Conference in Vienna placed this figure at $880 a year.
The World Health Organization estimated that 5.2 million of the 15 million people with HIV globally received treatment at the end of 2009. “There is no excuse for failing to provide treatment for the remaining 10 million people in need,” said Clinton, referring to the goal of universal access by 2015.
The international HIV/AIDS community also seeks to virtually eliminate mother-to-child transmissions — Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday announced that the U.S. government would pledge an additional $80 million to achieve this benchmark as part of a broader $157 million pledge towards what she described as an AIDS-free generation. They have also pledged to reduce new HIV infection rates by 50 percent over the next three years.
The former president acknowledged that the global financial crisis has adversely affected the amount of money that donor countries can give — although he noted that the United Kingdom and Ireland are among those that continue to contribute inspire of austerity measures. He further pointed to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and other private foundations and donors that have increased their support of global HIV/AIDS efforts in recent years.
“There’s an enormous amount of private money being raised and spent and there will be more,” said Clinton. “Governments, even in this difficult time, I believe will do more if we prove we’re maximizing the amount of money they have given.”
The former president noted only slightly more than a quarter of the 1.2 million Americans living with HIV “are getting optimum care.” He further cited statistics that new infection rates among young gay men — and particularly among black men under 30 who have sex with men continue to rise. Clinton also spoke about the epidemic’s continued impact on Latinos, Native Americans, Asians and Pacific Islanders.
“Many of them feel that because of the overall progress made in the fight against AIDS, they’re just going to be left out and left behind,” he said.
Clinton also applauded D.C. for efforts to fight HIV. These include the distribution of more than five million male and female condoms last year and a 72 percent decrease in HIV rates among intravenous drug users between 2007 and 2010. Mayor Vincent Gray reiterated at the AIDS Memorial Quilt on the National Mall on Sunday that no baby has been born with HIV in the city since 2009.
“In this city, government and community leadership has been reinvigorated,” said Clinton. “They are making a different.”
Pelosi: We have an obligation to continue HIV/AIDS fight
In a separate speech, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) recalled the epidemic’s early impact in San Francisco.
“It was 31 years ago when we first heard in our community that doctors at UCSF (University of California-San Francisco) were seeing unlike anything they’d seen before, symptoms that harkened back to the Middle Ages,” she said. “Many of you could tell this same story. Quickly, AIDS began to take a terrible toll. Soon, we were going to as many as two funerals a day. Quickly we know that this was an emergency and that we had to pull out all the stops.”
Pelosi’s first speech in Congress after she arrived on Capitol Hill in 1987 was about AIDS. She said that some of her fellow lawmakers questioned why she decided to speak about the issue.
“I said: ‘I said it because that’s what I came here to do,’” recalled Pelosi. “But recognize that was the sign of the times in Washington, D.C.”
She said she and other San Franciscans saw themselves at the center of the epidemic.
“We were ground zero, as we saw it, of the AIDS assault — on our health, on our economy and on our community; on the lives of our dear friends,” said Pelosi, who later sewed a patch on the AIDS Memorial Quilt in memory of the flower girl at her wedding who lost her battle to the disease. “With death, denial, and discrimination against those with the disease, AIDS was not only a challenge to our scientific and medical professionals; it was a challenge to the conscience of all of us and it remains so to this day. We knew we had to organize, not just agonize — and organize, not agonize, and organize not agonize we did.”
She specifically cited California Congressman Henry Waxman and the late-Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy for their efforts to secure passage of the Ryan White Care Act in 1990. Pelosi praised Clinton and former President George W. Bush for their commitment to the fight against the global AIDS epidemic. And she applauded President Obama for both signing the health care reform bill and repealing the travel ban for people with the virus.
“On the brink of the AIDS-free generation, we must carry on with determination, hope, and courage,” said Pelosi. “Courage is one of the defining qualities that we always must bring to this. In doing so, we will succeed in turning the tide together. Thank all of you, to every one of you for your leadership, your activism, for your commitment to ending HIV/AIDS once and for all.”
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) speaks at the International AIDS Conference (Blade photo by Michael Key)
Local
Local LGBTQ groups, activists to commemorate Black History Month
Rayceen Pendarvis to moderate Dupont Underground panel on Sunday
LGBTQ groups in D.C. and elsewhere plan to use Black History Month as an opportunity to commemorate and celebrate Black lives and experiences.
Team Rayceen Productions has no specific events planned, but co-founder Rayceen Pendarvis will attend many functions around D.C. this month.
Pendarvis, a longtime voice in the LGBTQ community in D.C. will be moderating a panel at Dupont Underground on Sunday. The event, “Every (Body) Wants to Be a Showgirl,” will feature art from Black burlesque artists from around the country. Pendarvis on Feb. 23 will attend the showing of multimedia play at the Lincoln Theatre that commemorates the life of James Baldwin.
Equality Virginia plans to prioritize Black voices through a weekly online series, and community-based story telling. The online digital series will center Black LGBTQ voices, specifically trailblazers and activists, and contemporary Black queer and transgender people.
Narissa Rahaman, Equality Virginia’s executive director, stressed the importance of the Black queer community to the overall Pride movement, and said “Equality Virginia is proud to center those voices in our work this month and beyond.”
The Capital Pride Alliance, which hosts Pride events in D.C., has an alliance with the Center for Black Equity, which brings Black Pride to D.C. over Memorial Day weekend. The National LGBTQ Task Force has no specific Black History Month events planned, but plans to participate in online collaborations.
Cathy Renna, the Task Force’s director of communications, told the Washington Blade the organization remains committed to uplifting Black voices. “Our priority is keeping this at the forefront everyday,” she said.
The D.C. LGBTQ+ Community Center is also hosting a series of Black History Month events.
The D.C. Public Library earlier this year launched “Freedom and Resistance,” an exhibition that celebrates Black History Month and Martin Luther King Jr. It will remain on display until the middle of March at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library at 901 G St., N.W.
District of Columbia
U.S. Attorney’s Office drops hate crime charge in anti-gay assault
Case remains under investigation and ‘further charges’ could come
D.C. police announced on Feb. 9 that they had arrested two days earlier on Feb. 7 a Germantown, Md., man on a charge of simple assault with a hate crime designation after the man allegedly assaulted a gay man at 14th and Q Streets, N.W., while using “homophobic slurs.”
But D.C. Superior Court records show that prosecutors with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for D.C., which prosecutes D.C. violent crime cases, charged the arrested man only with simple assault without a hate crime designation.
In response to a request by the Washington Blade for the reason why the hate crime designation was dropped, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office provided this response: “We continue to investigate this matter and make no mistake: should the evidence call for further charges, we will not hesitate to charge them.”
In a statement announcing the arrest in this case, D.C. police stated, “On Saturday, February 7, 2026, at approximately 7:45 p.m. the victim and suspect were in the 1500 block of 14th Street, Northwest. The suspect requested a ‘high five’ from the victim. The victim declined and continued walking,” the statement says.
“The suspect assaulted the victim and used homophobic slurs,” the police statement continues. “The suspect was apprehended by responding officers.”
It adds that 26-year-old Dean Edmundson of Germantown, Md. “was arrested and charged with Simple Assault (Hate/Bias).” The statement also adds, “A designation as a hate crime by MPD does not mean that prosecutors will prosecute it as a hate crime.”
Under D.C.’s Bias Related Crime Act of 1989, penalties for crimes motivated by prejudice against individuals based on race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, and homelessness can be enhanced by a court upon conviction by one and a half times greater than the penalty of the underlying crime.
Prosecutors in the past both in D.C. and other states have said they sometimes decide not to include a hate crime designation in assault cases if they don’t think the evidence is sufficient to obtain a conviction by a jury. In some instances, prosecutors have said they were concerned that a skeptical jury might decide to find a defendant not guilty of the underlying assault charge if they did not believe a motive of hate was involved.
A more detailed arrest affidavit filed by D.C. police in Superior Court appears to support the charge of a hate crime designation.
“The victim stated that they refused to High-Five Defendant Edmondson, which, upon that happening, Defendant Edmondson started walking behind both the victim and witness, calling the victim, “bald, ugly, and gay,” the arrest affidavit states.
“The victim stated that upon being called that, Defendant Edmundson pushed the victim with both hands, shoving them, causing the victim to feel the force of the push,” the affidavit continues. “The victim stated that they felt offended and that they were also gay,” it says.
District of Columbia
Capital Pride wins anti-stalking order against local activist
Darren Pasha claims action is linked to his criticism of Pride organizers
A D.C. Superior Court judge on Feb. 6 partially approved an anti-stalking order against a local LGBTQ activist requested last October by the Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C.-based LGBTQ group that organizes the city’s annual Pride events.
The ruling by Judge Robert D. Okun requires former Capital Pride volunteer Darren Pasha to stay at least 100 feet away from Capital Pride’s staff, board members, and volunteers until the time of a follow up court hearing he scheduled for April 17.
In his ruling at the Feb. 6 hearing, which was virtual rather than held in-person at the courthouse, Okun said he had changed the distance that Capital Pride had requested for the stay-away, anti-stalking order from 200 yards to 100 feet. The court records show that the judge also denied a motion filed earlier by Pasha, who did not attend the hearing, to “quash” the Capital Pride civil case against him.
Pasha told the Washington Blade he suffered an injury and damaged his mobile phone by falling off his scooter on the city’s snow-covered streets that prevented him from calling in to join the Feb. 6 court hearing.
In his own court filings without retaining an attorney, Pasha has strongly denied the stalking related allegations against him by Capital Pride, saying “no credible or admissible evidence has been provided” to show he engaged in any wrongdoing.
The Capital Pride complaint initially filed in court on Oct. 27, 2025, includes an 18-page legal brief outlining its allegations against Pasha and an additional 167-page addendum of “supporting exhibits” that includes multiple statements by witnesses whose names are blacked out.
“Over the past year, Defendant Darren Pasha (“DSP”) has engaged in a sustained, and escalating course of conduct directed at CPA, including repeated and unwanted contact, harassment, intimidation, threats, manipulation, and coercive behavior targeting CPA staff, board members, volunteers, and affiliates,” the Capital Pride complaint states.
In his initial 16-page response to the complaint, Pasha says the Capital Pride complaint appears to be a form of retaliation against him for a dispute he has had with the organization and its then president, Ashley Smith, last year.
“It is evident that the document is replete with false, misleading, and unsubstantiated assertions,” he said of the complaint.
Smith, who has since resigned from his role as board president, did not respond to a request by the Blade for comment at the time the Capital Pride court complaint was filed against Pasha.
Capital Pride Executive Director Ryan Bos and the attorney representing the group in its legal action against Pasha, Nick Harrison, did not immediately respond to a Blade request for comment on the judge’s Feb. 6 ruling.
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Local LGBTQ groups, activists to commemorate Black History Month
