Local
Gov’t seeks 45-year prison term for FRC shooter
LGBT Center surfaces in FBI interrogation of Corkins
Floyd Lee Corkins — who pled guilty to three felony charges in February — volunteered at D.C.’s LGBT community center. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)
UPDATE:
At a court status hearing on Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Roberts rescheduled Corkins’ sentencing hearing for July 15. He also reaffirmed his denial of bail for Corkins, who has been in jail since the time of his arrest last August.
Hours before his arrest last August for shooting a security guard in the arm in the lobby of the anti-gay Family Research Council (FRC) headquarters in downtown Washington, Herndon, Va., resident Floyd Lee Corkins II, 28, says he told his parents he needed to use their car to drive to the D.C. LGBT Community Center, where he said he worked as a volunteer.
According to a 22-page transcript of an FBI interview of Corkins on the day of his arrest on Aug. 15, 2012 — which prosecutors released in a court filing last week — Corkins told FBI agents that instead of going to the LGBT Center he drove the family car to the East Falls Church Metro station.
From there he said he took the Metro to the Gallery Place station and walked to the FRC building at 801 G St., N.W., with the intention of killing as many people as possible.
“I wanted to kill the people in the building and smear a Chicken-fil-A sandwich on their face,” the FBI transcript quotes Corkins as saying.
Police and prosecutors said the heroic action by the unarmed security guard, who wrestled Corkins to the floor and took away the gun after being shot in the arm, prevented Corkins from reaching the upper floors of the FRC building where at least 50 employees were working at their desks.
Corkins pleaded guilty in February to three felony charges, including committing an act of terrorism while armed, assault with intent to kill while armed, and interstate transportation of a firearm and ammunition. He faces a possible maximum sentence of 70 years in prison.
He had been scheduled to be sentenced Monday, April 29. But U.S. District Court Judge Richard W. Roberts agreed on April 22 to a request by Corkins’ attorney to postpone the sentencing to give the attorney, David W. Bos, more time to review the status of Corkins’ mental health.
Citing information not previously disclosed, Bos stated in a motion seeking the postponement that Corkins had been the subject of a “72-hour civil commitment in February 2012, which led to the mental health treatment the defendant was receiving at the time he committed the instant offense.”
In his interview with the FBI agents, Corkins hedged about whether he was committed or entered a treatment facility voluntarily, but said the treatment took place during a time when he was living in San Francisco.
“… I went to seek help and I got charged with a 51-50,” he said.
“What’s a 51-50?” one of the FBI agents asked him.
“It’s if they think you are a danger to yourself or to others,” Corkins replied.
Corkins said he left San Francisco and moved back to his parents’ home in Herndon around April of 2012.
The fact that he purchased a handgun and large quantities of ammunition from a Virginia gun store in August just six months after being committed for a mental health condition linked to possible danger to others comes at a time when President Obama and gun control opponents continue to argue over legislation aimed at requiring stricter background checks for gun purchasers.
In what appears to be a calm, matter-of-fact discussion, Corkins told two FBI agents who conducted the interview that he disagreed with the FRC’s anti-gay positions, including its statement of support for the Chick-fil-A restaurant president, who said he opposes same-sex marriage.
Corkins said in the interview that he bought 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches one day earlier, the same day he practiced shooting his recently purchased revolver at a gun range in Chantilly, Va. He said he carried the gun, three magazines with 15 rounds of ammunition each, and the sandwiches in the backpack he brought to the FRC building.
“I consider myself a political activist,” he told the FBI agents. “[S]o I was going to use that as kind of a statement,” he said of his plans to smear the sandwiches in the faces of the people he planned to shoot.
Corkins mentioned his affiliation with the LGBT Center at the beginning of his FBI interrogation.
“Were you home when you got up in the morning today?” one of the agents asked Corkins.
“Yeah, I was at home,” he replied.
“Just walk us through when you got up,” the transcript quotes the agent as saying.
“Uh, let’s see. I got up in the morning,” Corkins replied. “I told my parents, I volunteer at the D.C. Center, the LGBT center. So I told my parents I was going down there today and that I needed the car,” he told the FBI agents.
“The night before I had loaded three magazines full of bullets, I planned on going down to the [FRC] building … ,” Corkins told the agents.
At the time of the FRC shooting, officials with the D.C. LGBT Center said Corkins volunteered there as a front desk clerk in 2011. Center officials joined local and national LGBT leaders in condemning Corkins’ actions, saying they support his prosecution to the fullest extent of the law.
Center officials said at the time that Corkins showed no signs that he could be capable of committing an act of violence but gave no further details of Corkins’ relationship with the Center other than that he was a part-time volunteer.
D.C. Center Executive Director David Mariner told the Blade early Monday that the Center would have no further comment on the matter other than the statement Mariner issued last August at the time of the FRC shooting incident.
“I was shocked to hear that someone who has volunteered with the D.C. Center could be the cause of such a tragic act of violence,” Mariner said in that statement. “No matter the circumstances, we condemn such violence in the strongest terms possible. We hope for a full and speedy recovery for the victim and our thoughts are with him and his family.”
The Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, which is prosecuting the case, submitted the FBI interview transcript as one of several exhibits attached to a 32-page sentencing memorandum filed in court on April 19.
The U.S. Attorney’s office also submitted as an exhibit a full video of the FBI interview with Corkins. The video became part of the public court record and is available for viewing and copying on the federal court system’s website.
The Family Research Council promptly posted an excerpt of the video on its own website that shows Corkins telling the FBI agents he selected the FRC as a target after seeing it listed as a “hate group” on the website of the Southern Poverty Law Center, a national civil rights organization.
In an April 25 press release, FRC President Tony Perkins called the SPLC’s decision to list FRC as a hate group a “reckless labeling [that] has led to devastating consequences.”
Added Perkins, “Because of its ‘hate group’ labeling, a deadly terrorist had a guide map to FRC and other organizations. Our team is still dealing with the fallout of the attack that was intended to have a chilling effect on organizations that are simply fighting for their values.”
SPLC has said it lists FRC as a hate group based, among other things, on what it says are FRC’s false and defamatory claims linking homosexuality and LGBT people to pedophilia. SPLC officials have criticized Perkins for misrepresenting their position, saying they never label an organization as a hate group based on its political views or public policy positions.
The sentencing memorandum outlines the government’s reasons for asking Judge Roberts to sentence Corkins to 45 years in prison.
“The defendant, the lone gunman and perpetrator of this attempted massacre, had the malicious intent and engaged in the requisite planning and effort necessary to achieve his purpose,” the memo says. “Fortunately, he was thwarted by the heroic intervening actions of Leonardo Johnson, a building manager/security guard who was seriously injured as a result.”
Johnson, who was unarmed, is credited with tackling Corkins seconds after Corkins pulled out a 9mm handgun from a backpack he was carrying and pointing it at Johnson. Johnson sustained a gunshot wound to the arm as he wrestled Corkins to the floor of the lobby of the FRC building and took possession of the gun.
D.C. police arrived on the scene minutes later and arrested Corkins. The FBI also became involved in the case.
D.C. police and the FBI said Corkins told authorities that had he gotten past Johnson, he would have taken the elevator to the building’s upper floors and opened fire on the 50 or more FRC employees working that day.
“The defendant’s crimes are serious and warrant severe sentences – not only to punish the defendant for his actions, but to keep the community safe from him and deter other would-be mass murderers and domestic terrorists from following suit,” the sentencing memo says.
“Accordingly, the government respectfully requests that the Court sentence the defendant to a combined term of imprisonment of 45 years,” the memo says.
A new sentencing date was expected to be announced at the status hearing scheduled for 11 a.m. Monday.
In his motion seeking the postponement of the sentencing hearing, defense attorney Bos said the state of Corkins’ mental health should be taken into consideration in the sentencing process.
“While counsel believes the defendant’s mental health history does not bear on the defendant’s competency to proceed in this matter, counsel believes the defendant’s mental health history is relevant to the appropriate sentence in this case.”
Floyd Lee Corkins II (Photo courtesy the U.S. Attorney’s Office)
District of Columbia
Pride faith services in Washington, D.C.
Almost half of all LGBTQ adults in the U.S. are religious
Are you an LGBTQ person of faith or someone exploring spirituality? It is more common than people realize. According to a Williams Institute study published in October 2020, almost half of all LGBTQ adults in the United States are religious. This may seem counterintuitive as any LGBTQ people have complicated relationships with faith because of very real histories of abuse, trauma, and violence.
This violence still continues in the United States, especially following the Supreme Court’s March 2026 decision in Chiles v. Salazar, who ruled Colorado’s ban on conversion therapy for minors violates the First Amendment, but not everyone has encountered this violence, nor do people who have faced it, separate themselves completely from religion. Many people may seek out affirming faith traditions which are prevalent in the DMV area.
For individuals seeking out faith services during Pride 2026, please check out the list below, which will be updated as more events are publicized.
Memorial Service for SaVanna Wanzer
May 17th at 1 pm
Westminster Presbyterian Church (400 I St SW, Washington, DC 20024)
Westminster Presbyterian will host a celebration of life for legendary DC trans rights activist and founder of DC Trans Pride and Black Trans Pride SaVanna Wanzer who was a long-time member of the church. Live music will begin at 12:15 pm before the start of the memorial service. The service will be livestreamed on the Westminster DC Facebook page. A meal will follow the Sunday service.
There will also be a celebratory vigil held on Saturday, May 16th from 6:30-8 pm for friends and family at the church led by LGBTQ organizer Raycee Pendarvis.
May 23th at 11 am
Downtown Westin (999 9th Street NW, Washington, DC 20001)
This intimate conversation is hosted by Janeé Lee, founder of Queer Ministry, between Black trans and queer people who are surviving religious trauma and navigating their relationship with the church. The workshop, hosted as part of Trans Pride DC, is a chance for people to share their stories at the intersection of queerness and spirituality and to walk away with a spiritual healing guide with affirming scriptures and inclusive theology.
DC Black Pride Worship Service
May 24th at 10 am
Remnant Christian Center (120 West Hampton Avenue, Capitol Heights, MD)
Hosted by The Community Church of Washington DC-UCC, this service will feature speakers and sessions on Black queer faith and unity, including host and speaker Robert D. Wise Jr. for a powerful Pentecost Unity Service. Attendees are encouraged to come dressed in and white.
June 5th at 7 pm
Sixth & I (600 I Street, NW, Washington, DC 20001)
Join Rabbi Jenna will be leading an inclusive, musical service celebrating the diversity of Jewish life in Washington, DC. Happy Hour, which is limited to people 21 and older, will start at 6 pm. The service will start at 7 pm, with dinner at 8:15 pm. The service is free but registration is required, and the kosher-style pescatarian meal does cost money. Register online here.
June 14th at 5 pm
Black Cat (1811 14th St NW, Washington, DC 20009)
Muslim Pride is a community-led and funded grassroots performance series centering queer and trans Muslim artists through music, drag and dance. The series was originally founded in 2020 as a way to create affirming spaces where faith, culture, and queerness can coexist. This year’s series features Mercedes Iman Diamond. This year, Muslim Pride expands to Washington, DC, New York City, and Los Angeles. Buy tickets here.
Pride Celebrations and Sunday Worship Service
June 14th all day
Riverside Baptist Church (699 Maine Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20024)
Join Riverside Baptist Church for a day-long Pride celebration beginning with Pride Weekend/Musical Theater Sunday worship service at 10 am. Later that morning and early afternoon, from 11:30 am to 1:30 pm, the church will be hosting a Pride Pageant, a technicolor celebration featuring a runway showcase, line dancing, food, and refreshments.
June 22nd at 7 pm
St. Mark’s Episocpal Church (301 A Street, SE, Washington, DC 20003)
Join this interfaith service celebrating affirming faith traditions and intertradition dialogue hosted by queer and trans faith leaders. The interfaith service has been hosted annually for over 40 years, and first began back in the 1980s with faith leaders and queer people of faith coming together to mourn and pray at the site of the AIDS Memorial Quilt on the National Mall. Learn more about the history of the interfaith service here.
June 23rd at 6 pm
Holy Trinity Catholic Church (3513 N St NW, Washington, DC 20007)
Holy Trinity will be hosting its 6th annual Pride Mass. After its debut this past summer, the Pride Mass choir will be singing at the Pride Mass in June, and following the Mass, there will be an annual reception with ice cream and other goodies. Learn more about attending the reception and Holy Trinity’s LGBTQ+ Ministry.
Delaware
Blade Foundation awards 9th journalism fellowship to AU student
Thomas Weaverling will cover LGBTQ issues in Delaware this summer
The Blade Foundation this week announced the recipient of its 2026 Steve Elkins Memorial Fellowship in Journalism is Thomas Weaverling, who is scheduled to graduate from American University with a degree in communication, language, and culture this month.
He will cover issues of interest to Delaware’s LGBTQ community for 12 weeks this summer. The fellowship is named in honor of Steve Elkins, a journalist and co-founder of the CAMP Rehoboth LGBTQ community center. Elkins served as editor of Letters from CAMP Rehoboth for many years as well as executive director of the center before his death in March of 2018.
Kevin Naff, editor of the Blade, welcomed Weaverling and will introduce him to the Rehoboth Beach community at an event this week.
“If the applicants to our fellowship program are any indication, the future of American journalism is very bright,” Naff said. “Thomas stood out for his broad skillset and strong writing and reporting skills and we’re all excited to work with him this summer.”
Weaverling is the ninth recipient of the Elkins fellowship, which is funded by community donations at the Blade Foundation’s annual fundraiser in Rehoboth Beach. This year’s event is scheduled for May 15 at Diego’s and includes a generous sponsorship from Realtor Justin Noble and remarks from Ashley Biden accepting an award on behalf of her brother Beau Biden for his LGBTQ advocacy while serving as Delaware’s attorney general.
“I am incredibly honored and excited to receive the Steve Elkins Memorial Fellowship in Journalism,” Weaverling said. “Writing for the Washington Blade has been a goal of mine since I began my freshman year of college and I could not be more thrilled to have this opportunity. I am looking forward to getting to know the LGBTQ+ community in Rehoboth Beach and throughout Delaware.”
Weaverling is graduating cum laude with a concentration in journalism and Spanish. He studied in Spain in 2025 and worked in the office of Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) as a policy intern.
For more information on the fellowship program or to donate, visit bladefoundation.org.
District of Columbia
GLAA releases ratings for 18 candidates running for D.C. mayor, Council, AG
Mayoral contender Janeese Lewis Geroge among those receiving highest score
D.C. mayoral candidate Janeese Lewis George, a Democrat, is among just four candidates to receive the highest rating score of +10 from GLAA D.C. who are competing in the city’s June 16 primary election.
GLAA, formally known as the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance of Washington, has rated candidates for public office in D.C. since the 1970s. It rated 18 of the 36 candidates on this year’s primary ballot for mayor, D.C. Council, and D.C. attorney general based on its policy of only rating candidates who return a GLAA questionnaire asking for their positions on a wide range of issues, most of which are not LGBTQ-specific.
Among the candidates who did not return the questionnaire and thus did not receive a rating, according to GLAA, was Democratic mayoral contender Kenyan McDuffie, who along with Lewis George, is considered by political observers to be one of the two leading mayoral candidates running in the Democratic primary.
GLAA President Benjamin Brooks said that when the McDuffie campaign learned that GLAA announced it had released its candidate ratings and McDuffie was not rated because a questionnaire from him was not received a McDuffie campaign worker contacted GLAA. Brooks said the campaign worker told him they didn’t initially believe they received the questionnaire but they discovered this week that it landed in the spam folder of the campaign’s email account.
Brooks told the Washington Blade he informed the campaign worker it was too late for GLAA to issue a rating for McDuffie since the submission deadline for all candidates had passed. But he said GLAA will allow McDuffie to submit a completed questionnaire that it will post on its website along with the questionnaire responses of the other candidates who submitted them to GLAA.
McDuffie’s campaign in a statement to the Blade said the GLAA questionnaire “had gone to a spam folder tied to a campaign email address and was never seen by the campaign.”
“Kenyan McDuffie has long been proud of his record of standing with DC’s LGBTQ+ community,” reads the statement. “He has completed the GLAA questionnaire in every election since his first campaign and, in 2022, earned one of the top two ratings among candidates for the two at-large Council seats that election cycle.”
“Kenyan remains committed to fighting for equality, dignity, safety, and opportunity for LGBTQ+ residents across all eight wards, and our campaign welcomes the opportunity to continue engaging with GLAA and the LGBTQ+ community throughout this race,” it continues.
Lewis George and McDuffie, who each have long records of support for the LGBTQ community, are among a total of eight candidates running for mayor on the June 16 primary ballot: seven Democrats and one Statehood Green Party candidate. In addition to Lewis George, GLAA rated just two other mayoral candidates. Rini Sampath, a Democrat who self identifies as queer, received a +6.5 rating, and Ernest E. Johnson, also a Democrat, received a +4.5 rating
Under the GLAA rating system, candidate ratings range from a +10, the highest score, to a -10, the lowest possible score. In its ratings for the June 16 primary, the lowest score issued was +4.5. GLAA said in a statement that each of the 18 candidates it rated expressed strong support for LGBTQ-related issues in their questionnaire responses, indicating that the overall rating scores reflect the candidates’ positions on mostly non-LGBTQ-specific issues.
The three other candidates who received a +10 GLAA rating are each running as Democrats for the Ward 1 D.C. Council seat. They include gay candidate Miguel Trindade Deramo; Aparna Raj, who identifies as bisexual; and LGBTQ ally Rashida Brown. The only other Ward 1 candidate rated by GLAA is LGBTQ ally Terry Lynch, who received a +5.5 rating.
Ward 5 D.C. Councilmember Zachary Parker, the Council’s only gay member who is facing two opponents in the Democratic primary, received a +7 GLAA rating. The two challengers did not return the questionnaire and were not rated.
“In seven out of 10 of our priorities, every candidate indicated agreement,” GLAA said in its statement to the Washington Blade in referring to the candidates it rated. “Total consensus on core issues signals that whomever is elected to Council and mayor, we should expect to hold our elected officials accountable to our goals of protecting home rule, resisting federal overreach, advancing transgender healthcare rights, and eliminating chronic homelessness in the District,” the statement says.
“While candidates agree on the basics, they distinguish themselves in the depth and creativity in their responses, and their record on the issues,” according to the statement, which adds that candidates’ full questionnaire responses and ratings can be accessed on the GLAA website, glaa.org.
Like past election years, GLAA does not rate candidates running for the D.C. Congressional Delegate seat or the so-called “shadow” U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate seats.
With the exception of one question asking about transgender rights, none of the other nine of the 10 questionnaire questions are LGBTQ-specific. But most of the questions mention that LGBTQ people are impacted by the issues being raised, such as affordable housing, federal government intrusion into D.C. home rule, and access to healthcare and public benefits for low-income residents.
One of the questions asks candidates if they support decriminalization of sex work in D.C. among consenting adults, which GLAA supports. Lewis George is among the candidates who said they do not support sex work decriminalization at this time. The other two mayoral candidates that GLAA rated, Sampath and Johnson, said they support sex work decriminalization.
In the race for D.C. attorney general, GLAA issued a rating for just one of the three candidates running: Republican challenger Manuel Rivera, who received a +4.5 rating. Incumbent Democrat Brian Schwalb and Democratic challenger J.P. Szymkowicz were not rated because they didn’t return the questionnaire.
D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson (D), who is running unopposed in the primary, received a +6.5 rating. Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, who is facing three Democratic challengers in the primary and who is a longtime LGBTQ ally, received a +6.5 rating.
In the special election to fill the at-large D.C. Council seat vacated by the resignation of then-Independent Councilmember McDuffie to enable him to run for mayor as a Democrat, GLAA has rated two of the three Independent candidates competing for the seat. Elissa Silverman received a +5.75 rating, and Doni Crawford received a +6.5 rating.
Finally, in the At-Large D.C. Council race GLAA issued ratings for five of the 11 candidates running in the primary, each of whom are Democrats. Oye Owolewa received a +9; Lisa Raymond, +7.5; Dwight Davis, +6.5; Dyana N.M. Forester, +6; and Fred Hill, +6.6.
The full list of GLAA-rated candidates and their detailed questionnaire responses can be accessed at glaa.org.
Pride faith services in Washington, D.C.
European Commission says all EU countries should ban conversion therapy
Blade Foundation awards 9th journalism fellowship to AU student
Jason Collins dies at 47
Polish government to recognize same-sex marriages from EU countries
New Hungarian prime minister takes office
Senate Democrats press DOJ over anti-trans prison directives
DJ Chanel Santini is bringing the heat and some gender-fluid diversity to XBIZ Miami
America’s broken pipeline of mental healthcare for trans youth
National tour of ‘Gatsby’ comes to National Theatre
-
Hungary4 days agoNew Hungarian prime minister takes office
-
Federal Government2 days ago
Senate Democrats press DOJ over anti-trans prison directives
-
Music & Concerts3 days ago
DJ Chanel Santini is bringing the heat and some gender-fluid diversity to XBIZ Miami
-
National1 day ago
America’s broken pipeline of mental healthcare for trans youth
