Local
‘Archive Activism’ reveals efforts to recover hidden LGBTQ gov’t documents
Memoir by Charles Francis highlights ‘secrets’ held at LBJ Presidential Library
A newly released book called “Archive Activism: Memoir Of A ‘Uniquely Nasty’ Journey” describes the efforts by author Charles Francis and his supporters to uncover long hidden documents, among other things, revealing how LGBTQ federal workers were forced out of their jobs in the 1950s and 1960s.
Francis, a former public relations consultant and longtime Washington insider, co-founded in 2011 a repurposed Mattachine Society of Washington, D.C. as an advocacy group to uncover LGBTQ-related historical and archival documents while advocating for LGBTQ equality.
The original Mattachine Society of Washington was co-founded by pioneer D.C. gay rights advocate Frank Kameny in the early 1960s as D.C.’s first gay rights organization to become politically active and engage in gay rights protests.
Francis points out that the title of his book is taken, in part, from a 1964 document in which an attorney for the then U.S. Civil Service Commission named John Steele defended the longstanding policy of not allowing LGBTQ people to work for the government.
“What it boils down to is that most men look upon homosexuality as something ‘uniquely nasty,’ not just a form of immorality,” Steele states in the document.
“Archive Activism is the story of recovering forgotten, sealed – often deleted – LGBTQ history and using it to fight for equality and social justice at a time of historic erasure, book bans, and political assault,” Francis told the Washington Blade. “This is not a bland text about ‘LGBTQ history month,’” he said.
“It is about protecting ourselves, our families and political gains by understanding the shoulders we stand upon through original archival research,” he said in a statement. “A gay, ex-Republican raised in Texas in the ‘50s and ‘60s, I was awakened by the power of our history, our gay and lesbian legacy and the fight to save American democracy,” he said.
Francis’s book covers his early years in Washington working for nationally known public relations executive and Republican Party advocate Bob Gray, his efforts to help elect former Texas Gov. George W. Bush as U.S. president in the 2000 presidential election, and his subsequent disillusionment with Bush after Bush became an outspoken advocate for a federal constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage.
The book also tells how Francis in 2000 formed the Republican Unity Coalition, an LGBTQ supportive group that called on the Republican Party to make homosexuality a “non-issue” for the GOP. In a development that surprised many GOP officials, then U.S. Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.), former president Gerald Ford, and Mary Cheney, daughter of former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, signed on as members of the RUC group.
Francis describes in the book his early archive activism efforts that included co-founding the Kameny Papers Project, which arranged for the Library of Congress to acquire the voluminous collection of the documents of Frank Kameny. The Mattachine Society of Washington also arranged for the Library of Congress to acquire the papers and documentary films produced by D.C. LGBTQ rights advocate Lilli Vincenz.
A statement released by the book’s publisher, University of North Texas Press, says the book breaks ground in uncovering LGBTQ-related documents generated under President Lyndon Johnson.
“For the first time, ‘Archive Activism’ reveals how LGBTQ secrets were held for decades at the LBJ Presidential Library in the papers of President Johnson’s personal secretary, sealed until her death at age 105,” the statement says.
Francis and Mattachine Society of Washington co-founder Pate Felts went to Texas in 2016 to work with LBJ Library officials to find LGBTQ-related documents, including those showing that Johnson quietly fired a longtime Johnson family friend and White House staffer named Robert “Bob” Waldron after learning that Waldron had “engaged in homosexual acts,” according to one of the documents.
“‘Archive Activism’ is a rescue mission for primary archival materials located in archives and libraries, large and small, worldwide,” Francis says in the book. “It is a preservation-minded movement to recover and protect historical queer memory,” he writes. “Archive Activism is a populist mission to recover the erased past and to document the government animus that continues to course through LGBTQ political and policy history.”
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Maryland
Anne Arundel schools updates gender identity regulation following Trump administration threats
District facing federal lawsuit, White House threats over guidelines
By JESSICA CALEFATI | Under pressure from the Trump-Vance administration, Anne Arundel County Public Schools Supt. Mark Bedell announced Wednesday the district had updated a regulation intended to protect transgender students’ right to be called by their chosen name.
The revised language makes clear that district rules on gender identity do not block parents’ rights under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act as the federal government alleged last month, and that a student’s gender identity will not be treated as confidential medical information.
“No policy, guideline, or practice may limit or otherwise interfere with parental rights under FERPA,” Bedell wrote in a Wednesday letter to the community. “This includes any information maintained in education records that relates to gender identity, transgender status, sexual orientation, preferred name, or preferred pronouns.”
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
District of Columbia
Man charged with anti-gay assault in D.C. accepts plea offer
Community service offered in exchange for dismissing hate crime charge
A Germantown, Md., man arrested by D.C. police on a charge of simple assault with a hate crime designation for allegedly assaulting a gay man while using “homophobic slurs” has agreed to an offer by prosecutors to plead guilty to simple assault without the hate crime designation and with the promise of having the charge dismissed if he completes, among other requirements, 48 hours of community service work.
Dean Edmundson, 26, standing beside his attorney, officially accepted the offer of a Deferred Sentencing Agreement at an Aug. 18 status hearing in D.C. Superior Court after Senior Judge Hiram Puig-Lugo explained the details of the agreement and confirmed Edmundson’s decision to waive his right to a trial.
Among other things, the judge said the agreement offered by prosecutors with the Office of the United States Attorney for D.C. includes the requirement that he successfully completes 48 hours of community service work, stays away from the victim of the assault, writes a letter of apology to the victim, and does not violate any other laws or get into trouble for the next 12 months.
Puig-Lugo then announced he scheduled a sentencing hearing for Edmundson for Aug. 18, 2027, at which time a determination will made on whether he has fulfilled all the requirements under the agreement and whether the simple assault charge will be dismissed. The judge added that if it is determined that Edmundson did not fulfil the terms of the agreement the charge would remain in place and he could be sentenced to a possible maximum penalty of 180 days in jail and a $1,000 fine.
Edmundson, who appeared in court wearing a business suit with a dress shirt and tie, was released on his own recognizance following his arrest by D.C. police on Feb. 7, 2026.
Police and court records show he was initially charged by arresting officers with simple assault with a hate crime designation. In a statement announcing the arrest, D.C. police said, “On Saturday, Feb. 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 kept walking,” the statement says.
A follow-up arrest affidavit filed by police states that Edmundson followed the victim and called him “bald, ugly, and gay,” and then “pushed the victim with both hands, shoving them, causing the victim to feel the force of the push.” The affidavit adds, “The victim stated that they felt offended and that they were also gay.”
According to the court records, the Office of the U.S. Attorney filed its official charge of simple assault against Edmunson on Feb. 9 without the hate crime designation. The office has not responded to a request by the Washington Blade for its reason for dropping the hate crime designation. The office has also not immediately responded to a follow-up inquiry from the Blade this week asking if prosecutors consulted the victim to obtain the victim’s thoughts about the plea offer.
The Blade, which has a policy of not disclosing the identify of crime victims in cases like this without their consent, could not immediately obtain contact information to reach the victim for comment.
Court records show that Edmundson rejected an earlier plea agreement offer by prosecutors and he was scheduled for a non-jury trial on Aug. 18. The records show his attorney filed a motion earlier this month asking the judge to convert the trial into status hearing on that same day after his client accepted the Deferred Sentencing Agreement offer by the U.S. Attorney’s office. The judge approved the motion without objection from prosecutors.
Virginia
Winsome Earle-Sears ‘Life and Marriage Tour’ to include Northern Va. stops
Voters to consider marriage equality, reproductive rights referenda in November
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears has announced her campaign against efforts to enshrine marriage equality and reproductive rights in the state constitution will make several stops in Northern Virginia.
Her “Life and Marriage Tour” will include stops in Manassas, Winchester, and Harrisonburg. Earle-Sears said the “Life and Marriage Tour” will also travel to Virginia Beach, Lynchburg, Roanoke, Charlottesville, and other cities across Virginia “throughout September and October.”
The announcement did not include specific dates.
“Virginia, you’ve been asking where the Life and Marriage Tour is headed — here’s a look at our current tour locations,” she said on X on Tuesday. “We’ll be traveling across the commonwealth throughout September and October, and we’re still building the journey.”
Current Gov. Abigail Spanberger, a Democrat, last November defeated Earle-Sears, a Republican, in the race to succeed Republican Glenn Youngkin.
Voters in 2006 approved the Marshall-Newman Amendment, which defined marriage in Virginia as between a man and a woman.
Same-sex couples have been able to legally marry in Virginia since 2014. Youngkin a decade later signed a bill that codified marriage equality in state law.
Two successive legislatures must approve a proposed constitutional amendment before it can go to the ballot.
Spanberger signed bills that finalized the marriage equality and reproductive rights referenda’s language.
The referenda will take place on Nov. 3.
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Winsome Earle-Sears ‘Life and Marriage Tour’ to include Northern Va. stops
