Politics
Mondaire Jones ready to fight anti-LGBTQ extremism
Former congressman seeking a comeback to ‘safeguard democracy’
“The state of the race here” for New York’s 17th congressional district “is good for those of us who want to safeguard democracy and protect LGBTQ+ rights,” Mondaire Jones told the Washington Blade by phone on Monday.
Next year, Jones is looking to reclaim the House seat that he held from 2021 to 2023 before “unusual redistricting events” cost him the Democratic nomination and “lifelong political hack” GOP U.S. Rep. Mike Lawler eked out a victory by just 1,820 votes.
Confident in the state of his campaign looking ahead to the elections, having just out-raised Lawler along with all of his Democratic opponents, combined, in Q3, Jones is focused on the stakes:
“If you believe, as many people do, that with Joe Manchin’s retirement we are likely to lose the Senate,” began Jones, referring to the dimmed chances of Democrats retaining control of the upper chamber following the West Virginia senator’s announcement of plans not to run in 2024.
“And if you believe most of the polling in the presidential race, which has shown Donald Trump well positioned to take back the White House,” he continued, “I am the only person standing in the way of Mike Lawler” and Republican allies “passing a national abortion ban, gutting Social Security and Medicare, rolling back LGBTQ+ rights, raising the price of prescription drugs, and exacerbating the uniquely American problem of mass shootings.”
“There are people in Congress and on television who say things like, ‘if Joe Biden doesn’t change his position on Israel, then the young people and people of color are not going to vote for him’ — rather than [talking] about how irrational that is” or highlighting the Biden-Harris administration’s work on behalf of young people, from student loan forgiveness to the child tax credit and the largest climate action ever undertaken via the Inflation Reduction Act, Jones said.
And if reelected, he noted, Trump has promised to reinstate the Muslim ban imposed during his administration. (In fact, the former president pledged to expand it to include barring resettlement of refugees from Gaza.)
Another example of the disservice done to voters: During a speech on Veterans Day, “Donald Trump just referred to his political opponents as vermin, which is an invocation of the sinister rhetoric used by people like Adolf Hitler to demonize an entire race of people,” Jones said.
“The fact that the New York Times treated like a mere divergence from the speeches Donald Trump typically gives as opposed to the more sinister harbinger of a fascist and an anti-Semite and a racist who has promised to weaponize government against groups of people who he does not like is really a failure of the New York Times to get this moment; to understand this moment in American history.”
Jones also bristles at how the media have sometimes characterized certain congressional Republicans as moderates, citing, for instance, the entire conference’s support for their new Speaker, U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson (La.), despite his extreme views.
“I am concerned because the media have given a platform to the small handful of House Republicans who even purport to be moderate,” he said. “Their treatment of these people who masquerade as moderates despite voting like extreme MAGA Republicans will give the impression to people that they are not part of the problem in the way that Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene are,” Jones said, referring to the far-right firebrand GOP U.S. representatives from Florida and Georgia.
These Republican members include Lawler, who “did not have to vote with the extreme MAGA Republicans,” Jones said, but chose not to separate himself from the far-right faction of his caucus “on issue after issue,” which is “because he himself is an extremist.”
For instance, he said, Lawler has “trafficked in climate denialism” and “mocked women and our Orthodox communities here in the lower Hudson Valley” while voting “to overturn a gun regulation intended to keep us safe from mass shootings” and for an abortion ban “without exception for rape or incest.”
All to defend a seat in Congress in a district where Donald Trump was rejected by 10 points, Jones noted.
“People here in the 17th district want to protect a woman’s right to an abortion,” he said. “They want to protect LGBTQ+ rights and ban assault weapons so that kids can stop getting gunned down in schools throughout the country.”
Jones continued, “Mike Lawler opposes these things. He also wants to cut Social Security and Medicare and raise the cost of prescription drugs as evidenced by the fact that he has been working to unravel the provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act.”
Running on his record
“When I was elected in 2020, I was elected as the first person of color to ever represent this district and the first member of the LGBTQ+ community to represent this district,” Jones said.
In Congress, he was named the most legislatively active freshman legislator by a landslide.
“I’ve got a record of actually delivering for this district,” Jones said. “I brought hundreds of millions of dollars for schools, housing, and health care in the lower Hudson Valley. I negotiated passage of the bipartisan infrastructure law. And it was my bill with [U.S. Rep.] Jerry Nadler [D-N.Y.] called the Respect for Marriage Act that has made strides in safeguarding marriage equality for so many LGBTQ+ Americans around the country, even if the Supreme Court were to go back on its precedent.”
He added, “I have a track record of being an effective legislator, and people want me back.”
“I have great respect for the members of the Equality Caucus and the LGBTQ+ members in both chambers of Congress,” Jones said. “I will say that it is apparent to both me and, I think, to many people who have compared last term with this term, that my voice is missing in a significant way with respect to matters concerning the LGBTQ community.”
Among other matters, he said, this would include “of course, the Supreme Court, healthcare, healthcare equity,” – including access to PrEP medication regardless of one’s ability to pay for it – “ and justice.”
“Even the conversation around student debt cancellation is one that I described as an issue of LGBTQ justice to the president in the Roosevelt Room in the spring of 2022 when I was conveying to him the importance of canceling student debt by executive order.”
Additionally, Jones said, “When I look at what’s happened, when I look at what’s happening abroad, in certain parts of Africa, with respect to the criminalization of queer people, that is something that I would be leading on right now as the nation’s first openly gay Black member of Congress.”
“I don’t see anyone leading on that or on the Supreme Court,” said Jones, a lawyer who has worked at the Justice Department, the multinational law firm Davis Polk, and as a clerk for a judge in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. “It makes me sad,” he said, “but I also know that is the reason why I need to fight like hell to get back in Congress and continue the work that I started last term.”
The High Court “is itself something that poses an existential threat to the lives and livelihoods of the LGBTQ+ community,” Jones said.
To remedy the problem, Jones supports court expansion – a move he proposed in legislation with Nadler and U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) during the last term. It could be “a critical step to protecting basic freedoms for the LGBTQ+ community not to be discriminated against by business owners, as well as protecting the right of women to exercise their own healthcare rights, whether it is abortion or any other healthcare decision that they want to make.”
The Supreme Court has also imperiled American democracy, Jones said, referencing the 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder, which “opened the floodgates to the hundreds of racist voter suppression bills that we have seen introduced in dozens of states around the country — and that, in many of those states, have become law.”
Congress
Lindsey Graham dies at 71
Republican SC senator passed away ‘from a brief and sudden illness’ on Saturday
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) died suddenly on Saturday.
The South Carolina Republican’s office in a statement said Graham, 71, “passed away from a brief and sudden illness.” The Washington Post reported first responders responded to Graham’s Washington home on Saturday and transported him to a local hospital.
Graham had been in the U.S. Senate since 2002.
The close Trump ally was running for re-election. Graham died a day after he returned to the U.S. from Ukraine.
Speculation over Graham’s sexual orientation persisted during his tenure.
The Washington Blade will update this story.
2026 Midterm Elections
As Washington shifts right, Democratic Socialists gain ground
Next major test for movement comes in Midwest
As President Donald Trump’s second administration has pushed the federal government further to the right on issues ranging from immigration to LGBTQ rights, a different political movement has been gaining momentum inside the Democratic Party.
From industrial communities in upstate New York to Colorado’s Front Range, candidates aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) have won a series of victories in Democratic primaries this year, in several cases defeating longtime incumbents who had represented Democratic strongholds for years. Their success has reignited debate over the Democratic Party’s future, as a growing faction of progressive voters calls for a more confrontational approach to economic inequality, healthcare, housing, labor rights, climate policy, and LGBTQ protections rather than what they view as the party’s increasingly cautious establishment.
These victories also reflect a broader ideological divergence in American politics. While Republicans under Trump have embraced a more conservative governing agenda, many Democratic primary voters in safely blue districts appear to be rewarding candidates running on unapologetically progressive platforms that reject incremental change in favor of more sweeping reforms.
The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), the nation’s largest socialist organization, says it has more than 100,000 members and chapters in all 50 states. The organization advocates what it describes as democratic socialism — promoting social and economic equality through democratic government while supporting a larger public role in healthcare, housing, labor protections, education, and other social programs alongside a regulated market economy.
On its website, the DSA explains its goals are to utilize “progressive movements for social change while establishing an openly democratic socialist presence in American communities and politics.”
For LGBTQ Americans, the organization has long supported expansive nondiscrimination protections, marriage equality, transgender rights, and broader legal protections through a platform first adopted in 2017. Its LGBTQ policy calls for federal legislation prohibiting discrimination, expanded access to gender-affirming healthcare, reproductive freedom, and opposition to laws targeting LGBTQ people.
The movement’s biggest victories came in New York.
Just months after the election of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist, candidates backed by the DSA and allied progressive organizations swept Democratic primary elections that many political observers viewed as a referendum on the party’s ideological direction.
Among the most notable victories were Brad Lander’s defeat of incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman in New York’s 10th Congressional District, Claire Valdez’s victory over Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso in the 7th District, and Darializa Avila Chevalier’s upset of five-term incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat in New York’s 13th Congressional District.
Overall, nine of the 10 New York City candidates backed by the DSA won their Democratic primaries, further cementing the organization’s growing influence in the nation’s largest city and demonstrating that democratic socialist candidates can compete beyond isolated local races.
Outside New York, the trend continued.
In Colorado, Melat Kiros defeated 15-term incumbent Rep. Diana DeGette in one of the cycle’s biggest primary upsets. Kiros campaigned without accepting corporate PAC contributions and criticized DeGette’s fundraising practices and foreign policy positions, presenting herself as an alternative to the Democratic establishment.
While socialist movements have existed in the United States for more than a century, democratic socialism remained largely on the political margins for decades. That began to change following Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaigns in 2016 and 2020, which introduced millions of Americans to democratic socialist ideas and energized a younger generation of progressive activists.
Although Sanders never won the Democratic nomination, his campaigns helped reshape the party’s left flank by elevating issues such as universal healthcare, tuition-free public college, stronger labor protections, and economic inequality into the mainstream Democratic conversation.
Today, the movement’s most recognizable elected officials include Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and several members of the congressional “Squad,” who have helped normalize the democratic socialist label among younger Democratic voters and increasingly challenged party leadership from the left.
For LGBTQ voters, democratic socialist candidates have frequently positioned themselves among the Democratic Party’s strongest advocates for transgender rights, particularly as the Trump administration has sought to restrict access to gender-affirming healthcare, military service, and other legal protections for transgender Americans.
The next major test for the movement may come in the Midwest.
In Michigan, progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed is locked in a closely watched Democratic Senate primary, while in Wisconsin, DSA-backed Francesca Hong is seeking her party’s nomination for governor. The outcomes of those races could offer another measure of whether democratic socialism’s recent gains represent a lasting realignment within the Democratic Party or are concentrated primarily in deep-blue urban districts.
Politics
In Trump’s divided America, Michael Weinstein’s AHF responds
PART 1 | Group helps Venezuela, president on Democratic Socialists, Fla. march
As the United States of America acknowledges her 250th birthday, too many Americans are partying with fewer family and friends because their wallets and their patriotic hearts just aren’t in it. Meanwhile, the president is using taxpayer dollars to finance ugly pet projects, and a war of choice with Iran that no one wants, and Congress didn’t authorize, while We the People just watch an uncontrolled Trump train speeding through American lives.
Theoretically, this is nothing new. Since the nation’s founding in 1776, individuals have struggled with where to place their allegiance to best uphold their personal freedom and protect the collective unity of the country.
But now the simple democracy-project premise “of the people, by the people, and for the people” has been upended and subverted by Donald Trump, the amoral corrupt 47th president who is using the once independent Justice Department to bypass “due process” and pursue retribution against his enemies — especially around his baseless 2020 election claims — while rewarding his Jan. 6 army of criminal loyalists with pardons and a proposed $1.8 billion “anti-Weaponization” slush fund, now temporarily blocked by a federal judge.
There have been amoral and ineffectual presidents in the past, as well as arrogant presidents who wielded power inhumanely, such as Andrew Jackson, who defied the Supreme Court and oversaw the Indian Removal Act, and Rutherford B. Hayes, who pulled troops out of the South, effectively ending the post-Civil War Reconstruction era. And there have been dangerous, outright liars like Richard Nixon, Lyndon Johnson, and Warren G. Harding, whose Teapot Dome Scandal in his administration may have killed him.
But American history has never seen such a profoundly corrupt con artist who has taken over the federal government, installing ideological autocratic loyalists intent on expanding Trump’s power in the Supreme Court and Congress — the second and third branches of government intended to provide checks and balances to an overreaching Executive.
And now, in allegiance to White Supremacy and Christian Nationalism, Trump is trying to claim the right and power to decide who gets to claim citizenship, how he can pre-determine the outcome of elections through gaslighting and disinformation, and how he can make American residents afraid and silently complicit by not challenging his blatant racism, sexism, and transphobia.
New York Times columnist M. Gessen writes: “Read the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on transgender athletes — the majority’s decision, written by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and the dissent, written by Justice Sonia Sotomayor — and you will see the members of the court arguing about something more fundamental than the law. They are arguing about who should be seen, whose story ought to be heard, and who deserves to be protected.”
AIDS Healthcare Foundation co-founder and President Michael Weinstein might add that deciding who lives and dies is fundamental, too. The nonprofit is the world’s largest provider of HIV medical care, cutting-edge medicine, and advocacy regardless of ability to pay with 3 million in care and 50 countries served.
AHF has a history of acting quickly with coalitions when there is a need. For that, Weinstein was honored by the Los Angeles Urban League on June 24 with the John W. Mack Legacy Award during the annual Whitney M. Young Jr. Awards Celebration.
“The Los Angeles Urban League is proud to present the John W. Mack Legacy Award to Michael Weinstein — transformative leader, fearless advocate, and champion for health equity and human rights,” they wrote in their announcement on Facebook.
“As founder and president of AIDS Healthcare Foundation, Michael Weinstein has led one of the largest global HIV/AIDS medical care providers in the world, expanding access to treatment, housing, prevention, and advocacy for underserved communities. His bold leadership has saved lives while challenging stigma and systemic inequities in healthcare,” they continued.
“For decades, he has stood at the intersection of public health and social justice — building systems of care that affirm dignity, expand access, and ensure that the most vulnerable are not left behind. His unwavering advocacy reflects the very principles that guide the Los Angeles Urban League’s mission: advancing equity, protecting opportunity, and strengthening communities,” they said. “In many ways, his work echoes the legacy of Whitney M. Young Jr. — courageous leadership rooted in policy, partnership, and a belief that justice must be both spoken and enacted.”
Interestingly, on June 24, the night the Urban League celebrated Weinstein as “a leader whose impact continues to shape a more just and compassionate future,” two consecutive 7.2 and 7.5 magnitude earthquakes struck northern Venezuela, killing and injuring thousands.
Interim President Delcy Rodríguez later called the earthquakes the “most brutal natural catastrophe” in Venezuela’s history.
In a horrific twist of fate, the BBC reported that ICE had deported more than 140 Venezuelans back to their home country on June 24, where they were housed in a hotel near the coast. The massive quakes struck there hours later, killing at least 2,200 people, injuring more than 10,000, and, according to UN figures, leaving 50,000 missing.
On July 2, the Venezuelan government estimated that 2,295 people died in the earthquakes, with another 11,000 injured.
“However, that’s believed to be a vast undercount. Gianluca Rampolla del Tindaro, the United Nations’ humanitarian coordinator for Venezuela, said the organization was procuring 10,000 body bags. And U.N. emergency relief coordinator Tom Fletcher called an estimate of 50,000 missing people ‘terrifyingly plausible,’” PBS reported.
Remember when Trump said the U.S. will ‘run’ Venezuela after capturing Maduro in surprise military strike?
Meanwhile, the Associated Press reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested 10,000 people over a five-day period at the end of June — that’s roughly 2,000 arrests per day — continuing Trump’s mass deportations agenda. No news about where they might be sent.
But while Trump is wildly spinning about his Fourth of July plans, AHF is in Venezuela, actively helping those in desperate need.
“The number of fatalities continues to rise, and many shelters have been set up in public spaces to help those in need. Hospitals and morgues are working tirelessly beyond their capacity, demonstrating the community’s resilience. Fortunately, international rescue teams have arrived, offering much-needed assistance to recover those still trapped in the debris. Venezuela’s government response has been uncoordinated, poor, and delayed, influenced by political interests,” AIDS Healthcare Foundation Latin America Bureau Chief Patricia Campos wrote to Weinstein on June 29.
“Despite the communication challenges, our team from AHF Colombia has been communicating with 600 of the 1080 of our patients in care who live in Venezuela. We are continuing to search for the 480 others to be sure they are alive or to support them,” Campos concluded, noting that AHF´s Emergency Aid supplies arrived with 11/13 Foundation and distribution was underway.
In an hour-long Zoom interview, Weinstein talked about a number of issues, including his long association with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a self-described Socialist, and the New York races that just yielded three Democratic Socialist candidates (Part 1) and his long, successful fight against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s HIV/AIDS cuts (Part 2).
Check out the video interview here.
“Well, as a native New Yorker,” Weinstein says, “the election in New York is a clash between the corporate Democrats and, particularly, a younger generation, with the exception of Bernie. It’s an epic change, right? And I would say that younger people who powered this (New York Mayor) Mamdani, AOC (New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez), and the rest of the movement do not feel that they have a stake in the system the way it is, right? And so, they’re willing to look at more radical answers.
“And this really is similar to the 1930s, you know, whereby when [President Franklin D.] Roosevelt came to office, who was a blue blood, right? He basically said, ‘in order to save the system, we have to move in the direction of socialism.’ He may not have called it that, but that’s essentially what it was,” Weinstein says.
“I mean, the model for democratic socialism is essentially Scandinavian and Northern European countries, right? Which is, essentially, a capitalist system that has a strong safety net, or basically says, ‘we’re going to tax the rich heavily in order to maintain a minimum level of existence for everyone.’
“So that’s basically what Bernie is espousing, and what Mamdani and others are espousing. And I don’t take too seriously … the characterizations that Trump has of them being Communist, et cetera, et cetera.”
Weinstein, longtime Latina activist Dolores Huerta, and an expected crowd of thousands in an AHF-created coalition are participating in a We The People March for Freedom in Trump’s Florida backyard on July 3.
“At a time in our nation when healthcare is being rationed, and rents are outpacing wages, teachers are working second jobs, and rural hospitals are closing, we must continue to stand up for what’s right for all Americans. July 4, 2026, marks 250 years since the Declaration of Independence. The We the People March for Freedom is not just an event to celebrate this document or its declaration of independence, but the night before the fireworks, to remind America what and who it’s for,” stated Esteban Wood, AHF director of advocacy and legislative affairs and March for Freedom coordinator.
This is a cross-post from Ocamb’s LGBTQ+ Freedom Fighters Substack.
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