Washington Blade, Volume 56, Issue 28, July 11, 2025
‘I am not alone in this place’
Locals celebrate opening of LGBTQ center in Winchester,Va., PAGE 06
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Community Partners
Defying trends, new LGBTQ center opens in rural Winchester, Va.
‘It has taught me that I am not alone in this place’
By MICHAEL KEY
A new LGBTQ community center celebrated its grand opening on June 30 in Winchester, Va., defying recent trends amid a federal crackdown on DEI and LGBTQ funding.
The local HIV/AIDS service organization AIDS Response Effort, Inc. (ARE) worked with a team of volunteers to open the area’s first physical center.
ARE’s R.I.S.E. (Resources, Inclusion, Support and Empowerment) Center, located near the heart of Old Town Winchester on West Piccadilly Street, is more than a renovated bank building to the local LGBTQ community. The empty teller window on the side of the structure and converted vault inside give away the building’s past. But the volunteers, program participants, and well-wishers gathered at the ribbon-cutting ceremony tell the Blade that they are hopeful for a thriving future for the building — and the community.
The Washington Blade spoke with the executive director of ARE as well as the co-directors of ARE’s R.I.S.E. Center during a tour of the facility ahead of the opening.
Katy Vance, executive director of ARE told the Blade, “I started [at ARE] about five years ago and we were an AIDS service organization, we have been for about 35 years now. We started as a group of volunteers out at the hospital —with Valley Health, and we’ve grown into a program that provides HIV case management for folks living with HIV in the community.”
Vance explained that as community needs have changed for service organizations like ARE, it is has led to some soul-searching among advocates.
“We had this big meeting about, ‘who are we?,’ ‘who do we want to be?,’ ‘who do we want to be in a few years?,’” Vance recalls. “As things shift and change with HIV … we have a lot of folks that come into our office who are newly diagnosed. They will get connected to a medical case manager, they’ll get on medication, and they are undetectable within one to two months, which means they are untransmittable, which is amazing.”
“So, science and technology has come so far,” Vance continued. “And so, who are we when this tends to go in the direction of no longer being the major epidemic it has been for the last 30 years, right?”
“But, when I came in, we also had a general housing program for anyone in the community,” Vance said. “That was confusing for a lot of people who came into our doors trying to figure out who we were and what we are. We called it, our ‘identity crisis,’ essentially.
“Are we an HIV service organization? Are we a housing program?” Vance asked. “So we worked with our local Goodwill and the board got together and we decided to transition our housing program out and we realized we wanted to open an LGBTQ center.”
“We have had a little bit of pushback as to why an HIV agency is opening a center,” ARE’s R.I.S.E. Center Co-Director Matt Buracker said. “Obviously, HIV and LGBT identities have a long history and a lot of stigma, but we felt like it was kind of irresponsible to talk about one without talking about the other. And we’ve always been supporting the LGBT community, so we’re just expanding our services to encompass more.”
The center seeks to serve the LGBTQ community in a county that Donald Trump carried with more than 63% of the vote in the 2024 election. While ARE receives local and state grants for its operations, the LGBTQ center is currently funded by community donations and a founders’ campaign and is staffed with volunteers.
Vance tells the Blade that the Center met its initial fundraising goal of $50,000 very quickly. The building housing the center was renovated with a combination of grants, donations and volunteer work.
“I think our fundraising goals now are going to be more programmatic so that we can do the things that we want to do,” R.I.S.E. Center Co-Director Mary Bohacek said. “Because Matt and I are great at finding things to do for free. But there are other things that people are asking us to do, craft events or things that aren’t free to do. Eventually, we might need a license if we want to do movie screenings. So there is always going to be a fundraising need to fund the programming, but the building has been a huge success.”
“The support from the community has been overwhelming,” Buracker told the Blade. “We’ve had such a positive response from the community and it’s just it’s been so emotional to see that the need has been here and we are the one to finally do something about it.”
Vance interjected, “And of course, there are community members that aren’t a fan that are ‘keyboard warriors’ that are coming out saying stuff. What is amazing is: we had an article in the paper and they put it up on their Facebook page and people were making just terrible comments. But then, we got new volunteers from that. The community support has been, like Matt said, amazing and overwhelming.”
ARE’s R.I.S.E. Center is a member of CenterLink, a community of LGBTQ centers. Other LGBTQ community centers in the wider region include the Roanoke Diversity Center in Roanoke, Va, the Shenandoah LGBTQ Center in Staunton, Va., Diversity Richmond in Richmond, Va., NOVA Prism Center in McLean, Va., the DC Center for the LGBT Community in Washington, D.C. and the Frederick Center in Frederick, Md. A new MoCo Pride Center is scheduled to open in Bethesda, Md. in August.
While the physical building opened to the public on June 30, the R.I.S.E. Center in Winchester has held events for more than a year.
“We’ve had programming going on for almost two years now,” Bohacek told the Blade. “Our first event was a ‘Friendsgiving.’ There were so many people that showed up that we literally didn’t have enough space: we needed to knock down walls.”
The staff and volunteers at ARE and the nascent Center used that momentum to foster the growth of affinity groups, community groups and services.
Affinity groups are described as “not just support groups or social groups, but rather as something of a hybrid between the two.” As Bohacek says about the affinity groups, “if someone needs community or needs a place to talk about queer issues, they have a space to do that.”
Affinity groups hosted by the Center include a group for trans and gender non-conforming people, a group for the families of trans people, a polyamorous affinity group, an aro-ace group, a “Rainbow Connection” all-purpose group, and a“Gay-RP” affinity group for people 50 and older.
“We also have a young adult group, which is for ages 18-25, which is one of the more vulnerable sections of our community,” Bohacek said. “So we want to make sure that they have places to connect.”
As reported in the Blade, the youth advocacy organizations Hopelab and Born this Way Foundation recently issued a report that suggests LGBTQ youth (ages 15 to 24) living in rural communities face greater challenges than their suburban or urban peers in dealing with their sexual orientation or gender identity, though have significantly benefited from online resources.
“We also have some community-wide programming that allies are welcome attend,” Bohecek said. Programming includes a monthly game night, a volunteer night for the many Center volunteers, as well as the “stitch and bitch” group, who “sit, crochet, embroider and talk.”
“And Coffee and Coloring!” Bohecek exclaims. “That’s one of my favorites. We like to say it’s about — just sit down, relax, have a cup of coffee — but frankly it’s about community building.”
Bohacek proudly lists the many other services the center offers, including a transgender/gender-affirming closet, which is currently overflowing with donations of clothes.
MARY BOHACEK, KATY VANCE and MATT BURACKER (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
LGBTQ voters divided in Ward 8 special election
All four candidates on D.C. Council seat ballot are allies
By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com
Political observers, including LGBTQ activists, believe LGBTQ voters in Ward 8, like most if not all voters in the ward, are divided over which of the four candidates to support in the July 15 special election to fill the ward’s vacant D.C. Council seat.
Each of the four candidates, all of whom are Democrats, including ousted Ward 8 council member Trayon White, who is running to recapture his seat, have expressed support for LGBTQ related issues.
The special election was called earlier this year after the D.C. Council voted unanimously to expel White following his indictment and arrest by the FBI on a federal bribery charge in August 2024.
He has pleaded not guilty to the charge and under D.C. law he can legally run for and regain his council seat until the time he is convicted of the charge. His trial is scheduled to begin in January 2026.
The three candidates challenging White — Sheila Bunn, Mike Austin, and Salim Adofo — are longtime Ward 8 community advocates who have been involved in local government affairs for many years and, according to LGBTQ activists who know them, have been supportive of LGBTQ rights.
White also has a record of supporting LGBTQ issues while serving on the council since 2017. Following his indictment, he won re-election by a wide margin in the November 2024 general election against a lesser-known Republican opponent.
Political observers say White’s indictment on a bribery charge is likely to alienate some of his past supporters, but they say he remains popular in the ward, and with three candidates dividing the opposition vote he could win the election with less than 50 percent of the divided
vote count.
Two of the candidates, Bunn and Adofo, responded to a request by the Washington Blade sent to each of the four candidates asking for a statement summarizing their positions on LGBTQ related issues. In their respective statements Bunn and Adofo expressed strong support on a wide range of LGBTQ issues.
“In my nearly 30 years of public service, I have consistently supported the rights and worked to improve the quality of life for the LGBTQIA+ community,” Bunn said in her statement. She noted that much of her work on behalf of LGBTQ rights took place when she served as chief of staff for D.C. Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton and as a senior staff member for former D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray.
In his statement, Adofo said he advocated for a wide range of LGBTQ issues, including housing programs for homeless LGBTQ youth and supportive employment training programs for transgender residents.
“At the heart of our platform is a steadfast commitment to uplifting LGBTQ+ communities, ensuring that policy is shaped not just for them, but with them,” his statement says. Adofo’s positions in support of LGBTQ rights are also posted on his campaign website.
The Capital Stonewall Democrats, D.C.’s largest local LGBTQ political group, chose not to make an endorsement in the Ward 8 special election.
“We thought that this is best because this is a special election and in these unfamiliar times, we decided not to take a stand,” Howard Garrett, the group’s president, told the Blade.
Ward 8 gay Democratic activist Phil Pannell is supporting Adofo, he told the Blade, on grounds of Adofo’s
strong support on LGBTQ issues and Adofo’s role as the only candidate in the Ward 8 special election who supported Initiative 83, the ballot measure passed by D.C. voters in November 2024 calling for a ranked choice voting system and open D.C. primaries. A lawsuit challenging the initiative filed by the D.C. Democratic Party has delayed its implementation.
Another longtime Ward 8 gay Democratic activist, David Meadows, is supporting Bunn. Meadows cites Bunn’s support for LGBTQ rights and her positions on other issues he supports as his reason for backing her candidacy.
Continues at washingtonblade.com
Locals celebrate opening of LGBTQ center in Winchester
“We also have an amazing library of all kinds of identities and all kinds of ages for people to come and see,” Bohacek told the Blade. “This building is actually an old bank, so we put our books into the vault.”
The old bank, now vibrant community center, was filled to capacity for the official opening ceremony on a hot Monday afternoon in late June. People from across the Shenandoah Valley who had come to the ribbon-cutting event snacked on rainbow-colored cupcakes as they toured the renovated building.
“To be a gay man growing up in a small, rural area . . . we didn’t have anything like this,” Front Royal, Va. resident Ed McKee told the Blade. Though he lives in a town a few miles away, he works at a salon in Winchester and had come to see the new center opening.
“We didn’t have anything like this when I was growing up,” McKee said as he gestured toward the packed LGBTQ community center. “If we had, it would have made my life so much easier. I probably would have come out sooner — I didn’t come out until I was about 30 — because I would have felt the support, you know?”
“Especially now with everything that is going on in our country,” McKee continued.
“We need to show strength in numbers: come together. And the center is allowing for that to happen.”
McKee’s husband, Winchester business owner Paul Miller, agreed.
“I’m hoping that [the Center] can be a great way to connect with people who might not otherwise understand how they can come together,” Miller told the Blade. “And I’m hoping that, while I’m not sure that this is its mission, I’m hoping that it has a political effect in Virginia.”
Members of the community who came to witness the opening gathered outside of ARE’s R.I.S.E. center for the ribbon cutting. Speakers at the ceremony included the Center’s co-director Bohacek.
“Today, we’re celebrating the renovation of the building,” Bohacek began. “But, we’re also celebrating the rise of this community.”
“This community has taught me resilience and it has taught me friendship and it has taught me that I am not alone in this place,” Bohacek told the crowd. “There are people that care. And we are so proud to have a place where we can be ourselves, where anyone and everyone is welcome — and we mean it. So, with that said, let’s keep on rising!”
Members of the community gather on June 30 for the official opening of ARE’s R.I.S.E. Center in downtown Winchester, Va. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Former Ward 8 D.C. Council member TRAYON WHITE (Blade photo by Lou Chibbaro, Jr.)
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D.C. police seek public’s help in July 5 murder of trans woman
Relative disputes initial decision not to list case as hate crime
By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com
D.C. police are seeking help from the public in their investigation into the murder of a transgender woman who they say was shot to death at about 12:30 a.m. on Saturday, July 5, on the 2000 block of Benning Road, N.E.
But the police announcement of the fatal shooting and a police report obtained by the Washington Blade do not identify the victim, 28-year-old Daquane ‘Dream’ Johnson of Northeast D.C., as transgender. And the police report says the shooting is not currently listed as a suspected hate crime.
It was local transgender activists and one of Johnson’s family members, her aunt, who confirmed she was transgender and said information they obtained indicates the killing could have been a hate crime.
“On Saturday, July 5, at approximately 12:51 a.m., Sixth District officers were flagged down in the 2000 block of Benning Road, Northeast, for an unconscious female,” a July 5 D.C. police statement says. “Upon arrival, officers located an adult female victim suffering from gunshot wounds,” it says.
“D.C. Fire and EMS responded to the scene and transported the victim to a local hospital where after all lifesaving efforts failed and the victim was pronounced dead,” the statement says.
A separate police flyer with a photo of Johnson announces an award of $25,000 was being offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for the murder.
The flyer identifies D.C. police Homicide Detective Natasha Kennedy as being the lead investigator in the case and says anyone with information about the case should contact her at 202-380-6198.
Longtime D.C. transgender rights advocate Earline Budd told the Blade that one of the police investigators contacted her about the case and that she also spoke to Detective Kennedy. Budd said police confirmed to her that Johnson was a transgender woman.
One of Johnson’s family members, Vanna Terrell, who identified herself as Johnson’s aunt, told the Blade that Johnson used the first name of Dream
and had planned to legally adopt that name instead of Daquane but had not gotten around to doing so.
Terrell said she and other family members learned more about the incident when one of two teenage high school students who knew Johnson’s brother contacted a friend and told the friend that they recognized Johnson as they witnessed the shooting. Terrell said the friend then called her to tell her what the friend learned from the two witnesses.
According to Terrell, the witnesses reportedly saw three men approach Johnson as Johnson walked along Benning Road and one of them called Johnson a derogatory name, leading Terrell to believe the men recognized Johnson as a transgender woman.
Terrell said one of the witnesses told the friend, who spoke to Terrell, that the man who shot Johnson kept shooting her until all of the bullets were fired. Budd, who said she spoke to Terrell, who also told her what the witnesses reported, said she believed the multiple shots fired by the shooter was an “overkill” that appears to have been a hate crime. Terrell said she too believes the murder was a hate crime.
In response to an inquiry from the Blade, Officer Ebony Major, a D.C. police spokesperson, stated in an email, “At this point there is nothing in the investigation that indicates the offense was motivated by hate or bias.”
Terrell said a memorial gathering to honor Johnson’s life was scheduled to be held Saturday, July 12, at River Terrace Park, which is located at 500 36th St., N.E. not far from where the shooting occurred.
Gay GOP group hosts Ernst, 3 House members
— all of whom
oppose Equality Act
Log Cabin, congressional guest speakers mum on June 25 event
By LOU CHIBBARO JR.
| lchibbaro@washblade.com
U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and three women Republican members of the U.S. House appeared as guest speakers at the June 25 meeting of Log Cabin Republicans of D.C., the local chapter of the national LGBTQ Republican group with that same name.
The U.S. House members who joined Ernst as guest speakers at the Log Cabin meeting were Celeste Maloy (R-Utah), Kat Cammack (R-Fla.), and Julia Letlow (R-La.).
Neither D.C. Log Cabin Republicans President Andrew Minik nor spokespersons for Ernst or the three congresswomen immediately responded to a request by the Washington Blade for comment on the GOP lawmakers’ appearance at an LGBTQ GOP group’s meeting.
“Please join us for an inspiring evening as we celebrate and recognize the bold leadership and accomplishments of Republican women in Congress,” a D.C Log Cabin announcement sent to its members states.
“This month’s meeting will highlight the efforts of the Republican Women’s Caucus and explore key issues such as the Protection of Women and Girls In Sports Act and the broader fight to preserve women’s spaces in society,” the message says.
It was referring to legislation pending in Congress calling for banning transgender women from participating in women’s sports events.
According to media reports, Ernst and the three congresswomen have expressed opposition to the Equality Act, the longstanding bill pending in Congress calling for prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in the areas of employment, housing, and public accommodations.
The Log Cabin announcement says the meeting was scheduled to take place at the Royal Sands Social Club, which is a restaurant and bar at 26 N St., S.E. in the city’s Navy Yard area. D.C. Log Cabin member Stuart West, who attend -
ed the meeting, confirmed that Ernst and the three congresswomen showed up and spoke at the event.
“It was a good turnout,” he said. “I would definitely say probably 30 or 40 people attended.” West added, “Four women came to talk to a group of mostly gay men. That’s something you don’t see very often.”
DAQUANE ‘DREAM’ JOHNSON (Photo courtesy D.C. police)
Sen. JONI ERNST spoke to D.C.’s Log Cabin group. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)
Treasury Dept. has a gay secretary but LGBTQ staff are under siege Agency reverses course on inclusion under Bessent
By CHRISTOPHER KANE | ckane@washblade.com
A former Treasury Department employee who led the agency’s LGBTQ employee resource group says the removal of sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) from its discrimination complaint forms was merely a formalization of existing policy shifts that had already taken hold following the second inauguration of President Donald Trump and his appointment of Scott Bessent — who is gay — to lead the agency.
Christen Boas Hayes, who served on the policy team at Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) from 2020 until March of this year, told the Washington Blade during a phone interview last week that the agency had already stopped processing internal Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) complaints on the basis of anti-LGBTQ discrimination.
“So the way that the forms are changing is a procedural recognition of something that’s already happening,” said Hayes. “Internally, from speaking to two EEO staff members, the changes are already taking place from an EEO perspective on what kind of cases will be found to have the basis for a complaint.”
The move, they said, comes amid the deterioration of support structures for LGBTQ workers at the agency since the administration’s early rollout of anti-LGBTQ executive orders, which led to “a trickle down effect of how each agency implements those and on what timeline,” decisions “typically made by the assistant secretary of management’s office and then implemented by the appropriate offices.”
At the end of June, a group of U.S. House Democrats including several out LGBTQ members raised alarms after a Federal Register notice disclosed Treasury’s plans to revise its complaint procedures. Through the agency’s Office of Civil Rights and EEO, the agency would eliminate SOGI as protected categories on the forms used by employees to initiate claims of workplace discrimination.
But Hayes’s account reveals that the paperwork change followed months of internal practice, pursuant to a wave of layoffs targeting DEI personnel and a chilling effect on LGBTQ organizing, including through ERGs.
Hayes joined Treasury’s FinCEN in 2020 as the agency transitioned into the Biden-Harris administration, working primarily on cryptocurrency regulation and emerging technologies until they accepted a “deferred resignation”
offer, which was extended to civil servants this year amid drastic staffing cuts.
“It was two things,” Hayes said. “One was the fact that the policy work that I was very excited about doing was going to change in nature significantly. The second part was that the environment for LGBTQ staff members was increasingly negative after the release of the executive orders,” especially for trans and nonbinary or gender diverse employees.
“At the same time,” Hayes added, “having been on the job for four years, I also knew this year was the year that I would leave Treasury. I was a good candidate for [deferred resignation], because I was already planning on leaving, but the pressures that emerged following the change in administration really pushed me to accelerate that timeline.”
Hayes became involved with the Treasury LGBTQ ERG shortly after joining the agency in 2020, when they reached out to the group’s then-president — “who also recently took the deferred resignation.”
“She said that because of the pressure that ERGs had faced under the first Trump administration, the group was rebuilding, and I became the president of the group pretty quickly,” Hayes said. “Those pressures have increased in the second Trump administration.”
One of the previous ERG board members had left the agency after encountering what Hayes described as “explicitly transphobic” treatment from supervisors during his gender transition. “His supervisors denied him a promotion,” and, “importantly, he did not have faith in the EEO complaint process” to see the issues with discrimination resolved, Hayes said. “And so he decided to just leave, which was, of course, such a loss for Treasury and our Employee Resource Group and all of our employees at Treasury.”
The umbrella LGBTQ ERG that Hayes led included hundreds of members across the agency, they said, and was complemented by smaller ERGs at sub-agencies like the IRS and FinCEN — several of which, Hayes said, were explicitly told to cease operations under the new administration.
Hayes did not receive any formal directive to shutter Treasury’s ERG, but described an “implicit” messaging campaign meant to shut down the group’s activities without issuing anything in writing.
“The suggestion was to stop emailing about anything related to the employee resource group, to have meetings outside of work hours, to meet off of Treasury’s campus, and things like that,” they said. “So obviously that contributes to essentially not existing functionally. Because whereas we could have previously emailed our members comfortably to announce a happy hour or a training or something like that, now they have to text each other personally to gather, which essentially makes it a defunct group.”
Hayes said the dismantling of DEI staff began almost immediately after the executive orders. Employees whose position descriptions included the terms “diversity, equity, and inclusion” were “on the chopping block,” they said. “That may differ from more statutorily mandated positions in the OMWI office or the EEO office.”
With those staff gone, so went the infrastructure that enabled ERG programming and community-building. “The people that made our employee resource group events
possible were DEI staff that were fired. And so, it created an immediate chilling effect on our employee resource group, and it also, of course, put fear into a lot of our members’ hearts over whether or not we would be able to continue gathering as a community or supporting employees in a more practical way going forward. And it was just, really — it was really sad.”
Hayes described efforts to erase the ERGs from internal communication channels and databases. “They also took our information off internal websites so nobody could find us as lawyers went through the agency’s internal systems to scrub DEI language and programs,” they said.
Within a week, Hayes said, the administration had removed gender-neutral restrooms from Main Treasury, removed third-gender markers from internal databases and forms, and made it more difficult for employees with nonbinary IDs to access government buildings.
“[They] made it challenging for people with X gender markers on identification documents to access Treasury or the White House by not recognizing their gender marker on the TWAVES and WAVES forms.”
The changes have left many LGBTQ staff feeling vulnerable — not only because of diminished workplace inclusion, but due to concerns about job security amid the administration’s reductions in force (RIFs).
“Plenty of people are feeling very stressed, not only about retaining their jobs because of the layoffs and pending questions around RIFs, but then also wondering if they will be included in RIF lists because they’re being penalized somehow for being out at work,” Hayes said. “People wonder if their name will be given, not because they’re in a tranche of billets being laid off, but because of their gender identity or sexual orientation.”
In the absence of functional ERGs, Hayes said, LGBTQ employees have been cut off from even informal networks of support.
“Employees [are] feeling like it’s harder to find members of their own community because there’s no email anymore to ask when the next event is or to ask about navigating healthcare or other questions,” they said. “If there is no ERG to go to to ask for support for their specific issue, that contributes to isolation, which contributes to a worse work environment.”
Hayes said they had not interacted directly with Secretary Bessent, but they and others observed a shift from the previous administration. “It is stark to see that our first ‘out’ secretary did not host a Pride event this year,” they said. “For the last three years we’ve flown the rainbow Pride flag above Treasury during Pride. And it was such a celebration among staff and Secretary Yellen and the executive secretary’s office were super supportive.”
“Employees notice changes like that,” they added. “Things like the fact that the Secretary’s official bio says ‘spouse’ instead of ‘husband.’ It makes employees wonder if they too should be fearful of being their full selves at work.”
The Blade contacted the Treasury Department with a request for comment outlining Hayes’s allegations, including the removal of inclusive infrastructure, the discouragement of ERG activity, the pre-formalization of EEO policy changes, and the targeting of DEI personnel. As of publication, the agency has not responded.
U.S. Treasury Secretary SCOTT BESSENT (Blade photo by Michael Key)
Activist recalls experience in Tel Aviv after Israel-Iran war began
Marty Rouse was part of Pride mission
By MICHAEL K. LAVERS | mlavers@washblade.com
A long-time activist who was in Israel last month when its war with Iran began has returned to D.C.
Marty Rouse traveled to Israel on June 6 with the Jewish Federations of North America. The five-day mission ended the night before the annual Tel Aviv Pride parade was scheduled to take place.
Mission participants met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and several LGBTQ activists in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. They visited the Western Wall, the Nova Music Festival site, and Nir Oz, a kibbutz in southern Israel that is less than a mile from the country’s border with the Gaza Strip. Mission participants also visited Sderot, a city that is roughly a mile from the Hamas-controlled enclave, a veterans rehabilitation facility, a new LGBTQ health center and the Aguda: The Association for LGBTQ Equality in Israel in Tel Aviv.
Hamas militants on Oct. 7, 2023, killed upwards of 360 partygoers and kidnapped dozens more at the music festival that was taking place at a campground near Re’im, a kibbutz that is roughly 10 miles southwest of Nir Oz. The militants killed or took hostage nearly a quarter of Nir Oz’s residents. They also took control of Sderot’s police station.
Tel Aviv Deputy Mayor Chen Arieli spoke at the mission’s closing party that took place at the Sheraton Grand, a hotel that overlooks Tel Aviv’s beachfront, on June 12.
Rouse and other mission participants planned to stay in Tel Aviv for the Pride parade, which was scheduled to take place the following day. He and Gordie Nathan, another mission participant who lives in Palm Springs, Calif., had checked into a nearby hotel that was less expensive.
“We said our farewells,” recalled Rouse when he spoke with the Washington Blade in D.C. on June 24. “We went to our hotels, and we get the warning, and then all hell broke loose.”
Israel early on June 13 launched airstrikes against Iran that targeted the country’s nuclear and military facilities.
Rouse said mission organizers told him and other participants who remained in Tel Aviv to meet at the Sheraton Grand for breakfast and dinner — Israel’s airspace was closed in anticipation of an Iranian counterattack, and authorities cancelled the Pride parade.
He said he went to bomb shelters at least twice a night for three nights.
Israel’s Home Front Command during the war typically issued warnings about 10 minutes ahead of an anticipated Iranian missile attack. Sirens then sounded 90 seconds before an expected strike.
Rouse and Nathan walked to the Sheraton Grand on June 13 when the Home Front Command issued a 10-minute warning. They reached the hotel in a couple of minutes, and staff directed them to the bomb shelter.
“You know to walk slowly, everything’s fine,” recalled Rouse. “You get 10 minutes, so everything was fine when the alarm goes off.”
Rouse described the Sheraton Grand shelter as “well lit” with WiFi, a television, and air conditioning. He was watching an Israeli television station’s live coverage of the Iranian missile attack when he saw one hit an apartment building in the Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Gan.
A 74-year-old woman died and her boyfriend was seriously injured.
“I go over to look at the TV, just to watch,” recalled
Rouse. “All of a sudden, you watch, and you see one bomb go and land and explode in Tel Aviv on TV. It landed and blew up.”
“I was like, okay, this is real, and so that was scary,” he added.
Rouse said the bomb shelter in the hotel where he and Nathan were staying after the mission ended was far less comfortable.
“It was dark. It was humid. It was hot. It was very uncomfortable,” said Rouse. “You really felt alone.”
Rouse and nearly everyone else on the mission who were in Tel Aviv when the war began left Israel on June 15. They boarded buses that took them to the Jordanian capital of Amman, which is a roughly 2 1/2-hour drive from Tel Aviv through the West Bank.
Rouse described the trip as “like a field trip” until they drove across the Jordan River and arrived at the Jordanian border crossing.
“You walk into this room, and instead of being in a well air-conditioned airport, you’re in this hot, humid, small place in the middle of the desert, packed with people, and those big, large, loud fans and pictures of military people on the walls,” he said. “It was almost like a Casablanca kind of feeling.”
Rouse said Jordanian authorities brought mission participants through customs in groups of 10. A Jewish Federations of North America liaison from Amman who previously worked as a tour guide for A Wider Bridge — a group that “advocates for justice, counters LGBTQphobia, and fights antisemitism and other forms of hatred” — went “behind closed doors” to ensure everyone was able to enter the country.
“It took a really long time,” Rouse told the Blade.
Mission participants arrived in Amman a short time later. They checked into their hotel and then had dinner at a restaurant.
“Now we feel like we’re safe and we’re in Amman,” recalled Rouse. “We’re sitting outside having a beautiful dinner.”
Iranian missiles passed over Amman shortly after Rouse and the other mission participants had begun to eat their dessert. They went inside the restaurant, and waited a few
minutes before they boarded busses that brought them back to their hotel.
“No one was openly freaking out, which I was surprised by,” said Rouse.
The group was scheduled to fly from Amman to Cairo at 11 p.m. local time (4 p.m. ET) on June 16. They visited Jerash, an ancient city north of Amman, before their flight left Jordan.
“[The Jerash trip] actually took our minds off of everything,” said Rouse.
A Jewish Federations of North America contact met Rouse and the other mission participants at Cairo’s airport once their flight landed. Rouse arrived at JFK Airport in New York on June 17.
President Donald Trump on June 23 announced a ceasefire that ended the 12-day war.
The U.S. three days earlier launched airstrikes that struck three Iranian nuclear sites. The ceasefire took effect hours after Iran launched missiles at a U.S. military base in Qatar.
Iran said the war killed more than 900 people in the country.
The Associated Press notes Iranian missiles killed 28 people in Israel. One of them destroyed Tel Aviv’s last gay bar on June 16.
The war took place less than two years after Oct. 7.
The Israeli government says Hamas militants on Oct. 7, 2023, killed roughly 1,200 people on that day when it launched its surprise attack on the country. The militants also kidnapped more than 200 people.
The Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry says Israeli forces have killed nearly 55,000 people in the enclave since Oct. 7. Karim Khan, the International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor, has said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who the IDF killed last October, are among those who have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza and Israel.
Rouse upon his return to the U.S. said he “was never as aware of the comfort of another human being than I was during that time.” Rouse affectionately called Nathan his “bomb shelter boyfriend” and even questioned the way he reacted to the missile alerts.
“He’s sitting on the edge of the bed and he goes, okay, I’m going to put on my socks and my shoes, and I say, really? You’re going to put on your socks,” Rouse told the Blade. “The fact that I was nervous, that putting on socks might have changed the direction of our lives, to me was like I can’t believe I said that to him.”
Rouse quickly added Nathan helped him remain calm.
“If I was by myself, those nights would have been long enough,” said Rouse. “It’s a totally different feeling to be with another human that you know than to be by yourself.”
Rouse also praised the Jewish Federations of North America.
“JFNA really sprung into action and started to figure out all options to get us all safely home,” said Rouse. “It was all about logistics. Staff worked around the clock identifying and then mobilizing to get us back to the states. It was a great team effort and I know I speak for everyone in expressing our deep appreciation for their dedication to getting us safely home.”
MARTY ROUSE, second from left, at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. (Photo courtesy of Rouse)
JAMES BRIDGEFORTH
, Ph.D.,
is a national columnist on the intersection of politics, morality, and civil rights. His work regularly appears in The Chicago Defender and The Black Wall Street Times.
What if doctors could deny you insulin for being gay?
The Supreme Court just made that legal for trans kids
Imagine walking into a pharmacy, prescription in hand, and being told, “Sorry, we don’t give that to people like you.” Now imagine the government says that’s perfectly fine—as long as it’s wrapped in words like “concern” or “safety.”
That’s not a dystopian movie plot. That’s United States v. Skrmetti.
On June 18, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s SB1, a state law that bans gender-affirming care for minors. Puberty blockers. Hormone therapy. All of it. Not because the treatments are dangerous (they’re not), or untested (they’re not), but because the kids receiving them are transgender.
Let’s be clear: this isn’t regulation. It’s targeted denial. And it just got the Supreme Court’s stamp of approval.
Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, said SB1 doesn’t discriminate. He argued the law merely regulates treatment based on “age and purpose.” That’s a little like banning seatbelts—but only for gay people—and claiming it’s about “safety.” Here’s the truth: SB1 bans hormone therapy only when it’s used for gender transition. Those same drugs are still allowed for other conditions. That’s not neutral. That’s surgical discrimination, written into law.
Even Tennessee’s legal team admitted it: the law “only affects those who seek to transition.” That’s not an accidental loophole. That’s the entire point.
Even worse, the Court ducked the bigger question: Do transgender Americans qualify as a “suspect class” under the Constitution—meaning they deserve stronger protections against discrimination?
Historically, groups with a long track record of discrimination, limited political power, and immutable traits (like race or religion) have gotten this status. Trans people check every box. Yet the Court said nothing.
That silence wasn’t a technicality. It was a political decision. A willful refusal to say: “You matter. You count. You’re protected here.”
Let’s drop the pretense. This isn’t about medicine or morality. Gender-affirming care is backed by every major U.S. medical association—from the American Academy of Pediatrics to the AMA. It’s safe. It’s effective. And it saves lives.
But these laws don’t ban puberty blockers across the board. They just ban them
for trans kids.
That’s not policy—it’s punishment.
We wouldn’t tolerate a law that banned mammograms for women, or insulin for diabetics, only if they’re queer. But that’s exactly what this is: identity-based medical apartheid.
Supporters claim it’s about protecting children. But you don’t protect kids by denying them care recommended by doctors and supported by science. You do that to control who they’re allowed to become.
Here’s the part that should make us all pause: Most Americans don’t agree with this decision. A recent Pew poll found that 64% of Americans support protections for transgender people. Nearly 60% support access to gender-affirming care. Among young adults, those numbers are even higher.
This isn’t a red state vs. blue state issue. It’s a basic civil rights question in the 21st century. The people are not divided. But our institutions—the courts, the legislatures—are lagging behind. Or worse, being weaponized.
This ruling leaves trans youth legally exposed and politically abandoned. But that doesn’t mean we’re powerless.
Here’s what must happen now:
· State legislatures must pass ironclad non-discrimination laws that protect transgender youth where federal protections now fall short.
· Congress must pass the Equality Act—in full—and enshrine civil rights protections for LGBTQ+ Americans nationwide.
· The media must stop framing this as just another “culture war.” This isn’t about ideology. It’s about constitutional rights— access to care, bodily autonomy, and equal protection under the law.
· And we the people must act. Vote. Call your lawmakers. Tell your stories. Make it clear that civil rights don’t depend on your zip code, political party, or gender identity. This moment is more than a court ruling. It’s a moral test for a country that claims to believe in liberty and justice for all.
You don’t have to be trans to be alarmed. If the state can deny medical care to one group based on identity, what’s to stop them from doing it to you? Your kid? Your neighbor?
History will remember where we stood. Let it remember this: we stood with trans kids and their parents. Loudly. Unapologetically. And without retreat.
OLNEY THEATRE CENTER PRESENTS THE SYNETIC THEATER PRODUCTION OF
A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
JULY 17–AUGUST 10
ROBERTS MAINSTAGE
OlneyTheatre.org
CHLOE SCHWENKE
is a professor at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy.
USAID’s demise: America’s global betrayal of trust Trump dismantled agency, undermining LGBTQ people everywhere
The U.S. Agency for International Development — proudly my institutional home for several years of my international development career and an American institutional global fixture since November 1961 — is no more.
How will USAID’s closure impact LGBTQI+ people around the world, especially in poor, struggling countries (“the Global South”)? Time will tell, but “dire,” “appalling,” and “shameful” are appropriate adjectives, given the massive increase in HIV/AIDS deaths that follow the callous, abrupt, and unspeakably cruel cut-off of funding for USAID’s health and humanitarian programming in HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, and care.
Regarding LGBTQI+ people and issues, USAID worked in a tough neighborhood. In Africa alone, more than 30 countries in which USAID had programming still criminalize same-sex relationships, often to the point of imposing the death penalty. These fiercely anti-LGBTQI+ countries share harsh anti-LGBTQI+ punishments with most countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Other countries where USAID formerly worked retain colonial-era sodomy laws.
Where did USAID fit into all this turbulence? The agency was not allowed to transgress local laws, so how could it support the human rights of local LGBTQI+ people? USAID did so by building close and trusting relationships with local LGBTQI+ civil society, and by “superpower advocacy” for the universal human rights of all people, including those of us in the queer community.
I served at USAID’s Africa Bureau under the Obama administration, becoming the only openly transgender political appointee in USAID’s history. In that role, I was privileged to have a platform that caught the astounded attention of both queer people and of anti-LGBTQI+ governments around the world. If the president of the United States can elevate a transgender woman to such a senior position within the U.S. government, that open declaration of acceptance, inclusion, worth, and recognition set a precedent that many in the LGBTQI+ community worldwide hoped their countries would emulate.
Serving as an openly queer person at USAID also afforded me the opportunity to meet with many fiercely anti-LGBTQI+ senior politicians and government officials from African countries who sought USAID funding. Uganda’s first woman speaker of the parliament, Rebecca Alitwala Kadaga and her whole delegation came to see me at USAID in Washington about such funding. I had some very frank (and USAID-approved) “talking points” to share with her and her team about President Obama’s strong and secular commitment to equal human rights for all people. My tense meeting with her was also an opportunity to educate her as to the nature of the transgender, nonbinary, and intersex community — we who are simply classified and discriminated against as “gay” people in Uganda and in most countries in the Global South. I also had the chance to represent USAID in the “inter-agency” LGBTQI+ human rights task team led by gay U.S. Ambassador David Pressman, whose effective leadership of that Obama-era initiative was inspirational.
Working closely with professional, capable, and caring USAID career employees such as Ajit Joshi and Anthony Cotton, and with the strong and open support of the USAID Deputy Administrator Don Steinberg, I helped to craft and promote USAID’s very first LGBTQI+ policy. Under President Obama, USAID also created the LGBT Global Development Partnership, a public-private partnership supporting LGBTQI+ civil society groups throughout the Global South. USAID funding also increased for programs promoting LGBTQI+ inclusion, anti-violence, and relevant human rights protections. This programming expanded further (albeit never adequately funded) during the Biden administration under the able leadership of USAID Senior LGBTQI+ Coordinator Jay Gilliam and his team.
So what did it all mean? Has USAID left a footprint for the global LGBTQI+ community? Will its absence matter?
In my view, that answer is an emphatic yes. International development and humanitarian response go to the heart of recognizing, respecting, and caring about universal human dignity. USAID converted those ethical commitments into tangible and meaningful action, again and again, and modelled for the world what it means to truly include all persons.
My time serving at USAID was a high point of my career, being surrounded by the best of American civil servants and foreign service officers. For me, “USAID Forever” remains my battle cry. Let’s start thinking of how we will rebuild it, beginning in three years.
PETER ROSENSTEIN
is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist. He writes regularly for the Blade.
Democrats need to stop the self-immolation
Republicans are the enemy of the people
The felon in the White House, who has lied his way to victory, has now signed his ‘big disgusting bill’ into law. He has managed to get members of Congress to agree to screw their own constituents, and vote for this abomination of a bill.
Republican members of Congress who have said it will be a disaster in their states. Who have said it will force the closure of rural hospitals, and throw seniors out of nursing homes, in their states, because they will lose their Medicaid. Who have said they oppose the bill because it will add $3.3 trillion to the deficit, which young people will suffer for in years to come. They have said they oppose it because it pretends to help those earning tips and overtime, but close reading of the fine print shows it does practically nothing for them. But because their lips are firmly attached to Trump’s ass, they voted for it anyway. It is the biggest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in the country’s history. Now if that doesn’t give decent people the incentive they need to fight, to take back their country, nothing will. And when I say fight, I mean with their votes.
To win, Democrats need to stop the self-immolation. Democrats are doing fine across the nation. Winning many special elections for state legislatures and the judiciary. Even when they don’t win, the margins in solid Republican districts are way down. Democrats will win governorships in New Jersey and Virginia this year. So instead of Democrats constantly talking about how bad the polls are for the party, and trashing each other, they need to focus on what it will take to win back Congress in 2026. The best way to start is to trash Republicans. I am concerned about groups like David Hogg’s PAC, and figures like Sen. Bernie Sanders, supporting candidates against sitting Democrats. Spending money and time on primaries against sitting democrats, even old ones, may not be the way to go this cycle. We need one focus — taking back Congress in 2026. That means laser like focus on which seats are winnable; open seats, and Republican seats, in both the House and Senate. Doing this is the only way we can stop the felon in the White House, and his MAGA sycophants in Congress, from doing more damage in his final two years as president. Time to face reality, that is really all that can be done for now.
If Democrats take back the House, they can stop the budget machinations Trump is trying to get done. If Democrats take the Senate, they can stop the felon from getting any more MAGA judges, or disgusting unqualified executive branch nominees, confirmed. Again, that has to be the singular focus for 2026 for anyone serious about stopping Trump. I, too, want younger members of Congress. I would urge older Democrats, those in safe districts, to voluntarily step aside. But spending millions to primary them, when in most cases history shows they will win anyway, seems counterproductive at this time. Choose the best candi -
dates in primaries for open and Republican seats — those with the best chance of winning in the general election. I have given my support at this time to Zach Wahls, running to unseat Sen. Joni Ernst in Iowa.
Democrats must remember that most of the voters in the nation are moderate and concerned with kitchen table issues. So, while there are districts far left candidates can win, like Mamdani who just won the mayoral primary in New York City, we have seen such candidates lose in most of the country. There are takeaways from Mamdani’s win in New York for every candidate, other than everyone likes things for free. I recommend candidates look at the brilliant way he used social media. That is something Democrats around the country need to learn. People, especially young people, get their news that way these days. Then Democrats must accept the midterm elections are really local elections. They will be about what the local Democratic candidate campaigns on, and the contrast to what the Republican Party is doing for, or in most cases to, the voters in that particular district.
If Democrats do anything nationally it should be to flood the airwaves with the negatives of Trump’s bill. If done right Democrats will win. Then stop trashing Democrats who don’t agree with you on every issue. Again, stop listening to the likes of Bernie Sanders, who tells people if they don’t like everything about a Democrat, they can vote for an independent. History tells us that only helps Republicans. Understand the most important vote any legislator makes is their first one. It determines who will control the legislature. Who will be Speaker of the House, and Majority Leader in the Senate, and most state legislatures. If the vote is for the Democratic leadership, then Democrats control the agenda, and committees. That is how to make a real difference.
Stop listening to those who claim the Democratic Party is not clear on what it stands for. The Democratic platform has been clear for years. Democrats support equality, unions, working people, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. They support the right of women to control their bodies; support equality for the LGBTQ community. Democrats are for a fair immigration policy; doing everything possible to fight climate change, and protect the environment; bringing down prices for groceries, gas, and rent. If Democrats take back control of committees, in both state legislatures, and Congress, they can once again begin to move forward on all those issues.
So, stop the self-immolation, and attack Republicans. They are the enemy of the people, not a Democrat who you may not agree with on every issue. Try to move forward as a united Democratic Party. If everyone understands and does that, Democrats will win in 2025 and 2026, and will stop the felon in the White House before he totally destroys our country.
Each episode of the 10-part series delves into a different piece of D.C.’s queer past—from landmark clubs to untold personal stories—told through the voices of drag legends, activists, DJs, historians, and patrons who lived it. The show also threads together personal experiences from today’s community, bringing the listener on an auditory journey from Prohibition-era speakeasies to contemporary nights out at places like As You Are or Saints & Sinners.
Abby Stuckrath, alongside her sibling Ellie Stuckrath, and producer Mads Reagan, make up the podcast’s creative team. A recent journalism graduate of American University, Abby told the Blade that her passion for queer storytelling began during college—and that D.C. itself played a defining role in shaping her queer identity.
Queering the District podcast reveals local LGBTQ history
Exploring our past from Prohibition to Pride
By JOE REBERKENNY | jreberkenny@washblade.com
On June 25, as Pride month inched toward its end, three queer creators launched an ambitious project to honor the spaces that built D.C.’s LGBTQ community—and connect them to today’s queer life. The first episode of their podcast, Queering the District, hit streaming platforms that day, aiming to spotlight what host and co-creator Abby Stuckrath calls “third places”: bars, clubs, and gathering spots that have served as hubs for queer life across the city.
the city until one Google search, and then I just kept learning more and more. I was kind of pissed because I studied gender studies in school in D.C. and didn’t learn shit about this.”
Season one focuses on the role of third places—non-work, non-home spaces where queer people could gather, exist fully, and build community.
“I went to American University. I graduated last year and studied journalism. When I was in school, I always wanted to focus on queer stories – especially in D.C., because I’m from Denver, Colorado, I’ve never lived in a place like this before. D.C. has always just kind of been a place I call home when it comes to my queer identity.”
But breaking into the media to tell those stories wasn’t easy. Stuckrath quickly learned that editorial support—and funding—for queer-focused projects is limited. So she decided to do it her own way.
“I kind of found out that if you want to tell stories, you kind of have to do it on your own– especially when it comes to queer stories. There’s not a lot of people begging for us to talk about queer people and to pay you for it. So I was like, ‘Okay, let’s just do it on my own.’”
The idea for the podcast first took root in conversations with Ellie, Abby’s sibling and biggest supporter. Ellie had also moved to D.C. to find more space to explore and express their queer and gender identities. Together, the two began shaping a vision that would combine storytelling, sound design, and grassroots community input.
“I was like, ‘I don’t know what exactly I want to do yet, but I want it to be queer, and I want it to be about D.C., and it’s going to be called Queering the District, and we’re going to find out what that means.’ And Ellie is my biggest supporter, and my best friend. And they were like, ‘Hell yeah. Like, let’s do this.’ And so we decided to just do it together.”
The name stuck—and so did the mission. The team began researching queer D.C. history and found a city overflowing with stories that had rarely been documented, especially in mainstream archives.
“We started looking up the history of queer culture in D.C., and it kind of just clicked from there,” Stuckrath said. “I did not know anything about how rich our history is in
“Third places have always been the epicenter of queer life… places outside of just your own personal home, because sometimes that isn’t a safe place. And of course, the work most commonly in the past and still today, isn’t a safe place for queer people to be full of themselves. So like, bars were the first place for queer people to really thrive and meet each other.”
To make the show participatory, Queering the District includes a twist: a voicemail line where anyone can call in and share a memory or question. The team calls the phone “Fifi”—a nod to the kind of retro guestbooks often used at weddings, but reimagined for queer nightlife and history.
“We wanted to find a way for people to share their stories with us anonymously… so even though we start in Prohibition, we wanted to connect it to now—like, those people who were singing jazz to each other in a white queer bar are connected to you singing karaoke on a Sunday night at your favorite gay bar. We’re all interconnected by this third place of queer bars in D.C.”
Those connections are emotional as well as historical. While building the series, one realization hit Stuckrath particularly hard: the immense loss of queer spaces in D.C., especially in neighborhoods that have since been heavily redeveloped.
“Every time I go to a Nats game, I think about, well, this just replaced five gay bars that used to be here. It used to be the home of Ziegfeld’s… Tracks, which was almost 2,000 square feet, with a volleyball court in the back, a fire pit, and iconic light show. I just didn’t know that we had that, and it made me sad for the queer elders that are in our city now who walk the streets and don’t see all those places they used to call home.”
That sense of loss—alongside the joy and resilience of queer community—is what the show aims to capture. As the podcast continues, Abby hopes it serves as both a celebration and an educational tool, especially for young LGBTQ people arriving in D.C. without realizing the queer foundations they’re walking on.
“D.C. is a unique city, and specifically young queer people who are hoping to move to the city—to know that you’ve got to know your history to be here. I hope this serves as an easier way for you to consume and learn about queer history, because queer history defines how we move in life.”
And for all the voices still left out, Abby is clear: this podcast is an open door, not a final word.
“This is a perfectly imperfect podcast. We should just be a starting point. We shouldn’t be the ending point.”
New episodes of Queering the District drop every Wednesday on all major platforms.
From left, ELLIE STUCKRATH and ABBY STUCKRATH (Photo courtesy of Queering the District Podcast)
BETSY TWIGG
Associate Broker | Licensed in Virginia 703.967.4391 (CELL ) betsy.twigg@corcoranmce.com
“Center Aging Friday tea Time” will be at 2 p.m. in person at the DC Center for the LGBT Community’s new location at 1827 Wiltberger St., N.W. This is a social hour for older LGBTQ+ adults. Guests are encouraged to bring a beverage of choice. For more details, email adam@thedccenter.org.
Women in Their Twenties and Thirties will be at 8 p.m. on Zoom. This is a social discussion group for queer women in the Washington, D.C. area and a great way to make new friends and meet other queer women in a fun and friendly setting. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website.
GoGayDC will host “LGBTQ+ Happy Hour” at 7 p.m. at Firefly. This event is ideal for making new friends, professional networking, idea-sharing, and community building. This event is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
Saturday, July 12
GoGay DC will host “Family Fun Story Time” at 12 p.m. at Freddie’s Beach Bar & Restaurant. Join award-winning drag queen Tara Hoot for songs, stories, bubbles, puppets and dancing. It’s the feel-good event you didn’t know you needed. This event is perfect for kids and kids at heart. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
Miss Capital Pride will host “DC Drag brunch on Rooftop - Penthouse” at 12 p.m. at MXDC Cocina Mexicana. Guests will experience a Mexican brunch infused with Baby Shank’s signature dishes, complemented by delicious margaritas and mimosas, all within the beautiful and spacious atmosphere of MXDC. There will also be outstanding performances by glamorous drag queens and celebrated celebrity impersonators, featuring Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Nicki Minaj, Ariana Grande, Whitney Houston, Cher, and many more. Tickets cost $30.65 and are available on Eventbrite.
Sunday, July 13
The National Portrait Gallery will host “Stormé at Stonewall” at 1:30 p.m. This is a gallery talk with LJ Roberts and Charlotte Ickes. This exhibition is a light-box portrait of activist Stormé DeLarverie, who is said to have thrown the first brick at Stonewall—the uprising credited with launching the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement in 1969. Roberts created this unconventional portrait in response to DeLarverie’s absence in mainstream narratives about the history of the Stonewall rebellion. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
Monday,
July 14
“Center Aging Monday Coffee Klatch” will be at 10 a.m. on Zoom. This is a social hour for older LGBTQ+ adults. Guests are encouraged to bring a beverage of choice. For more details, email adam@thedccenter.org.
Genderqueer DC will be at 7 p.m. in person at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. This is a support group for people who identify outside of the gender binary, whether you’re bigender, agender, genderfluid, or just know that you’re not 100% cis. For more details, visit www.genderqueerdc.org or Facebook.
Tuesday, July 15
Center Bi+ Roundtable will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is an opportunity for people to gather in order to discuss issues related to bisexuality or as bi individuals in a private setting.Visit Facebook or Meetup for more information.
OUT & ABOUT
Help preserve Black LGBTQ history
The Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs will host “Black LGBTQ+ History Preservation Committee Public Meeting” on Wednesday, July 16 at 6 p.m. at 899 North Capitol St., N.E.
Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs and the Black LGBTQ+ History Preservation Committee will discuss their upcoming grant project. Attendees will have the opportunity to ask questions and network with committee members. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
GoGay DC will host ‘Family Fun Story Time’ at 12 p.m. Saturday at Freddie’s Beach Bar & Restaurant with TARA HOOT
Wednesday, July 16
Job Club will be at 6 p.m. on Zoom. This is a weekly job support program to help job entrants and seekers, including the long-term unemployed, improve self-confidence, motivation, resilience and productivity for effective job searches and networking — allowing participants to move away from being merely “applicants” toward being “candidates.” For more information, email centercareers@thedccenter.org or visit www.thedccenter.org/careers.
Thursday, July 17
The DC Center’s Fresh Produce Program will be held all day at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. People will be informed on Wednesday at 5 p.m. if they are picked to receive a produce box. No proof of residency or income is required. For more information, email supportdesk@thedccenter.org or call 202-682-2245.
Virtual Yoga with Charles M. will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is a free weekly class focusing on yoga, breath work, and meditation. For more details, visit the DC Center for the LGBT Community’s website.
Lit Lovers: Book Club for Seniors will be at 2 p.m. on Zoom. The book selection for July is “Rubyfruit Jungle” by Rita Mae Brown. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website.
Poly Discussion Group will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is an inclusive, welcoming, virtual safer space to talk about all things polyamorous — the rapturous, the confused, the pure YIKES, we want to hear them all. For more details, email supportdesk@thedccenter.org.
(Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
1112 Neal Dr, Alexandria, VA 22308 | Open Sun 2-4
Revised value for this gem $1,250,000! Prepare to be impressed by this magnificent renovation in the highly sought-after Waynewood School District! This home offers incredible flexibility with five bedrooms, perfect for a growing family or those needing dedicated office spaces. Every inch of this residence has been updated with high-end, custom finishes. NEW plumbing, electrical, sewer, roof, windows, doors, HVAC, HWH, Flooring, kitchen, bathrooms and floor plan- it’s like moving into a brand new house with the charm of a mid century! Step inside the bright and airy twostory foyer, and just a few steps up will lead you to the heart of the home. Here, you’ll find a spectacular open kitchen featuring an enormous waterfall island, ideal for entertaining. The kitchen seamlessly flows into the dining area and living room, creating a wonderful open floor plan. The main level also includes a luxurious primary suite, two additional bedrooms, and another full bathroom. The lower level offers even more living space with two more bedrooms or offices, a full bathroom, a comfortable family room, and a laundry area, complete with a striking stacked stone, woodburning fireplace. Outside, the large, flat lot features a convenient two-car garage and a spacious deck- it’s all been done with elegance and comfort in mind!
Exciting lineup on tap for theater festival in Shepherdstown, W.Va.
Queer artists play prominent roles in various productions
By PATRICK FOLLIARD
As a queer Latino freelance costume designer, Christopher Vergara’s work has taken him from Broadway to a multitude of regional outposts and companies worldwide. Over the last decade, he’s lent his prodigious talents to theater, opera, TV, and film, and beyond.
Currently the native New Yorker is costuming playwright Mark St. Germain’s new two-hander “Magdalene,” now making its world premiere at the annual Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF) at Shepherd University in historic, queer-friendly Shepherdstown, W.Va. (just a 90-minute drive from D.C.).
“Magdalene” is the story of Peter reconnecting with the banished Mary Magdalene and discussing their widely divergent memories of Christ. At 90 minutes without costume changes, it may not sound like a big job, but Vergara applies his usual meticulous consideration.
“It’s not the Bible pageant you might see at church,” he says. As a costume designer, Vergara approaches all new works by delving deep into the script with collaborators.
“I like to do what I call a visual dramaturgy, to read the script and take it in aiming to arrive at a sort of truth, not necessarily historically accurate.
“Without being period, I get to what their world was like in some way. And because the play’s conversation is contemporary, I’m inspired by both old and new lines and fabrics. It’s speaking to us now but set in a different time.”
Born and raised in New York, Vergara learned to sew at the side of his Panamanian grandmother. “Growing up I was enthralled. She had an amazing Singer machine that could sew through steel. But it was always a covert thing. Boys shouldn’t be sewing.”
He put his skills to use at Valparaiso University in Indiana where while majoring in music he found a well-paying and flexible job in the costume shop. After graduation he returned to New York and entered a Juilliard apprentice program concentrating on a costume track and a busy career has ensued. His vast résumé includes Broadway shows like “Here Lies Love” and the revival of “The Color Purple” among numerous others; he was associate designer for a production of “Ben-Hur” in Rome that featured a cast of more than 200 with 1,000 costumes.
Vergara is enjoying his introduction to CATF. “Initially I was feeling a little apprehensive. I’d never been to West Virginia before, but when I saw all the Pride flags lining the main street
in Shepherdstown, any misgivings were dispelled,” he says.
CATF also presents “Happy Fall: A Queer Stunt Spectacular” by Lisa Sanaye Dring with Rogue Artists Ensemble. Based on true life events, it’s the story of queer Hollywood stuntmen navigating the dangers of exposing their love. Living up to the “spectacular” bit in the title, the guys’ story is told through video, puppetry, illusions, and live stunts.
The playwright says “I’m queer so I’m interested in queerness, and I’ve also been interested in masculinity for some time. I lived in LA for 10 years so the play is a love letter to Hollywood and the weirdness of the industry.”
Also, of interest to Sanaye Dring is the interracial and intergenerational relationship at the play’s center: Clay is a white man in his late 40s and Felix is mid-20s and Asian (played Aubrey Deeker and Glenn Morizio, respectively).
Her transition from actor (including commercials and some TV) to playwright can be traced back to her one-woman show titled “Death Play,” a work spurred by the passing of her parents and grandmother. “It wasn’t easy. I hadn’t anticipated just how emotionally difficult that five-week run would be. It was after that when people started asking me to write plays and direct.”
CATF Artistic Director Peggy McKowen describes this year’s festival as being “about understanding the things that make us unique, but also the things that make us similar,” adding that it also explores “questioning who are as people and how we fit into our community.”
Here are the other new works in the festival’s exciting lineup.
West Virginia-born playwright Cody LeRoy Wilson’s “Did My Grandfather Kill My Grandfather?” It recounts the unlikely journey of his blended family from Vietnam to Plum Run, W. Va.
In “Kevin Kling: Unraveled” NPR commentator Kevin Kling tells the story of finding his way as a disabled artist. With humor, he reflects the life challenges he has surmounted, including a congenital birth disorder and partial paralysis from a near-fatal motorcycle accident.
And finally, playwright Lisa Loomer’s “Side Effects May Include…,” a work that takes audiences on a frightening and complex trip into the world of psychiatry as a mother tries to help her son on his journey to wellness.
CATF runs through Aug. 3 in three varied venues on the Shepherd University campus: Frank Center, Marinoff Theater, and Studio 112.
Contemporary American Theater Festival Through Aug. 3
Shepherdstown, W.Va. | Catf.org
LISA SANAYE DRING (Photo by Stephanie Girard Photography)
CHRISTOPHER VERGARA (Shai Yammanee)
ICYMI: ‘Overcompensating’ a surprisingly sweet queer treat
A sweet, savvy show about breaking free to embrace your true self
By JOHN PAUL KING
Pride month 2025 is now behind us, and while it’s safe to say that this year’s celebrations had a darker edge than usual, it’s also true that they came with a particularly rich bounty of new queer movies and shows to entertain us – so many, in fact, that even if we are facing a lull until the fall another harvest of fresh content, there are still plenty of titles – which, for whatever reason, were off your radar – for you to catch up on in the meantime.
One of the most notable of these – the bingeworthy series “Overcompensating” (now streaming on Amazon Prime) – will most definitely have been ON the radar for the plentiful fans of creator and star Benito Skinner, the actor/comedian who rose to viral fame through his content on platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. For anyone else, it might have easily slipped through the cracks.
Created and written by Skinner as a loosely autobiographical “college comedy,” it aims for the kind of raucous, explicitly sexed-up tone one expects from the genre as it centers on Benny (Skinner), newly arrived as a freshman at prestigious Yates University. A former football jock and “golden boy” at his midwestern high school, he’s the picture of idealized youthful masculinity; he’s also deep in the closet, struggling to keep his sexuality hidden and maintain his macho front under the intense scrutiny of the college’s social scene – and under the resentful eye of his older sister Grace (Mary Beth Barone), who has already secured her own place at the top of the pecking order.
In the first episode, Benny’s difficulties are eased when he meets Carmen (Wally Baram), another freshman trying to navigate the politics of college life; a gamer from a home marred by tragedy, she’s an outsider who feels like she’s putting on an act, too, and they click – giving him the convenient “cover” of female companionship while providing them both with much-needed support and encouragement. He’s also befriended by a handsome film major from England (Rish Shah), who has already caught his eye, stirring other kinds of feelings and possibly even reciprocating them. Meanwhile, he’s being courted by the school’s “exclusive secret society” – headed by his sister’s aggressively “alpha” boyfriend Pete (Adam DiMarco) – and trying to stay interested in his studies, despite a growing realization that a career in business doesn’t actually appeal to him all that much. That’s a lot to juggle for anybody, even an overachiever like Benny – whose “lucky” life so far has largely been the result of playing a role he is finding harder and harder to maintain. As the series goes on through its eight-episode arc, it becomes clear
that he’s not the only one who is “keeping up appearances,” and he, along with the other confused and damaged young people in his orbit, begins the painful (but often hilarious) process of evolution that is required in order to become truly oneself. Directed toward appealing to a younger demographic, “Overcompensating” is the kind of show that requires a few episodes worth of invested time to make an impression that feels like substance. Full of the bawdy farcical antics that go hand in hand with stories about hormonally charged college kids, it’s not above leaning into the formulas and tropes that have always driven these kinds of comedies. At first, while its broadly comedic strokes and frequently explicit sexual hijinks might elicit plenty of chuckles, the show might easily feel tiresome for more mature audiences; there’s a nostalgic fun to it, made even more appealing, somehow, by the “political incorrectness” of its frequently sexist and homophobic humor, but for a while things may feel like an unnecessary attempt to reinvent “Animal House” for the Gen Z crowd.
By the time the season reaches its halfway point, however, things have started to get real. The antics of these horny almost-adults take on a more pointed absurdity, informed by the increasingly tangled web of defensive deceit they weave among themselves – and, as things draw toward a cliffhanger climax, the consequences of maintaining it – until it achieves a sense of empathy toward them all. There’s a wisdom that smacks of lived authenticity underlying the whole affair, transforming it from the “sexploitative” teen comedy of its surface into something deeper. To be sure, things stay expectedly wacky, and the soap-operatic melodrama of its twists and reversals continue to maintain the show’s “mature YA” appeal; but beneath those trappings, by the end of the season a truer identity has begun to emerge, just as its characters have begun to find their own levels of self-actualization for themselves.
As creator, primary writer, and star, it’s obviously Skinner who deserves much of the credit. While it might be tempting, early on, to dismiss the show as an “ego project,” the internet-spawned sensation proves his talents quickly enough to get past such judgy suspicions, delivering a pitch-perfect blend of sauciness and sensitivity that extends its appeal toward both ends of the taste spectrum; just as crucially, he brings the same aforementioned “lived authenticity” to his winning performance – after all, he’s essentially playing himself in a fictionalized version of his own life –while also making sure that equal time (and compassion) is afforded all the other characters around him, each of whom are pushing at the boundaries of their own respective “closets,” too. It’s unavoidable to notice that – like most of his co-stars –he’s plainly a decade too old to be playing a college student; but by the time we reach that crucial halfway turning point, we’ve become too engaged by him to care.
The show is full of excellent performances, in fact. Relative newcomers Baram and Barone offer layers of complex nuance, while the more familiar DiMarco (“White Lotus”) is close to heartbreaking as the toxic BMOC clinging to the illusion of power as his life begins unraveling around him. Other standouts include the mononymic actress Holmes as Carmen’s “wild child” roommate, solidly likable turns as Benny’s parents from mature veterans Connie Britten and Kyle MacLachlan (whose presence, along with stylish elements in several key scenes, hints at an homage-ish nod to the late David Lynch), and podcaster Owen Thiele as an openly gay fellow student who has Benny “clocked” from the moment they meet. Finally, Lukas Gage makes a deep impression as a former high school teammate at the heart of Benny’s most haunting memory.
There’s no official word yet on whether “Overcompensating” will be renewed for a second season, despite the multiple loose ends left dangling at the end of its first; it has proven to be popular, and Skinner’s large fanbase makes it likely that the story will continue. Even if it doesn’t, the place of uncertainty in which it has left its characters rings true enough to serve as a satisfying endpoint.
As for us, we hope that won’t happen. For all its sophomoric humor, generic plot twists, and purposefully gratuitous sexual titillation, it’s one of the sweetest, kindest, and most savvy shows we’ve seen about breaking free from conformity to embrace your true self – and that’s a message that applies whether you’re queer, straight, or anywhere in between.
The cast of ‘Overcompensating’
How this Texas drag king reclaimed their identity
Chicano performance art serves as inspiration
Three out of ten drag kings who were cast for this first season of King of Drag self-identified as Latinx and after episode two, only one Latinx king remains in the running for the competition.
Buck Wylde, a king from Dallas, Texas delivered a performance that took inspiration from their Catholic upbringing and Catholic school days to put together this persona. During the episode, they shared that they like to “play with religion.”
Murray Hill responded by adding, “sometimes we can’t afford to go to therapy for the Catholic guilt, so we do drag.” Buck Wylde says their therapy and their church is drag. Buck Wylde, cancer sign, goes by Trigger Mortis when they are outside of drag and present more on the femme side. Along with Big D—another drag king on the series— they are the only two who are more femme outside of their drag persona.
During this episode, Buck Wylde also spoke about the difficulty of performing drag in a red state. They live in conservative Dallas, so they still struggle to find large-scale acceptance and support in the midst of statewide legislation targeting the LGBTQ community in Texas.
“Sometimes it doesn’t feel [as] safe as [I] would like it to be. There’s protesters all the time and we don’t have as many spaces to perform as kings there,” they said in the interview.
Buck Wylde says that for them, the most important thing about drag, is that it is and always has been a protest. Living in a conservative state is a challenge to them as a
By GISSELLE PALOMERA
drag king, but they say that it’s important for them to stand their ground and not only bring that representation to these areas, but also intentionally keep it there.
“So many people leave Texas for their safety and mental health to go to Portland, LA, or Colorado Springs or you know, anywhere but here.”
During the episode, Buck Wylde also opened up about how their religious background and cultural heritage added an extra layer to their identity issues growing up where they did. Their family wanted them to assimilate and even prevented them from speaking Spanish and they say that through Buck, they are able to re-examine what it means to be a part of that culture.
Buck Wylde is a third generation Mexican-American and they say that though their Spanish is not fluent, they say they do prefer their horchata without (ICE).
“I kind of straddled different worlds there, because I was sort of assimilated but I still had my Mexican culture. I always felt like I wasn’t connected enough because of the assimilation and it was through drag that I was able to reclaim my culture.”
In the first round of competitions for the second episode, the kings broke up into three teams of three for an improv skit where they would have to mansplain a topic and whichever team did it the best—won the group Weenie Challenge.
The winning team included Buck Wylde, Alexander the Great and Henlo Bullfrog. Together they improvised a skit where they mansplained the Amelia Earhart story.
For the solo show, they dressed up as ‘The Devil’ for the
improv solo challenge, cracking a joke about how they are dressed like the person currently living in The White House.
Dressed as the Devil, sporting a Zoot Suit for the final competition, Buck Wylde improvised a skit with food.
Buck Wylde says they felt the pressure to perform because along with the other nine kings who were cast, they are the first ten kings to make it to the mainstream and represent king culture.
“We call ourselves the first ten because whatever happens, we’re responsible for how the kings are viewed and how we move forward together, being the blueprint for what’s to come,” said Buck Wylde in an exclusive interview with Los Angeles Blade.
Back stage before the solo improv competition, Buck Wylde says they felt their drag persona “crumbling” away.
They felt like Buck had abandoned them prior to their big moments to prove to the judges that they should stay in the running for the competition. They went up against Perka $exxx, who gave a king-based Dave Chappell performance.
In the end, it was Perka $exxx who received a 4-1 vote from the judges.
Buck Wylde left the show with some advice for the kings and the audience: “No matter what life throws at you, always remember who the Buck you are.”
King of Drag is now available to stream on RevryTV, an LGBTQ streaming platform for queer movies, TV shows, music and more — all for free. New King of Drag episodes will premiere weekly on Sundays.
Independence Day Weekend in Rehoboth
Wicked Green Pool Party, fireworks among festivities (Washington
Vacationers and residents alike enjoyed Independence Day Weekend activities in Rehoboth Beach, Del. The Wicked Green Pool Party drew hundreds to the CAMP Rehoboth fundraiser on Saturday. That evening, revelers went to the rooftops to watch the fireworks display.
Blade photos by Daniel Truitt)
Big changes ahead: D.C. housing policy
is finally shifting
Here’s what it means for you
By SCOTT BLOOM
On Monday, April 21, 2025, I attended the Small Multifamily & Rental Owners Association’s Spring Summit, “Rent Burdened & the Fight for Reform,” held at Busboys and Poets on 14th Street, N.W. The event featured remarks from Mayor Muriel Bowser and Council member Robert White, Chair of the DC Council’s Housing Committee, who offered a timely update on his efforts to address the rental housing crisis. He was joined by Council member Matthew Frumin, chair of the Committee on Human Services and representative for Ward 3, who shared insights on proposed amendments to the Mayor’s ERAP Reform Bill. I was there to listen closely, gather the latest intel from District leadership, and break down what it all means for you — the D.C. rental property owner.
For years, D.C. housing providers have been raising alarms about how difficult it is to invest and operate rental housing in the District. After what felt like years of being ignored, there’s a real — and sudden — shift happening at the DC Council.
Here’s the latest you need to know:
1. DC Rent Registry Launch: Immediate Action Required
The much-anticipated DC Rent Registry is about to go live — and housing providers must act quickly to comply with new requirements. If you Google “DC Rental Registry,” you’ll find the official site right at the top. All housing units must be re-registered within 90 days of the system’s launch, and the process must be completed online — no paper submissions will be accepted. Notices have already started going out to property owners with valid Basic Business Licenses (BBLs), alerting them to the need to re-register. If you have questions, you can email RADdatabase.Inquiries@dc.gov for assistance.
To help ease the transition, the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) has released training materials, including a demonstration video available on YouTube, webinars tailored especially for small housing providers, and in-person clinics that will be held after June 2. A recording of the webinar will also be made available. Additionally, providers are encouraged to submit feedback — one great idea being floated is to use the registry information to automatically populate RAD forms 3–5, saving time and effort down the line.
2. Real Conversations About Affordable Housing and Rent Stabilization
In another encouraging sign of change, DC Council member Matthew Frumin recently acknowledged that the affordable housing crisis impacts not just tenants, but housing providers as well. He and other Council members have spent several weeks meeting with landlords directly to understand what policies could be made more fair and workable. One key example is the new Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP) modification bill, which Frumin believes will demonstrate that improvements to housing policy can be made without harming providers.
Frumin also stressed the importance of improving the rent collection process and pledged to tackle reforms to rent stabilization, although he noted that a lack of funding for housing vouchers remains a significant challenge. Importantly, he confirmed that reforming the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA) is now being actively considered — with a new focus on making it fair for all stakeholders, not just tenants. As Frumin put it, “ We can work together to create a system that works for everyone.”
3. A New Approach to Rental Housing Policy: Council member Robert White’s Vision
Another significant shift is coming from Council member Robert White, now serving as Chair of the DC Housing Committee. In a notable break from past practice, White has committed to moving away from letting only tenant advocates
shape housing laws — a major change that could create more balanced, workable solutions for landlords and tenants alike. Recognizing that the rental housing market is in crisis, White has taken a strong position: if the city doesn’t act to repair its investment climate, the people most hurt will be working families, not the wealthy.
White and his team have met intensively with housing stakeholders, listening carefully to their concerns. Across the board, one issue kept surfacing: the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA) is seen as a major obstacle to rental housing investment and development. While TOPA was designed with good intentions, White acknowledged that the data now shows it is often hurting the very people it was meant to help. He plans to introduce amendments to make TOPA more workable — reforms aimed at making the program serve residents more effectively without scaring away investment.
Beyond TOPA, White is also focused on improving fairness in the eviction process. Right now, Superior Court vacancies are causing significant delays, and he believes the system needs to function properly for both landlords and tenants. He also wants to create a Small Multifamily Repair and Maintenance Fund to support property upkeep, although funding for that initiative remains a hurdle.
White emphasized that when housing providers come to testify at upcoming hearings, they should bring a spirit of problem-solving, not confrontation. His goal is clear: to create policies that keep DC’s rental market healthy and accessible — without sacrificing fairness or sustainability. Hearings on the Rental Act were scheduled as soon as the mayor’s budget was passed on May 27th. The first vote will take place on July 14. White made it clear that while rent control issues may be addressed later, immediate action is needed on these foundational challenges. So what are the key takeaways for housing providers like you?
SCOTT BLOOM
is owner and senior property manager of Columbia Property Management. Reach him at 888-857-6594.
Council member Robert White serves as chair of the D.C. Housing Committee. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)
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