National
Annise Parker on leading Victory Fund: ‘My focus is on the candidate’
“Trump is not the embodiment of the Republican Party for a lot of people.”


Annise Parker is now CEO of the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund and Institute. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
After more than 40 years of activism and three terms as mayor of Houston, Annise Parker has taken on a new leadership role as CEO of the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund and Institute.
The change in leadership for the organizations was announced Friday at the annual International LGBTQ Leaders Conference. Parker, 61, told the crowd times have changed since she began her activism in the 1970s, but too many LGBT people “still have to fear” many of the dangers LGBT people faced decades ago.
“We celebrate milestones,” Parker said. “My race was one. But when you’re checking off milestones, it means you have not reached the end of the journey, and we don’t reach the end of this journey until all those fears are swept away and until all of our communities — across the United States, across cultures, across ethnicities — everyone of us has an equal opportunity to succeed.”
In an interview with the Washington Blade on Friday at the conference, Parker said the focus of her work would be on supporting LGBT candidates ready to make a difference.
“But it’s not just about having candidates, it’s about making sure that those candidates are funded and the Victory Fund does a great job of vetting candidates,” Parker said. “You have to have a good candidate, but passion’s not enough. You have to demonstrate their viability, and their ability to be successful.”
Parker takes the reins of the Victory Fund and Institute after the organizations were led for two-and-a-half years by Aisha Moodie-Mills, whose tenure was marked by historic wins by transgender candidates in local races in 2017. Moodie-Mills has left the organization with the stated purpose of championing work as a progressive activist.
Based on her long history in the LGBT movement, Parker said she brings a “different mindset” than Moodie-Mills and will be focused on the candidates, not progressive activism.
“I bring a different energy, I bring a different focus. My focus is on the candidate, but that doesn’t mean that anything we’ve done has been wrong or misplaced or inappropriate,” Parker said. “We just bring different styles and interests.”
Parker said the Victory Fund and Institute would take on the Trump administration “whenever we feel it’s necessary,” but keep electing LGBT candidates as the focus.
“Because it’s clear that simply standing up and speaking out against President Trump doesn’t have an impact, the best way to blunt his ability to hurt us is to put people in office who can vote against his anti-gay policies,” Parker said.
Parker will stay in Houston as CEO of the Victory Fund and Institute, but plans to travel often for the organizations, and will regularly be in D.C. Her tenure as CEO begins Monday.
Read the full interview here:
Washington Blade: We’ve seen a lot of success with LGBT candidates in 2017, particularly with the transgender wins in local races. How do you plan on building on that success going forward?
Annise Parker: Being successful in political campaigns starts with the candidate, so we are just as proud of the turnouts for our candidate training, the expressions of interest from candidates all over the country in running out and seeking Victory Fund support, so continuing to tap into the passion that people have right now and helping channel that into the campaigns.
But it’s not just about having candidates, it’s about making sure that those candidates are funded and the Victory Fund does a great job of vetting candidates. You have to have a good candidate, but passion’s not enough. You have to demonstrate their viability, and their ability to be successful. And so, that process is an important piece.
But then, once you have the right candidate in right race, it’s about making sure they have the resources and I know a lot of what I’ll be focused on, as the board does, is making sure that our candidates have the funding they need.
What I’ve seen over this — not quite a year — now, but through 2017 is the energy across the country. LGBT candidates, candidates of color, candidates who are women who are stepping up saying, “Enough is enough.” I want to make a difference and I’m going to jump into races, and they’re not discouraged at all by the idea that it’s an uphill battle, or that from an objective perspective, doesn’t look like they can win there.
They’re in it to win, but they’re not afraid of losing. They want to get out there and make statements. It’s a great time to come and tap into that kind of energy.
So we’re going to do that, but the fundamentals of Victory Fund haven’t changed in a very long time.
Blade: I wanted to ask you about that because I know you talked in your speech about how hard it was to be part of an organization in 1975 compared to 2017.
Parker: Different and it’s not different.
We have made tremendous progress, but if you look at when I was an activist in the 70s and 80s, I used to debate homophobes all the time, and they used to talk about the gay agenda. Remember the gay agenda? And I used to laugh and say there was no gay agenda.
Over time, I finally realized that there was a gay agenda, and the gay agenda is fairly straight forward. We want to be able to go to school without being bullied, we want to be to work at jobs we love and earn a paycheck so we can pay taxes to this country, we want to be able to serve openly in the military, we want to be able to walk down any street in America in safety, we want to be able to marry the people we love, we want to be able to adopt and raise children. That’s the GLBT agenda.
Many of those things we have achieved, but what we see now is how easily they can be swept away when we have the wrong person in the White House and the wrong attitude in Congress. So we made progress, but we can take this giant step back if we don’t keep our eyes focused on moving forward.
Blade: But what I wanted to get at there is do you think it’s simply enough for candidates to be out about their sexual orientation and gender identity, or is there something more that’s needed in 2017 in order to make an impact?
Parker: Yes and no.
It’s not enough to be a gay candidate. You have to be good at what you do. We have high expectations for our candidates, and that’s why we vet them, it’s why we look closely at their viability and the races they’re in. Not everybody who seeks a Victory Fund endorsement gets that Victory Fund endorsement.
But are we sending them out to be activists? No. We are sending them out to be who they are and represent their constituents and do the job they’ve been elected to do because when they do that, they make the really profound changes that we need to see that have been so transformative in America.
This latest anti-trans movement really, I think, unfortunately, wasn’t launched in Houston, but our HERO campaign [the 2015 campaign to preserve the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance] was where it really flowered. We had right-wing groups from all over the country, pouring money and resources in Houston. We had the right-wing ideologues coming through, the Mike Huckabees and Ted Cruzes coming though Houston and doing trans-bashing in Houston, and then they took it on the road to North Carolina and back to Texas with the statewide bathroom bill.
The difference in my more than 40 years of activism: No one in America can say they know no person who is gay or lesbian. Whether it’s simply they say, “Well, I know Ellen on TV,” whatever it is, they know someone, and very, very few people in America today can say they don’t know anyone, either in their family or their community who is gay.
But for too many Americans, transgender issues are unknown. They don’t know someone who is transgender; they don’t understand what the issues are, and they make them the other. And a lot of what we’re seeing is the arguments are the same arguments they used against us — us meaning the gay and lesbian part of the LGBT community — against the transgender community. Today, it’s the same arguments just slightly repackaged, but it’s all about taking something that is unknown and that you can create a fear around it and use it for either for political purposes or economic purposes.
And so, what is going to be so powerful, just as it took us a long time to get there for the gay and lesbian community, but this is a different era, and I think we’re going to make much faster progress, but what it’s going to take is our transgender brothers and sisters to get out there and speak for themselves, to go out as candidates and raise awareness.
And again, they don’t have to carry the flag for the community. They have to be out and they have to do a good job, and that’s what changes hearts and minds.
Blade: Let’s talk about the Victory Institute. Where do you envision that going as an organization, particularly the robust international program?
Parker: I started by saying the focus is on the candidates. We can’t win races if you don’t have the candidates, and that is the Victory Institute.
But we all understand we can turn this negative tide that’s coming out of Washington, we can firmly secure our rights here in America and we have to realize that agenda that I outlined, that still has to be won in all of these other countries around the world, and that we have a responsibility from our positions of relative privilege to make sure to support people who are doing the seminal work in those countries. It’s not about America; it’s about the LGBT community.
And some of the most horrific problems are going on in other places. When I was mayor of Houston, Houston has a huge international focus and I did a lot of trade missions. And everywhere I went, I made a practice of meeting with local LGBT leaders and women’s organizations, so I have met with lesbians in South Africa and transgender women in Indonesia, India and Brazil.
The tip of the spear right now is transgender issues. Their courage particularly in countries where it’s not — they’re not worried about walking down the street and having someone say something rude to them, they’re worried about walking down the street and having someone kill them. And we have to make sure that we stand together with them.
Blade: The anti-LGBT policies of the Trump administration are ongoing. To what extent will the Victory Fund and the Institute tackle that?
Parker: As an organization, our focus is on supporting candidates, but we are advocates for LGBT rights and issues, so with the other organizations in this space, we’ll stand up whenever we feel it’s necessary, but we also believe that the best way to blunt that — because it’s clear that simply standing up and speaking out against President Trump doesn’t have any impact, the best way to blunt his ability to hurt us is to put people in office who can vote against his anti-gay policies.
What I’ve seen over the last year, I actually did some extensive polling in Houston for other purposes, people in an odd way, they see Trump as a one-off. Trump is not the embodiment of the Republican Party for a lot of people. I know we like to think that that’s the case, those of us who are Democrats probably think that’s the case and we’re going to use that to demonize him, which doesn’t take much work, and use that to run. It’s not enough.
He’s Donald Trump, and there’s a core following that he has, but for most Americans, whether they love him or hate him, he’s over there, he’s a one-off, and it doesn’t translate into other down-ballot races.
Blade: That’s kind of what I wanted to get at with your vision for the Victory Fund and Institute. Would you say that they’re progressive organizations, or do they seek to advance LGBT people, LGBT rights regardless of political affiliation or ideology?
Parker: So that’s a really interesting question.
It’s clear that Aisha Moodie-Mills is very much a part of the progressive movement. I like to consider myself there as well, but as an organization our focus is completely bipartisan and it is about finding capable, qualified LGBT candidates, helping them get elected.
Now, capable and qualified, someone who’s LGBT but is ashamed of it, someone who’s LGBT and actively supports anti-gay legislative initiatives, we would not support that kind of candidate. So does that make us a progressive organization?
We also build alliances. Many of our candidates are pro-choice, they have progressive political agendas and they build coalitions in order to get elected. It’s not as if there’s any place in America — well, maybe West Hollywood, who knows — where we are a majority, so it requires us to build coalitions.
And our LGBT candidates are masters of putting together strong coalitions across racial and ethnic lines, with labor, with environmental organizations and voters in order to put a winning package together, so by that definition, we are absolutely a progressive organization, but that’s not our focus.
Blade: Would you say you’d have a different approach than Aisha going forward, or is it building off what she did?
Parker: I think we have to reflect what’s happening in the world around us as an organization. I’m a generation of activists older than she. I have children older than she is — adopted children, children nonetheless — and I bring a different mindset.
I was an activist in the 70s and I have seen the changes and sort of the arc of our history. I bring a different energy, I bring a different focus. My focus is on the candidate, but that doesn’t mean that anything we’ve done has been wrong or misplaced or inappropriate. We just bring different styles and interests, and as I said, we have to have coalitions to get elected. Maybe someday the right will offer us opportunities for coalition building, but today all of our coalitions are going to be on the left and in progressive communities because the right has become so virulently anti-gay.
There are gay elected officials here who are Republicans and so stand up proudly within their party and never waver on our issues, and we need more of that.
Blade: In the past, the Victory Institute has sought to appoint LGBT people to the U.S. government. Will the Victory Institute continue that within the Trump administration? I’m aware of four Trump appointees who are LGBT. Would the Victory Institute support them?
Parker: Our goal is to put people into office where they can make a difference. It’s not very fertile ground to plow, but that doesn’t mean we’re not going to try to plow it.
Blade: And will you continue to support Republican candidates who are LGBT?
Parker: Yes. But they have to, obviously, support, as I have outlined, the LGBT agenda.
It’s not about political party, it’s about making sure we have candidates who can advocate, or just being present. There are times when I was in office in the 18 years that I was in office that I had to stand up and articulate LGBT issues, but I think I was just as effective those times when I was simply there with my wife and making sure that they had to deal with me on human basis.
And if you talk to the office holders in the room, you’ll find out that they all have those kinds of stories where they’ve managed to change the trajectory of a bill or made inroads in some way simply because they were there and fully present in all aspects of their life.
Blade: Let’s talk about the approach to the candidates Victory Fund endorses. I think one big issue, and you talked about this in your speech, is religious freedom and the tension that has with LGBT rights, rightly or wrongly.
Parker: No one has a right to discriminate against me. I mean, that’s what RFRA bills are. The right to discriminate. If you are given the right to discriminate against me because I’m gay or because I’m transgender, why is that any different from you having to discriminate against someone who happens to be black or who happens to be a religion you don’t agree with. We have to fight against these bills.
Blade: But what would be your advice to candidates who are confronted with this? I remember when you were mayor of Houston, this became an issue with the subpoena of the sermons and there was this big argument that was infringing upon these pastors’ religious liberty.
Parker: There was a big argument. It happened without me knowing about it. I didn’t think it was wrong, but I rescinded it simply because it created too much of a peripheral issue. But that had to do with litigation around HERO. It wasn’t anything to do with RFRA or the ability to discriminate. That actually was around the litigation.
Blade: But what would be your advice to candidates who are confronted by those who say your views are an assault on religious liberty?
Parker: We are all Americans, and one of the bedrock values of America is that we treat each other fairly and decently and that everyone should be afforded the full rights of being an American.
We have fought wars against people who targeted minority populations. In World War II, millions of Americans died to fight an enemy that was specifically targeting Jews, Gypsies and LGBT people. It is fundamentally un-American. It took us a long time to get it right. We had to go through segregation, but it is fundamentally un-American to say I don’t like you, I’m not going to serve you. Once you allow someone to do that, it’s impossible to draw the line again.
Blade: One other thing I wanted to ask you about, we mentioned the Trump administration, I’m very curious as to what your take is on the massive hurricanes we had in recent months and Houston was devastated by Hurricane Harvey. How would you evaluate the administration’s handling of the response?
Parker: And I had a great deal of fun with Ann Coulter and my hurricane weather control abilities.
His response to the hurricane?
Blade: How would you evaluate that?
Parker: Inadequate across the board, but mediocre in Texas and in Florida and absolutely embarrassing in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Blade: Why do you think there’s that discrepancy?
Parker: I think it’s all about his voting base. In Texas we’re also fighting against an incompetent state government that is not fully funding the recovery.
And this is my opinion. I’m not going to speak for the Victory Fund here because this is far afield of that. But having been an elected official at the local level, the Bush 43 administration learned after Katrina, and the Obama administration absolutely, Texas, Republican leadership, Rick Perry — I had a great working relationship with Rick Perry — they understood what was needed to recover from those kinds of storms, and you saw that in Sandy.
Now I think we have an administration that fundamentally doesn’t understand the role of the federal government in disaster recovery, doesn’t want to spend money on people who aren’t part of the president’s voting base and have had a tremendous amount of turnover in those positions, so actually have lost the expertise to know what to do, so it’s a three-fer, and it’s causing tremendous problems.
Texas voted for Trump.
Blade: Houston did not, though.
Parker: Houston did not. The big cities across Texas are all Democratic islands in a big, red sea, but Texas voted for Trump. 20 percent of the refining capacity is in Houston or just on the border of the city of Houston. You would think from a strategic standpoint that he’d be focusing on making sure that there’s a complete recovery across the energy industry base down there, but it’s not happening.
And Puerto Rico? They don’t vote. It’s an afterthought.
Blade: I want to go back to Texas and talk about Pigeon v. Turner. [A case in which the Texas Supreme Court questioned whether the Obergefell ruling guarantees same-sex spousal to city employees. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to review the decision of the Texas Supreme Court, which remanded its findings to lower state court.]
Parker: Actually, it was Piegon v. Parker. It’s referred to both ways, but yeah.
Blade: You mentioned that in your speech. How concerned are you about that litigation?
Parker: When you track what happened, the state Supreme Court refused to intervene, and then the lieutenant governor of the state of Texas, the governor and the right-wing leaders across the state put pressure on the elected state Supreme Court, and they re-evaluated and then sent it back down to the appellate court.
It’s transparent to everybody in the state that they bowed to political pressure. That said, the argument being made by the right is that the Supreme Court says you can have marriage, but you can’t have benefits. There’s no right to benefits. Well, that’s absurd. Ultimately, if we get all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, they’ll straighten it out.
But from a practical standpoint, even if we lose Pigeon v. Parker, Pigeon v. Turner, even if the city of Houston loses, there’s no impact because the mayor of Houston is going to continue to offer benefits. They possibly have a pyrrhic victory which says no you don’t have to offer benefits, and well say, no, we don’t have to offer them but we’re going to. Mayor Turner’s clear on that and we’ll go forward.
But I have no faith in the Texas Supreme Court. In fact, we have several really great candidates running statewide. One of our LGBT candidates is a local elected judge who’s running for the state Supreme Court for precisely this reason, that they are making these kinds of political decisions. But there’ll be no practical impact from it.
Blade: My last question is as someone how has been part of the movement for so many years, how would you evaluate the LGBT movement now? Is it stronger than it was, or is it more anemic?
Parker: Yes and no.
It’s stronger in the sense there’s so many more people, it’s broader and deeper and it’s really reflective of the vast diversity of our community across America, but it’s weaker in only one sense. And that is that we have made gains and there a lot of folks who felt we can lay our burden down, no, we got this, it’s going to go in the right direction, I can go do other things, I don’t have to show up and vote every time, I don’t have to send money to all these organizations, I don’t have to protest or write letters or do this. Yes you do.
So on the whole it is much stronger, but it’s different and the issues evolve, and how we have to address those issues evolved. And I’ll just close with we had a vote on Houston’s non-discrimination ordinance.
And to be clear, because the media gets this wrong all the time, we had no non-discrimination ordinance. We didn’t decide to add gender identity and sexual orientation. We had zero ordinance. So we wrote a comprehensive ordinance that included everybody, and when the citizens of Houston voted it down, we don’t have an ordinance that protects black people in Houston.
Everything about the anti-HERO vote was about men in women’s bathrooms, but what was interesting is the average age of voters was 68 years old. If the average age of voter in the city of Houston election had been 50, we would have won. If the average age of voter had been 35, they would have laughed it off the ballot.
I think we’re going to win the war. In fact, we’ve already won the war, but we lose a lot of battles between now and then, and we can’t take our foot off the pedal. All of the things we’ve been doing for the last 45 years since Stonewall basically throwing ourselves into the political process, showing up, voting, protesting when necessary, we still have to keep doing it.
It’s extremely frustrating, the HERO vote because of the low turnout. And young people, you absolutely got it, but they have to vote.
Note: This interview has been edited for length.
National
Military families challenge Trump ban on trans healthcare
Three military families are suing over Trump’s directive cutting transgender healthcare from military coverage

Three military families sued the Department of Defense on Monday after President Trump’s anti-transgender policies barred their transgender adolescent and adult children from accessing essential gender-affirming medical care.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, challenges the legality of the Trump administration’s decision to ban coverage of any transgender-related medical care under Department of Defense health insurance plans.
Under the new directive, military clinics and hospitals are prohibited from providing continuing care to transgender adolescent and adult children. It also prevents TRICARE, the military’s health insurance program, from covering the costs of gender-affirming care for both transgender youth and young adults, regardless of where that care is received.
A press release from the families’ attorney explained that the plaintiffs are proceeding under pseudonyms to protect their safety and privacy. They are represented by GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD Law), the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR), Brown, Goldstein & Levy, LLP, and Keker, Van Nest & Peters LLP.
“This is a sweeping reversal of military health policy and a betrayal of military families who have sacrificed for our country,” said Sarah Austin, Staff Attorney at GLAD Law. “When a servicemember is deployed and focused on the mission they deserve to know their family is taken care of. This Administration has backtracked on that core promise and put servicemembers at risk of losing access to health care their children desperately need.”
“President Trump has illegally overstepped his authority by abruptly cutting off necessary medical care for military families,” said Shannon Minter, Legal Director at NCLR. “This lawless directive is part of a dangerous pattern of this administration ignoring legal requirements and abandoning our servicemembers.”
“President Trump’s Executive Order blocks military hospitals from giving transgender youth the care their doctors deem necessary and their parents have approved,” said Sharif Jacob, partner at Keker, Van Nest & Peters LLP. “Today we filed a lawsuit to put an end to his order, and the agency guidance implementing it.”
“This administration is unlawfully targeting military families by denying essential care to their transgender children,” said Liam Brown, an associate with Keker, Van Nest & Peters. “We will not stand by while those who serve are stripped of the ability to care for their families.”
National
Supreme Court sides with transgender boy in bathroom access fight
Plaintiff challenging SC law

On Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a transgender boy may use the boy’s bathroom in a South Carolina public high school while pursuing a challenge to a state law that requires students to use the bathrooms corresponding to their sex assigned at birth.
The order, which was unsigned by any of the justices, did not provide reasons for the court’s decision, but made clear that it applied only to the one student in this case. The order specifically stated that it was “not a ruling on the merits of the legal issues presented in the litigation” and was instead “based on the standards applicable for obtaining emergency relief.”
It should be noted that Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr., and Neil M. Gorsuch filed dissents to the order, though they did not provide any explanation for their opposition.
This is not the first time the highest court in the nation has addressed trans rights in the country.
In 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in Bostock v. Clayton County that federal law prohibits anti-trans discrimination in employment. Despite this significant victory for trans rights, in June the court upheld a Tennessee law banning gender-affirming medical care for trans minors in U.S. v. Skrmetti. That ruling, which suggested the court could be used to remove protections for trans people, has contributed to increased scrutiny and the reconsideration of previous rulings favorable to trans rights, placing broader LGBTQ protections at risk.
The recent order comes as the Supreme Court prepares to hear two cases involving trans athletes and their rights to participate in sports under Title IX, the federal civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on sex in educational programs and activities that receive federal funding. Advocates for trans rights have expressed concern that these upcoming cases could further challenge the legal landscape surrounding gender identity in schools and other public institutions.
National
Trump to honor Charlie Kirk with Medal of Freedom
Anti-LGBTQ political activist assassinated in Utah on Wednesday

At a Sept. 11 remembrance ceremony at the Pentagon on Thursday, President Donald Trump announced that he will award right-wing political activist Charlie Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Kirk was assassinated less than 24 hours earlier at Utah Valley University while speaking on conservative talking points to a crowd.
The 31-year-old conservative commentator is best known for founding Turning Point USA, a nonprofit that sought to build a robust conservative youth movement. He earned notoriety for his unwavering loyalty to Trump, his advocacy of expansive Second Amendment rights, and his opposition to LGBTQ rights. Conservatives and far-right supporters have quickly elevated Kirk to martyr status since his death.
“Before we begin, let me express the horror and grief so many Americans feel at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk,” Trump said. “Charlie was a giant of his generation, a champion of liberty, and an inspiration to millions and millions of people.”
As of now, there is no indication when the award ceremony will take place, although Trump said “I can only guarantee you one thing, that we will have a very big crowd.”
Many credit Kirk with helping Trump return to the White House in 2024 by mobilizing young voters — particularly young men — on behalf of the twice-impeached president.
Kirk’s stance against LGBTQ rights was a central part of his political brand.
A staunch opponent of Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark Supreme Court ruling requiring states to recognize same-sex marriage, Kirk often used incendiary rhetoric, at times calling for the erosion of LGBTQ rights altogether.
As host of “The Charlie Kirk Show” on the Salem Radio Network, he frequently denounced transgender participation in sports, referring to trans people and their supporters as “sick.” He also suggested they should be “taken care of like how things in the 1950s and 60s” were — an allusion many critics interpreted as a reference to lobotomies, shock therapy, and forced institutionalization.
Kirk often framed his views through the lens of “Christian values.”
On his YouTube channel, he invoked biblical passages, at one point citing Leviticus 20:13 to claim that the Bible’s call for the stoning of gay men reflected “God’s perfect law.”
The Washington Blade contacted several LGBTQ advocacy organizations for comment on Trump’s decision to posthumously honor Kirk, a man widely criticized for his hostility toward the LGBTQ community. Many focused instead on condemning the violence that ended his life.
“Political violence is unacceptable and has no place in this country,” said Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, in an emailed statement. “We cannot ever accept this epidemic of gun violence as normal. We cannot keep living like this.”
Kristen Browde, president of the Florida LGBTQ+ Democratic Caucus, which has 21 chapters across the state, making it one of the largest LGBTQ caucuses in the nation, echoed those sentiments while pointing to the consequences of Kirk’s rhetoric.
“Political violence, for any reason, is wrong. Gun violence, for any reason, is wrong. Spending your life, inciting violence, demonizing political opponents? Attacking those who are different? Every bit as wrong. And when violence follows such actions? One can’t be shocked. All you can do is recommit yourself to fight against it.”
According to videos — and witnesses at Utah Valley University, Kirk was shot seconds after beginning to answer a question about how many”transgender” people were responsible for “mass shootings,” where he answered “too many.”
As of Thursday evening, Kirk’s killer remained at large. The FBI has identified a person of interest in its investigation and is offering a $100,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.
Utah
Charlie Kirk shot to death at Utah university
Anti-LGBTQ figure asked about trans shooters moments earlier

Charlie Kirk, a right-wing political activist, outspoken anti-LGBTQ figure, and founder of Turning Point USA, a conservative nonprofit, was shot and killed at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah on Wednesday.
The 31-year-old was visiting the university’s Turning Point USA chapter and speaking to a large outdoor audience when he was struck in the neck by a single bullet fired from about 200 yards away. NBC reported that no suspect is in custody, despite university police previously indicating otherwise. President Trump announced Kirk’s death on social media.
Just moments before the shooting, an audience member asked Kirk, “How many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years?”
“Too many,” Kirk replied—seconds before being shot. Videos of the graphic incident have since gone viral online.
Kirk had long opposed LGBTQ rights and publicly opposed same-sex marriage. He frequently cited his “Christian values” as the basis for his positions, often quoting Leviticus 20:13 (“men lying with men… abomination”) as “God’s perfect law” on sexual matters.
He was also a prominent national voice in efforts to ban transgender healthcare, saying, “Donald Trump needs to run on this issue.” Kirk further proclaimed, “Pride is a sin,” and dismissed “gay corporations that hate America.”
On his YouTube show, he declared there are “only two genders” and described “transgenderism and gender ‘fluidity’ … lies that hurt people and abuse kids.” He also warned that LGBTQ efforts would not stop at marriage equality but instead aimed to “corrupt your children,” according to Media Matters for America.
Utah Valley University, established in 1941 as Central Utah Vocational School, is the state’s largest public university, with more than 46,000 students. It is located about 40 miles south of Salt Lake City.
National
Concerns for future emerge at U.S. Conference on HIV/AIDS
‘I’m done being treated like shit in the country I grew up in’

More than 2,400 people, including public health experts, scientists, physicians, local government officials, and community activists, turned out for the 29th annual United States Conference on HIV/AIDS, which took place Sept. 4-7 at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in D.C.
Organized by the D.C.-based group NMAC, formerly known as the National Minority AIDS Council, the conference is considered the nation’s largest and most comprehensive gathering of experts involved in addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the U.S.
NMAC spokesperson Pavni Guharoy said NMAC officials will be completing a final count of the conference participants based on registration numbers later this week, but she said the current estimated attendance was at least 2,500.
The conference included more than 100 workshop sessions that focused on a wide range of issues related to the status of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the U.S., with a focus on the large and growing number of people living with HIV who are 50 years of age or older.
Information released at the conference shows that as of 2022, of the nearly 1.1 million people living with HIV in the U.S., approximately 54 percent were 50 years of age or older.
Many of the sessions addressed the needs, concerns and sometimes stigma faced by diverse communities of people living with HIV and those at risk for HIV, including African American, Latinx, and LGBTQ communities, both those who are aging as well as young adults.
The conference also included four plenary sessions in which all conference attendees listened to two-dozen prominent keynote speakers. Among them was former U.S. National Institutes of Health official Dr. Anthony Fauci, who pointed out that continuing advances in HIV research have led to effective medical intervention that changed AIDS from a once fatal illness to a condition in which people with HIV can live “a normal life span.”
Other keynote speakers included Earvin ‘Magic’ Johnson, the acclaimed basketball player who became an advocate for people with HIV after testing positive for HIV 33 years ago, and Dr. Rachel Levine, who made history by becoming the first out transgender person to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2021as an appointee by then-President Joe Biden as a U.S. Assistant Secretary of Health.
Also speaking was Jeanne White-Ginder, the mother of Ryan White, who was diagnosed with AIDS in 1984 at the age of 13 from a blood transfusion. White-Ginder told conference attendees how Ryan faced discrimination when he was initially barred from going to his school in Indiana out of fear that he could transmit the virus to others at school.

In a moving presentation, she told how Ryan became one of the nation’s early advocates for people with HIV/AIDS up until the time of his death in 1990, one month before his high school graduation. She said then-U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) invited her to come to Washington to help lobby for a bill Kennedy introduced and which Congress passed in her son’s honor called the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency (CARE) Act in August 1990.
“Now, today, thanks to your hard work and dedication, Ryan’s bill and your bill, too, provides treatment and support to more than half a million Americans in big cities, small towns and rural communities across the country,” she said. “It has dramatically reduced suffering. It has enabled people to live with HIV, to live long and healthy lives.”
But White-Ginder joined the many conference speakers, including Magic Johnson, in calling on attendees and the public to urge Congress to reject the dramatic cuts in funding for federal AIDS programs, including the Ryan White program, proposed by President Donald Trump and Republican congressional leaders for the Fiscal Year 2026 federal budget.
Among those calling on the AIDS community and allies to speak out against the proposed budget cuts were Paul Kawata, NMAC’s outgoing executive director and CEO, who is retiring Oct. 7, and Harold Phillips, the former director of the White House Office of National AIDS Policy during the Biden administration and current NMAC Deputy Director for Programs who was chosen to succeed Kawata as NMAC CEO.
NMAC officials, led by members of its board of directors, praised Kawata for his 36 years of service as NMAC’s leader and his dedication to the cause of service and support for people with HIV and AIDS.
Kawata reflected on his work at NMAC and his concerns over the current political climate in Washington in a sometimes-emotional farewell address at one of the conference’s plenary sessions on Sept. 5.
“I’ll be honest with you. After 36 years the thought of leaving all of you is much more difficult than I thought it was going to be,” he told the gathering. “You are my family. You are the people that I love,” he said.
“You taught me how to be a better version of me. And I am so extraordinarily grateful for everything that you have given me,” he continued. “And you will always be a part of my heart.”
Pointing to members of the NMAC staff, both current and former members in the audience, Kawata said, “NMAC is NMAC because of what you do every single day with your life. You fight to make a difference in the world. And I am honored and privileged to call you my friends.”
Without mentioning the Trump administration by name, Kawata had harsh words for what he said was happening now in the United States and its impact on people living with HIV.
“I’m not going to lie to you,” he said. “I’m done being treated like shit in the country that I grew up in. I’m done being told that I’m a second-class citizen because of who I love,” he continued. “It’s not my America anymore. And I’m worried for our future.”
He added, “We always talk about the pendulum of justice, about the arc of justice. And I really want you to know in this moment, as difficult and as awful and how hellacious it is, we are on the right side of history. We are the ones who will change the world.”

In his remarks at the conference’s closing Sept. 7 plenary session, Fauci said, “We’re in very difficult times. You don’t need me to tell you that. But we’ve got to continue to put the pressure on what we did in the ‘80s with the activist groups, to make sure we do end the epidemic.”
He noted that he was at his job as director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases in the early 1980s, when the AIDS epidemic first surfaced and the AIDS patients he and his colleagues cared for, had little chance of survival.
“Fast forward now, 44 years, extraordinary things have happened,” Fauci said. “We now have drugs that you are all very aware of that can have an individual living with HIV live essentially a normal life span in putting under the care and the availability of drugs,” he continued.
“We know what U equals U – something that we didn’t imagine some years ago. That undetectable equals untransmissible,” he said, referring to the current HIV medication that suppresses the HIV virus to an undetectable level that prevents an infected person from transmitting it to someone else.
“And right now, with these drugs that we have for the prevention of HIV we have what we actually hoped for years ago – and that is to end the HIV epidemic,” he said.
Dr. Rachel Levine, who during the Biden administration served in the dual role as Assistant Secretary of Health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and as director of the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, also spoke at the closing session of the conference.
She noted that she began her career as a pediatric physician in 1983 in New York City, at the time of the early stages of the AIDS epidemic. From that time through her years as Assistant Secretary of Health, Levine said she observed first-hand the skills and dedication of doctors, nurses, and others who cared for people with HIV/AIDS who she described as the HIV care workforce.

“The HIV care workforce since that time has been incredibly dedicated, with many people working for decades,” she said. “And working to end the HIV epidemic in the United States and around the world. We applaud you. You are in this room. We applaud you arduously for your dedication and for your passion.”
Levine also noted that the cuts in funding and large-scale federal worker layoffs brought about by the Trump administration have had a direct impact on the HIV care workforce.
“Many dedicated public health leaders, including most of the HIV and infectious disease team who I worked with in my office at HHS have had their positions eliminated,” she said. “These hard-working civil servants went to work every single day to support the health and wellbeing of all Americans, including those living with HIV.”
She added, “And we know that there are shortages in HIV care. And it is so critical at this challenging time that we support you, the HIV care workforce.”
Many conference attendees said Magic Johnson played a leading role in boosting morale and spirit at the 2025 U.S. Conference on HIV/AIDS by his inspirational speech at the Sept. 5 plenary session.
Upon receiving a prolonged, standing ovation after being introduced as the next speaker, Johnson said, “When I think about 33 years living with HIV in a moment that changed my life forever. And what a blessing to be here 33 years later to tell that story at a time when there was only one drug.”
Johnson added, “Wow, and they said it probably is a death sentence for myself, and I had to wrap my arms around making the toughest decision I probably had to make in my life, which was to retire from the NBA.”
Among other things, Johnson said his doctors told him that while he was physically capable of continuing to play basketball, the stress of an 80-game season could impact his immune system and lower his T-cell count.

With the support of family, friends, and his community, Johnson said he miraculously survived the early days without a known fully effective HIV drug. And at the request of community activists, he agreed to speak out as a well-known figure and a person with HIV to inform “my community,” especially people of color, he said, about how to live with HIV and how uninfected people can lower their risk.
“But what I do, I adhere to my doctor. I take my meds. I work out, and then I love life and myself,” he said.
In response to the challenge facing people with HIV under the current political situation, Johnson said, “We got to pull ourselves together and continue this fight, because it’s important and we got to keep this at the forefront. Now, HIV and AIDS kind of slipped back. We got to bring it back up.”
Among other things, he said the nonprofit foundation he helped to form has “given away over $15 million” in grants to HIV/AIDS organizations. “And we will continue to do that because of the work you are doing.”
He received another thunderous applause and standing ovation upon the completion of his speech.
Phillips, who will succeed Kawata as NMAC’s CEO on Oct. 7, told the Washington Blade he believes this year’s U.S. Conference on HIV/AIDS was “extraordinary” under difficult circumstances.

“I think so, because this year we did this without a lot of federal support,” he said. “And many of the attendees – the federal government, HRSA, the Ryan White program told them they couldn’t use their grant funds to attend the conference, which was a shame.”
Phillips added, “But I think with a crowd of over 2,400, some people found a way to be here regardless and thought that it was important, and the topic was important enough. And I think our listening sessions, our workshops, our plenaries hopefully gave them what they needed to continue to be activated to serve people living with HIV. “
“And also gave them a sense of hope, especially in these dark times that we can continue to work to end the HIV epidemic,” he said.
National
House GOP seeks to cut all U.S. HIV prevention programs in 2026
‘A disastrous bill that will reignite HIV in the United States’

The Republican-controlled Appropriations Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives has released its Fiscal Year 2026 funding bill that calls for cutting funds for domestic HIV prevention, treatment, and care programs by at least $1.7 billion, which is an amount significantly greater than the AIDS budget cuts proposed by President Donald Trump.
Among other things, the bill, if passed by the full Congress, would eliminate federal funding for all HIV prevention programs in the U.S. as well as eliminate the Ending the HIV Epidemic Initiative program that Trump persuaded Congress to pass during his first term as president.
“This is not a bill for making America healthy again, but a disastrous bill that will reignite HIV in the United States,” said Carl Schmidt, executive director of the D.C. based HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute, in a Sept. 1 statement.
“We urge Congress to reject these reckless cuts,” Schmidt says in the statement. “Eliminating all HIV prevention means the end of state and local testing and surveillance programs, educational programs, and linkage to lifesaving care and treatment, along with PrEP,” the statement continues. “It will translate into an increased number of new HIV infections, which will be costlier to treat in the long run.”
It adds, “At a time when we have the tools to prevent HIV, including new long-acting forms of PrEP, we must not abandon the bipartisan progress our nation has made in combating HIV.”
The proposed bill by the House Appropriations Committee, which has not yet taken a full committee vote on the bill, would also cut the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Care and Treatment Program by $525 million or 20 percent.
The bill would eliminate the entire $1 billion in prevention funding at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including $220 million allocated to President Trump’s Ending the HIV Epidemic (EHE) initiative.
Schmidt points out that nearly 90 percent of this funding “flows to state and local health departments, including those in the South that do not have dedicated state funding and carry over half of HIV cases in the country.”
The House committee proposal supports the president’s budget proposal to eliminate $43 million in dedicated funding for hepatitis prevention at the CDC and instead proposes a $353 million block grant to states that would also include STD and tuberculosis prevention. This is $53 million more than the president proposed but still represents a combined cut of $24 million, Schmidt says in his statement.
“Instead of decreasing and diluting funding for hepatitis, if the country is serious about addressing chronic health conditions,” added Schmid, “we should be increasing funding so that people with hepatitis can be identified through testing and linked to treatment, and in the case of hepatitis C, a cure.”
The proposal by the House Appropriations Committees follows the U.S. Senate’s release earlier this year of a bipartisan FY 2026 budget bill that would maintain current funding for domestic HIV programs. If the House committee passes its proposed budget bill the budget provisions would have to be reconciled with the Senate version, and a reconciled version must then be passed by the full Congress.
National
Doctor who led mpox response resigns from CDC, slams administration
‘Unskilled manipulation of data to achieve a political end’

Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, resigned from his position on Wednesday in a scathing social media post.
“I am unable to serve in an environment that treats CDC as a tool to generate policies and materials that do not reflect scientific reality and are designed to hurt rather than to improve the public’s health.” Daskalakis wrote in a resignation letter he posted to X. “Having worked in local and national public health for years, I have never experienced such radical non-transparency, nor have I seen such unskilled manipulation of data to achieve a political end rather than the good of the American people.”
Daskalakis, who’s gay, was among three senior officials to resign following President Trump’s firing of CDC Director Susan Monarez. She is fighting her dismissal.
In 2022, Daskalakis drew praise from the LGBTQ community while serving as White House National Monkeypox Response Deputy Coordinator. Daskalakis previously served as medical director for the New York-headquartered Mount Sinai Health System and then was made deputy commissioner for the Division of Disease Control at the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. In late 2020, as the U.S. saw thousands of new covid fatalities each day, Daskalakis joined the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention.
In an exclusive interview with the Blade during the mpox crisis in 2022, he warned of the dangers of homophobic stigma.
“Stigma is stigma, and homophobia is homophobia,” Daskalakis said, and while these problems are older, more intractable, and broader in scope than public health messaging around MPV, it is important to not “attach an infection to an identity.”
“Stigmatizing a disease and creating stigma really creates rabbit holes that take people away from [figuring out] how to respond to an infectious disease — and the way that you respond to infectious diseases, the focus on community, the focus on knowledge, and the focus on data, which should act as a guidance” in getting messages to people, whether through online social platforms or other channels, he said.
Dr. Monarez, who only served in her job for one month, said she refused “to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives” and accused HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of “weaponizing public health.”
Dr. Monarez reportedly clashed with Kennedy over vaccines. The government announced earlier this week that healthy adults would not be eligible for a new COVID booster and instead only those 65 and older, children, and those with underlying medical conditions would be eligible for the new vaccine.
National
CVS Health withholds coverage for new HIV prevention drug
AIDS activists criticize delay for acclaimed twice-yearly PrEP medication

CVS Health, one of the nation’s largest pharmacy benefit manager companies that play a lead role in deciding which drugs are covered by health insurance plans, has initially decided not to approve coverage for the new HIV prevention drug Yeztugo
Developed and manufactured by the pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences, Yeztugo was approved for use in June of this year by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as an HIV prevention or PrEP medication that needs to be taken just twice a year by injection.
HIV prevention advocates hailed the new drug as a major breakthrough in the years long effort to curtail and end the HIV/AIDS epidemic by enabling far more people at risk for HIV infection to adhere to a prevention drug regimen that needed to be taken once every six months rather than daily pills or through bi-monthly injections.
But the same advocates warned that the benefits of Yeztugo, which tests showed is greater than 99 percent effective in preventing HIV infection, could not be realized if the cost of the drug is not covered by health insurance plans or other coverage programs.
At the time the FDA approved its drug, Gilead Sciences announced that the yearly retail price for Yeztugo without insurance coverage would be $26,218.
According to reports by Reuters and Bloomberg news publications, a CVS Health spokesperson disclosed on Aug. 21 that the company “for now” would not add Yeztugo to its commercial coverage plans.
“As is typical with new-to-market products, we undergo a careful review of clinical, financial, and regulatory considerations,” Bloomberg News quoted CVS spokesperson David Whitrap as saying. Bloomberg reports that Whitman added that Yeztugo hasn’t been added to CVS Caremark’s commercial drug plans or U.S. Affordable Care Act plans.
“The entire world is excited by this drug and its potential contribution to preventing and eventually ending HIV,” said Carl Schmid, executive director of the D.C.-based HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute. “However, a drug will only work if people can access it and right now CVS Health, which owns the largest pharmacy benefit manager in the country, is shamefully blocking people from taking it, unlike other payers,” Schmid said in a statement.
“We urge CVS, which has been committed to ending HIV in the past, to reconsider their decision immediately,” Schmid said. “Additionally, we call on federal and state regulators to ensure that plans are in compliance with the federal government’s PrEP coverage guidance and the many state laws that require coverage of all PrEP drugs.”
Gilead Sciences, meanwhile, has said it is “extremely pleased” with the progress it is making with other health insurance companies and “payers” to arrange for coverage of Yeztugo, according to Reuters. “[T]he company said it is on track to secure 75 percent of U.S. insurer coverage of Yeztugo by year-end, and 90 percent coverage by June 2026,” Reuters reports.
National
After targeting youth, state lawmakers now going after the rights of LGBTQ adults
Legislators are also teeing up challenges to same-sex marriage

The proliferation of anti-LGBTQ bills proposed by state legislatures across the country, which ticked up dramatically in 2021 and has since increased year-over-year, looks different in 2025.
Efforts that once focused on school sports and pediatric gender care have now broadened, as many advocates warned they would, to target adult life and the legal scaffolding of hard-won freedoms like same-sex marriage.
LGBTQ issues remain fraught political battlegrounds, but the fight has shifted to driver’s licenses, hospital policies, state-worker speech rules, and even marriage licenses — exposing these communities to greater risk of civil-rights violations.
This shift comes at a moment when legal avenues for challenging discrimination by state governments or the Trump-Vance administration have narrowed significantly, even as rhetorical and political attacks intensify.
The new types of bills
By the numbers, this year is shaping up to be the worst in recent memory. The ACLU tracked 520 anti-LGBTQ bills in 2023, 533 in 2024, and by February the organization had already logged 339, an accelerated pace for 2025.
Predictably, these legislative efforts are clustered in conservative places like Texas, where state lawmakers teed up 32 anti-trans bills on the first day of pre-filing for 2025, as GLAAD noted.
At the same time, however, the group reports that the year kicked off with similar activity in far bluer statehouses located in places like Massachusetts, Colorado, and New York.
The new crop of bills share some distinguishing features. For instance, Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, and Illinois are considering (or have enacted, in Alabama’s case) proposals to adopt restrictive definitions of sex and gender.
Not only does the establishment of a legal definition for gender based on a fixed binary that must be determined by one’s sex at birth exclude the recognition of people who are trans or have other gender diverse identities, but it also carries significant downstream impacts.
President Donald Trump has already demonstrated how this can work. Issued on the first day of his second term, his Executive Order 14168 recast “sex” across all federal policy as a fixed category that is limited to “male” or “female,” defined at “conception,” and unchangeable.
Pursuant to the order, the administration mandated that agencies replace all mention of “gender” with “sex,” strip gender self-identification options from passports, and halt funding for anything deemed “gender ideology,” including gender‑affirming care.
With respect to restrictions on gender markers on passports and official documents, the consequences for Americans who are not cisgender are far-reaching, touching areas of their lives from housing to employment and travel.
Georgia, meanwhile, previewed how conservative lawmakers can restrict guideline-directed best practices medical interventions for not just transgender youth, but adults as well, with a bill introduced this year that would bar coverage by state employees’ health benefits plans.
Georgia has also enacted a law prohibiting all gender-affirming care (hormones, surgeries, and even personal funding of such care) for incarcerated individuals in state prisons, which came after Trump’s executive order requiring the Bureau of Prisons to halt funding for these treatments and move trans women inmates into men’s facilities.
Broadened healthcare restrictions did not necessarily start this year, however. Florida passed a law in 2023, for example, that requires trans adults to receive in-person, state-approved informed consent for gender-affirming care, while banning nurse practitioners and telehealth delivery of such treatments, thereby limiting access for patients.
Following years of conservative activism focused on censoring pro-LGBTQ speech from schools — banning books and other materials with gay or trans characters or themes; restricting classroom instruction on matters of sexual orientation and gender identity — some states have taken a new tack in 2025: protecting anti-LGBTQ speech.
Once again, the scope of these efforts now extends beyond educational institutions and their focus is broadened from youth to youth and adults.
Montana’s Free to Speak Act, enacted in May, protects students and public employees from being disciplined for refusing to use a person’s preferred name or pronouns, establishing a private right of action allowing affected individuals to sue for injunctive relief, monetary damages, and attorney fees.
Lawmakers in Florida are going even further with a proposal that would bar public employers from requiring the use of trans individuals’ preferred pronouns, remove “nonbinary” as an option on state job applications, and make LGBTQ+ cultural competence training optional rather than mandatory.
Marriage equality under fire
On Monday, news outlets around the world reported on the return of Kim Davis. The thrice divorced former Kentucky county clerk has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear her case, which seeks to overturn the High Court’s precedent setting ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges that established marriage equality as the law of the land in 2015.
Some legal experts believe the gambit is a long shot. Others are less confident, pointing to the establishment of a 6-3 conservative supermajority in October 2020 and Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurring statement in the 2022 decision overturning abortion rights, where he expressed interest in revisiting the marriage decision.
In what may be a harbinger of another battle over same-sex marriage, or a sign that the matter was never settled in the first place, five states this year have considered non-binding resolutions asking the justices to overturn Obergefell: South Dakota, North Dakota, Idaho, Michigan, and Montana.
Other measures have been more concrete. In Tennessee and several other states, lawmakers introduced “covenant marriage” bills defining marriage as a union between “one male and one female” with heightened divorce restrictions — a move that would effectively exclude same-sex couples from that marital track. While none have yet been passed or enacted, they illustrate how legislatures can reshape marriage law without directly challenging Obergefell.
Such bills raise a potential clash with the Respect for Marriage Act, legislation passed during the Biden-Harris administration that requires states to recognize same-sex marriages performed elsewhere but does not require them to issue licenses.
District of Columbia
Trump’s federal takeover of D.C. police sparks outrage among LGBTQ leaders
Move threatens marginalized communities and undermines city’s autonomy

As President Donald Trump pushes forward with his takeover of the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department using federal agents, local LGBTQ leaders are sounding the alarm.
Trump on Monday invoked Section 740 of the D.C. Home Rule Act to “declare a crime emergency” in the District and began sending 800 National Guard troops to patrol the nation’s capital.
Multiple leaders in the District have criticized Trump for using misleading statistics to justify this power grab, one that will disproportionately impact Black, brown, and LGBTQ residents.
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser initially tried to reframe Trump’s takeover as something that could benefit the District, saying to “make the most of the additional officer support that we have” during a Tuesday meeting with Attorney General Pam Bondi. She later began to backtrack on that statement.
“This is a time where community needs to jump in and we all need to, to do what we can in our space, in our lane, to protect our city and to protect our autonomy, to protect our Home Rule, and get to the other side of this guy, and make sure we elect a Democratic House so that we have a backstop to this authoritarian push,” Bowser said in a virtual meeting with local leaders later that day.
One of those local leaders, Ward 5 Council member Zachary Parker, called the Trump administration’s claims of “bloodthirsty criminals” and “roving mobs of wild youth” unsubstantiated and a distraction from “the bigger game in motion.”
In two separate Instagram posts, Parker — the District’s only openly LGBTQ Council member — called the move more about Trump “flexing” his power over a Democratic stronghold than fixing any issues of crime.
“The suggestion that crime is out of control is not supported by data,” Parker wrote Tuesday on his personal account, citing Department of Justice data from earlier this year showing the president’s claims are unsubstantiated. “Violent crime hit a 30-year low in 2024,” he continued, citing Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) data showing a 26% decrease in violent crime in the past year alone.
In another post, Parker called the tactic by the Trump administration a stark move that echoes the dictatorial takeovers of history.
“The raids today from those in power are derivatives of the instruments of power that have policed neighborhoods since the ’70s,” his second post said. “The ploy to seize capitals and collapse power traces back to colonial times and, more recently, Hungary and Turkey.”
The D.C. LGBTQ Budget Coalition, comprised of multiple organizations and advocates that fight for resources supporting LGBTQ residents — including trans people of color, low-income individuals, those with disabilities, and migrants — called this an “attack on D.C. autonomy.”
“This is a blatant violation of D.C.’s right to self-govern and a dangerous escalation rooted in political theater, not public safety,” the coalition’s official statement read. “We stand with local community leaders and other advocates fighting for D.C. to be free (including our evergreen fight for statehood), and all who reject this federal overreach… This move is not about safety, but about control and fear.”
The statement also echoed Council member Parker’s point that both federal and local data show a decline in violent crime despite massive budget cuts to the city prompted by Trump.
“Crime is down — the data is clear. And any attempts to combat the District’s issues were directly thwarted during the federal budget battles that forced our government to cut $1 billion from the local budget.”
The letter, sent to coalition members and supporters, explicitly called these actions anti-LGBTQ and anti-people of color.
“This kind of horrific federal overreach will inevitably cause the most irrevocable harm to our Black, brown, immigrant, and LGBTQ+ siblings — communities who already bear the brunt of systemic violence, over-policing, and underinvestment,” the email said.
“As LGBTQ+ advocates working to ensure equitable investment in our communities, we know that safety comes from housing, healthcare, and justice — and we will not demonize those most vulnerable in this city.”
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