Former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan died last Wednesday at the age of 92. Other than a brief mention in LAist, readers of his Los Angeles Times obituary and other remembrances might have no clue about the profound impact this rich, white, old, moderate Republican had on LA’s LGBTQ community and how many lives he helped save during the height of the Second Wave of AIDS.
I covered Riordan’s 1993 mayoral race against LA City Councilmember Mike Woo and was shocked to learn that not everyone in the lesbian and gay community supported the strong Democratic ally who represented Silver Lake and other gay strongholds in the city.
The beginning of 1993 was full of promise. LA-based ANGLE (Access Now to Gay and Lesbian Equality), with the strong leadership of gay political consultant David Mixner, had just organized the fi rst-ever gay voting bloc to elect Mixner’s friend Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton as President of the United States.
Clinton had promised an AIDS Czar and funding for AIDS research, plus he’d lift the ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the US military and would sign the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). Two years earlier, in 1991, as a nod to the emerging radical Republican right led by Congressmember Newt Gingrich, California Gov. Pete Wilson had vetoed AB 101, a state gay civil rights bill he’d promised to sign. LGBTQs and allies protested en masse for two weeks.
At the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation on April 25, we celebrated Clinton’s victory and the belief that the end of AIDS — the end of all the endless dying — was near. Earlier, Clinton posed with a handful of lesbian and gay leaders in the Oval Offi ce holding “Conduct Unbecoming,” Randy Shilts’ signed book about gays in the military presented by Torie Osborn.
We had reason for optimism.
But while Richard Riordan seemed very nice with his broad smile and humorously awkward mangled syntax, he was still a Republican. Pete Wilson had proven that using “moderate” before the party affi liation was simply a Trojan Horse. Plus, Riordan’s law fi rm, Riordan & McKinzie, represented Cardinal Roger Mahoney’s Catholic archdiocese, a target of ACT UP/LA. It was almost inconceivable that LA — as torn up as it was by the riots sparked by the not guilty verdict for four LAPD cops videotaped beating the crap out of motorist Rodney King — would elect a Republican after 20 years of the beloved Democratic Mayor Tom Bradley.
And then I was introduced to Mike Keeley, an out gay Democrat who was a highly regarded partner in Riordan’s law fi rm, personal friend, and advisor on gay is-
sues.
Keeley introduced me to others who backed Riordan –as did the then-mostly-moderate Log Cabin Republicans. Riordan, we were promised, judged people on their merits, and touted his version of conservative Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater’s phrase about gays in the military: “It’s not whether you’re straight or gay — it’s whether you shoot straight.” The stance was greatly appreciated after so many of us felt betrayed when six months into his presidency, Clinton announced the horrid “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy and the witch hunts intensifi ed.
ecutive Director Lorri Jean; and he attended LGBT and AIDS events, including hanging out at a Project Angel Food benefi t with people with AIDS such as Aileen Getty. Riordan’s grandest progressive move was literally lifesaving. After talking with advisors such as ANGLE’s Dr. Scott Hitt — chair of the President’s AIDS Advisory Council — and learning about the spread of HIV/AIDS through IV drug use, Riordan found a way around California state law prohibiting the sale and use of drug paraphernalia. On Sept. 6, 1994, Riordan declared a state of emergency that enabled LA City AIDS Coordinator Ferd Eggan and other city offi cials to work with and fund privately-run healthcare programs such as Clean Needles Now.
By declaring an emergency to combat HIV/AIDS in the nation’s second largest city, Riordan circumvented conservative Republican Attorney General Dan Lungren and Republican Governor Pete Wilson, who had already vetoed two clean needle exchange bills, despite CDC and other studies showing the spread of HIV/AIDS through shared dirty needles. Riordan ordered LAPD Chief Willie Williams to tell offi cers who hung out near known CNN exchange areas and nabbed suspected drug users to prioritize other criminal activities.
Riordan also had good answers when I peppered him with questions, including a promise to ride in the Christopher Street West Pride Parade. Former Mayor Bradley had only ridden once.
He kept that promise, accompanied by LA City Councilmember Joel Wachs, who, despite being closeted, had pressed for anti-gay and anti-AIDS discrimination laws and supported recruitment, hiring and promotion of out lesbians, gays and bisexuals in the LAPD.
During his two terms as mayor, Riordan went beyond expectations and helped renew our faith in America just a tad — appointing Keeley as LA’s fi rst out gay deputy mayor; appointing Art Mattox as LA’s fi rst out gay LAPD police commissioner; contributing to and riding the last leg of the fi rst California AIDS Ride, a fundraiser for the LA Gay & Lesbian Community Services Center run by Ex-
But Riordan’s emergency order went beyond the city of Los Angeles. I interviewed LA County Sheriff Sherman Block — who was elected, not appointed — and he said that he, too, issued a department-wide memorandum telling deputies they had “higher priorities” than making needle exchange citations and arrests. (Interestingly, the Jewish Republican Sheriff was willing to stand up to the Republican state leadership and smudge the law since the Board of Supervisors did not issue a similar emergency order – but, as he told out Adelphia cable host and close Riordan friend Bill Rosendahl, Block would not provide condoms and AIDS education in jails since that would be a tacit admission that sex happened in jails.)
To be clear — there was much with which many LGBT folks could disagree with Richard Riordan. But when it mattered at a peak in the AIDS pandemic before the miraculous triple drug cocktail, Riordan appointed out lesbian and gay people to powerful posts, lifted up and participated in LGBT visibility, and most importantly, saved lives by putting healthcare above politics.
While mainstream media may ignore us with the usual benign neglect, it is incumbent upon our own LGBTQ and HIV/AIDS communities to recognize the historic advances the late mayor made in helping us strive towards full equality.
(This article was previously published on Facebook and is republished by permission.)
Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey P. Horvath (3rd District) is on a mission to end homelessness in Los Angeles County. She represents 10 cities and 26 unincorporated communities from West Hollywood to Malibu, Topanga to Chatsworth, and Pacoima to Santa Monica. Her district spans 446.08 square miles and is plagued by homelessness.
There are approximately 69,144 homeless people within the county, and that number is on the rise. 75% of those unhoused individuals do not have any form of permanent housing and are forced to wander from place to place, fi nding or making shelter wherever they can.
Six out of 10 of these unhoused individuals are newly homeless – a refl ection of the inequity between rising home prices and stagnant income levels that have left so many in California unable to make ends meet.
In January of this year, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors declared a state of emergency for the homeless crisis.
jurisdictions. She is behind several initiatives aimed at increasing interim and permanent housing placements by working in more streamlined collaboration with local partners and stakeholders.
To further ensure her dream of ending the homeless crisis, Horvath placed herself on the Board of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA), “to hold them accountable for getting the funding and resources that are needed in the community, and they are delivered directly on the ground,” she noted.
LAHSA is the lead agency for the Los Angeles Continuum of Care, the regional planning body that coordinates housing and services for homeless families and individuals in the County. LAHSA coordinates and manages over $800 million annually in federal, state, county, and city funds for programs that provide shelter, housing, and services to people experiencing homelessness.
LAHSA says that over the past fi ve years, the agency and its partners have made 84,000 permanent housing placements–enough to fi ll Dodger Stadium one and a half times. Last year alone, the rehousing system made 21,213 placements.
When asked whether there is any space in her district for the tiny home communities popularized by media as a quaint and convenient solution to housing the unhoused, Horvath said that tiny homes are not her preferred method of ending this crisis.
“There are some tiny homes that have popped up in the valley. I will say they are not everyone’s favorite form of solving this crisis. Some communities prefer not to have tiny homes, and I think that given the magnitude of the problem that we are trying to solve, I would rather implement solutions that are more scalable,” she said.
“There have also been some safety issues raised with tiny homes. I think we have seen, not even just in Los Angeles but in places throughout the country, that have tried to use this as a solution.
that provides individuals experiencing homelessness with essential tools necessary to stabilize their lives, secure income, and fi nd permanent housing.
“We were able to use modular construction that allows houses to be constructed more cost-eff ectively in a timely fashion,” Horvath said of the 51-unit, 5-story development consisting of 50 fully furnished studio units and 1 two-bedroom management unit. The development is targeted toward seniors and senior veterans (55+) who are formerly homeless.
“The declaration has allowed us to do two things,” Horvath told The Blade. “First, we were able to accelerate hiring. We learned that in the Department of Mental Health, for example, it can take longer than a year for mental health professionals to be hired into the department. That is completely unacceptable. We need to hire people faster to do this work.
“Second, we were also able to expedite contracting. We learned from LAHSA that a contract could be touched up to 140 times before it is fi nally executed, and funding is able to reach service providers. Obviously, that is unacceptable. We are improving our contracting processes.”
The services Horvath are most concerned with are stable housing, access to mental health care, and providing economic opportunities to the underprivileged.
Horvath’s encampment resolution seeks to reduce unsheltered homelessness in partnership with local
“We also often see when people are placed in interim housing like a tiny home, they fi nd that they are in that housing solution longer than they expected. Tiny homes are not intended to be long-term solutions. They are supposed to be an interim place to get people off the streets and then into permanent supportive housing. It’s challenging to provide the supportive services that people need at a tiny home development. The wraparound services are what help people to stay off the streets. We want to stand up housing developments that accommodate the kinds of needs and services that people expect when they are coming off the streets and dealing with issues that have impacted them big homeless.”
Horvath explained that she prefers modular housing to tiny homes. This modular housing concept was used for a new development for veterans at 11010 Santa Monica Boulevard in West Los Angeles in conjunction with the Weingart Foundation.
The Weingart Center is a 501(c)(3) nonprofi t agency
In an eff ort to stop people from losing their homes due to COVID and economic hardship, Horvath and the Board of Supervisors are working with the Department of Consumer and Business Aff airs in the Principal Assistance Program, making sure that property owners who might be landlords, or, as the Supervisor put it, “Mom and Pop-style landlords” get the services that they need.
“We set up rental assistance programs for tenants and landlords to access so we are able to keep people and housing that they otherwise could not aff ord,” said Horvath.
Given the new laws attempting to outlaw the existence of the LGBTQ+ community in many Republican-controlled red states across America, young LGBTQ+ people fl ock to places like Los Angeles with little to no resources to avoid being persecuted for their identities.
When asked how the she intends to deal with the infl ux of homeless LGBTQ youth pouring into LGBTQ+ safe havens like Los Angeles, Horvath told the Blade that she is prepared to welcome them with open arms.
“We tackled this challenge a lot when I was the Mayor of West Hollywood. We saw a lot of people come to West Hollywood for exactly this reason, and we know that that is not unique to West Hollywood. It’s happening throughout Los Angeles County, so we are already providing those services to those who need them. Anyone who comes to our area will be met with support and care.”
‘We need to make sure we are better using the resources that we have’Los Angeles County Supervisor LINDSEY P. HORVATH (3rd District) (Photo Credit: County of Los Angeles) (Photo courtesy County of Los Angeles)
Horvath also shared that she is looking forward to Pride month as another way to show her support for the LGBTQ+ community. She has co-authored a motion to have the Pride fl ag fl own all over Los Angeles County during the month of June.
“We are very excited to be making sure that our support of the LGBTQ+ community is strong and visible,” said Horvath.
Horvath’s initiatives supply mental health and substance use disorder services to unsheltered and sheltered persons by coordinating fi eld-based services and reducing wait times.
“We must lead countywide with a system of care that supports and keeps people safe,” said Horvath. “I initiated my city’s request to have dedicated Mental Evaluation Teams (MET), which combine a clinically-trained social worker with a public safety professional to respond to relevant calls. I support further investment in behavioral health response teams for relevant calls, as well as coordinated responses with public safety professionals when needed.
“We must invest in establishing teams to meet people where they are with the relevant support and resources they need – including mental health services, addiction recovery, and job training – instead of leaving them to face the challenges of navigating through an endless bureaucratic process on their own. We must invest in solutions that take into account the root causes, rather than wastefully spending more public dollars without solving the foundational problems.”
Horvath also stressed that Los Angeles has historically used “redlining,” or racially and economically discriminatory practices, to stop the underprivileged from receiving services and care. Horvath explained that these practices have created pockets of poverty resulting from a lack of resources and economic opportunity.
“We need to overcome that history of redlining and racist development by connecting our communities, literally. We can do this through systems like our metro system, which is why I am particularly excited about the
Crenshaw Northern extension connecting communities.”
According to metro.net, the Crenshaw Northern Extension project will fi ll a major gap in the Metro Rail network and create opportunities by connecting the Crenshaw District (a historically underprivileged Black-majority district), Mid-City, West Hollywood, and Hollywood.
Horvath pointed out that this would link Angelenos to health care services like Cedar-Sinai, and the various medical services on Olympic Boulevard.
“We also want to be making sure that we are bringing services and support directly into each and every community,” said Horvath. “So, making sure that we are bringing the County outside of itself to downtown and out into the neighborhoods where services and support are really needed.”
Horvath plans to “meet people where they are,” meaning there will be more diversity hiring so that care can be culturally relatable to those in need.
“We need to make sure that we are investing in communities where help is needed the most. We need to make sure that we are providing culturally competent services and care, so whether that is language appropriate, whether it is making sure that people are getting services from people who look like them and who have similar lived experiences as them, we need to expand the kind of services and support that we provide to make sure that we are supporting everyone where they are in their communities.
“We need to expand and intentionally hire some communities that have typically been left out of services like mental health care services and like the supportive social services that so many communities need, but often those opportunities have been limited to people who are already in certain communities, or who have been given certain opportunities. We need to break through and do better.”
When asked to name some communities where help is needed most, Horvath responded that communities in the San Fernando Valley and economically distressed areas like Pacoima and Sylmar have reached out, stating that they have felt unfairly left out of the type of care she is committed to spreading throughout the County.
“We also know that even in some of our wealthy Westside LA areas, there are still people who are struggling
with poverty and with the aff ordability crisis that we all face, so we need to make sure that even in wealthy communities, or perceived wealthy communities, people who are struggling and need help get it.”
Horvath is also behind the County’s Economic Opportunity Grant Program (EOG) for small and micro businesses as well as nonprofi ts. EOG will award more than $54 million across 6,800 grants to organizations in Los Angeles County adversely aff ected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
For those seeking career guidance and help, LA County’s America’s Job Center off ers free job training and career counseling, paid work experience, layoff aversion, and other employment resources.
LA County’s Homeless Initiative Budget is currently a $600 million proposed budget for 2023-2024. The stated goals for the budget are:
• Reducing encampments to bring unsheltered people indoors
• Increasing interim and permanent housing placements
• Ramping up mental health and substance use disorder services for people experiencing homelessness.
Horvath is dedicated to tracking the allotted budget so that funds are received and used appropriately and eff ectively.
“What I think we need to do is make sure we are better using the resources that we have by not investing in solutions we know do not deliver the results,” Horvath told The Blade. “We really need to be holding ourselves accountable to tracking how investments are delivered. We are so focused on getting people off the street that we are not always clear about the long-term impact we have. We need to follow people through the system to make sure they are staying in housing and make sure they stay off the streets.”
The $609.7 million represents an additional $61.8 million over last year’s allocation of $547.8 million, an increase of 11%. It includes funding for:
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• Wraparound supportive services for 22,130 permanent supportive housing (PSH) units, expanding the total inventory by 4,630 units, the County’s largest ever year-over-year increase. • PSH serves people who have the most complex needs, including chronic medical and/or behavioral health conditions.
• More than $60 million in time-limited rental subsidies to quickly house people who have recently become homeless and off er them services until they can gradually take on the rent themselves.
• 5,029 interim housing beds to bring people indoors from encampments as quickly as possible. This is in addition to about 20,000 beds funded by LAHSA, local jurisdictions, and other County programs overseen by the Departments of Health Services, Mental Health, and Public Health, among Increased homelessness prevention measures, including a ten-fold increase in funding for “problem solving,” which helps people identify viable temporary or permanent housing and other resources.
• A 40% increase in funding for programs to help people gain stability as they secure housing. These can include services to help them secure benefi ts they’re eligible for, as well as employment and income support.
The plan to reduce homelessness also relies on deepening collaboration with local jurisdictions, including the County’s 88 cities and local Councils of Governments (COGs). This budget includes $25.5 million to work with
local jurisdictions to resolve encampments and co-invest in housing.
In addition to the FY 2023-24 budget of $609.7 million, the Board also approved $76.9 million to fund:
• A newly established ongoing Local Solutions Fund (LSF) that can be tapped by cities and COGs to help people move out of encampments and into housing in collaboration with the County. This year’s allocation is $20 million.
• An additional $5 million for the Cities and COGs Interim Housing Fund (CCOGIHS), which builds on an existing $10 million investment. Last year’s CCOGIHS allocation has already been awarded to seven projects so far to fund supportive ser-
vices at interim housing sites.
• The Skid Row Action Plan, which aims to comprehensively address the needs of residents in Skid Row, includes interim and permanent housing, behavioral health and substance use treatment services, and more.
• The “Every Woman Housed” program, which is specifi cally designed to end homelessness for women and families residing on Skid Row.
• The RV Encampment program, which is committed to annually assist 300 people living in recreational vehicles to fi nd safer housing solutions and to dismantle inoperable RVs.
• Specialized outreach to people camped in high-severity fi re zones in unincorporated areas of the County.
ANAHEIM – In a unexpected twist, the massive fire-breathing Maleficent’s animatronic dragon prop literally exploded in flames last Saturday night at Disneyland during the last performance of the Fantasmic nighttime water and fireworks show held on the Rivers of America on Tom Sawyer Island.
Multiple videos shared on social media by park goers shows flames first igniting from the dragon’s face before spreading to the rest of its body fully engulfing it quickly spewing heavy thick smoke into the air. Several videos also show Disneyland cast members evacuating crowds out of the waterfront viewing area and nearby attractions as responding Anaheim Fire & Rescue firefighters worked to extinguish the fire.
“During the final showing of Fantasmic at Disneyland park on Saturday evening, the dragon caught fire,” a spokesperson for Disney Parks, Experiences and Products, Inc. explained in a statement. “Anaheim Fire & Rescue quickly responded and the fire was extinguished. All cast members were evacuated from Tom Sawyer Island. Due to smoke and wind, attractions near the island were safely cleared of any guests, and the cause of the fire remains under investigation at this time.”
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During the LGBTQ Victory Fund’s National Champagne Brunch Sunday morning in Washington, D.C., the Washington Blade spoke with Fabian Nelson, a Black and gay Democratic candidate who could become the first out LGBTQ lawmaker ever to serve in the Mississippi Legislature.
Nelson will square off against two opponents from his party in the Aug. 8 primary. If successful, he would face a general election on Nov. 7, an easier gambit provided the seat to represent Mississippi’s 66th House District is solidly Democratic, Nelson said.
Notwithstanding his electoral prospects, Nelson acknowledged the challenges with racism and homophobia that he has continued to contend with as a candidate, along with the hostile political environment in which he would serve if elected. Still, he is optimistic about the trajectory of his campaign and for the potential to move Mississippi in a better direction.
“I come from a family of a lot of ‘firsts,’” Nelson said. His grandfather opened a bank in the early 1900s for Black residents of his hometown, while his grandmother was the first Black nurse to integrate the hospital in Yazoo City and his father was the first Black graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University’s dental school.
“They keep raising the bar, so I have to raise it a little bit higher,” he said.
Mississippi has a Republican trifecta as well as a Republican triplex, which means the party exerts tremendous political power with control over both chambers of the state’s legislature and the governorship, along with the offices of the secretary of state and attorney general.
If elected, Nelson would represent residents of Mississippi’s majority-Black state capital, Jackson – which has long suffered with issues like high poverty rates and rising crime, including gun violence.
Years of poor governance have exacerbated these problems, while the state’s conservative legislators have used the city’s condition as a pretext to strip residents of the right to choose their elected leaders.
Nelson has an expansive range of policy areas that he said will be major priorities should he win the House seat, from expanding Mississippi’s Medicaid program to fighting back against the conservatives’ disenfranchisement of his constituents in Jackson and their harmful anti-LGBTQ legislative proposals.
During Mississippi’s first legislative session of 2023, lawmakers considered 31 anti-LGBTQ bills, more than were introduced anywhere else in the country.
Nelson, who was involved in advocacy against these legislative proposals as a member of the Human Rights Campaign, noted the importance of mobilizing the public’s opposition to anti-equality bills in helping to defeat 30 of those 31 proposals that failed to pass in the last session.
Unfortunately, Nelson said, the lone bill that survived was perhaps the most harmful of those under consideration in the chamber – a measure barring access to guideline di-
rected gender affirming health care interventions for youth in Mississippi with gender dysphoria, which the governor signed into law in late February.
It was a major blow, Nelson acknowledged. At the same time, he said, pushing back more effectively against Republican messaging on the healthcare ban, such as by framing its proponents as politicians who are trying to “play doctor,” may have yielded a different outcome.
Nelson is not just encountering anti-LGBTQ bigotry in the legislative context, but also that which has been directed at him personally as a gay candidate for public office in a deep-red state in the Deep South. Especially in Mississippi and among older folks in the state, homophobia can come from voters and elected officials even from his own party, Nelson said.
“I think [my] being LGBTQ may pose a problem with some of the Democratic lawmakers” in the chamber, he said.
Nelson told the Blade one of his supporters, an 80-yearold Jackson resident whom he affectionately calls “Miss Emma,” was approached by a Democratic opponent who asked her, “How do you feel about [Nelson] being gay with his [LGBTQ] agenda?”
“All these years, I’ve voted for straight people,” Nelson said she told him. “None of them came and picked my garbage up or cleaned my flowerbed out.”
Following the city government’s shutdown of trash hauling services earlier this month, Nelson said he had personally been picking up and disposing of garbage for Miss Emma along with Jackson’s other elderly or disabled residents.
Nelson said effectuating real change is possible when pro-equality candidates run for office, fight for their constituents, establish relationships with colleagues on both sides of the aisle, and communicate effectively with the public about what is (and is not) happening in the Capitol building to encourage more active civic engagement and strengthen political organizing efforts.
Nelson’s campaign comes amid the scandal over the GOP-led Tennessee House of Representatives’ expulsion of two Black Democratic lawmakers from the chamber, which was widely denounced as racially motivated.
Meanwhile, over the Mississippi border into Alabama, the state’s Republican Gov. Kay Ivey last week ousted the Black director of early childhood education, Barbara Cooper, for including teaching on concepts like inclusion and structural racism.
Asked how he expects to contend with racism in the chamber if elected, Nelson said conflict can be minimized
and discussions made more productive in many cases by practicing active listening so those with different views feel heard.
“You don’t have to be the loudest one in the room to make an impact” he said, so long as you are “standing your ground when it comes to bad legislation and, you know, standing my ground and fighting for what I believe in, not backing down.”
Engaging members of the public and bringing them into the fold is another crucial tool, Nelson said. He pointed to the public outcry in Tennessee and across the country that led voters to return state Reps. Justin Pearson and Justin Jones to their democratically elected seats in the legislature.
Residents in Jackson were not only deprived by their government of garbage collection services, but also suffered the near collapse of the city’s water system, prompting the U.S. Department of Justice to step in with a lawsuit last year on behalf of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Civil Rights.
Meanwhile, rising crime in Jackson and calls for an increased police presence created the pretext for Mississippi’s Republican lawmakers to pass H.B. 1020, legislation that will allow conservative state officials to appoint, rather than allowing constituents to elect, judges and prosecutors in the city’s sprawling Capitol Complex Improvement District.
They will serve alongside a Capitol Police force whose jurisdiction was expanded despite the department’s officers having shot four citizens since last August with little explanation or accountability.
News that the governor signed H.B. 1020 into law last week had instigated protests, by which point Nelson said it was already too late. He said the time to rally opposition among voters, which would have first required effectively reaching them with information about how the law would strip them of political power and autonomy to pick their elected officials, was immediately after Republican lawmakers had introduced it.
“If you have the citizens, the people, in your corner,” he said, “you cannot lose when you start exposing this bad stuff that’s happening.”
“And one more thing,” Nelson said, pointing to a pin on the lapel of his jacket, “this is our new state flag.”
Four years ago, amid considerable pressure from the public, the GOP-controlled legislature made the extraordinary decision to replace Mississippi’s state flag that had flown since 1894, which depicted the Confederate battle flag in its upper left canton.
The new banner features a white magnolia blossom befitting of the state’s official nickname.
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris formally announced plans to run for reelection on Tuesday, sharing a video on Twitter along with a press release naming members of the campaign leadership team.
As the video displayed images from the Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol, Biden warned that “MAGA extremists” are “dictating what health care decisions women can make, banning books, and telling people who they can love.”
“That’s why I’m running for reelection,” the president said.
“Because I know America. I know we are good and decent people. And I know we are still a country that believes in honesty and respect, and treating each other with dignity. That we’re a nation where we give hate no safe harbor. And we believe that everyone is equal, and that everyone should be given a fair shot to succeed in this country.”
Senior Biden adviser Julie Chávez Rodríguez was tapped to run the campaign. She was previously White House Director of Intergovernmental Affairs and deputy campaign manager for Biden and Harris in the 2020 race.
A granddaughter of labor rights icon Cesar Chávez and longtime Democratic aide, Chávez is the highest-ranking Latina serving in the White House.
Quentin Fulks, who just ran the first successful Democratic Senatorial reelection bid in Georgia in more than 30 years with U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.)’s 2022 midterm victory, will serve as principal deputy campaign manager for the 2024 Biden-Harris ticket.
Formerly deputy campaign manager and senior political adviser to Democratic Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, Fulks has worked for organizations like the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and EMILY’s List.
Former Assistant White House Press Secretary Kevin Muñoz, who oversaw the administration’s messaging for key public health issues like COVID-19, will lead media relations for the campaign. He previously served on Biden’s transition team and 2020 campaign.
National co-chairs for the campaign include U.S. Reps. Lisa Blunt-Rochester (D-Del.), Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) and Veronica Es-
cobar (D-Texas), along with U.S. Sens. Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and producer/media mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg, a top Democratic donor.
GLAAD President Sarah Kate Ellis issued a statement in response to the announcement: “LGBTQ Americans’ safety is under attack in statehouses across the country, as extremists on the U.S. Supreme Court, federal judiciary and gerrymandered states continue to strip human rights vital to everyone’s future,” she said.
“Essential health care, book bans, and access to society as our authentic selves should never be up for debate but they are on the ballot in 2024. GLAAD will once again be tracking the records and rhetoric of candidates in order to educate LGBTQ people and our allies as they head to the polls.”
On Monday, Biden criticized elected Republican officials for the increasingly widespread practice of banning books from America’s schools and libraries in prepared remarks delivered from the White House.
Addressing an audience gathered in the Rose Garden for the Council of Chief State School Officers’ Teachers of the Year event, the president said, “Empty shelves don’t help kids learn very much,” adding, “I’ve never met a parent who wants a politician dictating what their kid can learn, and what they can think, or who they can be.”
By framing these policies as government overreach, Biden co-opted and repurposed the “parental rights” language commonly used by conservatives advocating for book bans.
For example, right-wing activists often argue that requiring schools and libraries to allow interested parties to review the materials made available to minors and lodge complaints with anything they may find objectionable rightfully restores the rights of parents to exercise more control over how their children are educated.
According to PEN America, however, the first half of the 2022-2023 school year has seen at least 1,477 attempts to ban 874 individual book titles, disproportionately targeting materials that include LGBTQ characters or themes or those that ad-
dress issues of racial justice.
Explicitly targeting these materials for censorship are elected officials like Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and his conservative allies in the state legislature, who last week expanded the controversial “Don’t Say Gay” law (officially known as the Parental Rights in Education Act), which Biden has called “hateful.”
Critics have long argued the law, which will now cover all grade levels in Florida’s public schools, uses overly broad language with the specter of many different enforcement mechanisms to create a chilling effect designed to discourage teachers and staff from offering affirming messages to LGBTQ students or from serving openly if they themselves are LGBTQ.
“By opening the door to arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement against speech that favors or promotes the inclusion and acceptance of LGBTQ+ individuals,” the American Bar Association wrote, “the law arguably runs afoul of the First Amendment’s stringent prohibition on viewpoint discrimination and imposes an unconstitutional chilling effect on disfavored speech.”
CHRISTOPHER KANE
Flanked by four guests from Showtime’s “The L Word,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre began Tuesday’s briefing with comments commemorating Lesbian Visibility Week and addressing issues related to LGBTQ representation.
The first out LGBTQ press secretary expressed how important it is for “so many people in the community” to “see diverse narratives that reflect their lives,” recalling how she had “felt alone and often invisible” when growing up as “a young queer woman of color” in New York.
Jean-Pierre underlined the importance of this work in the current moment “as the LGBTQIA+ community continues to face relentless attacks.”
From “book bans to ‘Don’t Say Gay’ laws, MAGA extremists want to roll back the visibility and progress we fought so hard to achieve,” she said.
Hours earlier, in his long awaited video announcing plans to run for re-election in 2024, President Joe Biden used similar
language — warning voters that “MAGA extremists” are “dictating what health care decisions women can make, banning books and telling people who they can love.”
After addressing LGBTQ Americans to repeat the promise
that the Biden-Harris administration “has their back,” JeanPierre thanked the guests for their work on “The L Word” and turned the podium over for remarks by the show’s co-creator, writer and executive producer, Ilene Chaiken.
“We learned by the beautiful response to our show how profoundly important it is for people, particularly young people, to see themselves reflected in our entertainment culture and to know that they’re embraced, valued and not alone,” Chaiken said.
“We’re galvanized by President Biden’s leadership, from strengthening non-discrimination protections for our communities to signing the Respect for Marriage Act into law to supporting LGBTQI kids and their parents,” she said.
Calling Biden “the most pro-LGBTQI president in our history,” Chaiken concluded her comments by thanking him “for giving us the first out lesbian press secretary, who represents hope and possibility for so many people.”
CHRISTOPHER KANEDozens of LGBTQ and intersex rights activists gathered outside the Ugandan embassy in Northwest D.C. on Tuesday and demanded President Yoweri Museveni not sign his country’s Anti-Homosexuality Act.
The protesters chanted “Museveni, hear us now, we are queer and trans and proud” and “human rights, not hate. Museveni kill the bill” as they stood in front of the embassy on 16th Street, N.W., near Military Road.
Health GAP (Global Access Project)
Executive Director Asia Russell, Prevention Access Campaign Global Policy
Advocacy Director Michael Ighodaro, Treatment Action Group Government Relations and Policy Associate Kendall Martinez-Wright and Green Leadership Trust Executive Director Emira Woods spoke. Human Rights Campaign Senior International Policy Associate Andrea Gillespie and RFK Human Rights Senior Vice President of Programs and Legal Strategy Wade McMullen, Council for Global Equality Policy Advocate Ian Lekus and Planned Parenthood Federation of America Senior Director of Global Communications Crister DelaCruz are among those who attended the protest.
“We are here today because there is a rising tide of hate that has come from the U.S., exported by religious fundamentalists to countries like Uganda and beyond,” said Russell. “On March 21, Uganda’s Parliament passed a hateful bill that was co-authored with fundamentalist evangelicals in the United States.”
Russell specifically mentioned Family Watch International, an Arizona-based group the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated as a hate group.
“That hatred, which is profoundly un-Ugandan, profoundly un-African, is now threatening the lives of millions of people in Uganda and beyond: People who are queer, trans, people
who are defending basic freedoms and liberties, the people who queer people love, their families and essentially everybody who loves freedom in the country of Uganda,” said Russell.
“LGBTQ, trans individuals in Uganda and various parts of Africa and also here in the United States of America are experiencing flat out hate. We come here today to take a stand and to denounce this death sentence. We take a stand for all African LGBTQIA+ individuals in Uganda, from the small villages to the big city of Kampala to tell President Museveni enough is enough.”
Martinez-Wright noted the Anti-Homosexuality Act “will hamper the already struggling efforts in terms of eradicating HIV.” Martinez-Wright also said “LGBTQ, trans individuals in Uganda and various parts of Africa and also here in the United States of America are experiencing flat out hate.”
“We come here today to take a stand and to denounce this death sentence,” said Martinez-Wright. “We take a stand for all African LGBTQIA+ individuals in Uganda, from the small villages to the big city of Kampala to tell President Museveni enough is enough.”
Ighodaro and Woods echoed Martinez-Wright.
“We’re here to say no to Uganda and Museveni,” said Woods, who is from Liberia. “We’re here today to say no to the forces that are running for office at local and national levels in the United States.”
“We are here to say no to the U.K. and the U.S. foreign aid that has also propped up the very anti-homophobic groups that are behind and pushing this legislation in Uganda, in Kenya, in Liberia, in the United States,” added Woods. “We say no to this global fight to turn back the clock.”
Protests also took place in New York, London, New Delhi and
other cities around the world as part of an “Emergency Day of Action” against the Anti-Homosexuality Act that, among other things, would impose the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality” and require Ugandans to report LGBTQ-specific activities to authorities.
“As an organization committed to strengthening and advancing sexual and reproductive health care rights and access around the world, Planned Parenthood Global stands in solidarity with the LGBTQI+ community in Uganda and human rights for all,” said Lori Adelman, vice president of Planned Parenthood Global’s Global Connect program, on Tuesday in a press release. “For over 50 years we have backed brave partners in the advancement of bold and courageous social justice movements and leaders, including Uganda.”
Museveni on April 20 sent the Anti-Homosexuality Act back to Parliament for additional consideration before he signs it.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and Victor Madrigal-Borloz, the independent U.N. expert on LGBTQ and intersex issues, are among those who have sharply criticized the measure. Jessica Stern, the special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights abroad, earlier this month during a panel with four Ugandan activists the Center for Strategic and International Studies hosted said the Biden-Harris administration is “investing the potential impact of the Anti-Homosexuality Act on U.S. foreign assistance.”
“If this bill is signed into law, it will be an action-forcing event,” said Stern.
State Department Vedant Patel on Tuesday during a press briefing declined to comment on whether the U.S. will cut aid to Uganda if Museveni signs the Anti-Homosexuality Act. Patel, however, did note to the Blade the State Department has “spoken quite clearly about the legislation broadly.”
“We have been clear that we believe that any legislation that reduces or retracts the basic human rights for those of the LGBTQI+ community is something that we certainly would take issue on,” said Patel.
MICHAEL K. LAVERSHungarian President Katalin Novak vetoed legislation that included a provision for citizens to anonymously report on same-sex couples who are raising children. In a rare departure from the policies of Hungary’s nationalist prime minister Viktor Orbán whom she generally supports, Novak returned the bill to the parliament telling lawmakers to strike that provision.
While lawmakers can still override her veto, the president’s veto letter to lawmakers of the National Assembly of Hungary contained unusually sharp critique from a member of Orbán’s inner circle.
The wording of the provision specifies that Hungarians may report those who contest the “constitutionally recognizged role of marriage and the family” and those who contest children’s rights “to an identity appropriate to their sex at birth.” The latter wording specifically aimed at acknowledging transgender youth.
The country’s constitution states that the institution of marriage is “between one man and one woman,” and notes that “the mother is a woman, the father a man.”
This law’s passage last week comes after the country’s Constitutional Court issued a ruling in February that will continue to block new applications from trans people for legal gender recognition. The judgment effectively creates two categories of trans people in Hungary: Those who applied early enough to pursue gender recognition and those who did not.
Earlier this month according to a spokesperson for the German government, Germany and France joined with other EU member states in the European Commission lawsuit over a Hungarian law which discriminates against people on the basis of their sexual orientation and gender identity.
The 14 EU member states now joined the lawsuit’s proceedings: Belgium, the Nether-
lands, Luxembourg, Denmark, Portugal, Ireland, Spain, Malta, Austria, Sweden, Slovenia, Finland and now France and Germany.
Orbán has publicly proclaimed he is a “defender of traditional family Catholic values.”
Orbán has been criticized by international human rights groups as discriminating against LGBTQ people with this law which European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen
called a “disgrace.”
On June 15, 2021, the Hungarian Law purportedly aiming at taking stricter action against pedophile offenders and amending certain laws to protect children was adopted. Some of the new provisions target and limit the access of minors to content and advertisements that “promotes or portrays” the so-called “divergence from self-identity corresponding to sex at birth, sex change or homosexuality.”
Prior to its passage, more than 5,000 people, LGBTQ activists and supporters along with human rights activists demonstrated in front of the Parliament in Budapest, angered by legislation banning any content portraying or promoting homosexuality or sex-reassignment surgery to anyone under 18.
It was sponsored by Fidesz, Orbán’s ruling conservative party and essentially equates sexual and gender diversity people to pedophilia.
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The highly anticipated finale of RuPaul’s Drag Race will feature incredible ensembles, sensational lip sync performances, and of course, the revelation of the season 15 winner. Alongside the competition, the finale will also highlight a joint effort with the ACLU to help defend constitutional rights and creative expression in the LGBTQ community.
With our nationwide network of affiliates, supporters, and advocates, we’re showing up to fight back against hate, and holding politicians accountable for their anti-trans agenda — and you can join us.
ACLU employees represented the ACLU on the red carpet during the April 1 taping of the finale, which featured drag queens from past and present seasons. During the airing of the finale, the ACLU’s Drag Defense Fund will also get a special shoutout as a way to mobilize against mounting legal attacks against drag performers.
What is the Drag Defense Fund?
In partnership with production company World of Wonder, MTV, and RuPaul’s Drag Race, the ACLU’s Drag Defense Fund will support the ACLU’s work defending LGBTQ rights, including censorship of drag performers themselves. The ACLU is committed to the importance of drag as a First Amendment right and an important form of artistic expression. It will also fuel the ACLU’s expansive advocacy work in support of the LGBTQ community, which includes everything from courtroom battles, to guidance on state-level legislation, to challenging LGBTQ censorship in classrooms.
What’s at Stake in the Drag Community?
Drag performance has always been a hallmark of the queer community, allowing members to express themselves openly and joyously. Due in large part to the explosive success of RuPaul’s Drag Race over the years, drag performers have received widespread fanfare and support. But in the past few months, dozens of bills have also been introduced in states around the country that restrict how and where drag queens can perform. One recently-passed Tennessee bill bans drags shows in public spaces around the state, effectively criminalizing them.
These bills censor a fundamental human right to freedom of expression and attempt to remove LGBTQ people from public life — a strategy that ACLU Ambassador for Transgender Justice
and former RuPaul’s Drag Race contestant Peppermint recently explained.
“It is sort of a catch all that allows them to attack a word or a notion or an idea, drag, when really what they’re talking about is transgender folks,” she said on a recent episode of our At Liberty podcast. “Trans issues, trans rights, you know, anything having to do with gender and sexuality, they’re trying to dismantle that — dismantle any of the progress that we’ve had on that, and turn us into the boogeyman.”
These legislative attacks against drag performers, coupled with the anti-trans legislation across the country, underscore an unsettling trend. These bills are bald attempts to prevent people from expressing themselves authentically and restrict their right to bodily autonomy and self-determination. The majority of this legislation specifically targets trans youth and aims to obstruct their ability to find support and access health care. These attacks not only undermine drag queens and trans youth, but the broader LGBTQ community, and the very foundations of gender justice.
Many Drag Race alumni — and RuPaul — have come forward to promote the fund, speak out against the targeted legal attacks, and uplift drag queens as champions for equal rights.
“Drag has influenced everything about my queer identity — as a performer, as a trans individual, drag has just blurred all of the things I love and am into getting to be this kind of walking art installation that is also a protest,” drag queen and season 15 finalist Sasha Colby said of the art form.
The ACLU will always show up to defend our LGBTQ community, especially amid these ongoing legislative attacks. Along with mobilizing our Drag Defense Fund, we will continue to push back against censorship, hold legislators accountable for their anti-LGBTQ agendas, and take legal action to protect our communities. With your help, we’ll be stronger than ever. Join us as we work to preserve our right to freedom of expression, inclusive communities, safe schools, and the right to be who we are without fear.
“RuPaul’s Drag Race,” MTV, and World of Wonder are proud to donate to “The Drag Defense Fund” in support of the ACLU’s LGBTQ rights work. You can make a donation at aclu.org.
‘RuPaul’s
is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist. He writes regularly for the Blade.
I have real compassion for anyone in Sen. Diane Feinstein’s situation, and for her family. As an older American myself, I pray if I reach her state of mind, I will realize it is time to let go of commitments I have made while I still have the capacity to make that decision. Suffering from dementia is a terrible fate for the individual and their family.
Feinstein is a loved family member and a beloved public servant; she has a Senate career to be proud of. Now, however, she is not able to fulfill that role anymore. In determining what to do in Feinstein’s case, the interests of the nation must come first. I know I will be attacked for this column. I will be called an ageist and a sexist. But fact is my position would be the same if this were a younger person and a man.
I applaud Democrats in the Senate for trying to work around her in a compassionate way, and deplore the Republicans who are making that impossible. But if she cannot be temporarily replaced on the Judiciary Committee because of heartless Republicans, the time has come for Democrats to take whatever action is needed to allow the work of the Judiciary Committee to move forward.
We see what happens when Republicans nominate and confirm their judges. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and now Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Trump appointee, is trying to overturn the work of the FDA, replacing science with his social views. If we want to confirm judges
who will protect the rights of women, the LGBTQ community, the environment, and voting rights, the Senate must have the votes on the Judiciary Committee to advance Biden’s judicial nominations.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s comment was sympathetic to Feinstein. “It’s interesting to me, I don’t know what political agendas are at work that are going after Sen. Feinstein in that way. I’ve never seen them go after a man who was sick in the Senate in that way.” With great respect I would ask her: Was there a man who was in the same situation of having dementia, and an illness, keeping a crucial committee from functioning?
Feinstein knew she was ill enough to give up a leadership role on the committee. Her health has only deteriorated since then. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) said about Feinstein, “She’s a team player, and she’s an extraordinary member of the Senate. It’s her right. She’s been voted by her state to be senator for six years. She has the right, in my opinion, to decide when she steps down.” Where was that view when she hounded Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) out of the Senate?
We see what happens when people don’t recognize it is time to move on, when families can’t convince them to do so. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg should have stepped down when she was ill. Maybe if she had, Roe v. Wade would still be law of the land. Again, this is not about gender. It
is about health, and knowing when it is time to move on. If Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), who I have great respect and compassion for, were to be absent for longer periods of time for critical Senate votes, I would suggest the same thing.
I have never had to deal with a family member who had dementia or other long-term debilitating health issue. I consider myself fortunate in some ways, but unfortunate as my parents passed at too young an age. I just read Stephanie Mencimer’s column in Mother Jones — “Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s Saga Is a Very Public Example of a National Crisis.” It brought home so many issues families face when a loved one begins to lose their mind to dementia. I only feel total compassion for the individuals and families she describes in her column. Those are heartbreaking stories. She correctly writes our nation doesn’t do nearly enough to help either individuals or their families through those difficult times.
Again, it is one thing to have to deal with this as a private citizen, and another when your illness impacts the entire nation. Perhaps generations will have to live with the consequences of Feinstein’s decision for decades to come. When you run for public office, or are appointed to public office, you implicitly lose some of your privacy. In this case Feinstein’s illness is impacting the nation. For the good of the nation, she, or the Senate, must act to move forward.
Compassion
override nation’s interests Illness must not be allowed to impede Judiciary Committee’s work
CENTURY CITY – The Los Angeles LGBT Center held The Center Gala April 22, an occasion to recognize trailblazing members of the LGBTQ community, organizations, and allies for their work and commitment to achieve equality for all.
Commemorating the organization’s 54th anniversary, The Center Gala has transformed into one of the largest gatherings of LGBTQ leaders and allies in Los Angeles, raising funds to support The Center’s life-saving and life-enhancing programs.
The event raised $1 million to support the Center’s programs and services for the LGBTQ+ community.
The Center Gala at the Fairmont Century Plaza. Over 800 supporters came together as the Center honored the author and activist Pamela Anderson, Emmy-winning actress Keke Palmer, and the beloved entertainer Leslie Jordan (posthumously) for their contributions to the LGBTQ community. The gala was hosted by social media and television sensation TS Madison, and featured a special performance by R&B-soul artist Durand Bernarr.
“While I have only been the Center’s CEO since July, I know from my 25-year career that the Center is like no other organization in our movement. Not only are we fighting for our community’s rights through our global advocacy work, we are on the frontlines caring for the most vulnerable in our community when they need us most,” said Joe Hollendoner, the CEO of the Center. “The Center’s masterful weaving of direct services, public education, and policy work creates a safety net to ensure that no one falls through the cracks.
Actress, author, and humanitarian Pamela Anderson accepted the Vanguard Award for her long history of activism and allyship. “We are painting the picture of our lives every day. And every time we walk out the door, it’s performance art. Might as well have a blast. Thank you for giving me the chance to share that with you,” said Anderson. “Thank you for rooting for me.”
Emmy Award-winning television host (and former employee of the Center) Karamo Brown (Queer Eye, Karamo) presented Keke Palmer with the Vanguard Award for her achievements in the entertainment industry, as well as her commitment to creating new opportunities for young people from marginalized communities. In her acceptance speech, Keke Palmer said, “I have faith that the more we share our unique experiences, the louder we are with using our voices, the more we don’t have to explain and explain and explain again what it is to be a person. Living in this world, defying all definitions just to be an original. There is no greater masterpiece than a person living in their truth.”
Hollywood vets Mayim Bialik and Del Shores gave a touching tribute introducing the inaugural Leslie Jordan Award for Excellence in the Arts.
Jordan, an American actor and comedian, as well as a longtime supporter of the Center, passed away late last year. Mayim Bialik said of her late Call Me Kat co-star, “The world formed a love and connection with Leslie during the pandemic—he was who you saw on Instagram… and that’s why he is remembered and mourned so deeply. I’m grateful to The Center for creating the Leslie Jordan Award that will now be given annually to someone who shines a light on the LGBTQ+ community through their work and art.”
The Gala’s live programming included an auction and special musical performance by Durand Bernarr. Durand was also presented with the Center’s “Rising Star” award by Grammy-nominated artist Adam Lambert.
Other highlights of the evening include a guest video appearance by Mariah Carey, who decried the 400+ pieces of anti-LGBTQ legislation currently on the books in the United States, and a video of Nicole Richie “volunteering” at the Center, directed by 73 Questions creator Joe Sabia of Studio Sabia.
This year’s Gala was sponsored by Foster City, Calif. based Gilead Sciences, Inc. “Gilead is proud to honor and celebrate the remarkable achievements of LGBTQ+ leaders and advocates at this year’s Center Gala. Alongside the Los Angeles LGBT Center, we can better serve the LGBTQ+ community to create a healthier world where everyone can thrive,” said Alex Kalomparis, Senior Vice President, Public Affairs, Gilead.
By ROB WATSON
Two years ago, Peppermint gave us a clear picture about who she is, making a point to tell us in her song “A Girl Like Me.”
“She’s strong and doesn’t take it from nobody.”
As a finalist in the ninth season of “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” Peppermint came in fourth and was eliminated during the actual filming of the show. The production company had a change of heart though, and put her back in for the finale cutting her elimination from the broadcasted version.
She may have lost that competition, but she won something bigger: history. She was the first out trans person to compete on “Drag Race.” A year later, RuPaul came under fire for saying that only transgender queens who had not yet had surgery, as Peppermint had not at the time, could compete.
She was not amused. She tweeted an emoji with a big zipper across its mouth in response. The next day, RuPaul recanted and reversed his policy.
“A girl like me is not always seen as equal, and sometime not one at all… And when trouble comes she’s the first one to take the fall.”
Recently she was trolled on social media after the horrible shooting at a Christian school. A rightwing nut craved to find and trash a real transgender person expressing compassion for the nonbinary Nashville shooter. He did not find one so instead, he created a fake tweet and attributed it to Peppermint to construct a “trans people as unrepentant killers” narrative.
The fake tweet cautioned potential trans killers to wipe their social media clean before committing heinous acts, and thereby protect Peppermint and the community. The message was callous, and a fraud.
Peppermint locked down her Twitter account to “private” (no more Twitter post screenshots to doctor for you). She posted, “People are still photoshopping fake screenshots.” She then took over the narrative: “Attacking my character with words I NEVER tweeted. I’m heartbroken about the terrible shooting in TN. I believe access to guns is a major factor in gun related attacks. anti-trans comments misgendering me don’t deter me from uplifting people from marginalized communities.”
“A girl like me can light up any party.”
The Peppermint party is coming to us, Los Angeles. Peppermint is lighting up the stage at the Mark Taper Forum where she will star
in “A Transparent Musical” from May 20 thru June 25. The musical is the comedic version of the Pfefferman family story, whose patriarch is finally allowing their true selves to emerge as Maura, the transgender matriarch she always knew she was. Based on the hit Amazon Prime original TV drama show “Transparent” by Joey Soloway, “A Transparent Musical” takes the Los Angeles Jewish family in a funny and musical direction making them “Universally relatable, imperfectly human, and startlingly familiar.”
Peppermint is originating the role of Davina. The part in the series was first created by Alexandra Billings. As Davina, Peppermint runs programming at the local Jewish Community Center and is the confidant of the lead character Maura. Ultimately Peppermint helps tell the story of family secrets that unearth a story of self-discovery, acceptance, and celebration.
“And girls like me are scared and angry, but we always find a way to smile…”
Not to be confined to live theatrical performances, Peppermint bursts onto the Netflix scene in the series, “Survival of the Thickest,” which centers on the character of Mavis Beaumont played by Michelle Buteau, who wrote the book on which the series is based.
Black, plus-sized and newly single, Mavis unexpectedly finds herself having to rebuild her life as a struggling stylist. Peppermint portrays a social media influencer and owner of the local drag restaurant. Funny, super sassy and caring, Peppermint’s character acts as the “adopted” drag mother of Mavis.
“A girl like me knows how to live her truth.”
$1 million
Pamela Anderson, Keke Palmer, and Leslie JordanGrammy-nominated artist ADAM LAMBERT (Photo by Gregg DeGuire/ Getty Images for the Los Angeles LGBT Center) PEPPERMINT is coming to LA in May. (Photo courtesy Peppermint) CONTINUES AT LOSANGELESBLADE.COM
Fans of Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg’s 1988 film “Dead Ringers” – starring Jeremy Irons in the dual role of Elliot and Beverly Mantle, identical twin gynecologists with a fondness for drugs, a willingness to manipulate their patients into having sex with them, and a radical vision for the future of women’s reproductive medicine – are doubtless already aware of Amazon Prime’s new limited series adaptation, which dropped on April 21. Many of them, if not most, have probably already seen all six episodes.
For anyone else, however, it might feel like a perfectly reasonable question to ask why anyone might be drawn to a story with a premise as twisted, dark, and deeply disquieting as this one – but of course, those are the very things that make it irresistible.
and research facility where they can help more women while developing new innovations in female fertility. Beverly, sweet-tempered and idealistic, is often at odds with the more aggressive and cynical Elliot, particularly over the ethics involved in achieving their various goals (such as accepting funding for their project from a Big Pharma billionaire or impersonating one another to trick a sexual conquest into bed), but they are nevertheless the center of each other’s lives. As in the film, it’s this closed-off interpersonal dynamic that leads them astray, severing them from the rest of the world and fueling their secretive, transgressive behavior.
Where the original’s observational focus was placed squarely on the twins, however, Birch and her creative crew open things up to take a wider view, and they waste no time in turning a critical and sometimes outrageously satirical eye toward the outside world.
These moments occasionally veer a little over the top, such as with an extended second-episode sequence in which a dinner party with potential donors becomes an almost Fellini-esque display of disconnected self-indulgence among the privileged elite, but on a more subtle level they help ally our sympathies with Beverly and Elliot. The world they move in is full of boldfaced arrogance, craven hypocrisy, tone-deaf pretension, and unapologetic greed; how can we not take their side, when it’s clear the medical establishment which they seek to upend deserves everything they can do to it and more.
Of course, their own motives are murky, too. Much is kept mysterious about the Mantles, with secrets doled out in small, sometimes cryptic revelations, and we are kept off balance by an unreliable narrative structure that isn’t always linear and frequently jumps from reality to imagination without making it quite clear which is which. We’re never sure if what we’re seeing is really happening – or when it’s happening, for that matter.
The original “Dead Ringers” – which Cronenberg and screenwriter Norman Snider adapted from a novel (“Twins”) by Bari Wood and Jack Geasland – is considered a masterpiece of “body horror,” a sub-genre that plays on our instinctive fear of mutilation, deformity, or other such intrusive desecrations of our physical beings. It’s a brooding story of co-dependence and isolation, with Irons delivering two distinctively different but equally disturbing flavors of narcissistic amorality as the two brothers spiral away from the outside world into the private reality they’ve built around their obsessions and the unique advantages that come with being identical twins. At its essence, its biggest horrors are more psychological than visceral, and watching the slow-but-inevitable self-destruction that unspools from the Mantles’ insular and distorted perceptions is a painful but gripping journey that sticks with you in ways you wish it wouldn’t; still, there is a definite “gross-out” factor involved (the pair’s baroquely sinister, custom-designed gynecological tools are enough to make us cringe by the power of imagination alone) that lingers even longer, and makes the movie difficult to watch even for less squeamish viewers.
In Amazon’s updated reimagining of the story, the central narrative takes advantage of its long-form presentation to explore the twisted psychology of its twin protagonists – though that doesn’t feel like quite the right word, all things considered - and the fascination with body horror remains, but show developer and head writer Alice Birch changes almost everything else – starting with the gender of her two leading characters, though they still bear the same ambiguously androgynous names. It’s a bold transformation that might seem like a gimmick, at first, but quickly brushes past any skepticism to illuminate the story in a provocative new light – and we’re not just talking about the obvious lesbian implications inherent in the premise of female gynecologists seducing their own patients.
Now portrayed by Rachel Weisz, the Mantles are not merely successful, they are renowned, running their own clinic and pursuing their dream of opening a birthing center
All of that goes a long way toward keeping us hooked into “Dead Ringers” as it goes further and further down its crooked path, and a few heavily-portioned moments of gore – much of it related to childbirth and the medical procedures that take place around it – certainly keep us on edge. Likewise, the gender-swapped reframing introduces a layer of feminism by challenging us with a depiction of women exploiting other women – almost all the characters who hold power are female – to facilitate what ultimately descends into a whirlpool of self-serving hedonism.
Yet as intriguing as all those ideas might be, they’re never as compelling as we think they are going to be. Even the queer aspects of the story feel a bit rote, though perhaps it’s refreshing that lesbian lead characters and depictions of lesbian sex are handled as if their queerness is “no big deal.” Nor does “Dead Ringers” ever really scare, though it does unsettle.
That’s because at its core, it’s a tale about identity, about two sides of a single personality caught in a never-ending struggle for domination. It would be simplistic to equate Bev and Elliot to “good” and “evil” sides of our nature, though there are definite echoes of “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” in their interlocked personas, but the conflict between them is primal, nonetheless, and that’s where the meat of the story lies. All the rest is seasoning.
Fortunately, Rachel Weisz – a criminally underrated actress, and we say this knowing she is an Oscar-winner – takes charge from the start, delivering a tour de force dual performance that is every bit the equal of Irons’ acclaimed turn in Cronenberg’s film while making both roles uniquely her own. Compelling, layered, likeable, monstrous, fragile, fierce, and always authentic, she holds our interest even when the story flags – as it occasionally does – and keeps us watching all the way.
Thanks to her, Amazon’s “Dead Ringers” confidently carves a place of its own. Is it scary? Maybe not as much so as Cronenberg’s original, but it has an appeal of its own and enough clinical gore to provide at least a few enjoyable jump scares.
In any case, neither version is as scary as the fact that the novel which was the basis for them both was itself based on the story of the Marcus twins, a pair of real-life twin gynecologists who died in an apparent suicide pact.
It’s enough to make you never trust a doctor again.
“I started to compose poetry around the age of three – before I could even write,” poet Karen Poppy, 47, told the Blade in a telephone interview. “My Mom would write my poems down.”
“I had the good fortune,” added Poppy, whose first, full-length poetry collection “Diving At The Lip Of The Water” will be out from Beltway Editions, a Washington, D.C. area press, on May 1, “My Mom read poetry to me. The first poem was about a nightingale. Maybe she read Keats to me.” (John Keats was the 19th century Romantic poet who wrote “Ode to a Nightingale.”)
Poppy has written a book “that will rough a reader up and then wrap their scraps in silk,” poet Francesca Bell has said of “Diving At The Lip of The Water.”
For Poppy, who identifies as queer, nonbinary, lesbian and an artist, coming out has been a lifelong process. “I’ve come out many times in many ways,” Poppy, who grew up in Foster City, Calif., and now lives in the San Francisco Bay area, said.
April is National Poetry Month. In every month, Poppy thinks often of Walt Whitman, one of the United States’ greatest poets. Thought by many to be queer, Whitman, a nurse in Washington, D.C. during the Civil War, is best known for his groundbreaking work “Leaves of Grass.”
Whitman comes to mind to Poppy when she talks about her identity. “As an artist,” Poppy said in reference to how she identifies, “I’m everyone and everything.”
When Whitman talks about the self containing “multitudes,” “He’s not just speaking of individuals,” Poppy said, “he’s saying that poets-artists enter into everything.”
“As an artist – a poet,” Poppy said, “I don’t like to be put into boxes.”
Poppy celebrates Whitman’s creative spirit, refusal to have limitations placed on him and, what she called, “his joyous experience of limitlessness and connectivity with everything.”
As a young child, Poppy sensed that she was different. “I knew very early on,” she said, “I wanted to be like my mother and my father.”
She wanted to be glam like her mom. “My Mom’s nickname for me was Miss America,” Poppy said.
She wore her Dad’s leather jacket, cowboy hat and cowboy boots. “Early on, I got in trouble for trying to smoke a cigarette,” Poppy said, “I put it in the wrong way. I was lucky I didn’t burn my mouth off!”
“I cut my mouth, trying to shave as a toddler,” she added, “I was already creating my own gender identity.”
At a time, when people were far less out and proud than now, Poppy crushed on her girl babysitters. “In kindergarten, I got in trouble with my best friend at the time,” she said, “because I told her that I was interested in her phys-
ically.”
“I think she was very kind about it,” Poppy added.
That same year, Poppy was reprimanded by her teacher for kissing a boy. “The boy and I were in line waiting to go back to the classroom,” she said, “he kissed me back.”
During that era, Poppy didn’t have the words to name or describe her feelings. “I have a gay cousin who’s older than me,” she said, “and a lesbian aunt. But because they weren’t exactly the way I am, I didn’t realize I was queer, too.”
In Foster City, when she was growing up, people didn’t talk openly about being queer. “We talked about it in euphemisms and negatively,” Poppy said.
A poem is never just the story of what happened or the recitation of fact, poet Sheila Black, a 2012 Witter Bynner Fellow, said in an email to the Blade.
Poppy’s poetry, like that of many poets, at times, channels her life. Though, it’s not autobiographical in a literal or linear way. Like Whitman’s work, it contains multitudes from individual and collective experience.
Her searing, moving collection “Diving At The Lip Of The Water,” unmasks society’s gender expectations and family systems. Poppy’s poem, “No One was Gay Back Then,” draws us into what it’s like to have to hide your sexuality. “We used to make fun of you/You, making out with Michael/in the grass. 5th grade recess,” the poem begins.
“Michael liked Matt. So in 5th grade,” Poppy writes in the poem, “already seeking cover-ups/Trying to convince everyone and ourselves./Our small town. No one was gay back then.”
As a tween, Poppy not only realized she was queer (though she didn’t have the word for it); she knew where she wanted to go to college. Poppy was determined to go to Smith College because Sylvia Plath went there.
“When I was 12, I started to read Sylvia Plath,” Poppy said. “Plath has been a profound influence on me throughout my life.”
“Because of her fearlessness in speaking her truth,” Poppy added, “and her high level of poetic virtuosity.”
Poppy’s dream came true. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Smith College in Comparative Literature and Spanish in 1998.
At Smith, Poppy began to come out about her identity. But, there were pressures. “I was pressured into cutting my hair short,” she said, “the feeling was if I kept my hair long, I wasn’t a dyke.”
Poppy cut her hair. “I did cry,” she said, “there was a pressure to conform to a certain aesthetic. You had to be super femme or butch.”
It was another box that she had a hard time escaping from. “I realized boxes are not for me,” Poppy said.
She wasn’t sure what she wanted to do after she graduated from Smith. After a short stint as a chef apprentice, Poppy could tell that being a chef for the long term wasn’t for her.
Like most poets, Poppy knew being a bard rarely brings financial stability. “I wanted to have security and I wanted to help people,” Poppy said.
“I went to law school and studied international law,” she said, “A lot of my early focus was on immigration and help-
ing refugees.”
Poppy graduated from UC Hastings College of the Law (now known as UC College of the Law, San Francisco) in 2003 with a J.D. degree in international law.
Today, Poppy works for The Hartford in the area of workers’ compensation.
Poppy kept writing from her childhood into her 20s. “But then, somebody said something really cruel about my writing,” she said. “The ridicule chilled my creativity.”
For 17 years, because of this cruelty, she didn’t write. “I was in a creative silence,” Poppy said.
A traumatic event compelled her to go back to writing.
Since 2017, when her creativity was restarted, Poppy’s poetry has been published in literary journals, anthologies as well as the chapbooks “Crack Open/Emergency,” “Our Own Beautiful Brutality” and “Every Possible Thing.” She’s written three unpublished novels and short stories.
One of her writing projects is Whitmanesque in its intersections of identities.
Poppy is working on an opera libretto. “It takes place when Handel [the German-British Baroque composer] was alive,” she said.
It’s about a merboy who’s washed to shore. He’s young, Black and queer.
“A family takes him in,” Poppy said, “they want to make him a form of income.”
The family forces the merboy to become a castrato, Poppy said, “they make him wear a mask to hide his dark skin. When he’s older and has a relationship with a man, he has to be closeted.”
Poppy is looking for a composer to work with her on her libretto. If you’re interested, contact her through her website karenpoppy.com.
Poppy’s interest in immigrants is personal as well as professional. Poppy is Jewish. Some of her family were murdered in the Holocaust. “Others in my family left Europe before the Holocaust because of pogroms and poverty,” she said.
When her family came to the United States in the early 1900s, they were “very poor,” Poppy said. Her paternal grandmother, Poppy said, told her to make sure her son always had food, “because hunger would make his stomach hurt.”
We’ve come to see that the American dream is in many ways an illusion, Poppy said. It’s not accessible to all, and it’s slipping away.
“Elizabeth/The fifth of ten children/Who crossed the border, then/Still a child/,” Poppy writes in her poem “Elizabeth,” “Only sixteen and wanting to stay alive/To be the breath that survived.”
Poppy worries about the rise of anti-Semitism. “It comes in waves,” she said. “We have to remind each other to make sure it never happens again.”
It’s important for artists to take care of themselves, Poppy said. To get enough rest between creative projects. To be an athlete. So their minds and spirits can be in top form.
Poppy does yoga and loves to run. “A poem is a short lap,” she said, “writing a novel is like long distance open water swimming.”
“We write out of our humanity,” Poppy added.
