Local
GOP congressman urges: ‘Don’t be an asshole, don’t be a homophobe’
Rep. Hurd addresses Log Cabin Pride event
Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas), the only African-American Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives, praised the LGBT GOP group Log Cabin Republicans and its work on behalf of LGBT rights at a June 20 Pride Social gathering organized by Log Cabin Republicans of D.C.
Close to 70 people turned out for the gathering at the Chastleton Apartments ballroom on 16th Street, N.W., which Log Cabin D.C. billed as a bipartisan event. Among those attending were many LGBT Democrats and D.C. elected officials, including Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners and D.C. Board of Education President Ruth Wattenberg.
“It’s a pleasure to be with you all today because you all know something that many of my colleagues don’t,” Hurd told the gathering. “If you’re at least the age of 40 in most places across this country you have to whisper that you’re a Republican,” he said. “This is a party that is shrinking. The party is not growing in some of the largest parts of our country,” he continued.
“Why is that? I’ll tell you. It’s real simple,” said Hurd. “Don’t be an asshole. Don’t be a racist. Don’t be a misogynist, right? Don’t be a homophobe. These are real basic things that we all should learn when we were in kindergarten.”
Hurd’s district in Southern Texas includes more than a third of the U.S.-Mexico border. He has broken from many of his fellow Republicans by expressing strong opposition to President Trump’s controversial proposal to build a wall along the entire U.S.-Mexico border.
He is also one of just eight Republicans in the House that voted earlier this year for the LGBT civil rights bill known as the Equality Act, which the House passed but is stalled in the Senate.
Hurd told the Log Cabin gathering that he has a quick reply to those in his majority Latino district in Texas and in Washington who ask him how he came to support LGBT rights.
“People would ask me and I would say, look, are you asking the only black Republican to support not being pro-equality?” Hurd said. “And most people never have a follow-up question to that.”
Added Hurd: “And you all have been toiling and fighting for a very long time. You all have had a difficult fight not only in our country but in our party. And so I just thank you for sticking to it. Thank you for caring about our principles. Thank you for being an example for so many other people.”
Log Cabin D.C. President Adam Savit and the group’s vice president, Patrick Wheat, said they believe the event, in which attendees mingled before and after Hurd spoke, succeeded in furthering a campaign started earlier this year by gay Democratic activist Paul Kuntzler to build a bipartisan effort to advance the rights of LGBT people. Kuntzler was among those who attended the event.
“It exceeded my expectations,” Wheat said. “I’m extremely excited to have as many representatives from both the LGBT community and the D.C. elected officials,” he told the Blade. “We are in a unique place as the District of Columbia Log Cabin Republicans to serve as a conservative voice in LGBT spaces and as an LGBT voice in conservative spaces.”
Among the others attending the event were Jerri Ann Henry, executive director of the national Log Cabin Republicans; Robert Kabel, chair of the board of the national Log Cabin group; Bobbi Elaine Strang, president of the D.C. Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance; Jose Cunningham, the gay chair of the D.C. Republican Party; and James Abbott, a member of the U.S. Federal Labor Relations Board.
U.S. Rep. Will Hurd (R-Tex.)
Remarks before Log Cabin Republicans of D.C. Pride Social
June 20, 2019
Chastleton Apartments Ballroom
Washington, D.C.
First of all, thanks for not un-inviting me. I don’t know if you all heard, I got invited to a cyber security event and was quickly disinvited after they saw my positions.
It’s a pleasure to be with you all today because you all know something that many of my colleagues don’t. If you’re at the age of 40 in most places across this country you have to whisper that you’re a Republican. This is a party that is shrinking. The party is not growing in some of the largest growing parts of our country.
Why is that? I’ll tell you. It’s real simple. Don’t be an asshole. Don’t be a racist. Don’t be a misogynist, right? Don’t be a homophobe. These are real basic things that we all should learn when we were in kindergarten. But unfortunately there’s too many people that don’t follow those things.
A lot of people when I first got elected – it was like how did the black dude get elected in a Latino district? It’s real simple. Show up, talk to people, right? I don’t care where you’re from. Most people realize the way we solve problems is by the power of the people not by the power of the government.
Most people know that the way to help people move up the economic ladder is by focusing on the free market. It’s not socialism. We know these things. But if people don’t feel like you trust them or you care about them they’re not going to listen to your ideas even if your ideas are benefiting the masses.
So that’s something that I’m trying to do. You know it’s unfortunate that I was only one of eight Republicans that voted for the Equality Act. I had a real – this guy is taking a lot of notes. Do we have the press here?
DC LCR Vice President Patrick Wheat: He’s with the Washington Blade.
Hurd: Ok, good…Be kind. That’s all I’m asking. People would ask me and I would say, look, are you asking the only black Republican to support not being pro-equality, right? And most people never have a follow up question to that. But the bottom line is this. We are facing – 2020 is going to be difficult. But the only way we make sure the principles and theories that we believe in are to continue to exist is if our party starts believing like the rest of the country.
And you all have been toiling and fighting for a very long time. You all have had a difficult fight not only in our country but in our party. And so I just say thank you for sticking to it. Thank you for caring about our principles. Thank you for being an example for so many other people.
And just know you’ve got some partners to fight on behalf of everyone. This is something that I’m going to continue to do while I’m in Congress, and God bless you all…And one minute, please. Can I tell a quick story? I’ll make it short.
So you also know that I was in the CIA for nine and a half years. I was doing the back allies at four O’clock in the morning collecting intelligence to protect our homeland – two years in India, two years Pakistan, two years in New York City, and a year and a half in Afghanistan.
And when I was in Pakistan it was in 2005 during an earthquake. I was there when an earthquake hit Cashmere that killed 80,000 people. The ambassador at the time wanted to figure out how we can help the Pakistani people. He said hurry up and get there and figure out what we need and he said we really need an airlift because Cashmere was at 14,000 feet. A lot of villages were even higher up. They were cut off from most of the country.
So we got about two dozen Chinook helicopters – C 47 helicopters. And I was directing this traffic to help people from these villages that were cut off. And I was about to jump on one of these helicopters to go to my bed down location and we had a report that one village had gone without food and water and power for about four days. And it was in the middle of the winter. At night it was negative 23 degrees below zero. It was a legitimate 20 degrees below zero.
So we decided to make one more stop. So we land in this village, big main doors open. And if you’ve ever seen a helicopter crew, they look like they’re from outer space. You know the flap mask, all this kind of stuff. And these villagers start piling on – about 200 people. And there is a little girl who had been without food and who was about six or seven years old – lost both her mom and her dad in the earthquake. She sees this whole scene. She’s crying. She’s scared, she’s upset.
And this village elder picks her up. So I grab this little girl and hold her as tight as I possibly can. And halfway through the flight she kind of calms down and relaxes a little bit. When we get to our destination we open the big doors in the helicopter. I put the little girl down. She takes about ten steps, turns around, comes back and gives me the biggest hug of my life. She goes over to the helicopter crew and the person she probably thought was from outer space and she kisses him on the hand. And he pats her on the head and gives her the thumbs up. She smiles real big and returns the gesture. And she runs away.
That little girl’s face is seared into my mind because that girl and what we did that day is an example of how the United States government is the only country that has the resources and the willingness to help people even when they’re 7,000 mile away. It’s another example how America has become the exceptional country, not because of what we have taken but because what we have given.
And we can measure our success on what we give, not what we take. And that’s something I’m going to continue to try to do in Congress. I’m glad there’s folks like you all that are willing to join this battle as well. God bless you and God bless the United States of America.
Rehoboth Beach
Women’s FEST returns to Rehoboth Beach next week
Golf tournament, mini-concerts, meetups planned for silver anniversary festival
Women’s+ FEST 2026 will begin on Thursday, April 9 at CAMP Rehoboth Community Center.
The festival will celebrate a remarkable milestone in 2026: its silver anniversary. For 25 years, Women’s+ FEST has brought fun and entertainment for all those on the spectrum of the feminine spirit. There will be a variety of events including a golf tournament, mini-concerts and happy hour meetups.
For more information, visit Camp Rehoboth’s website.
District of Columbia
How new barriers to health care coverage are hitting D.C.
Federally qualified health centers bracing for influx of newly uninsured patients
Washington, D.C. has the second-lowest rate of people who lack health insurance in the country, but many residents are facing new barriers to health care due to provisions of the sweeping federal law passed in July, which threatens access for thousands.
Changes to insurance eligibility and the rising cost of premiums, which kicked in for some in October and others more recently, are expected to leave many more patients uninsured or unable to afford medical care. Federally qualified health centers, including D.C.’s Whitman-Walker Health, where 10 to 12 percent of patients are uninsured, are bracing for an influx of newly uninsured patients while facing their own financial challenges.
Even in D.C., where uninsured rates have been among the lowest in the country, changes brought on by the passage of the Republican mega bill (known as the “Big Beautiful Bill”) will have major effects.
The changes from the bill affect Medicaid, which is free to low-income patients, and subsidies for insurance that people buy on the health insurance exchanges that were started under the Affordable Care Act, which were allowed to expire on Dec. 31.
Erin Loubier, vice president for access and strategic initiatives at Whitman-Walker Health, says some Whitman-Walker Health patients have received notices about premium increases, including several who say the increases are up to 1,000 percent more than they were paying.
“That is like paying rent,” she says. “We live in an expensive city, so any increases are going to be really, really hard on people.”
Whitman-Walker Health and other healthcare providers are expecting the changes to have multiple effects — some patients may not be able to afford coverage or may avoid going to the doctor and allow health conditions to worsen because they can’t afford care, and many more will be seeking care who don’t have insurance.
“I’m worried that we’re going to not just have people who can’t get care, but that they delay care until they’re really sick, and then the care is not as effective because they might have waited too long, and then we may have a less healthy population,” Loubier says.
Loubier says delaying care, and serving more people without insurance has major implications for Whitman-Walker Health and other health centers serving the community.
“There’s going to be a lot of pressure on us to try to find and raise more money, and that’s going to be harder, because I think all organizations who provide health care are going to be facing this,” she says.
The U.S. health care system is the most expensive in the world, and has much higher out-of-pocket costs for individuals. But in other countries like the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, and many others, health care is much less expensive — or even free.
Even though the U.S. has a high-priced healthcare system, critics say there are still ways to bring down costs by forcing insurance and pharmaceutical companies to absorb more of the costs, rather than transferring the costs to patients.
“In the U.S., they end up trying to cut costs at the person’s level, not at the level of the different corporations or structures that are making a lot of money in healthcare,” said Loubier. “Our system is so complicated and there is probably waste in it, but I don’t think that that cost and waste is at the ‘people’ level. I think it’s higher up at the system level, but that is much, much harder to get people to try to make cuts at that end.”
Ultimately at Whitman-Walker Health, healthcare providers and insurance navigators are planning to help with everyday necessities when it comes to healthcare coverage and striving to provide healthcare in partnership with patients, said Loubier.
“The key here is we’re going to have a lot of people who may lose insurance, and they’re going to rely on places like Whitman-Walker Health and other community health centers, so we have to figure out how we keep providing that care,” she said.
(This article was written by a student in the journalism program at Bard High School Early College DC. This work is part of a partnership between the Washington Blade Foundation and Youthcast Media Group, funded through the FY26 Community Development Grant from the Office of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser.)
District of Columbia
Mayor Bowser signs bill requiring insurers to cover PrEP
‘This is a win in the fight against HIV/AIDS’
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser on March 20 signed a bill approved by the D.C. Council that requires health insurance companies to cover the costs of HIV prevention or PrEP drugs for D.C. residents at risk for HIV infection.
Like all legislation approved by the Council and signed by the mayor, the bill, called the PrEP D.C. Amendment Act, was sent to Capitol Hill for a required 30-day congressional review period before it takes effect as D.C. law.
Gay D.C. Council member Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5) last year introduced the bill.
Insurance coverage for PrEP drugs has been provided through coverage standards included in the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare. But AIDS advocacy organizations have called on states and D.C. to pass their own legislation requiring insurance coverage of PrEP as a safeguard in case federal policies are weakened or removed by the Trump administration, which has already reduced federal funding for HIV/AIDS-related programs.
Like legislation passed by other states, the PrEP D.C. Amendment Act requires insurers to cover all PrEP drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Studies have shown that PrEP drugs, which can be taken as pills or by injection just twice a year, are highly effective in preventing HIV infection.
“I think this is a win for our community,” Parker said after the D.C. Council voted unanimously to approve the bill on its first vote on the measure in February. “And this is a win in the fight against HIV/AIDS.”
Women’s FEST returns to Rehoboth Beach next week
Belarusian lawmakers approve bill to crackdown on LGBTQ rights
Calendar: April 3-9
How new barriers to health care coverage are hitting D.C.
Kenyan advocacy groups launch LGBTQ voter mobilization campaign
‘Out for McDuffie’ event held at D.C. gay bar
‘Jonah’ an undeniably compelling but unusual memory play
The Oscar-losing performance that’s too good to miss
Thousands attend ‘No Kings’ protests in D.C.
