WaPo: Donald Trump’s Big Gay Government

Life in Hostile Territory Mr. Moran knows a lot of them because he’s been “on the Trump train,” as he put it, from the beginning.

In 2015, back when the Republican establishment was still trying to thwart Mr. Trump, Mr. Moran said that he and some other gay Republicans he knew became intrigued by the brash New Yorker’s history of saying nice things about gay rights. These men had experienced homophobia from their fellow Republicans at one point or another, so they saw Mr. Trump’s ascendance as something new, especially after the 2016 Republican National Convention, when Peter Thiel was given a prime-time speaking slot and used it to endorse Mr. Trump, saying: “I am proud to be gay. I am proud to be a Republican. But most of all I am proud to be an American.”

Mr. Moran was in the front row when that happened. He recalled bracing for boos or a walkout. Instead there was big applause. He ended up helping out on all three of Mr. Trump’s campaigns. Along the way, he met the various members of the Trump family, all of whom treated him with a respect that couldn’t always be expected from Republican power brokers of the past, he said.

There were some gay appointees during the first Trump administration, but it wasn’t like now. Mr. Trump initially arrived in Washington as a true outsider; he had to draw from the disparate parts of the old G.O.P. he had vanquished in order to staff his government. This time around, he has his own establishment. And it turns out that the MAGA establishment has a lot more openly gay men than the Republican establishment that came before it.

In 2019, Mr. Moran took over Log Cabin Republicans, the gay Republican group, aligning it fully with the MAGA movement and increasing its ranks. He stepped down in January after nearly five years hoping he would be rewarded with a job in the incoming administration. Though he didn’t expect it would involve nukes.

Although he is now very busy learning the inner workings of the National Nuclear Security Administration, he said he feels a certain responsibility to continue looking after the “community” of gay MAGA Republicans he spent nearly a decade cultivating. He keeps a spreadsheet with dozens of names and titles of other gay compatriots working inside the administration. “I love it when I find out there’s somebody new,” he said.

Part of the A-Gays’ power comes from the fact that they (mostly) stick together. “Even within the bureaucracy, the bureaucracy is overwhelming,” Mr. Moran said. “I love having this community as a resource. Back in the day, these groups had to be closed off and hidden, but now we use it as a tool.” Just the other day, he recalled, a gay acquaintance of his was trying to figure out who in the government could help him get something done for his boss. “He called and was like, ‘Hey, do we have somebody at such and such agency?’” They had somebody.

But there is a kind of paradox about these men’s existence in Washington. They live in the gayest city in America, which is also pretty much the most Trump-hating city in America.

The gay men who work for him here are keenly aware that they are in hostile territory, surrounded by other gay men who consider them self-deluded traitors or worse. At gay bars around town and on dating apps they are either iced out or confronted about the things this president has said and done. He cut AIDS relief around the world and H.I.V. vaccine research and funding for L.G.B.T.Q. suicide prevention services. He called drag shows “anti-American.” His defense secretary announced during pride month that the Navy Vessel named after Harvey Milk would be renamed. Perhaps most worrying for many gay people is the how conservative the Supreme Court has become thanks to Mr. Trump. Could same-sex marriage go the way of Roe? It’s not out of the question.

Gay Trump appointees interviewed for this article — some of whom said they weren’t authorized to speak on the record — dismiss such opprobrium as overheated liberal whining. They argue that the battle for gay rights has basically been won, and that there has never been a Republican as friendly to the gays as Donald J. Trump.

Aren’t they themselves proof that this is so, they ask?

‘I Love the Gays’ There have always been gay men in power in Washington, but they were rarely open about it. The plot of the most famous novel ever written about this place, “Advise and Consent,” revolves around a gay senator who got blackmailed.

A few years ago, a Washington journalist named James Kirchick published, “Secret City: The Hidden History of Gay Washington,” a sprawling, definitive history on this subject.

“Being gay was the worst thing you could be in American politics,” Mr. Kirchick said one recent afternoon over lunch at the Bombay Club, the Clinton-era power lunch spot across the street from the White House. He recalled a famous quote about politics, spoken in 1983 by Edwards, the Louisiana Democrat who bragged: “The only way I can lose this election is if I’m caught in bed with either a dead girl or a live boy.”

Mr. Kirchick, 41, said one way to see how much has changed in recent years was to look at what things were like under the most recent Republican president before Mr. Trump, George W. Bush. “There were high-ranking gay people in that administration, but they had to be very discreet about it,” he said. “It was tough, and there was a lot of outing at the time.”

Trump just nominated a judge who compared homosexuality to bestiality

And Republicans voted to confirm him

Mr. Kirchick has been a vocal critic of Mr. Trump, but he did note one important difference when it comes to this president: “Trump himself is obviously a huge part of what’s changed. He’s clearly comfortable around gay people.”

Before his political turn, Mr. Trump mostly talked publicly about gay people the way one might expect of a New Yorker in show business. He once asked a contestant on “The Apprentice” if he was “a homosexual.” When the man said that he was, Mr. Trump replied: “I like steak, somebody else likes spaghetti. That’s why they have menus in restaurants. It’s a great world.”

He allowed gay people to join Mar-a-Lago when other clubs in Palm Beach still discriminated. One associate of his said that in the period when Mr. Trump was preparing to become a presidential candidate, he privately explained his thinking on gay-related policy issues, such as marriage equality, this way: “I love the gays. They pay the most for the weddings.”

But then he went on to pick as his running mate Indiana governor Mike Pence, who had a long record of opposing gay rights. And then there was the fact that the political base Mr. Trump had cobbled together and then needed to mollify included many gay-hating constituencies; he would never have made it without evangelicals. Once he got into office, he barred transgender people from the military. His most recent campaign for president pumped out videos ridiculing gay people in the military. He recently mocked Pete Buttigieg’s same-sex marriage.

Bring any of that up to the A-Gays and they just laugh and insist that no one can say with a straight face that MAGA is homophobic. They delight in what they see as the camp aspects of gay culture that suffuse their movement: On the eve of his inauguration this year, the president danced onstage with Village People as the group performed “Y.M.C.A.,” the ode to gay cruising. The soundtrack at MAGA rallies includes Abba, Queen, Elton John, Sinead O’Connor and Andrew Lloyd Webber. Mr. Trump often talked about the hotness of men he spotted in the front row or who appeared onstage with him.

Mr. Kirchick called the president a “camp icon,” adding: “He’s like a drag queen. He’s outrageous, he’s transgressive, he’s catty, he’s a narcissist the likes of which we haven’t seen since Alexander the Great.”

The A-Gays also worship Melania Trump and she seems to appreciate them, too. One of the few events she participated in during her husband’s last campaign was a fund-raiser with gay Republicans in Trump Tower (for which she was paid). Mr. Moran was there, of course. He keeps a framed photograph of himself with Mrs. Trump from that night at his desk at the Department of Energy and said he’s met the first lady “a dozen times.”

In 2021, she came to a dinner Mr. Moran threw at Mar-a-Lago to accept the Log Cabin’s “Spirit of Lincoln” award. He called it “the most incredible experience of my life.” But what is it like to actually hang out with her? “I mean, she’s Melania Trump, it’s not like we’re sitting around on the couch with our heels off eating pizza,” he said.

He said that he and his fellow MAGA gays consider her an icon because she has, as they feel they have too, gone through “trials and tribulations, the ups, the downs, the good, the bad.” (Also because of her fashion.)

All of this can be somewhat surprising to some of the other MAGA tribes who have come to the capital to get in on the action of the Trump redux.

“The funny thing is, I had a lot of girlfriends who wanted to move here,” said Natalie Winters, the D.C.-based right-wing media darling who is a protégé of Steve Bannon. “They thought the dating scene would be really great, that MAGA would bring in a whole wave of, like, you know, eligible, conservative, smart, enterprising men.”

Instead, she said, “everybody’s freaking gay.”

Charles Moran has no business in that position - he was a Log Cabin Republican spokesperson and Gays for Trump person for years.

Like most of Trump's appointees, he's just a boot-licker with no qualifications for his position.

He's fat and fem as well - despite his online pics.

A disgusting human being.

On the Town

In early June, the president and first lady went to the Kennedy Center for the opening night of a production of “Les Miserables.” This constituted a big night out on the MAGA social calendar — there was even a red carpet — and the A-Gays turned out in force. They stood around the Kennedy Center’s grand foyer in tuxedoed packs, swilling champagne and making after-party plans as they awaited the president’s arrival.

They soon came face to face with their ideological counterparts when a troupe of drag queens showed up to crash the party. Their very presence was a political statement, since the president had been railing online about how there would be no more drag shows allowed at the Kennedy Center.

The drag queens made their defiant march through the theater to find their seats near the stage. The right-wing gay men glared and shook their heads. The president and first lady, dressed all in black, hovered above the melodrama from their seats up in the balcony.

“The gay left just can’t handle the fact that President Trump loves the gays,” said Casey Flores, a 34-year-old MAGA gay who moved to Washington in April and started a job at the Kennedy Center as a fund-raiser.

“This idea that Republicans hate gays, that’s just so not the case, as clearly evidenced by all of us,” Mr. Flores said, referring to all of his gay friends who moved to Washington to work for Mr. Trump. “We’re so over it. We just want to help the country.”

Mr. Flores, who is not married, said he’s “not particularly worried about gay marriage being repealed,” mostly because of some “protections” he heard were put in place not long ago. (He was referring to the Respect for Marriage act, which President Biden signed into law in 2022; it mandates federal recognition of same-sex marriage and was passed by a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers.)

But what about some of the more homophobic-seeming constituencies and characters in MAGA world — is it ever difficult, as a gay man, to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with evangelicals and people like Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary who has a history of criticizing policies allowing gay people to serve in the military?

Eh, not really, said Mr. Flores.

“Nobody is meaner to gay people than other gay people,” he insisted. “Left-wing gays hate socially conservative Christians more than that group of people hates the gays, and I think that’s on public display every day on social media and elsewhere.”

A few weeks after the opening of “Les Miserables,” Mr. Flores was out for dinner at the Occidental, a retro-chic chophouse on Pennsylvania Avenue that draws in many Trump officials. (Mr. Bessent happened to be dining two tables away that night.) Printed in the center of each menu is the restaurant’s motto: “Where Statesmen Dine.”

Mr. Flores was there with his friend Jon Levine, a 38-year-old gay reporter for The Washington Free Beacon, a conservative publication. Both men are in some ways typical of the new kind of gay Republican in town. They moved here after Mr. Trump returned because there were suddenly new professional opportunities. In Mr. Levine’s case, the dawning of a new Trump era meant lots of stories to report and sources to meet. For Mr. Flores, there was a job at the Kennedy Center, which he landed because he is friendly with Mr. Grenell, who was put in charge of the performing arts center.

There were new social opportunities, too. A whole scene has sprouted up for gay Republicans. Just the week before, both men had been at a rooftop party in Logan Circle with about 50 other like-minded guys, many of whom had jobs in the administration (“No libs allowed except significant others” read the Partiful invite.) There have been similar house parties in Dupont Circle, and pool parties on Capitol Hill. But the most coveted invitation for a MAGA gay in Washington is to one of the parties that Mr. Thiel, the gay Trump megadonor, has been throwing at his mansion near Embassy Row. (Mr. Thiel declined to comment for this article.)

“A lot of gays across the Trump administration are very inspired by Peter Thiel,” Mr. Flores said. “He was the first contrarian to kind of open the door.” (Mr. Flores has yet to be invited to one of his parties.)

And yet, this is a relatively small world. It’s still coming together, and not everyone gets along. “Just because we’re all homos doesn’t mean we’re all friends,” Mr. Levine said.

But when these men do step outside their world, they are often reminded that they are not welcome in the flourishing gay scene that surrounds them.

“I will say, if people at a gay bar find out that you’re in the Trump administration or you’re working somewhere like the Kennedy Center, they are not nice to you — they instantly come at you,” Mr. Flores said. “I definitely don’t lead with it.”

That seemed to be true based on a spin through the room one recent night at the Little Gay Pub in Logan Circle. Patron after patron said there was no way they’d ever be friends with — much less date — a gay Trump appointee.

“If you work in the Trump administration, and you’re a gay person, clearly you have no respect for yourself,” said Jason Melton, a 44-year-old Washingtonian who works in health care policy. He was sipping vodka with pineapple juice and looking rakish in a gray Calvin Klein Suit.

Asked if he considered it morally acceptable to date a Trump appointee, he said: “Look, it’s OK to date whoever you want. It’s not up to me to say who you should or should not date. But, in any case …” he trailed off. What if the Trump appointee were super hot? “No, they would go from a 10 to a negative 10 if I found out they worked for Trump,” he said.

Across the room, one young, gay Democratic staffer who works on Capitol Hill stood with his friends, drinking pinot grigio and eating pigs in a blanket. He said he’s always viewed himself as open-minded and thus tried to play nice with some Trump gays he knows. But ultimately he just couldn’t stomach what he saw as their hypocrisy. The way he put it: You can either party with the gays on Fire Island, or you can cut funding for AIDS programs, but you can’t do both.

Mr. Moran said many of his friends encounter this sort of attitude all the time in their adventures throughout Washington. It gets them pretty down.

“But you know what I tell people?” he said. “If you’re not getting invited to the cool kids table, go make your own cool kids table.”

Or your own spreadsheet.

How does all this Trump-lovin' homo-ness in DC play in Peoria, though?

I knew Charles Moran twenty years ago, when he was an embittered young leather queen striving to fundraise for LA City Council candidates and ducking fatass Carl DeMaio at social events. He was a self-loathing little faggot back then, and he's only gotten worse with age.

Like many Gay Republicans, the root of his many issues is his family. His father was politically active with the LAFD, and is deeply outspoken and deeply conservative. When I knew him, he wouldn't say much about his parents, but the implication was that they did not approve of his sodomy. Politics, therefore, was all they were allowed to discuss with one another. Perhaps he saw it as a bridge to his distant and unaccepting father.

You can smell his insecurity in every quote here. The louder a person boasts about having connections, the weaker those connections actually are. The more someone tells you how cool they are, the cooler they ain't. I'm sure these MAGA queens feast on the scraps they're given - Moran got a temporary-ish posting at an obscure agency for which he's not qualified, this other fella got a sweet gig at the Kennedy Center, etc. - but it's not a real victory. Moran has a photo of himself with the first lady, but not with the President. What's that tell you? Either Donald doesn't love the gays as much as they think he does, or Charlie's too low-rent for a transactional cocksucker like Trump to ever touch.

They dismiss Trump's ACTIONS by pointing out cute little emotional sentiments instead. "It doesn't matter that he's attacked PEPFAR, fired trans soldiers, or renamed the USNS Harvey Milk. Did you know he once had dinner with a gay guy?" They point to their presence at his dinner parties as some kind of evidence that the man is not actually hostile to their kind. But that's no defense. The Nazis sometimes ate dinner with Jews, but that doesn't make up for the six million they murdered.

MAGA gays, including Charles Moran, are tragic because they hate themselves and their station in life. Their families don't accept them. Their friends merely tolerate them. And broader gay society considers them selfish traitors. And in true Republican style, rather than reflect on this and grow as people, they turn it around and make bitchy attacks on the people around them. "There's nothing wrong with me. It's the universe that has a tacky problem!"

Pity them. Dismiss them. And do not fuck them.

To R10-It's a "very small Dtrump Gay Rethugican world" they are involved in down in Wash DC.

Thiel is 1 of the "centers of Gay Rethug society" in Wash DC. The Rethug Gays are all over Rehoboth Beach too right now. My 2 boys& my daughter who is visiting RB told me "They are everywhere here" they're not bothering us.

[quote} WaPo

I couldn't find this article anywhere in the Washington Post. I wondered if it was some old article resurrected just for DL readers.

But it is brand new article posted August 26, but in THE NEW YORK TIMES.

For people with a subscription, here's the link.

[Quote] Mr. Flores, who is not married, said he’s “not particularly worried about gay marriage being repealed,” mostly because of some “protections” he heard were put in place not long ago. (He was referring to the Respect for Marriage act, which President Biden signed into law in 2022; it mandates federal recognition of same-sex marriage and was passed by a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers.)

It’s amazing how uneducated they are. This is why they worship Trump and willfully ignore all the homophobic hatred from MAGA

R15, yes, looks like that’s the same article. It was attributed to the incorrect paper

A lot of articles in various publications trying to sanewash the administration this week. I wonder what shitshow prompted this sustained effort by our corporate overlords.

The thing they are being willfully blind to is that of course Trump doesn't have an issue with gays personally. He doesn't believe in anything that would make him opposed morally to two men fucking. That doesn't mean however, he won't use gays and throw gays under the bus for any reason when it benefits him. He's letting his people push states to go after gay city crosswalks for Pete's sake because it makes a good chunk of his supporters happy. He does not care about anything except himself and this bizarre emperor Trump dream he has. And he's destroying the country in the process.

They are positioning themselves to be the Kapos in Trump-MAGA's sexual preference [sic] re-education camps.

[quote]He doesn't believe in anything that would make him opposed morally to two men fucking

Obviously.

Here is a gift link

It doesn’t matter what Trump personally believes—don’t the Log Cabins get this? He’s not going to fight for our rights when he needs the backing of his right wing supporters.

GWB also didn’t have a problem personally with gays, but he was happy to support a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage

I’ve worked with many different administrations. There are WAY more gays in Republican administrations—by a longshot

[quote]Mr. Kirchick called the president a “camp icon,” adding: “He’s like a drag queen. He’s outrageous, he’s transgressive, he’s catty, he’s a narcissist the likes of which we haven’t seen since Alexander the Great.”

James Kirchick is a good writer, but this quote alone should single him out for all time as a prize idiot. There is nothing campy about this administration; quite the contrary.

Gay Republicans? Well, I never in all my life!

I won’t click on WashPo

Being gay doesn’t mean you are not a selfish asshole or a racist. It probably does make it unlikely that you’re a Christian Nationalist.

It’s not WAPO. It’s NYT. Link at r22.

Why are all MAGAS self-saboteurs?

Quisling KKKunts

I'm willing to bet $1,000 that Charles Moran called up WaPo to get this article out there. He used to do press and was a spokesperson for Log Cabin Republicans - it is what he used to do.

He's trying to get more gays to reconsider - and wrapping it up in a faux "movement' bullshit.

Meanwhile, it makes him look good to the GOP and Trump's team - which is what he really wants.

This is all bullshit - about 5 gay men who Moran knows were selectively interviewed. That's all this is - a PR puff piece created by Moran. This is what PR and publicists do.

[quote] I'm willing to bet $1,000 that Charles Moran called up WaPo

It was

N O T

in the Washington Post.

OP was wrong; it was in todays NYT.

That’s “Mr. OP,” not “OP.”

R33 - sorry - just taking it from OP's headline. Still - same thing is true - it's a Charles Moran puff PR piece designed to make people think there are more gays involved in Trump's administration than there really is, that there is this burgeoning gay support of Trump - and all to increase Charles Moran's cred with Trump administration and the GOP.

Nothing I said was false except that it was in WaPo.

Gentle reminder: There were gay Nazis at one point...until they were executed on sight or thrown into the camps.

Gay Republicans are stupid beasts...like Tom Cotton..

The truth about being a climber is that, as included as you may become, they never really like you. There was an old racist joke, "What do you call a black doctor?" Well, the answer to what their straight Republican colleagues call them isn't too hard to guess.

Live it up, boys!

[Quote] Gentle reminder: There were gay Nazis at one point...until they were executed on sight or thrown into the camps.

There were even Jewish Nazis—many of them informants on other Jews

[quote] “A lot of gays across the Trump administration are very inspired by Peter Thiel,” Mr. Flores said. “He was the first contrarian to kind of open the door.” (Mr. Flores has yet to be invited to one of his parties.)

Hate this whole sad and stupid article, but I am loving the bitch for throwing this in.

[quote]The A-Gays also worship Melania Trump

What a fucking embarrassment.

What does Melania even do that could be worshipped? She's the laziest first lady in history.

Did he suck off Roy in his younger years?

Seriously, would love to know what exactly that award was for r42, other than apparently showing up to get it, for which SHE WAS PAID like the eternal whore she is.

When they open the camps, I'm going to be in charge of handing out uniforms!

Very disturbing. Trump's impression of what a gay man is was shaped by Roy Cohn -- vindictive, petty, closeted, self-loathing and dedicated to upholding the heteronormative ideal. This will end poorly for the Ls, Gs, Bs, Ts and Qs.

Good thing the As are spared.

[quote] The gay men who work for him here are keenly aware that they are in hostile territory, surrounded by other gay men who consider them self-deluded traitors or worse.

They are NOT in hostile territory. They live in a city that has been hospitable to gays for more than half a century. They are fortunate the U.S. Capitol is not in any of the red states that voted for Trump. They would learn quickly what "hostile" means.

[quote] “Being gay was the worst thing you could be in American politics,”

Tell me about it, sister!

No one cares about politics on grindr if you're just looking for a hookup. These guys can get action. But they're not able to find husbands, which , considering the fact that MAGA is trying to get Obergefell overruled, seems more than fair. These fools are so annoying.

Melania is also a drag queen.

[quote] For Mr. Flores, there was a job at the Kennedy Center, which he landed because he is friendly with Mr. Grenell, who was put in charge of the performing arts center.

"...friendly with Mr. Grenell" = dumb gay whore

[quote] Being gay doesn’t mean you are not a selfish asshole or a racist. It probably does make it unlikely that you’re a Christian Nationalist.

Dump's mentor, Roy Cohn, was gay and Jewish. He was also homophobic, racist and probably could be fairly described as a Christian Nationalist. A self-loathing psyche is capable of the extremes of hypocrisy.

Charles Moran LOVES to buy his own press. He's a bigger whore than Melania.

Honestly, I’m happy for articles like this. Hopefully when DC politicos read it, it will make them push back against efforts to overturn gay marriage

Like with Don’t Say Gay laws, Log Cabins will come up with some statement about how we don’t really need gay marriage…

R56 - or they will say they want to respect state's rights and that Log Cabins have been influential in raising their voices to GOP leaders, blah, blah, blah.

They've accomplished NOTHING in 50 years. The other gays and the Dem politicians gave them everything they love today - to be out, to have rights, to not get beaten up by cops or random strangers on the street, to not be fired from their jobs.

And a handful of political appointed gays does not make them A-gays. As if.

Fat, tiny-dicked Moran likes to think of himself as an A-gay, when he's just the femme, tall, fat kid from elementary on a power trip. Everyone knows the type I'm talking about.

Worse yet - it is SO. DAMN. OBVIOUS. They really are oblivious people - as are most Republicans though.

“We’re changing the party from the inside!”

"This oven looks really spacious from the inside. And it's really a dry heat!"

This line kills me: "They argue that the battle for gay rights has basically been won"

Yes - BY WHOM? Not fucking your team. AT ALL.

The audacity of these motherfuckers - living in blue cities where they can enjoy their freedoms and rights and privileges and just dismiss everything bad and say "gay rights have been won".

FUCK YOU.

"MAGA gays are exiles in blue cities. We have to carry a pistol when we walk our poodles, and none of these liberal gays will fuck us. It's all their agenda! We'd move to Tulsa, but all our friends are here!"

"They are NOT in hostile territory. They live in a city that has been hospitable to gays for more than half a century. They are fortunate the U.S. Capitol is not in any of the red states that voted for Trump. They would learn quickly what "hostile" means."

I find that hard to believe---I know a lot of people in state politics, and the Republicans have ZERO qualms about the flagrant hypocrisy animating their party---it's like the foundation of their ethical code, they need it. Sadly, there are rabid MAGAs currently thriving in red states---think about the Grindr Rethug who was running for lieutenant governor in VA.

R62 He still is. He is now the nominee, actually. His running mate, an ancient Black broad who loves guns as much as she loves Jesus, refuses to share a stage with him.

[quote] “We’re changing the party from the inside!”

Gay people do need a seat at the table in every administration. Multiple seats are even better.

Perhaps every minority group feels this way right now - and I’m just sensitive to it because it’s about “us”, but it really feels like we as gay men have to contend with this insidious narrative that a significant and growing swath of us are MAGA when every exit poll and survey showed that we are second only to Black women as a Democratic voting block and one of the only demos where they grew support in 2024. If establishment media sources write about Black men or Latinos or Jews (all of whom are more Republican than they were a generation ago) its much more cautious and sociological, whereas we get shit like this that plays into deeply homophobic tropes about us being reflexive fascists and embarrassingly frivolous.

Thank you R22, that was an interesting read. With all the shit going down with ICE and well pretty much everything else I couldnt in all conscience work for this government, but then I'm never going to be in that position being thousands of kms away in a different country

I hold conservative views on a number of issues, but the Log Cabin Republicans, Charles Moran, other gay men like him, and their ilk just don't get it. The racist, sexist, irresponsible imbecile and the White House and his administration use them as window dressing to deflect from the discriminatory views, policies, and actions that have harmed the LGBT community here in the US and abroad.

How these lickspittles can support the gutting of PEPFAR, USAID, and HIV/Aids treatments is beyond my understanding. How they can sit idly by and watch the racist, sexist, and transphobic actions of this administration unfold boggles my mind.

They can rot in hell!

Casey Flores looks lacks any serious education or experience - in anything. Check out this LinkedIn - most of these 'jobs' are just things he founded.

That's the thing - if you're lackluster, not very bright and not many options - go right wing and suddenly you have a platform and connections.

Candace Owens, Charlie Kirk, that closeted Nick Fuentes - it goes on and on. These are idiots who are given talking points.

I think most of them have daddy and acceptance issues. They want to feel special and powerful. They're still just little boys inside. Not mature.

They’re self-hating assholes BUT gay representation in all facets of government is important for us.

Dumbest timeline.

[quote]I think most of them have daddy and acceptance issues.

I think most of them are racists who hate paying taxes that might benefit a black or brown person.

This isn't rocket science. They're republicans. They're simultaneously the worst and the most basic assholes you've ever known. There's no grand unifying theory needed to explain gay republicans. They hate non-whites and worship wealth and power. They're republicans.

“Night of the long knives -Trump version”

Let's be honest, the only thing keeping a lot of you from voting republican is their anti-gay stuff, and maybe, you don't want to be associated with the trashier MAGAs. I read some of the posts on here and on gay-Twitter, if you could find some way to make it work some of you would gladly vote republican.

Just from DL alone, the pie chart would be mainly 1) The Anti-Capitalists/Anti Billionaire (raging Progressives) crowd, followed by; 2) Conservative gays (the heteronormative/Jesus crowd); followed by 3) mainstream Democrats, followed by 4) Republican gays, followed by; 5) Moderates.

"How these lickspittles can support the gutting of PEPFAR, USAID, and HIV/Aids treatments is beyond my understanding."

How is it beyond your understanding? Hypocrisy is and has always been one of the major elements of conservatism---you can't fight against social change and progress from an ideological standpoint, and then actually try to stop it in its tracks, it's too much work. And the foundation of conservative political theory dating back to before the French Revolution is a rejection of the Enlightenment values of truth, justice, and freedom.

i.e. why would these fuckers care about AIDS anywhere? They're economic libertarians, they believe that preventable suffering is natural and good.

R74, I have been on and off DL for 20 years (came across this place when I was a baby)---there have always been Republicans, but I would say that DL was always very much majority partisan Dem with a strong orientation to the Left on economics. Yeah, there has always been an interest in how reactionary and anti-gay politics were used to distract, but most gays here know that Republicans are conmen even when they embrace gay liberation.

What a bunch of delusional Govt homosexuals. When push comes to shove they'll be gotten rid of with the brown folks too when sh*t goes down.

[quote] They've accomplished NOTHING in 50 years. The other gays and the Dem politicians gave them everything they love today - to be out, to have rights, to not get beaten up by cops or random strangers on the street, to not be fired from their jobs.

They're too dumb to understand. In some states, you can still be fired from a job for being gay and have no legal recourse. All transgender servicemembers have been expelled from the military with relatively little public outcry. The influence of the psycho evangelicals extends to the federal judiciary and we are only a few decisions away from the end of any employment protection for sexual orientation and the end of same-sex marriage. Those imbecilic so-called MAGA gays won't know what hit them.

R78 - they don't care or think you're exaggerating. "Oh people don't REALLY do that, they don't discriminate in red states". Oh yeah - MOVE there!

I hate ALL Republicans, gay and straight, who live in urban metropolitan areas. It's the diversity, arts, public transport, restaurants, music scene that makes the city vibrant - any those usually are not conservatives.

Of course they say - well, it's the wealthy Republicans who make it happen - but there are plenty of Democrats in finance and financial industry.

Hypocrites, small-minded, and huge egos. And nobody calls them out on it because they keep it quiet and vote against everyone else but themselves.

They truly don't believe in a society - it's "i've got mine - fuck you" mentality.

[Quote] Gay people do need a seat at the table in every administration. Multiple seats are even better.

They’re sucking up to a fascist and rubber stamping whatever he wants, whether it’s anti-gay or not. Trump has slashed funding for any LGBT-related research, ended the LGBT suicide prevention line, is killing PEPFAR, reduced funding for PrEP, and will soon be cheering on the case to end gay marriage.

The Log Cabins are just fine with all that. Their excuse is always “Gay rights aren’t the primary thing we’re working for.”

Gays sucking up to pedophiles.

R74 clearly tongue’s up Trumps anus.

[quote] There were even Jewish Nazis

There may have been Jews who supported the Nazis, but they would never have been allowed to be party members. Antisemitism was a core party ideology.

R83 is sadly correct

"Of course they say - well, it's the wealthy Republicans who make it happen - but there are plenty of Democrats in finance and financial industry."

The Finance industry isn't why we have art or music scenes.

Sure, the art industry itself is definitely entangled with Finance---but what isn't?

R85 - the traditional argument (by many Republicans) is that the wealth they generate supports all the businesses and arts - and indeed there are a lot of corporate sponsors and individual donations that are necessary for them to keep going.

I don't agree with this argument - but it's very a trickle-down idea obviously - based on the presumption that all business owners, wealthy individuals, and corporations all back Republican policies and principals. Do they tend to be more Republican? Well yes, when all the laws and policies benefit the corporations and have less taxes for wealthy people. But I would say it's probably more 60% - not 95%.

Exactly r80. It's simply useless to have gays "at the table" if those gays refuse to ever, ever speak up against homophobia in any way, because they just refuse to see it or acknowledge it. Their resentment goes entirely the other way: it's all about those terrible liberal gays (you know, the ones who fought for all those gay rights they take for granted against heavy, heavy conservative opposition). The Christian Right of course is all light, love, and laughter, full of goodwill and outreach, if only lefty gays would see the love.

[quote] “Nobody is meaner to gay people than other gay people,” he insisted. “Left-wing gays hate socially conservative Christians more than that group of people hates the gays, and I think that’s on public display every day on social media and elsewhere.”

They might want to consider a few questions: Why might gay marriage be in trouble? Where is that coming from? What group is pushing to end it? Who appointed the Supreme Court Justices that might very well overturn it? But hey, the good news is the president uses YMCA at his rallies!

Moran and the LCR ghouls will gladly sell off pieces of the Movement to secure their own social access.

"Sure, you can put The Tranz in camps! We're not icky like that! Adoption? Real gays don't want kids! And an HIV vaccine? You know I'm the monogamous type, and I go to church just like you! Slash and burn, Donald! I'm just happy to still be sitting here!"

[quote] Let's be honest, the only thing keeping a lot of you from voting republican is their anti-gay stuff, and maybe, you don't want to be associated with the trashier MAGAs.

If the Republican Party was like the Conservative parties in Canada or the UK, then honestly yes, I’d be a Republican. But it’s not and won’t be anytime soon.

The TQ+ contingent will use this as proof that “cis white gay men” are “privileged” and not sufficiently “queer.”

R90 The Gay Republican contingent is almost 100% white, 100% male, and 100% privileged/rich/connected. And they're eager to downplay their faggotry in favor of tax cuts and religious bullshit. They hate themselves, and it shows.

So no, I'd say they're not sufficiently queer.

If you think the “gay Republican contingent” is their only target, you’re not paying enough attention.

R91 - not so fast - they've got Tammy Bruce and there are a lot of white lesbians who are registered Republicans. I've seen them on this board - usually trying to cosplay as their asshole Republican fathers because that's their model of what a butch, masculine type is.

And many are not rich or connected - they are kiss asses to become rich and connected because they value that over everything else. They literally sell out their own people to get ahead. Rich people don't need to do that.

When Trump signs the EO sending us off to the gulag, these gay Nazis will sing about how Trump just love gays and the gulag must be a place of honor.

“but he played YMCA at his rallies!”

R94 That quote fucking infuriated me. Some silly little queen actually thought that matters to Trump's image.

These gays are just prostitutes lining up to suck Trump’s cock for better social position

They have no moral compass. Self loathing to the core. They are all A-list gays so they hate on the rest. They are pathetic

R97 - they are self-proclaimed A-gays. They are not A-gays at all. They're desperate nobodies with no other career paths who are being used by the GOP and will be disposed of like all the others.

No gay man on earth would see them and say A-gays.

[quote] The TQ+ contingent will use this as proof that “cis white gay men” are “privileged” and not sufficiently “queer.”

I just refer to these homosexual sycophants as "regular gay guys.". They really love that!

[quote] If the Republican Party was like the Conservative parties in Canada or the UK, then honestly yes, I’d be a Republican.

As a Canadian, I can tell you that you wouldn't want to be a Tory in 2025. I mean, you'd support Pierre Polyester and KKKonvoyers? Or Danielle Smith? Or Orban's BFF Stephen Harper?

Charles Moran has to be a top, but only because his cleaning regimen is chronically insufficient.

Exactly, r100. Poliverre thinks Jordan Peterson is a great thinker.

A couple of gay Never Trumpers, including a former Chair of the Log Cabinettes, talk about this article here, and kind of the whole Republican and gay in DC thing, starting around the 48:00 minute mark. Anyway, if you're interested.

R103, it was an interesting watch. Not American so don't understand the Log Cabin Gays.

Tim Miller is a gay Never-Trump Republican, and now he has a popular podcast.

It's the best work he can get these days, since MAGA won't let him work as a media consultant anymore.

^ tell us something new.

Uhhh, he's a power bottom, too.

Sure you are, Tim. Sure you are.

But seriously, good vid.