Aaron Schock Finally Comes Out-- But Still Swears He's Never Seen Downton Abbey

Aaron has a lovely belt collection and a repulsively homophobic voting record

You can't have been a regular DWT reader if yesterday's exit from the closet by Aaron Schock was a surprise to you. Aaron was the out-est closet case in Congress when he was serving there. It's nice he didn't wait for National Coming Out Day (October 11) to finally embrace-- publicly-- his homosexuality. Is he still going to be a Republican? And when will Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Patrick McHenry, Adrian Smith, Jason Smith, Ben Ray Lujan... come out? After they leave office? And if the rumors are true about Gym Jordan and Matt Gaetz, please, guys, do not tell anyone... ever; just stay in the closet.

Here's Aaron's exit statement:

I am gay.

For those who know me and for many who only know of me, this will come as no surprise.  For the past year, I have been working through a list of people who I felt should finally hear the news directly from me before I made a public statement. I wanted my mother, my father, my sisters, my brother, and my closest friends to hear it from me first.

The fact that I am gay is just one of those things in my life in need of explicit affirmation, to remove any doubt and to finally validate who I am as a person. In many ways I regret the time wasted in not having done so sooner.

I offer my story as one person’s experience. I’ve come to believe it is, in some respects, just a more public version of a difficult and  ultimately, now optimistic, journey familiar to many LGBTQ people.

My story starts in the rural Midwest, as part of a family centered in a faith and its particular traditions. At the Apostolic Christian Church where we belonged, we were enthusiastic regulars. My parents did their best to raise me and my siblings according to biblical tenets as they understood them.

When our family moved from our farm in Minnesota to Peoria, Illinois, we wound up in one of the less rigid branches of our church.  So, while our previous congregation had, for example, considered watching TV to be sinfully idle, the Peoria branch let it slide.

In many ways, I thrived in this environment. It helped me to live with a feeling of purpose and taught me to try to treat others as I would want to be treated. Memorizing Bible verses, going to church camp, attending services at least twice a week-- that was my world.

I’m sure I knew other gay people in those years of growing up, but I don’t think any of us were aware of it. I understood that the teachings of my upbringing were pretty clear on the matter. Because of it, as I got  older and first felt myself drawn in the direction of my natural orientation, I didn’t want to think about it. I always preferred to force my thoughts in other directions, leaving a final answer about that for another day. To that end, it helped that I was also born a fairly goal-focused  personality, driven to succeed and to push myself in every way I knew how. My focus early in life was on getting a head start in business, purchasing my first piece of real estate while still in high school. But when my local school board blocked my attempts at early graduation, it’s that same drive that also pushed me to pursue elective office, first on the school board at 19, on to the Illinois legislature at 23, and in Congress at 27.

In spite of that success, or maybe because of it, I still lived a pretty sheltered life.

Arriving in Washington in 2009, as the youngest member of Congress, I received a  lot of attention. I confess to enjoying it, though in my case, the attention also glided toward speculation. I was a single guy, and people would comment on how I dressed, and about my preoccupation with physical fitness. Untruthful stories were written. Even years into my time in Washington, I was still naïve enough to wonder why the news media would run with an utterly false story about me and a show I’d  never even heard of, and still haven’t seen, Downton Abbey.

It took me a while to figure out that it was really just the media’s own way in which they got to say that about  me in print… to tie me to a stereotype. In fact, if you want to learn something about the “woke” media, Google my name and consider how  prominently that fabricated lie, still without even a single source to back it up, will feature in stories about me by people who otherwise  call themselves journalists. It was another way, albeit more sophisticated, to be teased about being gay. A dog whistle.

Once in Congress, I did like I’d always done and threw myself into the distraction of work and what I once understood success to be. That included being responsive to the interests of the constituents in the  district that I served. Perhaps correctly, perhaps not, I assumed that revealing myself as their gay congressman would not go over well. I put my ambition over the truth, which not only hurt me, but others as well.

I also, in retrospect, realize that I was just looking for more excuses to buy time and avoid being the person I’ve always been.

I like to think I would have sorted all this out in the right way, had  circumstances allowed. As it turned out, the opportunity quickly  vanished in early 2015, when I found myself facing an array of false  charges involving office and campaign expenses. That ordeal quickly descended into a years-long struggle to clear my name, so all-consuming that I chose to resign from the House and devote myself almost full time to the effort.

Following my resignation, I was neither seeking nor holding elected office for the first time since my teens. Thinking I was out of the political spotlight made me much less worried about others knowing that I was gay. I truly wanted to tell my family and felt ready to do so, starting with Mom and Dad. But just as I felt comfortable enough to come out,  government prosecutors weaponized questions about my personal life and used innuendo in an attempt to cast me as a person of deceptive habit and questionable character. My family, friends, and former employees were subpoenaed and asked prying questions about my personal and dating life.

Unfortunately for prosecutors, the most sensational thing they learned about my personal life was that I didn’t have much of one while I was in office. But the government’s tactics in prosecuting my case made it obvious that coming out would be better discussed after the charges against me were dropped. It was ironic and painful; just as I was finally ready to come out of the closet, it felt as though someone had locked the door.

For all the grief that these events brought into my life, I was confident that the truth would win out and that I would be free to share it. I refused any offer of a plea bargain and insisted on going to trial. The trial never happened because, last March, government prosecutors asked the judge to dismiss the indictment and all of the charges against me.

After the four years of legal hell finally ended this past March, the joy of vindication was met with the reality of facing my truth with those closest to me. I made plans to drive to my mother’s for Easter holiday and tell her what I had so long avoided.

In many ways my mind at that point was also oriented towards making up for lost time, socially. I got tickets for the Coachella Music Festival with friends. A few days later, I got into my car, with all the fear and anxiety that I suppose many feel when they finally head off to have that long-avoided conversation with their family. I think it would be fair to say, life intervened.

Halfway through the trip, I spoke with my mother. News broke of my weekend at Coachella. Pictures online made clear what I was en route to tell my mother in person. She told me to turn around and go back to LA. I wasn’t welcome at home for Easter.    To characterize some of these conversations with my family in general, it’s fair to say it has not been a case of instant acceptance and understanding. What I had to share was unwelcome news to every single person in my family, out of the blue in some cases, and was met with sadness, disappointment, and unsympathetic citations to Scripture.  It hurt to hear all this, to say the least. What I had feared from many of them had come to pass. My family had always been my closest friends and biggest supporters, through thick and thin. And I say, not to arouse sympathy, but hopefully, rather, understanding, I felt fairly alone.

My approach since has been rooted in an appreciation for how long it took me to overcome my own resistance to being gay. As much as I would like for my family to quickly change about the way they view it, I’ve come to  terms with the fact that it might take my loved ones more time than I would like. And I realize some might never come around.

I do hold out hope that, over time, my family will come to accept me as I am. I remind them that I am still the same Aaron they have always known, the one they were so proud of not long ago. I realize that, having gone through a tough and lonely career ordeal, I’ve come to need them only more.

While feeling at times like my mother’s fallen star, I’ve also been cautioned by my fellow gays active in politics about what to expect from the LGBTQ public. Where was I, they will ask, when I was in a position to help advance issues important to gay Americans?

No one gets to choose when we learn our lives’ big lessons. Mine have been no different. In 2008, as a Republican running in a conservative district, I took the same position on gay marriage held by my party’s nominee, John McCain.  That position against marriage equality, though, was also then held by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as well.

That fact doesn’t make my then position any less wrong, but it’s sometimes easy to forget that it was leaders of both parties who for so long wrongly understood what it was to defend the right to marry.

As is the case throughout most of human history, those who advance the greatest social change never hold elected office. I can live openly now as a gay man because of the extraordinary, brave people who had the courage to fight for our rights when I did not: community activists, leaders, and ordinary LGBT folks. Gay bloggers who rallied people to our cause. I recognize this even in the face of the intense and sometimes vicious criticism that I’ve received from those same people.

The truth is that if I were in Congress today, I would support LGBTQ rights in every way I could. I realize that some of my political positions run very much counter to the mainstream of the LGBTQ movement, and I respect them for those differences. I hope people will allow for me the same.

To that end, I hope that others can respect that for me being gay has not required stepping into some entirely new belief system, disconnected from every other facet of my life’s experiences. I haven’t overcome one kind of repression for another.

Looking ahead, I hope that you’ll find me reflecting credit on the gay  community-- diverse in its thinking, growing in confidence, gaining in  equality and acceptance. I’m a freer person, happy to let go of problems that really should never have been so problematic to begin with. Life is better with nothing to fear or hide. Whatever comes next for me, at least the story will be authentic, and good things usually follow from that.

I also hope that in sharing my story it might help shine a light for  young people, raised the way I was, looking for a path out of darkness and shame. And maybe aspects of my journey will also give their parents  and family some pause before they decide how they’re going to react to the eventual news. The battle for equality is won as hearts and minds once opposed to us are faced with a different set of facts than those they were taught.

This journey has taught me a valuable lesson: that, whether you are gay or straight, it’s never too late to be authentic and true to yourself.

As for my family, I still get occasional emails trying to sell me on  conversion therapy, but recently at our relative’s wedding, my mother told me that if there is anyone special in my life, she wants to meet  them. I’m optimistic about the future and ready to write the next chapter of my life.

How To Write About Lindsey Graham While Ignoring What Living In The Closet Does To A Person

Brian Stelter used his CNN.com column, Reliable Sources, to report that "Once upon a time, Lindsey Graham was a Republican senator who was not afraid to exit the Fox-verse and appear on other networks. But, in recent months, Graham has been appearing almost exclusively on Fox. In fact, he’s become a regular fixture on the president’s favored network. Since September 1, 2019, Graham has appeared at least 36 times on either Fox News or Fox Biz. He has appeared twice on CBS News in that time frame. We couldn’t locate any other interviews he has sat down for on other networks."

Just in time for Mark Binelli's Lindsey Graham profile, How Lindsey Graham Lost His Way for Rolling Stone. Interesting piece for people interested in Lindsey Graham, although there is one glaring flaw. The phrase "closet case" was never really talked about. Binelli skirted around the "rumors" that Graham is gay, but gave more space to denial than to assertion. It reminded me of the nonsense journalists used to cover up for other obvious closet cases like Mark Foley (R-FL), Denny Hastert (R-IL), Ed Schrock (R-VA), Jon Hinson (R-MS), Steve Gunderson (R-WI), Aaron Schock (R-IL) and Larry Craig (R-ID)-- to name a few-- before they were "officially" outed. I don't know or care who Lindsey Graham has sex with or if he does or he doesn't. What's important is the nature of closet cases and it has been covered extensively by some Republican politicians who were outed.

Two who explained it well are former raging homophobes Robert Bauman, once a closeted GOP congressional leader, and Roy Ashburn, once a closeted California state Senator. Here, watch Ashburn explain how toxic it is for a legislator to live in a fearful, dark closet and how it turns someone into an inveterate liar who eventually loses track of the difference between truth and lies.





This statement by Ashburn is typical of the Republican closet cases who have been outed and everyone knows Lindsey Graham is always ever so close to saying approximately the same thing: "I was in hiding and so casting any kind of vote might, could, in some way lead to my secret being revealed. That was terrifying to me; it was paralyzing. And so I cast some votes that have denied gay people of their basic equal treatment under the law. And I'm not proud of it." As I noted in 2012 the Lavender Scare is an integral part of conservative politics.

Robert Bauman's book, The Gentleman From Maryland: The Conscience of A Gay Conservative, is more important if you want to understand what makes closeted politicians like Lindsey Graham tick. Bauman had come a very long way from living as a a self-loathing, denier who voted against gays while sneaking out of his marital bed to troll for quickie sex with other males in the shadows of the Capitol by the times he was able to muster the clarity to wrote his book. He sought to warn future Republican elected officials against the hypocrisy of the closet. His warnings have gone unheeded by three generations of conservative closet cases in Congress and government. Remember, Bauman wasn't just some run of the mill Republican. He was one of the founders of both the Young Americans for Freedom and the American Conservative Union and served as chairman of each. He was a leader of anti-gay hysteria among Republicans in Congress, while he was sneaking around-- a married man-- having sex with underage boys. Eventually he was arrested with a 16 year old, shunned by his colleagues, rejected by his constituents, divorced by his wife... his life a shambles.

Benelli's Graham (closeted) is worried he could lose his seat-- the only thing he has in an otherwise miserable existence-- if he doesn't pretend to be a raging right-wing maniac and Trumpist. That's the story. Binelli's anecdotes are very good and make it worth reading. This was a good one by McCain campaign manager Steve Schmidt: "People try to analyze Lindsey through the prism of the manifest inconsistencies that exist between things that he used to believe and what he’s doing now. The way to understand him is to look at what’s consistent. And essentially what he is in American politics is what, in the aquatic world, would be a pilot fish: a smaller fish that hovers about a larger predator, like a shark, living off of its detritus. That’s Lindsey. And when he swam around the McCain shark, broadly viewed as a virtuous and good shark, Lindsey took on the patina of virtue. But wherever the apex shark is, you find the Lindsey fish hovering about, and Trump’s the newest shark in the sea. Lindsey has a real draw to power-- but he’s found it unattainable on his own merits."

David Woodard, is a political-science professor at Clemson University. He ran Graham’s first two campaigns for the House and recalls the first-term congressman as quickly becoming the unofficial social director for his freshman class, though he added, "You’re going to find Lindsey knows a lot of people, but he’s not close to anybody." Binelli closes his very long profile by asking Woodward what motivates Graham to stay in politics after all these years. "I’ve thought about that. He’s alone. It’s not like he has a family, a child. His time, when he’s away from the spotlight, I think is a lonely time. He’s more comfortable in the spotlight where he’s Senator Lindsey Graham, talking about things he knows a lot about. I thought he wouldn’t run in 2020. And then he did the Kavanaugh thing, and he’s the Trump buddy. If Trump wins a second term, he might wind up in the Cabinet, maybe Secretary of Defense? The South, and South Carolina in particular, has a history of sending ’em back. He’s got Thurmond’s seat, and Thurmond had that seat until he was 100. So he could have a long way to go."

Jerry Falwell, Jr. Has Been Very Christian-- Towards Handsome Young Men He Has Physical Contact With

No one knows for sure if the pool boy was screwing Jerry Falwell, Jr. or Ayatollah Falwell was screwing the pool boy. I'll keep my theories to myself until there's further evidence, even if circumstantial evidence would lead one to believe that Jr. may have a sore tuchas from time to time. But anyway... it appears that Falwell, Jr.-- when he isn't selling President Satan to gullible evangelicals-- has been double timing the pool boy-- with his personal trainer. Come on, admit it, the personal trainer, Benjamin Crosswhite-- a 23 year old recent graduate from Liberty-- when Falwell was wooing him-- is pretty hunky.

Aram Roston and Joshua Schneyer broke the story for Reuters yesterday, although they were more hung up on how much Falwell was fleecing the flock than on what he was getting up to with young Mr. Crosswhite. They wrote that "Evangelical leader and prominent Donald Trump backer Jerry Falwell Jr personally approved real estate transactions by his nonprofit Christian university that helped his personal fitness trainer obtain valuable university property, according to real estate records, internal university emails and interviews. Around 2011, Falwell, president of Liberty University in Virginia, and his wife, Rebecca, began personal fitness training sessions with Benjamin Crosswhite, then a 23-year-old recent Liberty graduate. Now, after a series of university real estate transactions signed by Falwell, Crosswhite owns a sprawling 18-acre racquet sports and fitness facility on former Liberty property. Last year, a local bank approved a line of credit allowing Crosswhite’s business to borrow as much as $2 million against the property." Nice! All Falwell gave the pool boy was a shabby male brothel!

A Florida lawsuit brought public scrutiny to a relationship between the Falwells and Giancarlo Granda, a young man they befriended while he was working as a pool attendant at a luxury Miami Beach hotel and later backed in a business venture involving a youth hostel. Falwell filed an affidavit in 2018 saying he used his own wealth to lend $1.8 million to the $4.65 million project with Granda.

And U.S. President Trump’s now-jailed fixer, Michael Cohen, has said he helped the Falwells suppress racy personal photos, as Reuters reported this May, in the months before Cohen persuaded Falwell to endorse Trump’s 2016 White House bid. There is no evidence that Cohen’s efforts to suppress the photos were a quid pro quo for Falwell’s vital political backing.

The support Falwell provided to the two young men, Granda and Crosswhite, has some parallels. Both were aided in business ventures and both have flown on the nonprofit university’s corporate jet.

One difference: When Falwell helped Crosswhite, he used the assets of Liberty, the tax-exempt university he has led since 2008. Among the largest Christian universities in the world, Liberty depends on hundreds of millions of dollars its students receive in federally backed student loans and Pell grants.

In 2016, Falwell signed a real estate deal transferring the sports facility, complete with tennis courts and a fitness center owned by Liberty, to Crosswhite. Under the terms, Crosswhite wasn’t required to put any of his own money down toward the purchase price, a confidential sales contract obtained by Reuters shows.

Liberty committed nearly $650,000 up front to lease back tennis courts from Crosswhite at the site for nine years. The school also offered Crosswhite financing, at a low 3% interest rate, to cover the rest of the $1.2 million transaction, the contract shows.

...“The concern is whether the university’s president wanted to do his personal trainer a favor and used Liberty assets to do it,” said Douglas Anderson, a governance specialist and former internal audit chief at Dow Chemical Co, who reviewed both the transaction and Liberty’s explanation of it at Reuters’ request. That would be bad governance, he said. “At a minimum, the terms suggest the buyer got a great deal and Liberty got very little.”

A Spy Named McTurtle? Do We Need-- God Forbid-- Another HUAC Now?

Undoubtably one of the worst chapters in American history revolved around a House committee established in 1938-- HUAC: the House Un-American Activities Committee. Late in its existence it worked in tandem with Wisconsin's deranged fascist Senator Joseph McCarthy. But when HUAC was established Congress was firmly controlled by the Democrats, who were eager to investigate "disloyalty and subversive activities" by private citizens, public employees, and organizations suspected of having ties to the Russians. It wasn't formally abolished until 1975. The roots of HUAC were actually honorable-- Democrats John McCormack and Samuel Dickstein investigating fascist plots against America, including the plans for a Wall Street/DuPont coup (Smedley Butler) against FDR. When it morphed into HUAC, the first chairman was a Texas Democrat and with deep Nazi sympathies and rabid hatred for communists, Martin Dies. At first, HUAC was commonly known as the Dies Committee and was more a laughing stock than a genuine threat. Joe Starnes of Alabama ranted and raved about Greek playwright, "Mr. Euripedes" preaching class warfare and asked the head of the head of the Federal Theater Project (a part of the New Deal) if Christopher Marlowe had been a commie.

HUAC stopped being a joke when it put together plans to round up Japanese-Americans and put them in concentration camps. When it was later suggested that the HUAC would be of more service to the country if it investigated the KKK, that was voted down and one white supremicist who was clearly ahead of his time and would probably be in Trump's cabinet today, Mississippi Democrat John Rankin noted admiringly that "The KKK is an old American tradition." Two decades later, in 1965, HUAC, finally took a few moments out of railing against commies to focus on the KKK. When HUAC became a permanent committee, the first chair was Edward Hart (D-NJ) and it was full steam ahead as an anti-Russian/anti-Communist vehicle.

It has been suggested that in light of the Republican Party pandering to Putin and the Russians, perhaps House Dems need to bring back HUAC and give it the mandate to look into the connects between McConnell's-- Moscow Mitch as Joe Scarborough has dubbed him-- and Trump's refusal to protect American elections from the Russians. One DWT corespondent suggested that he is "wondering if we are witnessing a latter-day Cambridge Five with Mitch McConnell declining to protect our electoral system from foreign hacking." Further, he thinks it significant that McConnell like Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt, and Donald MacLean is a closeted gay man vulnerable to exposure. "McConnell is hiding a damaging [for him] sexual history. Is this a sell-out because of kompromat, or is this simply GOP politics? In either case, why are the Democrats not taking a page from the standard GOP playbook" to show how the Republicans are working with the Russians to undermine America? He wondered if the House should consider an actual resurrection of the House Un-American Activities Committee to investigate Republican connections to past and current election tampering in advance of the 2020 elections?




When I told my correspondent that just the thought of HUAC makes me shudder with horror, he later wrote that "Of course you are right. My impulse was irony that is expressing a frustration with what Teresa Tomlinson diagnosed so convincingly this morning on your site: the Dems don’t have balls. They need to learn some lessons from the GOP and do some forceful grandstanding that captures the nation’s attention. Unfortunately, as you point out consistently well, many don’t have any convictions to rally around. Alas. Willing to share the name of the hotel in Yangon that you referred to on Feldman’s show?" [The hotel is The Strand for anyone else wondering.]

Chip Proser, HUAC artist

In his New York Magazine column today, Andrew Sullivan wrote about why Mueller's testimony didn't shake the country up the way it certainly should have. (Keep in mind that when Sullivan uses the words "we" and "us" he always means elites and insiders.) "The Mueller hearings," he wrote, "told us almost nothing that we didn’t know already. We knew that the president welcomed assistance from a foreign power in order to win an election, and has fawned over his political patron in this endeavor, Vladimir Putin, since he became president. We knew that though he was not competent enough to construct a conspiracy, he was eager to collude with a foreign foe to defeat his domestic one. And we knew that he then lied about it as baldly as he lies about almost everything, and tried repeatedly to obstruct the investigation into the affair. His attorney general then blatantly lied about the key conclusions of the Mueller report, distorting the public debate for weeks as he kept the contents under wraps, and then bet that Americans, with our gnat-like attention spans, would simply move on. We also knew that in contemporary America, none of these facts matter in the slightest. The notion that the average citizen should care deeply about the rule of law and constitutional norms-- and even actively defend them-- has become terribly passé. Now, all that truly matters is whether we are entertained by someone who can command televisual excitement the way Trump does on a daily, hourly basis. If he can’t, whatever the underlying facts, no one gives a damn. American political elites are no better. The president’s assault on the Constitution has merely revealed the Democratic Party as the lame farce we knew it was. Its ancient, pusillanimous congressional leadership was never going to do what duty, rather than politics, requires."

Another Republican Closet Case-- This One In Tennessee-- Caught With The Meat In His Mouth

But he doesn't look gay. Well... he does "look" gay in a blue state way, but in red states? This is exactly what gay political closet cases look like. Meet Bill Sanderson, a state Rep from Dyer County, in northwest Tennessee, about 80 miles north of Memphis-- a godforsaken area where Tennessee, Arkansas and Missouri all meet. There aren't many Democrats in Dyer County anymore. Trump trounced Hillary up there 10,175 (76.6%_ to 2,815 (21.2%). The most famous person from Dyer County was Emmett Kelly, Jr., world famous clown who copied his father's style, Emmett Kelly, Sr. Most people assumed the most famous GOP closet case from the tri-state area was Republican Congressman Jason Smith of southeast Missouri. But now... what's in the water up there that makes people stay closeted?

On Wednesday, Sanderson resigned the HD 77 seat in the Tennessee House. He had never worried about being defeated. In fact, the last time a Democrat even ran against him was in 2012 when that guy "held Sanderson down" to a 66% win. So why did he suddenly resign? Sanderson: "It’s no scandal, no controversy. It’s strictly a family situation, a business situation... It’s just overwhelming. I feel smothered." However...

As for rumors swirling around Capitol Hill that there are incriminating photos or social media posts of him, Sanderson said anything like that would have to be a fabrication.

“I’m a happily married man. I’ve got a wonderful wife,” he said.

One way you can identify a right-wing closet case is by how anti-gay they are. The more anti-gay, the more likely they are to be covering something up. You don't have to take my word for this. Former Maryland GOP raving homophobe and high-up Republican congressman, Bob Bauman, wrote a book about it, The Gentleman from Maryland. And when the de-facto head of the California anti-gay contingent in the state Senate, Roy Ashburn, was outed with a young male prostitute in his car, he did a great deal of introspection and began talking:



Maybe one day Sanderson, a "family values," "Trump-Christian" will too, but now he's in total denial. The LGBT community in Tennessee knows what Sanderson is though: "Since he took office in 2011, Tennessee state Rep. Bill Sanderson (R-Kenton) has voted repeatedly in favor of legislation designed to harm the LGBT community. During that same time period, the 59-year-old Sanderson has also been openly soliciting sex with much younger men on Grindr, a gay hook-up and dating app, both from his home in West Tennessee and in Nashville." Yikes!

Sanderson’s campaign website states he “is proudly pro-life and pro-family … [and] is leading the charge to defend the rights of the unborn and preserve the values that have defined our families for generations,” adding that he “knows that our nation was founded on conservative, Christian values.” His (now-deleted) campaign Facebook page describes Sanderson as a “Family Man, Small Business Man, Farmer, Public Servant” whose favorite activities include running, working in the yard and “spending time with my dear wife, Marjie (the person with the best heart of anyone I have ever, ever met).” (Sanderson has been married to Marjie since the fall of 2012. He has three grown children with his first wife, Valerie; they divorced in 2011.)

His voting record during his four and a half sessions on the hill back up his conservative bonafides. Sanderson introduced legislation to mandate “In God We Trust” on state license plates. He has been a co-sponsor of some of the most extreme anti-abortion legislation, including this year’s heartbill bill (which passed the House but was delayed in the Senate until next year). In 2018, Sanderson, then the chair of the State Government Subcommittee, was widely criticized for helping kill a resolution denouncing Neo-Nazis and opposing a bill to outlaw chain gangs, saying such work was not dehumanizing to prisoners.

And Sanderson has voted in support of almost every anti-LGBT bill that has made it to the House floor. Despite having a gay son with a longterm partner. Despite sending sexually explicit messages and pictures to men almost 40 years his junior.

Sanderson’s extracurricular activities have long been an open secret around the Capitol. I, for one, have known about a set of Grindr communications for three years. But only recently, in the wake of the scandals involving House Speaker Glen Casada and his former chief of staff Cade Cothren, along with the increasing pressure to oust alleged molester Rep. David Byrd (R-Waynesboro), did sources agree to let me write about the messages and encounters.

...Sanderson, during his time in office, has cast many, many votes in support of anti-LGBT legislation. In 2011, Sanderson voted to adopt HB 600, which banned municipalities from adopting ordinances prohibiting anti-LGBT discrimination and overrode and nullified an ordinance that Nashville had adopted. In 2012, Sanderson voted for legislation requiring abstinence-based sex education in public schools, a bill that notably banned discussion of “gateway sexual activity.” (Never mind that premarital abstinence tends to not end up so well.)

In 2016 Sanderson signed onto a resolution denouncing the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling legalizing gay marriage in Obergefell v. Hodges. He then voted to defund the University of Tennessee at Knoxville’s Office of Diversity over a controversy surrounding the annual Sex Week and the use of gender neutral pronouns. Sanderson supported HB 1840, the bill that allowed therapists to decline to see patients if they are gay, in violation of the American Counseling Association’s code of ethics. In 2017, he voted for HB 1111, the “natural and ordinary meaning” bill, widely perceived as an effort to attack LGBT parents.

Earlier this year, Sanderson voted in support of HB 1274, which would require the state to defend local school systems from lawsuits if they passed a transgender bathroom ban; in favor of HB 1151, a watered down attempt at a transgender bathroom ban; and for HB 836, which would allow adoption agencies to discriminate against gay couples seeking to adopt. However, when it came up in committee, Sanderson did vote against the adoption bill, and on the floor he abstained from voting on HB 563, a bill the Tennessee Equality Project calls a “Business License to Discriminate.” (HB 1151 has been signed into law; the other three bills await passage in the Senate in 2020. Sanderson also says he has attempted to kill many other anti-LGBT bills in committee, which TEP does confirm.)

During many, if not all, of these votes, Sanderson has been on Grindr (and possibly other apps). In a Grindr profile from 2013, Sanderson, calling himself “Brian,” describes himself as being in an “open relationship.” For all I know, that may be true. As a man born in 1959 who attended the small Methodist Lambuth University in Jackson, Tenn., Sanderson didn’t have the liberty to come out as queer easily as I did at age 19 at Yale in 1996. (Sanderson says he was not in an open relationship and told me that if I published this story it would ruin his marriage. He denied being either bisexual or gay or having ever sexually touched a man.)

Whatever the private reality of Sanderson’s marriage, his public face is extremely at odds with the Grindr and text messages I reviewed. They all include pictures of Sanderson, including one of his naked torso and genitals. That very explicit picture has his face cropped out of it, but Sanderson is wearing the same watch in other photos. (He says the nude photo is faked, and the other pictures were stolen from his Facebook account.)

The Grindr messages that I reviewed, as in the ones posted by The Dirty, instruct the men to text him at a phone number with a 731 area code. If you Google that number, you’ll find page after page connecting that number to either the White Squirrel Winery-- which Sanderson owns-- or sites where it is listed as Sanderson’s cell number. The texts I saw were sent by the same number. It is the same number I used to call Sanderson for comment on this story and have texted him on since. (Again, he claims that the texts were faked.)

Those texts, in addition to including the nude photo, are frequently explicit in terms of discussing sexual activity. I’m not going to quote from the explicit parts, as Sanderson (allegedly) exchanged them with a reasonable expectation of privacy. But I will note that in his 2013 Grindr profile, which could be seen by anyone using the app, he writes, “I’ve seen a lot and done a lot, but I really haven’t had a connection with a guy and I have a burning desire to have that relationship. I like down and dirty guy to guy play too! So, I guess you might say, nothing will be held back …” (Sanderson says he did not write this.)

While some closeted men do use Grindr to sext and get off without ever meeting anyone, the messages sent by Sanderson that I have seen always suggest meeting in person. In one set, Sanderson even mentions having seen the man and his roommate at a restaurant the previous night, before asking, “Want to meet and play?” This man, who was 20 at the time, did not meet up but did exchange explicit texts with Sanderson in 2013.

One former UT Martin student connected with Sanderson on Grindr several years ago when he was 19. In 2016, WKRN-TV recorded an interview with this man but decided later not to run the story. (Sanderson says he pressured the station to kill the story.) I have spoken to multiple people who confirm the man’s account, including a friend who was told about it at the time and shown the corresponding messages and pictures. All, including the former reporter (who is no longer at WKRN), had consistent accounts of the man’s recollections.

The former student says that Sanderson messaged him on Grindr and he agreed to meet with him in person. He was studying political science, and Sanderson was a state legislator; the man says he was hoping Sanderson could offer advice in regards to getting legislative jobs in Nashville after graduation. Although he assumed Sanderson was sexually interested in him, the man says he was not attracted to the legislator because of the massive age difference. After a winery tour, the man says, Sanderson tried to massage his shoulders and otherwise hit on him in a manner that made him feel uncomfortable. Sanderson also served the man wine, despite knowing he was 19, and gave him bottles of wine to take home. (Sanderson says he verifies the identification of everyone to whom he serves wine at White Squirrel.)

The man says that Sanderson’s wife Marjie unexpectedly came home, and that he was pressured by the legislator to make up a story on the fly about why he was on the property. A year later, he says, when he was in Nashville, he received another Grindr message from Sanderson (in town for the legislative session) trying to hook up. The man did not reply.

Arizona Republican Rep David Stringer Is Pissed Off He Was Forced To Resign For Raping Little Boys-- After All He Paid Them $10 Each

The Republican child rapist who was forced to resign from the Arizona state legislature Wednesday, is not some unknown back-bencher no one had ever heard of before. Not at all. Long before anyone knew he was luring young boys under the age of 15 to perform oral sex with $10 bills, David Stringer was getting famous as one of Arizona's worst racist pigs. He has a history of making overtly racist public remarks and he was stripped of most of his committee assignments after he was whining at a meeting of the Yavapai County Republican Men's Forum, that "there aren't enough white kids to go around." He subsequently defended his opinion as a "value judgement" that "wasn't denigrating anybody." As you can probably guess, Stringer is a rabid Trumpist. Republicans never seem to ask themselves why their party always attracts people like Stringer. An equally disturbing question is why do GOP voters keep electing them to public office?



Stringer was just reelected to a red district seat centered on Prescott, which is north of Phoenix and west of Flagstaff. It falls into Paul Gosar's congressional district (AZ-04), where Trump had his biggest win in the state, beating Hillary 67.7% to 27.5%, the only district in Arizona where she failed to get over a third of the votes. Gosar is also Arizona's most backward member of Congress-- so I'll leave it to you to imagine what kind of garbage populates AZ-04 (PVI is R+21, the worst in the state), and especially Stringer's fiefdom within it. Here's how he defended himself in regard to the rape charges (submitted at 2:56 a.m. on Saturday).

Dustin Gardner reporuted for the Arizona Republic that Stringer is now working to make himself into the victim of this sordid scandal, claiming he was forced to resign by Republican leaders in the state Legislature. In his letter of grievances on Facebook, he noted that "More important than the unfairness to me is the denial of the right of my constituents to elect a State Representative of their choice. The actions of the leadership of our state legislature in forcing me from office are deeply and shamefully offensive to free elections and democratic governance."

While Stringer claims he was never convicted, court records show he accepted a plea deal on some combination of charges and was sentenced to five years of supervised probation.

He also was required to seek admission to what appears to be a treatment clinic for sex offenders. But few details of the case are known because it was later expunged.

Stringer has said he took a plea of "probation before judgment"-- a Maryland sentence that allows someone to have a charge cleared after completing probation-- on two petty charges to not risk conviction.

The Baltimore Police report was obtained by a private investigator working for the House Ethics Committee, which investigated complaints about his sex-crime charges.

According to the police report, Stringer was arrested in September 1983, after a boy told detectives that Stringer had met him and a friend in a park a year earlier and asked them to come to his apartment for sex.

The boys were under the age of 15 and one had a developmental disability, the report states. Stringer allegedly paid the boys $10 each after they had oral sex the first time.

One of the boys told police he had been back to see Stringer, who was 35 or 36 at the time of the alleged encounters, at least 10 times to perform oral sex or penetrative sex, the report states.

That's what happens when you give someone convicted of a heinous crime a slap on the wrist. They don't get the idea that their behavior was unacceptable to society. Tuesday the state House had 31 Republicans and 29 Democrats. Today there are 30 Republicans and 29 Democrats-- as close as it gets.

Trumpanzee and Stringer, two racist slobs ruining America

Reminding Jim Jordan: Former GOP Speaker And Wrestling Coach Denny Hastert, Now In Prison, Adamantly Denied He Molested Boys-- Until He Admitted It

A couple of months ago I was researching a story on Janet Garrett, the Democrat who ran against Jim Jordan in a deep red Ohio congressional district in 2014 and 2016 and is running against him again this year. Jordan wants to be Speaker and, at the time, I wrote Like Denny Hastert, Jordan was a wrestling coach. A career politician, he was in the state legislature from 1994 'til 2006 when he wormed his way into Congress, representing a deep red, poorly educated, nearly 90% white district (PVI is R+14) with no cities. McCain won the district with 54.4%. Romney took it with 56% but Trump crushed Hillary 64.3% to 30.7%. Jordan was one of the founders of the extremist House Freedom Caucus and in 2017 John Boehner summed up his career in politics very simply: "Jordan was a terrorist as a legislator going back to his days in the Ohio House and Senate… A terrorist. A legislative terrorist." So when the news broke this morning tying him to another one of those wrestling coach-sex-stories, I wasn't taken aback as most people were.

Unless you're an absolute DWT fanatic, I don't expect you to remember right-wing hypocrite Wes Goodman, closet case by night, anti-gay super-fascist by day-- and the heir apparent to Jim Jordan, his mentor, day and night. Jordan's boy was caught having consensual sex with another adult male in his district office, but that was no one-time faux pas-- it never is. Goodman led a secret gay life and was somewhat notorious for making unwelcome advances to younger men. Jackie Borchardt reporting: "In public, Wesley Goodman was an up-and-coming conservative who championed pro-family and anti-LGBT causes and aspired to someday run for Congress. In private, he exchanged salacious texts and emails with gay men he met on Capitol Hill, and sent sexually suggestive messages to young men he met through conservative circles who were too intimidated to publicly complain, according to three people who knew him when he worked in Washington." It wasn't just the "inappropriate behavior" he was just outed for. And, yes, he worked for Jim Jordan while he was engaging in predatory behavior towards young men-- usually Republican college students-- in DC and back in Ohio.

Goodman was seen as a rising conservative star and a good networker who could help young people get jobs in conservative organizations, the Republican activist said.

"People never really wanted to come forward against someone in power," the operative added.

...Donnelly said the last time he saw Goodman was at a conservative event in 2009. Goodman was there with Jordan to urge support for the congressman's D.C. Defense of Marriage Act, which would have overturned a local law allowing recognition of same-sex marriages. Goodman was handling the issue for Jordan, Donnelly said.

A friend of mine who served in the state legislature with Jordan told me it was no secret that Jordan protected Goodman. No one, however, knew about the wrestling coach episodes that were revealed yesterday by NBC News and the Columbus Dispatch. According to the Dispatch, Ian Fury, a Jordan spokesman, sent them a written statement that Jordan "never saw any abuse, never heard about any abuse, and never had any abuse reported to him during his time as a coach at Ohio State." No one believes it since it was widely known that Jordan knew all about the Goodman scandal before it broke, endorsed Goodman, based on his "character, experience and passion" to serve, for the legislature, and studiously ignored it while young conservative boys were being molested.

A trio who wrestled for U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan when he was an assistant coach at Ohio State University now say the Urbana Republican knew about abuse perpetrated by the team doctor two decades ago and did not report it.

Former Ohio State wrestler Mike DiSabato, one of the first victims to report Dr. Richard Strauss’ alleged misconduct to Ohio State, told The Dispatch he is disappointed by Jordan’s response, calling the congressman “a coward.”

“He knew, did know, and it’s very disappointing that he has now denied knowledge, not once, but twice,” DiSabato said. “I’ve never known Jim Jordan to be a coward, frankly, but this shows that his own interest in seeking higher office is more important than the health, safety and well being of his friends and athletes who competed for him and with him.”

DiSabato was one of three former OSU wrestlers who confirmed the account to NBC News.

...Former student-athletes from 14 sports have reported allegations of sexual misconduct relating to Strauss, the university said in an update last month. Additionally, some students who were not athletes have reported sexual misconduct, as well those who were familiar with Strauss through a private medical practice he ran in Columbus in the 1990s.

Investigators are also now looking into whether Strauss also may have treated high school students.

Ohio State in April announced it was investigating accusations that Strauss abused team members when he was the team doctor from the mid-1970s to late 1990s, during a period that overlapped with Jordan serving as assistant wrestling coach. Strauss died in 2005.

Jordan has denied knowing about the abuse, telling The Dispatch this spring, “I had not heard about any type of abuse at all.” He said then that “no one reported any type of abuse” to him.

But three former wrestlers told NBC News that it was well-known that Strauss showered regularly with the students and inappropriately touched them during appointments. One wrestler said he told Jordan directly about the abuse.

...Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, urged caution, saying, “every one of us deserves the presumption of innocence until proven guilty.”

“I can’t tell you who’s telling the truth or how much of it is the truth,” he said. “We’ll just have to let it come out.”

He said the news isn’t likely to quash his chances of becoming the speaker of the House, saying Jordan was “very unlikely” to become speaker in the first place.

NBC adds that Mike DiSabato, a former wrestler, whose allegations against Strauss prompted Ohio State to open its investigation, called Jordan a "liar."

“I considered Jim Jordan a friend,” DiSabato said. “But at the end of the day, he is absolutely lying if he says he doesn’t know what was going on.”

DiSabato said he reached out to Jordan this year, before going to the university, to tell Jordan that he planned to go public with his allegations. Jordan told him to “please leave me out of it,” DiSabato said. “He asked me not to get him involved.”

Dunyasha Yetts, who wrestled at Ohio State in 1993 and 1994, said he and others told Jordan about Strauss.

“I remember I had a thumb injury and went into Strauss’ office and he started pulling down my wrestling shorts,” he said. “I’m like, what the fuck are you doing? And I went out and told Russ and Jim [Jordan] what happened. I was not having it. They went in and talked to Strauss.”

Yetts said he and his teammates talked to Jordan numerous times about Strauss.

..."So it’s sad for me to hear that he’s denying knowing about Strauss," he said. "I don’t know why he would, unless it’s a cover-up. Either you’re in on it, or you’re a liar.”

This morning, the Columbus Dispatch reported that Jordan was lying about not having been contacted about the investigation. "Lawyers hired by OSU to probe the allegations said Jordan was contacted-- both by phone and email-- to request an interview, but he never responded. And three members of the wrestling team under Jordan insist that he knew about the abuse but looked the other way." Jordan says everyone else is lying, not him.

“Despite claims to the contrary, Congressman Jordan’s office has not received a request for interview from the investigative team. We have demanded that they send us the supposed communication and remain willing to assist in any way that we can.”

A written statement from Porter Wright Morris & Arthur attorney Kathleen Trafford, provided by the university, said investigators had previously contacted Jordan’s office by email and phone to request an interview.

“To date, Rep. Jordan has not responded to those requests, but we understand from public statements issued on his behalf today that Rep. Jordan is willing to talk to the investigative team,” Trafford said.

Wrestlin' Around by Chip Proser

So far, no one has come out and accused Congressman Jordan of molesting any underage boys, just covering it up. It is odd, though, that he covered up child molesting both for Strauss and then, years later, for Goodman. What the hell is that all about? One thing we do know for sure-- you cannot trust these hypocritical homophobic Republicans around young boys. They just do not ever seem to be able to resist. Just call it the Hastert Rule.


So this isn't about wrestling but maybe you'll find it as relevant as I did. Tom Morgan is a local progressive activist in Jordan's district and a member of Get Equal. "A few years ago I went to one of his town hall meetings with a friend. We asked him [Jordan] about marriage equality. He mocked us, publicly, in front of everyone there... and encouraged them to do the same. This public 'servant' put us in danger that day." And one more thing: There are 258,868 in Jordan's people who have a form of public health insurance. Do the people in Ohio's 4th congressional district know how Jim Jordan votes?

Most Conservatives Screaming The Loudest About Hating Gays Are Repressed Homosexuals Or Self-Loathing Closet Cases

Who remembers Idaho Senator Larry Craig? He was elected to the House in 1980, was elected to the NRA's Board of Directors in 1983, the Senate in 1990, tried to seduce a humpy young undercover cop in a toilet in the Minneapolis Airport in 2007 and was forced to retire in 2009. Now he's a disgraced energy lobbyist. Craig was vehemently anti-gay but had spent his entire time in Washington orally copulating male prostitutes, many in public toilets, but some in his home. He likes rough trade.

The new issue of Scientific American includes a feature, Homophobes Might Be Hidden Homosexuals by Jeanna Bryner. "Homophobes," she wrote, "should consider a little self-reflection, suggests a new study finding those individuals who are most hostile toward gays and hold strong anti-gay views may themselves have same-sex desires, albeit undercover ones. The prejudice of homophobia may also stem from authoritarian parents, particularly those with homophobic views as well, the researchers added."

A friend of mine was just telling me about a flippy-floppy politician running for Congress in MI-06, a lobbyist who has helped finance Republican incumbent Fred Upton and is now running, as a conservative Democrat, for the nomination to run against Upton. He's a bit of a laughing stock.

"This study shows that if you are feeling that kind of visceral reaction to an out-group, ask yourself, 'Why?'" co-author Richard Ryan, a professor of psychology at the University of Rochester, said in a statement. "Those intense emotions should serve as a call to self-reflection."

The research, published in the April 2012 issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, reveals the nuances of prejudices like homophobia, which can ultimately have dire consequences.

"Sometimes people are threatened by gays and lesbians because they are fearing their own impulses, in a sense they 'doth protest too much,'" Ryan told LiveScience. "In addition, it appears that sometimes those who would oppress others have been oppressed themselves, and we can have some compassion for them too, they may be unaccepting of others because they cannot be accepting of themselves."

Ryan cautioned, however, that this link is only one source of anti-gay sentiments.

In four studies, the researchers looked at the discrepancies between what people say about their sexual orientation and their implicit sexual orientation based on a reaction-time test. The studies involved college students from Germany and the United States.

For the implicit measure, students had to categorize words and pictures flashed onto a computer screen into "gay" or "straight" groups. Words included "gay," "straight," "homosexual" and "heterosexual," while the pictures showed straight and gay couples. Before each trial, participants were primed with the word "me" or "others" flashed momentarily onto a computer screen. The researchers said quicker reaction time for "me" and "gay," and a slower association of "me" with "straight" would indicate said an implicit gay orientation.

In another experiment, the researchers measured implicit sexual orientation by having participants choose to browse same-sex or opposite-sex photos on a computer screen.

Questionnaires also teased out the parenting style the participants were exposed to, with students asked how much they agreed or disagreed with statements such as: "I felt controlled and pressured in certain ways;" and "I felt free to be who I am." To gauge homophobia in a household, students responded to items such as, "It would be upsetting for my mom to find out she was alone with a lesbian" or "My dad avoids gay men whenever possible."

Participants indicated their own level of homophobia, both overt and implicit; in word-completion tasks, students wrote down the first three words that came to mind when prompted with some of the words' letters. Students were primed at some point with the word "gay" to see how that impacted the amount of aggressive words used.

In all of the studies, participants who reported supportive and accepting parents were more in touch with their implicit sexual orientation, meaning it tended to jibe with their outward sexual orientation. Students who indicated they came from authoritarian homes showed the biggest discrepancy between the two measures of sexual orientation.

"In a predominately heterosexual society, 'know thyself' can be a challenge for many gay individuals," lead author Netta Weinstein, a lecturer at the University of Essex in the United Kingdom,said in a statement. "But in controlling and homophobic homes, embracing a minority sexual orientation can be terrifying."

Those participants who reported their heterosexuality despite having hidden same-sex desires were also the most likely to show hostility toward gay individuals, including self-reported anti-gay attitudes, endorsement of anti-gay policies and discrimination such as supporting harsher punishments for homosexuals.

The research may help to explain the underpinnings of anti-gay bullying and hate crimes, the researchers note. People in denial about their own sexual orientation, perhaps a denial fostered by authoritarian and homophobic parents, may feel a threat from other gay and lesbian individuals. Lashing out may ultimately be an indicator of the person's own internal conflict with sexual orientation.

This inner conflict can be seen in some high-profile cases in which anti-gay public figures are caught engaging in same-sex acts, the researchers say. For instance, evangelical preacher and anti-gay-marriage advocate Ted Haggard was caught in a gay sex scandal in 2006. And in 2010, prominent anti-gay activist and co-founder of conservative Family Research Council George Rekers was reportedly spotted in 2010 with a male escort rented from Rentboy.com. According to news reports, the escort confirmed Rekers is gay.

"We laugh at or make fun of such blatant hypocrisy, but in a real way, these people may often themselves be victims of repression and experience exaggerated feelings of threat," Ryan said. "Homophobia is not a laughing matter. It can sometimes have tragic consequences," as was the case in the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard, a gay man.

I really don't want to think that Wayne Shepard's most deranged and vicious posthumous tormenter, Virginia Foxx (R-NC), is a lesbian. These guys are talking about Larry Craig: