Nancy and the Gays

Contents:

• RON JR. ON THE RERD: THE SON OF RONALD REAGAN BREAKS HIS SILENCE REGARDG THE WHISPER MPAIGN THAT HE IS GAY.
• THE REAL RERD OF THE REAGANS ON GAYS AND AIDS
• ADAPTED OM SECRET CITY: THE HIDN HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON BY JAM KIRCHICK. PUBLISHED BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY. COPYRIGHT © 2022 BY JAM KIRCHICK. ALL RIGHTS RERVED.
• RONALD REAGAN FEARED SON WAS GAY WHEN HE BEME BALLET DANCER
• OP-ED: THE GAY TTH ABOUT RONALD REAGAN
• RONALD REAGAN WORRIED HIS SON WAS GAY
• WHEN REAGAN SAID GAY
• NANCY AND THE GAYS

RON JR. ON THE RERD: THE SON OF RONALD REAGAN BREAKS HIS SILENCE REGARDG THE WHISPER MPAIGN THAT HE IS GAY.

Gay buzz has surround the reed-th son of former print Ronald Reagan sce he dropped out of Yale Universy his hman year 1976 to dance wh New York Cy's Jofey Ballet. It follows him still, even though he and his longtime wife, clil psychologist Dorta Reagan, appear to be happily married, ensnced Seattle wh their three typed as gay "has never bothered me, " says Reagan, 46, a polil mentator for MSNBC and dog show host for Animal Pla. " He plans to vote for John outspoken cric of Bh, Reagan ma headl July when he addrsed the Democratic Natnal Conventn support of feral fundg for stem cell is equally passnate about gay marriage.

There were snickers om the right, but the prsure me om the left: Larry Kramer, one of the earlit and most proment AIDS activists, was one of the lour voic, sayg publicly that Ron was gay. Twelve days before Reagan was elected print November, 1980, Christians for Reagan, a supposedly pennt lobby anized to pture the fundamentalist vote for the Republin nomee, announced that would pay for a barrage of advertisements throughout the South, which attacked Print Carter for “terg” to homosexuals.

The Reagans me om a Hollywood i that had always embraced discreet homosexuals; that was probably the reason for their ocsnal displays of enlightenment. Bis Rock Hudson, Nancy Reagan’s gay iends clud the rator Ted Graber, who supervised a $1 ln renovatn of the fay quarters at the Whe Hoe. By far the most fluential gay man the Reagan ner circle was Robert Gray, an extremely succsful Washgton public relatns man who had been a closeted pal player ever sce he had served as Dwight Eisenhower’s appotments secretary.

THE REAL RERD OF THE REAGANS ON GAYS AND AIDS

” In New York, the gay power broker Roy Cohn boasted of his fluence wh the Reagan Whe Hoe, and his law partner, Tom Bolan, beme head of the screeng mtee for feral judghips New York State.

ADAPTED OM SECRET CITY: THE HIDN HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON BY JAM KIRCHICK. PUBLISHED BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY. COPYRIGHT © 2022 BY JAM KIRCHICK. ALL RIGHTS RERVED.

” In some ways, Cohn was the ial gay iend for the Reagans, bee he was not only eply closeted but also publicly self-hatg.

Asked about the persistent mor that his ballet dancer son, Ron Jr., might be gay, the printial ndidate said 1980, “He’s all man—we ma sure of that. Steve Weisman, who vered Reagan’s first term as print for the New York Tim, thought the “Whe Hoe wasn’t that homophobic bee Nancy had iends who were gay. As a health tastrophe veloped at the begng of this admistratn, the lack of any openly gay officials Reagan’s entourage would have terrible nsequenc.

RONALD REAGAN FEARED SON WAS GAY WHEN HE BEME BALLET DANCER

In fact, the prence or absence of openly gay people would terme how almost every major Amerin stutn reacted to the greatt medil crisis of the .

OP-ED: THE GAY TTH ABOUT RONALD REAGAN

Homophobia led many cisn makers to disunt the AIDS epimic, partly bee they didn’t re much about those who were sick, and partly bee they believed that as long as they were straight, they themselv would never have to worry about .

RONALD REAGAN WORRIED HIS SON WAS GAY

The only real hero were a few scientists si the CDC, who lobbied early and often for more money to fight the epimic, and a very small group of ngrsmen om California and New York, cludg Philip Burton, Henry Waxman, and Ted Weiss, whose openly gay staff members nvced them to take the epimic serly. Bill Krs, a gay ai to Burton, and Tim Wtmoreland, the gay unsel to a Waxman health submtee, were particularly important soundg the alarm. In April 1982, Wtmoreland wrote a statement for Waxman to read which clared, “There is no doubt my md that if the same disease had appeared among Amerins of Norwegian scent, or among tennis players, rather than gay mal, the rpons of both the ernment and the medil tablishment would have been different.

Insi the Reagan admistratn—at the Whe Hoe, at the Office of Management and Budget, and wh the Department of Health and Human man Servic—there were no openly gay staffers, and therefore, very ltle will to attack the problem forcefully. Members of the Moral Majory believed that would be worse to scribe gay sex to young people than was to prive them of the rmatn they might require to stay healthy. This attu was another ditn of the persistence of the myth that homosexualy was ntag—even though Reagan himself had publicly rejected that ia durg the battle over the Briggs amendment that would have banned gay teachers om California’s public schools.

WHEN REAGAN SAID GAY

“Many people, pecially our youth, are not receivg rmatn that is val to their future health and well-beg bee of our reticence alg wh the subjects of sex, sexual practic and homosexualy, ” the surgeon general wrote. It was 3:15 on the morng of June 26, 1980, and Congrsman Bob Livgston was extraordarily dnk, hidg the ngrsnal gym beneath the Rayburn Hoe Office Buildg, petrified that a team of highly traed right-wg homosexual assasss workg on behalf of Ronald Reagan was about to kill him. The mere suatn of homosexualy was sufficient to stroy a polil reer, and thgs uld get particularly vic between traparty adversari.

While public attus have bee far more open, the suatn that someone is gay — whether te or not — remas a potent weapon (as elements of the mpaign agast North Carola Republin Rep. This acunt of the alleged “homosexual rg” that ntrolled Ronald Reagan, and the efforts to expose on the eve of the 1980 Republin Natnal Conventn that nomated him for the princy, is piled om terviews wh several of the survivg participants and documents unvered the papers of former Washgton Post Executive Edor Ben Bradlee. “That stuff, ” or what Kemp adviser Ju Wanniski termed “the homosexual thg, ” had dogged the upstate New York ngrsman and former profsnal football player sce the fall of 1967, when the syndited newspaper lumnists Drew Pearson and Jack Anrson published a piece lkg Kemp to a “homosexual rg” operatg wh Reagan’s gubernatorial office.

NANCY AND THE GAYS

” The “slanr” and “old lumny” that the virile ex-football pro and father of four might be gay, journalists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak wrote at the time, was a “vic nard, ” the sort of “poisono” “garbage” one found “submerged the polil sewers” and other “gutter munitns” that “not only do gross jtice to their victims but also mean and pollute mocratic ernment. Behd those closed doors, McCloskey suggted strongly that the possibily of Kemp as a nng mate was proof that the “homosexual rg” around Reagan, long dismissed as mor, might be somethg all too real. Bt began llg him antilly to report that “homosexual people were very close to Reagan’s mpaign learship, ” that they were “nng” Reagan’s mpaign, and that “the suatn is absolutely out of ntrol.

” It was not until a boozy lunch wh a man claimg to have been a “long time Reagan associate, ” however, that Bt found what he believed to be the “smokg gun” provg that Reagan was ntrolled by homosexuals. ” After hearg om Bt, McCloskey agreed that a Kemp nomatn would revive the 1967 “Sndal Sacramento, ” possibly leadg to revelatns about the other homosexuals Reagan’s orb and thereby imperilg the GOP ticket.