D.C. lost yet another LGBTQ nightlife venue on Tuesday with the announcement that Cobalt, located at 1639 R St. NW, has closed its doors for good.
Owner Eric Little confirmed the closure in a message posted to the club’s Facebook page.
“It’s no secret that the building that housed Cobalt and the adjacent property recently sold,” Little wrote. “With the combination of the sale of the buildings, the start of demolition, costly infrastructure repairs and upgrades that we would need to shoulder to remain open for the short remainder of our lease (without an opportunity to extend the lease) along with a slow decline in sales we decided it was the right time to close the business to focus on our other businesses and some personal family needs.”
Even prior to Little’s announcement, speculation about the club’s fate had swirled for weeks, and hit fever-pitch after a photo was posted to Facebook showing the club’s main entrance door with a sign reading “CLOSED FOR WATER PROLBEMS” (sic) posted on the glass.
In the Facebook post, Little thanked the customers and staff who contributed to the club during its two-decade run, saying he was proud of Cobalt’s legacy.
“The gay bar industry has been changing over the past few years with the popularity of dating apps, changing social norms, and pop-up parties/events at non-gay venues and we applaud these evolutions as positive progress,” Little wrote. “And it is our hope that patrons will encourage these businesses to support the greater LGBT community to continue the good work and social change that Cobalt and all of the many other gay bars, restaurants, and businesses (past and present) have worked so hard to achieve.
“We understand the property will be redeveloped into residential use and we wish the new building owners and future residents the best of success and hope that the buildings will bring them all as much joy and happiness as it has brought the entire Cobalt family.”
Four people are dead and at least 13 others injured after a street racer fleeing police lost control and crashed into a popular LGBTQ nightclub in Tampa, Florida.
Surveillance video from the club shows pedestrians running for safety as a silver Toyota Camry careens through an intersection and into a crowd of more than a dozen people outside Bradley's on 7th.
The crash occurred around 12:45 a.m. on Saturday, just 15 minutes before drag performers were scheduled to take the stage, according to the New York Post.
U.S. Rep. Julie Johnson, one of several Democrats targeted in Texas's latest gerrymander, says she will seek reelection after a federal three-judge panel blocked a Republican-backed congressional map that would have drawn her out of her Dallas-area district for 2026.
The lesbian congresswoman is one of five Texas Democrats whose districts were reshaped to give Republicans a 2026 edge, and among several Democrats who were effectively drawn out of the seats they currently represent.
In Johnson's case, the proposed map would have stretched her Dallas-based 32nd District into Republican-leaning Rockwall County and rural East Texas, while shifting her hometown of Farmers Branch into GOP Rep. Beth Van Duyne's 24th District, a seat Trump won by 16 points in 2024.
The city of St. Petersburg has installed 11 rainbow-colored bike racks in response to the removal of several street murals -- including a Pride-themed mural -- by the Florida Department of Transportation.
The racks were installed in the Grand Central District at Central Avenue and 25th Street, the former location of one of five murals removed at the direction of federal and state authorities.
The mural at Central Avenue and 25th Street featured colored stripes representing the progressive Pride flag and was located just steps from Ride'em Cowboy, one of the city’s best-known LGBTQ nightclubs and a "safe space" for the community, according to Florida Politics.
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