WASHINGTON (DC News Now) — D.C. police arrested a man accused of vandalizing a popular gay bar in Logan Circle, spray painting over images of Vice President Kamala Harris.
It happened Saturday morning at The Little Gay Pub on P Street near 11th Street NW, and officials said it’s the second time this has happened this month.
The Little Gay Pub serves drinks with a side of politics. There’s a picture of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the window up top and a picture of Harris greeting you as you come in.
“In D.C. this is like our sports. And obviously, the election’s coming up and it’s a way of us, you know, living authentically and letting our clientele know who we support, where their money goes,” said co-owner Dito Sevilla.
Sevilla said the portraits he put up of Harris were vandalized on Sept. 11.
“We got a bunch of messages from neighbors on Instagram who would come by the pub and taking photos of the defaced Kamala signs. And so we were super shocked because, you know, in a neighborhood like this, you know, support is over 95%. It was very unexpected,” Sevilla said.
New posters were printed days later but Saturday morning a little before 8:30 a.m. the same man struck again.
The vandal was caught on video spraying x’s on Harris’s face and defacing a bus shelter.
“It said Harris equals Hitler. Trump better than Hitler. So it was some sort of weird equation,” Sevilla said.
Neighbors helped clean most of the graffiti off the bus shelter.
“Defacing somebody’s community or restaurant, and they have to constantly pay money for that,” said neighbor Angelique Marshall. “That’s not right. So when they catch the guy, just make them pay it back and do community service.”
Councilmember Brooke Pinto was at The Little Gay Pub Monday night for an event.
“It is not acceptable to spread these hateful messages. It’s not acceptable to destroy private property with them and we won’t stand for it,” Pinto said.
She said her office has spoken with the Department of Public Works to make sure the graffiti is removed quickly from the bus shelter. They’ve also spoken with police to make sure the cases are taken seriously.
Sevilla just wants the vandalism to stop.
“I would love to say that we, you know, we feel like victims and we’re more deterred, but in fact, it just makes us more resilient and we’ll keep putting them up,” Sevilla said.
The Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) is investigating this as potentially being motivated by hate or bias.
On Monday evening, MPD officers arrested and charged 38-year-old Nicholas Goldstein of Northwest, D.C. for the graffiti incidents on Sept. 11 and Sept. 21.
