The Columbus Dispatch

Honoree proud of being ‘visibly queer’ in Oval Office

- By Avi Selk

When Rhode Island’s teacher of the year took his turn in front of the camera with President Donald Trump in April, he struck a pose that some took as an act of defiance:

Nikos Giannopoul­os cocked his head ever so slightly away from the president, toward a black lace fan he had brought with him. He wore a rainbow pin on his lapel, a ring through his nose and a gold anchor around his neck.

Giannopoul­os, who received a copy of the photo only recently, said his attire in the Oval Office was more or less the same style he wore in the classroom at Beacon Charter High School for the Arts, where his work as a special-education teacher won him Rhode Island’s teacher of the year award and a trip to the White House in April.

“The issue with being openly queer is our existence is constantly politicize­d,” he said. “They never stop to think: Oh, maybe that’s just who I am.”

And yet, the teacher acknowledg­ed, there was a certain social significan­ce in his decision to dress as himself to a White House that has revoked federal protection­s for transgende­r students, erased an LGBT-rights page from its website and hired at least one adviser who appears to believe in gay conversion.

Beacon, a small school in Woonsocket, has nearly a dozen transgende­r students, Giannopoul­os said. “They’re nervous. They’re not feeling they’re going to be supported.”

He said he’s been working with them to write the school’s bathroom policies, after the Trump administra­tion revoked federal guarantees that they could use the ones matching their gender identity.

The 29-year-old teacher’s work with the school’s gay-straight alliance helped win him the award. When he interviewe­d with state officials about it, he said, he made sure to dress no differentl­y than he does with his students — “with a bit of flair.” And so by extension, Giannopoul­os felt he had to dress the same way in Washington. Perhaps with just a touch more flair.

“The entire day I was thinking about what it means to be in the White House and in the Oval Office,” he said. “What it represents to be an openly gay person and a queer LGBT person in the White House.”

The lace fan was his partner’s, he said, although it has become a regular traveling aid when he visits somewhere warm, as Washington was in April.

The gold anchor around his neck was not his standard attire. But he was representi­ng Rhode Island, and it’s the state symbol.

No one seemed to notice as he passed through security, he recalled. But Trump spotted the fan shortly after the teachers were led into the Oval Office.

“He said I had good style.”

Giannopoul­os grew more confident then — enough so that when an aide asked him to put the fan away for his private photo, he raised a small protest, eventually asking the president if he minded.

“Ultimately, we were allowed to do what we wanted,” he said. “I was visibly queer in the Oval Office, and no one can take that away from me.”

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