Hunter Biden Says Washington Has a "Closetoeracy"

Washington’s Closet Has Always Been Political

Hunter Biden wandered into one of Washington’s oldest forbidden conversations this week, and Don Lemon did not exactly rush to change the subject.

During a July 22 appearance on The Don Lemon Show, Lemon asked Biden, “Why are Republicans obsessed with gay people, men, especially?”

Biden offered a theory rarely stated so plainly in political conversation.

“You know why? And this is a serious statement,” Biden replied, before claiming there was “a contingency, a cabal” of closeted gay Republican men with what he believed was “an enormous amount of self-hate.”

“Yeah,” Lemon agreed. “And we all know who they are. You mean in D.C.?”

“In D.C.,” Biden replied. “We all know who they are. Yes.”

Then Lemon named one. “Was Lindsey Graham one of them?”

“Of course he was,” Biden replied. He went on to claim, “Everybody knew that Lindsey Graham was gay.”

Graham, the longtime Republican senator from South Carolina who died July 11 at 71, never publicly identified as gay. Rumors about his sexuality followed him for years, but no publicly verified evidence established those rumors as fact. Biden’s comments therefore remain allegations, regardless of how confidently he delivered them.

Graham’s legislative record requires considerably fewer qualifiers.

While serving in Congress, Graham supported the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage for federal purposes as between one man and one woman. As a senator, he supported a proposed constitutional amendment defining marriage along similar lines. In 2022, Graham voted against the Respect for Marriage Act, which repealed the remaining provisions of DOMA and established federal protections for legally recognized same-sex and interracial marriages.

Twelve Republican senators joined Democrats in supporting the legislation. Graham was not among them.

Lemon addressed that record during his conversation with Biden, saying Graham had supported legislation “detrimental to the members of the LGBTQ community.”

The exchange landed inside a broader political disparity that exists without relying on Washington gossip. When the 119th Congress convened in January 2025, all 13 openly LGBTQ members were Democrats. Openly LGBTQ politicians have increasingly won congressional seats with their identities already publicly known, yet openly LGBTQ Republicans remain considerably rarer in federal office.

Biden had already given his theory a name. During a separate appearance on the I’ve Had It podcast, he described what he alleged was a “closeted gay mafia, largely Republican,” operating within Washington politics. Then he coined a term considerably harder to forget: “It’s not the oligarchy, it’s the closetocracy.” Biden also acknowledged that he did not know the rumored identities of individual politicians to be true, an important distinction between the existence of Washington gossip and evidence supporting it. “Closetocracy,” however, neatly captured his broader accusation: a political culture where some people allegedly conceal their sexuality while participating in a movement whose policies have often restricted LGBTQ rights.

Republicans have elected openly gay politicians, although several prominent cases followed a more complicated path into public disclosure.

Former Arizona Rep. Jim Kolbe publicly came out in 1996 while serving in Congress, amid pressure from activists following his vote for the Defense of Marriage Act. Former Illinois Rep. Aaron Schock came out publicly in 2020, five years after leaving Congress and following years of speculation about his sexuality. His congressional record included opposition to several LGBTQ-rights measures.

George Santos followed a different trajectory. He campaigned as an openly gay Republican before winning a New York congressional seat in 2022, becoming a rare example of a Republican who entered Congress already publicly identified as gay.

None of these histories proves Biden’s theory about closeted Republicans. Sexual orientation cannot be reverse-engineered from a voting record, and opposition to LGBTQ legislation provides no evidence about a politician’s private sexuality.

Washington has spent decades trading rumors about closeted politicians, particularly lawmakers who publicly opposed gay rights. Some LGBTQ activists have defended outing politicians whose votes directly affected gay Americans, arguing that political hypocrisy changes the privacy equation. Others have rejected involuntary outing regardless of ideology or voting record.

Joe Biden took a substantially different policy direction during his presidency. His administration expanded federal protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, while Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law in December 2022. Republicans and conservative organizations opposed numerous Biden administration LGBTQ policies, particularly measures involving gender identity and transgender rights.

Hunter Biden offered a psychological explanation for some of that opposition. He alleged that closeted Republican men carrying “self-hate” had helped fuel hostility toward LGBTQ people.

That remains his theory. The identities behind Washington’s closed doors belong to the people living them, unless they choose to open those doors themselves.

@Santitos

@salinasmariasantos

Copyright © 2026 Maria Santos Salinas for FRONTeras.

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