Eric Johnson, the gay chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, is part of the new Sundance Channel show ‘The Hill.’ (Photo by Heidi Guttman)
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BRIAN MOYLAN
Friday, August 18, 2006
Eric Johnson, the chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler (D-Fla.) has tricked out his office on Capitol Hill with “Star Wars” memorabilia.
“I’m a big geek,” Johnson, 35 says. “I stay in touch with the kid inside me. When times are stressful I can go play with my action figure and make myself feel better.”
Equally geeky, but twice as gay is the life-sized cardboard cutout of Elijah Wood as Frodo Baggins from “The Lord of the Rings.”
“Elijah Wood’s so beautiful,” Johnson says. “That movie is gay. It probably is the gayest thing in my office.”
Nearby on a ledge next to his desk sits a family portrait of Johnson, his partner of seven years, James de Jesus, and their 3-year-old adopted son, Kai.
De Jesus is not only a presence in the office on Johnson’s windowsill, but he’s also there every day as a member of Wexler’s staff — albeit one who doesn’t work directly with or for his partner.
“I don’t get any special treatment,” de Jesus says. “The only time we really see each other is lunch time and we end up talking about Kai ... or what we’re going to do for the weekend or date night or more personal stuff.”
America is going to get to spend time with both of them and the rest of Wexler’s staff starting Wednesday, Aug. 23, when Sundance Channel starts airing its six-part documentary series “The Hill,” which takes an inside look at the world of politics.
The series filmed inside Wexler’s office beginning with the run-up to the 2004 presidential election.
The episodes follow Wexler, Johnson, communications director Lale Mamaux and legislative aide Halie Soifer as they deal with issues ranging from Bush’s successful re-election bid to the war in Iraq, the Patriot Act and the indictment of I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby in the Valerie Plame case.
While most of the action is contained inside their office and the chambers of Congress, the cameras occasionally follow staff members home for brief looks at their personal lives.
This is the perfect D.C. show, with plenty of politics, inside-the-Beltway intrigue, enough drama to keep things interesting and, well, more politics.
EVEN FROM AN early age, Johnson would probably have loved a show like “The Hill.”
“I remember watching the Ford/Carter debate with my parents, so I must have been 5,” he says. “I put up signs for Reagan in 1980 when I was about 9.”
His love of politics led to a run for a position on the school board in his native south Florida when he was 19, after he had already helped to run campaigns for local city council hopefuls.
However, he didn’t stay a Republican.
“As I got older and really understood where they stood on things, I realized I didn’t feel the same as these people,” he says. “As I got more in touch with my sexuality, I felt there wasn’t a home there for me. I wasn’t going to rationalize that I could be fiscally conservative and socially liberal.”
Johnson met Wexler when he was a Florida state congressman and was his campaign manager when Wexler was elected to his current office 10 years ago.
“I think a job in Congress is only as good as the member you work for. [Wexler is] very laid back and down to earth and informal,” Johnson says. “It’s a fun environment to work in and it so happens that there are almost no issues that we disagree on.”
Johnson and de Jesus met through a chance encounter in Dupont Circle when Johnson was having lunch with a friend and de Jesus was “playing hookey” from the Catholic seminary where he was studying. After more and more weekends away, de Jesus left the seminary to pursue the relationship.
De Jesus didn’t jump directly from religion to politics, but worked for AIDS Action and the Outreach Program for Children with Gender Variant Behaviors and Their Families at Children’s National Medical Center before starting part time in Wexler’s office, where he now works full time.
Though they have no legal documents from Massachusetts, Canada, Vermont or anyplace that legally recognizes same-sex relationships, they had a commitment ceremony in D.C. for friends, family and colleagues.
Today, the focus for the couple, who live in Glendale, Md., is raising their son.
“I’m the authoritarian type, and he’s more of the permissive type,” de Jesus says about their differing parenting styles. “Eric is fond of saying that if we can make Kai’s future therapy down to two years from 10 years we’ve done our job well.”
As for being part of the “The Hill,” Johnson is mostly pleased with how he comes off on screen.
“I’m proud of [the show] as a portrayal for the gay community,” Johnson says. “You definitely see that there’s a gay person who has a substantive role and that he has a family like every other family and I hope that it’s a very humanizing portrait of a gay family.”
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