Reports have surfaced that the Out NYC Hotel has been sold.

 

The queer boutique hotel opened in 2009, offering 105 rooms, a restaurant and nightclub.

 

It seemed to be doing well until April 2015, when owner Ian Reisner and his former lover and current business partner Mati Weiderpass hosted a private dinner and fund raiser at their Manhattan home for GOP Senator Ted Cruz. (Yes, that would be Ted "I hate gays!" Cruz.)

 

The business duo was skewered by the LGBT community. Initially, Reisner argued he had done nothing wrong, and that Cruz knew they did not see eye to eye on all issues. When that didn't work, Reisner apologized. 

 

A boycott against the hotel, and other businesses owned by the men, was started. Broadway Cares cancelled functions at Out. Queer Nation flew a plane over Fire Island last summer with a banner urging people to avoid Reisner’s businesses.

 

New owners have bought out the hotel's lease for a reported $40 million, and will no longer present it as a gay-only space.

 

"The men who owned this property had the audacity to host Ted Cruz in their homes and so in many ways, justice has been served," Pat Rosado, an activist who helped initiate the original boycott, posted on Facebook. "I still hold the [belief] that if you are a business person and your clientele is predominantly LGBTQ there is a certain [moral] obligation you have in who you support politically."

 

Oh well, gay men will have to stay at one of the hundreds of other hotels when they visit the city.