Louisiana governor John Bel Edwards has promised to veto any “unnecessary” and “discriminatory” legislation targeting “fragile” trans youth that winds up on his desk.
The Democrat said in a press conference on Monday (19 April) he would oppose bills seeking to ban trans youth in sports, as well as a proposal that would make it illegal for trans minors to access vital gender-affirming medical treatment. Edwards called both measures “unnecessary and discriminatory”, adding that he’s “hopeful” the state’s legislature “will not seek to advance those bills”.
“I am really concerned about emotionally fragile people and the idea that the weight of the state would be put behind something that to me is unnecessary and discriminatory and very hurtful for those individuals when there’s not a compelling reason to do it,” Edwards said.
He also said the proposals would have an “adverse impact to the state” should they be brought into law.
AP reported that New Orleans, Louisiana is scheduled to host the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s (NCAA) Final Four basketball tournament in 2022. The NCAA has issued a statement declaring its support for trans student-athletes and said it will choose locations for its tournaments where “hosts can commit to providing an environment that is safe, healthy and free of discrimination”.
Two of the four Louisiana lawmakers sponsoring the bans on trans athletes in school sports have said they intend to move the bills forward despite this.
Republican senator Beth Mizel told the LA Illuminator that the state should “not let the NCAA or any other special interest group tell us what to do”. She claimed any group that said they would boycott the state should the anti-trans bills pass into law was practising a kind of “extortion”.
Louisiana lawmakers introduced four anti-trans measures thus far in 2021. Two bills – Senate Bill 104 and House Bill 575 – would ban trans minors under the age of 18 from receiving healthcare and mental health services related to their gender identity.
SB 104 would require trans youth to get permission from their parents before pursuing any gender-affirming care, including counselling.
HB 575 would prohibit trans minors from getting any prescriptions for drug therapy or even gender-affirming surgery even if they have the permission of their parents. The bill would also force school staff to out trans students to their parents. If it were to pass into law, it would criminalise anyone that provides gender-affirming care to trans minors with a two-year prison sentence or a $10,000 fine.
Highlighting the school’s “double standard”, he asked board members at the time: “Why is it against dress code for a man to be comfortable with his masculinity and defy the gender norms society has imposed on us?
“Why is it harmful for me to wear nail polish? If it’s not harmful for girls to wear it, why is it harmful for males?”
Now, months later, Trevor Wilkinson has finally convinced Clyde School Board to introduce a gender-neutral dress code.
According to the Abilene Reporter, the new code no longer mentions nail polish or makeup at all, and all other requirements will apply to all students, regardless of their gender.
Board members even included high school students in the drafting of the new code.
Trevor Wilkinson told local news station KTXS: “It is with great honour that I am pleased to announce that Clyde High School’s dress code is officially gender-neutral forever.
“I’m at a loss of words for the joy I am feeling on this special day.
“I am so blessed by the support, love, and help I have received through this experience.”
He added on Facebook: “It has been great to be able to help be a small part of a much needed change.”
The Biden administration announced on Thursday it has formally withdrawn a rule proposed in the Trump era by the Department of Housing & Urban Development that would allowed taxpayer-funded homeless shelter to turn away transgender people on the basis of their gender identity.
HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge said in a statement the proposed regulation, which would have weakened the Equal Access Rule barring discrimination in housing against LGBTQ people and was widely expected to be scrapped in the Biden administration, won’t be implemented.
“Access to safe, stable housing — and shelter — is a basic necessity,” Fudge said. “Unfortunately, transgender and gender non-conforming people report more instances of housing instability and homelessness than cis-gender people. Today, we are taking a critical step in affirming HUD’s commitment that no person be denied access to housing or other critical services because of their gender identity. HUD is open for business for all.”
The Trump administration ended this year without HUD making final, which was proposed in July 2020 under former HUD Secretary Ben Carson. It’s not clear why HUD never went through with making its rule final unlike other changes undoing regulations barring discrimination on the basis of transgender status made during the Obama years, which could be due to the volume of comments, public backlash over the anti-trans regulation or simply incompetence in the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, other regulations seen to enable anti-LGBTQ discrimination went into effect, such as a rule undoing LGBTQ discrimination protections among HHS grantees, including adoption and foster case centers, and a rule expanding the religious exemption in former President Obama’s executive order barring anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination among federal contractors. Because those rules went into effect, they can’t be as easily withdrawn as the proposed HUD regulation because of the Administrative Procedure Act, a law governing federal regulations.
Nonetheless, the website for the White House Office of Management & Budget continued to indicate the proposed rule was slated to go into effect in April 2020. The announcement to reject the proposed rule formally takes the proposed regulation off the books.
The Trump administration’s proposed regulation would allow federally funded single-sex homeless shelters to turn away transgender people seeking emergency housing. The sole basis would be the staff perception on whether or not that transgender person appears sufficiently masculine or feminine to be housed in that facility.
The legality behind the proposed rule was dubious in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling earlier this year in Bostock v. Clayton County, which found anti-LGBTQ discrimination is a form of sex discrimination, therefore illegal under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The underlying reasoning behind the decision applies to all laws banning sex discrimination, essentially making anti-LGBTQ illegal in employment, housing, credit, health care, education and jury service.
Meanwhile, HUD under the Biden administration announced earlier this year it would fully implement the Bostock in its application of the Fair Housing Act and take up cases of anti-LGBTQ discrimination in housing, which is consistent with the Supreme Court’s decision and the executive order Biden signed on his first day in office ordered federal agencies to implement the ruling across the board for all laws barring sex discrimination.
Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, deputy executive director for the National Center for Transgender Equality, said in a statement the withdrawal of the proposed Trump-era rule demonstrates the Biden administration’s commitment to transgender people.
“The Biden administration is living up to its commitment to protect transgender people from discrimination. Today’s announcement by Secretary Fudge is an important step in ensuring access to safe, affirming housing for transgender people,” Heng-Lehtinen said. “This is a decision that will save lives, and help transgender people experiencing homelessness receive the assistance they need.”
Caitlyn Jenner, the former Olympian, reality TV star and transgender activist, said Friday she is running to be governor of California, as a recall of the sitting Democratic governor moves forward.
In a press release posted to Twitter, Jenner, a longtime Republican, said that she’d make a “formal announcement” in the “the coming weeks” and pitched herself as a “compassionate disruptor” who will campaign on “solutions” and “providing a roadmap back to prosperity” for the state.
“California has been my home for nearly 50 years. I came here because I knew that anyone, regardless of their background or station in life, could turn their dreams into reality. But for the past decade, we have seen the glimmer of the Golden State reduced by one-party rule that places politics over progress and special interests over people. Sacramento needs an honest leader with a clear vision,” Jenner said.
Jenner’s campaign website also went live Friday morning. Axios first reported the news.
POLITICO reported this week that Jenner did not cast ballots in nearly two-thirds of the elections in which she was eligible to vote since 2000. Though critical of Newsom, she did not vote in the 2018 gubernatorial election in which the Democratic governor had the biggest landslide victory for a non-incumbent since 1930.
All told, Jenner has voted just nine times in California’s 26 statewide elections since 2000, Los Angeles County records show.
Jenner announced she is a transgender woman in April 2015. She starred in her own reality TV show, called “I am Cait” in 2016.
“The reality is that the trans community is being relentlessly attacked by this president,” she wrote.
Despite her renouncement of Trump, pro-LGBTQ groups were quick to slam Jenner over her entrance into the race Friday, citing her prior support for him.
“Make no mistake: we can’t wait to elect a #trans governor of California. But @Caitlyn_Jenner spent years telling the #LGBTQ+ community to trust Donald Trump. We saw how that turned out,” tweeted Equality California.
Instagram is launching a new anti-bullying feature to filter out “racist, sexist, homophobic” abuse in your DMs.
While Instagram already “proactively looks for hate speech or bullying” in public comments, the new feature will focus the abuse users receive in direct messages.
The new tool will filter DM requests, where users say they receive the most abusive messages, containing “offensive words, phrases and emojis”.
Users will be able to toggle filters on and off for DMs and comments in a new “Hidden Words” privacy section, where they will be able to add words, phrases and emojis that they don’t want to see in addition to a predefined list.
The list of terms already created by Instagram was developed in collaboration with “anti-discrimination and anti-bullying organisations”.
Instagram said: “We understand the impact that abusive content – whether it’s racist, sexist, homophobic, or any other kind of abuse – can have on people.
“Nobody should have to experience that on Instagram. But combatting abuse is a complex challenge and there isn’t one single step we can take to eliminate it completely.”
To further combat hate on the platform, Instagram will also start filtering common misspellings of offensive terms in public comments, “so that even if a word you don’t want to see is accidentally or deliberately spelled wrong, you still won’t see it in your comments”.
In addition, a third new feature means that when a user blocks someone, they will also be able to preemptively block any new accounts the user might create in the future.
A trans woman in Oklahoma was denied the life-saving coronavirus vaccine because she had a “mismatched” identity document.
The resident, who has not been named, was turned away by the Logan County Health Department because her name did not match what was written on her ID card.
She sought to explain this administrative snag to healthcare officials – she was waiting on the paperwork, she claimed – but the department still refused, KOCO5 News reported.
Frustrated, the woman reached out to Freedom Oklahoma, Oklahoma’s sole statewide LGBT+ advocacy group, for help – and they were prepared for a fight.
Tweeting the Oklahoma State Department of Health, the group wrote: “Why is Logan Co Health Department turning away a trans woman trying to get a vaccine and telling us to take it up with the state?”
The department replied on 14 April that it is coordinating with both county health officials and activists to “rectify” what happened.
“It is a top priority to ensure equity in our state’s public health system, including ensuring every Oklahoman has access to the COVID-19 vaccine,” it added.
State officials later stressed that the incident was a one-time thing in a statement to activists.
“The equity of the COVID-19 vaccine distribution has always been paramount in the Oklahoma State Department of Health’s effort to vaccinate Oklahoma,” a spokesperson for the department said in a statement.
“Unfortunately, a situation with a resident being denied a vaccine, due to a mismatched ID, at one of our county health departments was handled poorly.”
In Oklahoma, trans locals face an uphill climb all too common in the US to have their name and gender changed on identification documents.
While more and more state legislators have cleaned up these confusing legal frameworks, making it easier to acquire accurate ID, roadblocks – and there are many – remain.
In the confusing patchwork of US states that allow trans people to update their documents – or not at all – the muddled system, at times, limits what kinds of services trans people can access.
But policymakers aren’t exactly lacking in reasons to iron out these processes.
According to a report from the Williams Institute, 42 per cent of trans people who are eligible to vote in 45 American states do not have accurate identification documents. Researchers estimate that’s more than 350,000 trans Americans.
Moreover, a trans person simply having a passport or birth certificate with the correct gender can drastically improve their mental health, a studyfound.
Even then, some people (and countries and international agencies, such as the United Nations) question whether there’s even a need for a gender marker on identity documents at all.
Police in South Africa are investigating the killing of a young gay man – Lonwabo Jack – who’s believed to be the country’s fourth LGBT+ murder victim in less than a month.
The body of the 22-year-old was found with stab wounds in a pool of blood on Sunday (18 April) in Mau-Mau, Nyanga East. He died on his birthday, according to the Lesbian Alliance Of South Africa (GLASA).
Police spokesperson Noloyiso Rwexana told IOL that no arrests had been made yet, and that allegations of rape had also formed part of the investigation.
“Lonwabo was a nice kid, he was always surrounded by his friends and liked fun and good times,” said Lonwabo’s father Mzwabantu.
“He was a quiet kid and would not say some of the things he would experience because he felt like he could handle them just like any other man. However, when he told us that he was raped we knew as his parents that we had to take a stand. Having a gay child has taught us a valuable lesson.”
The family are said to be distraught after learning of the manner of his son’s death. “We also suspect that he was raped because his shorts were taken off,” he added.
“It’s heartbreaking to give birth to a child and also bury them, especially because he was never sick.”
The brutal killing came days after LGBT+ protests at the South African parliament on Friday (16 April) as queer people demanded tangible action against the rising rate of hate crimes.
Less than a week ago South African media learned of the death of Nathaniel Mbele, a gay man who was stabbed in the chest near the city of Vanderbijlpark.
Shortly before this police found the mutilated remains of Andile “Lulu” Ntuthela, a gay man who was butchered and burned. He was tragically preceded by Sphamandla Khoza, 34, a gay man who was stabbed, beaten and had his throat slit in Durban.
“It comes as a great shock to hear that there has been another horrific rape and murder of LGBTIQ+ persons,” said Siyabulela Monakali, spokesperson for the women’s rights and gender-based violence group Ilitha Labantu.
“We urge members of the community to work together to help root out this scourge of violence and discrimination. We need to build communities that are tolerant and accepting of people’s diversity and not discriminate against anyone based on their sexuality.
Petaluma City Schools (PCS) invites elementary school parents and caregivers to attend an online education session regarding supporting LGBTQIA+ students on Wednesday, April 28, 2021 from 6-8pm. This session, which is open to families with elementary students in other nearby school districts, will aim to provide both an introduction to relevant topics for LGBTQIA+ youth and families who may be at the beginning of their journey, as well as more in-depth information for families who have already been on this journey for a while. Spanish translation and ASL interpretation will be available.
For this gathering, we will be joined by panelists from the following local community organizations, with descriptions of relevant program offerings listed next to each:
North Bay LGBTQI Families: Community building events and school advocacy resources for LGBTQIA+ families, and monthly social and family gatherings for gender expansive youth under age 12.
Positive Images LGBTQIA+ Center: Peer support groups for youth/TAY and adults, Leadership Development Program for youth/TAY 12-24, LGBTQIA+ Cultural Competency Trainings and Consultation, Community Outreach Events, Resources and Referrals.
Promotores de Amor/LGBTQ Connection: Education and resources for support of LGBTQIA+ youth in the Latinx community; peer support and youth leadership development programs for ages 14-24.
Amor Para Todos: Advocacy and implementation to create more gender and LGBTQIA+ inclusive school and community environments through things like policy and curriculum changes, gender neutral restroom signage, as well as elementary APT Student Clubs (similar to GSAs).
Petaluma TIDE: Raising awareness, coalition building and advocating for equity in school communities through dialogue and relationships.
UCLC/CUAC (United Community Learning Coalition/Comunidad Unida en Aprendizaje Colaboratorio): A working group dedicated to building a wraparound support model for the schools to address educational inequities in Petaluma.
For event security purposes this session will be presented as a webinar, and participants will have the opportunity to send in written questions via this form both before and during the event. Participants may also submit their questions by phone by calling McKinley School at 707-778-4750.
Please know that through this event we intend to offer a safe and supportive space for our LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC community members. Hate speech or disrespectful conduct of any kind will not be tolerated, and any participant displaying conduct of this nature will be removed from the event immediately. You may submit any questions or feedback you have regarding this event via the form above.
See below for call-in options, and we look forward to seeing you on the 28th!
When: Apr 28, 2021 06:00 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)
Topic: Virtual Parent & Caregiver Education Night on Supporting LGBTQIA+ Students
Please click the link below to join the webinar:
Or One tap mobile :
US: +16699006833,,84338809877# or +13462487799,,84338809877#
Or Telephone:
Dial (for higher quality, dial a number based on your current location):
US: +1 669 900 6833 or +1 346 248 7799 or +1 253 215 8782 or +1 312 626 6799 or +1 929 205 6099 or +1 301 715 8592
Las escuelas de la ciudad de Petaluma (PCS) invitan a los padres y cuidadores de la escuela primaria a asistir a una sesión de educación en línea sobre el apoyo para los estudiantes LGBTQIA + el miércoles 28 de abril de 2021 de 6 a 8 p.m. Esta sesión, que se ofrece a familias con estudiantes de primaria en otros distritos escolares cercanos, tendrá como objetivo proporcionar una introducción a temas relevantes para los jóvenes y familias LGBTQIA + que pueden estar al comienzo de este camino, al igual que información más detallada para familias que ya llevan un tiempo en este camino. Habrá traducción al español e interpretación de ASL.
Para esta reunión, se nos unirán panelistas de las siguientes organizaciones comunitarias locales, con descripciones de programas relevantes al lado de cada una:
Familias LGBTQI de North Bay: eventos comunitarios y recursos de defensa escolar para familias LGBTQIA +, y reuniones sociales y familiares mensuales para jóvenes menores de 12 años de género expansivo.
Positive Images LGBTQIA + Center: Grupos de apoyo para jóvenes / TAY y adultos, Programa de desarrollo de liderazgo para jóvenes / TAY 12-24, Capacitaciones y consultas sobre competencias culturales LGBTQIA +, Eventos de alcance comunitario, Recursos y referencias.
Promotores de Amor / LGBTQ Connection: Educación y recursos para el apoyo de los jóvenes LGBTQIA + en la comunidad Latinx; programas de desarrollo de liderazgo juvenil y apoyo entre pares para edades de 14 a 24 años.
Amor Para Todos: Promoción e implementación para crear más entornos escolares y comunitarios inclusivos de género y LGBTQIA + a través de cosas como cambios en las políticas y el plan de estudios, señalización de baños neutrales en cuanto al género, así como grupos de estudiantes APT de primaria (similares a los GSA).
Petaluma TIDE: aumentar conciencia, formación de coaliciones y promoción de la equidad en las comunidades escolares a través del diálogo y las relaciones.
UCLC / CUAC (United Community Learning Coalition / Comunidad Unida en Aprendizaje Colaboratorio): un grupo de trabajo dedicado a construir un modelo de apoyo integral para que las escuelas aborden las inequidades educativas en Petaluma.
Por motivos de seguridad, esta sesión se presentará como un seminario web y los participantes tendrán la oportunidad de enviar preguntas por escrito a través de este formulario antes y durante el evento. Los participantes también pueden enviar sus preguntas por teléfono llamando a la escuela McKinley al 707-778-4750.
Tenga en cuenta que a través de este evento tenemos la intención de ofrecer un espacio seguro y de apoyo para nuestros miembros de la comunidad LGBTQIA + y BIPOC. No se tolerará el discurso de odio o la conducta irrespetuosa de cualquier tipo, y cualquier participante que muestre una conducta de esta naturaleza será retirado del evento de inmediato. Puede enviar cualquier pregunta o comentario que tenga sobre este evento a través del formulario anterior.
Vea a continuación las opciones de llamadas, ¡y esperamos verlo el día 28!
Cuándo: 28 de abril de 2021 a las 06:00 p.m. hora del Pacífico (EE. UU. Y Canadá)
Tema: Noche educativa virtual para padres y cuidadores sobre el apoyo a los estudiantes LGBTQIA +
Haga clic en el enlace a continuación para unirse al seminario web:
In keeping with our mission of ending HIV in Sonoma County we have partnered with Q.Care, a telehealth service provider so that we can offer PrEP to all that come through our doors. With PrEP, people who are HIV negative take medication once a day to reduce the risk of getting infected if they are exposed to HIV. It is an additional method that can be used with other HIV prevention strategies such as condoms.
Executive Director, Sara Brewer states, “Despite the success of marketing PrEP to gay men, there has been less effort to inform the general public. This has led to a huge disparity of awareness, access, and usage among different populations, especially people of color, women, transgender individuals, people who inject drugs, and men who have sex with men who are not integrated into the gay community.”
Even if people have heard about PrEP there are several other potential barriers such as cost, access to medical care, insurance coverage, perceived stigma and more. At Face to Face, we see the expanded use of PrEP as the highest priority in preventing new infections and are pleased to offer support to help overcome these challenges. This is an alignment with and another step in our mission of ending HIV in Sonoma County.We are truly thrilled to be able to expand our servicesin providing PrEP to our clients.
If you know someone, or if you yourself are interested in finding out information on PrEP, our prevention team offers educational services and will assist you through every step to get on PrEP. Access includes virtual doctor visits, convenient at-home labs and prescriptions delivered directly to your door. Getting on PrEP has never been easier.Contact our PrEP Navigator, Angel Ortiz at [email protected]or call our offices at 707-544-1581
Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco)’s Senate Bill 357, the Safer Streets for All Act, passed the Senate Public Safety Committee by a vote of 4-1. SB 357 repeals provisions of California law that criminalize loitering for the intent to engage in sex work. These provisions — arrests for which are based on an officer’s subjective perception of whether a person is “acting like” they intend to engage in sex work — result in the disproportionate criminalization of trans, Black and Brown women, and perpetuates violence toward sex workers. SB 357 does not decriminalize soliciting or engaging in sex work. Rather, it simply eliminates an anti-loitering offense that leads to harmful treatment of people for simply “appearing” to be a sex worker.
Criminalizing sex work does not make sex workers or our communities safer. Most criminal penalties for sex workers, loitering laws included, do nothing to stop sex crimes against sex workers and human trafficking. People engaged in sex work deserve to be treated with dignity and respect.
In February, a similar piece of legislation to repeal this type of loitering ban became law in New York. SB 357 is part of the movement to end discrimination against and violence toward sex workers, especially the most targeted communities — trans, Black, and Brown people. SB 357 is cosponsored by Positive Women’s Network – USA, St. James Infirmary, SWOP LA, TransLatin@ Coalition, Asian Pacific Islander Legal Outreach, Equality California and the ACLU of California.
Under current law, it is a crime to loiter in a public place with the “intent” to commit a sex work-related offense. But this law can be broadly interpreted, and thus allows for discriminatory application against the LGBTQ community and people of color. Law enforcement can use a non-exhaustive list of circumstances to subjectively determine if someone “intends” to engage in sex work, including factors such as speaking with other pedestrians, being in an area where sex work has occurred before, wearing revealing clothing, or moving in a certain way. Because current law regarding loitering is highly subjective and vague, law enforcement officers disproportionately profile and target Black and Brown transgender women by stopping and arresting people for discriminatory and inappropriate reasons. This is how Black and Brown transgender women get arrested and cited for simply walking on the street. It also gives law enforcement the ability to more easily target and arrest sex workers.
People within the LGBTQ, Black, and Brown communities report high rates of police misconduct throughout the United States and are disproportionately affected by police violence. Transgender people who have done street-based sex work are more than twice as likely to report physical assault by police officers and four times as likely to report sexual assault by police. A Black person is 3.5 times more likely to be shot by police than a white person. These statistics are a daily reality that transgender, Black and Brown people face and lead to mistrust of law enforcement.
SB 357 will repeal a discriminatory law that makes it a crime to loiter with the intent to engage in sex work, given that it fails to prevent street-based sex work and disproportionally results in the criminalization of transgender people and communities of color.
“Sex workers are workers like anyone else, and they deserve to be treated with dignity and respect,” said Senator Wiener. “Our criminal justice system criminalizes people – particularly Black, Brown and LGTBQ people – for simply existing and going about their lives. Laws like this one do nothing to make people safer, or stop sex trafficking. Instead, they criminalize members of our community who are simply going about their lives. We need to support sex workers instead of criminalizing them.”
“This is just one step towards ending the criminalization of the color of a person’s skin, their gender or their livelihood,” said Celestina Pearl of St. James Infirmary. “We all deserve to exist in public peacefully without fear of arrest.”
Fatima Shabazz of Fatima Speaks, and co-lead the Policy Committee of the DecrimSexWorkCA Coalition added, “This is the first step in repealing a Jim Crow law that criminalizes Black and trans people in public spaces.”
“For far too long, California law has been used to arbitrarily target, harass and arrest transgender and gender-nonconforming people simply for existing in public spaces,” said Tami A. Martin, Equality California Legislative Director. “Let’s be clear: this law doesn’t make our communities safer — it contributes to distrust between LGBTQ+ people of color and law enforcement. By listening to and following the lead of transgender people of color — who are most often targets of archaic and discriminatory loitering laws — California has the opportunity to boldly stand on the side of justice and improve public safety. All LGBTQ+ people deserve to exist without fear of harassment and violence, which is why we are proud to cosponsor SB 357.”
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Equality California is the nation’s largest statewide LGBTQ+ civil rights organization. We bring the voices of LGBTQ+ people and allies to institutions of power in California and across the United States, striving to create a world that is healthy, just, and fully equal for all LGBTQ+ people. We advance civil rights and social justice by inspiring, advocating and mobilizing through an inclusive movement that works tirelessly on behalf of those we serve. www.eqca.org