The ashes of gay University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard, who was murdered in one of the nation’s most infamous anti-gay hate crimes in 1998, will be interred at the Washington National Cathedral on Oct. 26, according to an announcement on Thursday by his parents. The announcement came one day before the 20th anniversary of Shepard’s(…)
Longtime LGBT rights advocate Nancy Russell, a retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel, was hopeful that the three 11-foot-tall black granite panels designated as the centerpiece of a National LGBT Veterans Memorial would be installed in D.C.’s Congressional Cemetery in time for a Memorial Day dedication in 2015 or 2016. Russell, who’s 80 years old and(…)
Activist David Hogg is among those participating in the U.S. Conference on AIDS. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key) The annual 2018 United States Conference on AIDS, one of the nation’s largest gatherings of experts involved in HIV prevention and treatment efforts, is expected to draw more than 3,000 participants on Sept. 6-9 to(…)
Two national litigation groups that specialize in lawsuits seeking to overturn LGBT rights laws issued a joint statement last week denouncing the National LGBT Bar Association for calling on the nation’s lawyers and law firms to refuse to provide free legal services for the two groups. The Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented the Colorado baker(…)
The international telecommunications company Verizon presented a check on Monday for $250,000 to PFLAG, which advocates for families and allies of LGBT people, at the group’s headquarters in Washington. PFLAG said in a statement that the donation came at the conclusion of a month-long campaign by Verizon in support of PFLAG that included the release of a(…)
Dick Leitsch, a New York City gay rights leader in the 1960s who is credited with playing a lead role in ending police entrapment arrests of gay men and helping to organize the first known gay civil disobedience protest to end a ban on serving drinks to gays in bars – died June 22 in(…)
The younger brother of the 19-year old youth charged with killing 17 people in the Feb. 14 school shooting in Parkland, Fla., has announced the formation of a national anti-bullying organization that he says will be supported by high school and middle school students from across the country. Zachary Cruz, 18, told reporters at a June 14(…)
This weekend’s Capital Pride festivities in D.C. will take place on the one-year anniversary of the June 11, 2017 Equality March for Unity and Pride, an LGBT protest march that drew as many as 80,000 LGBT people and their allies to the nation’s capital from across the country. Dozens of affiliated LGBT marches that same(…)
Trans United Fund, a D.C.-based national group that raises money for candidates for public office supportive of transgender rights, launched its 2018 D.C. election effort on Tuesday night at an event in Adams Morgan that raised $2,000 for possible contributions to D.C. Council candidates. “Trans United Fund is building a unified voice for trans and(…)
The Montgomery County, Md., Board of Education voted 6-2 on April 12 to name a new elementary school in Rockville after African-American civil rights leader Bayard Rustin, marking the first time a school in the county has been named after a well-known gay person. The Bayard Rustin Elementary School is scheduled to open(…)