Jo Yarcaba

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These families say they’re leaving the U.S. because of its anti-transgender climate

Chase, a 9-year-old trans girl, sits with her parents, Candace and Brandon, as their family prepares for a life-changing move to New Zealand. Jimena Peck for NBC News Denver parents Brandon and Candace are spending tens of thousands of dollars to move to New Zealand in July. The reason, they said, is to protect their 9-year-old transgender daughter, Chase, from the effects of the Trump administration’s policies and an increasingly hostile climate for trans people in the United States. “You’re taught to believe, or indoctrinated, I suppose, in America that this is the land of the free and promise and all […]

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California governor signs bill offering legal refuge to transgender youths 

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill Thursday that aims to legally protect transgender youths and their parents if they flee conservative states that have restricted access to gender-affirming care.  The bill seeks to “offer refuge” to trans minors and their families “if they’re being criminalized in their home states,” state Sen. Scott Wiener, who introduced the bill, said on Twitter after Newsom signed it. Wiener said states like Texas and Alabama “are seeking to tear these families apart,” referring to efforts in both states to bar parents from providing their trans children with medical care like puberty blockers and hormone […]

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11 grassroots groups that celebrate and support transgender people

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State legislatures nationwide have considered a record number of anti-transgender bills over the last two years, and fatal violenceagainst the community is also at an all-time high.  News centered on the trans community is often dominated by such trends, but across the country, grassroots nonprofit groups led by transgender people are creating spaces for their communities to find safety and joy.  Transgender Day of Visibility on Thursday is an annual awareness day dedicated to celebrating the accomplishments of transgender people while still acknowledging the violence and discrimination they continue to face. Here are 11 grassroots groups that do just that by providing their […]

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New Lavender Book app will map safe spaces for Black queer people

Black LGBTQ people face an increased risk of violence and harassment. A new app hopes to help change that. David Johns, executive director of the National Black Justice Coalition, said Black queer and trans people have to worry about things “most people take for granted and don’t have to think about, like whether or not a barber or beautician is going to say something that might be homophobic, or you’re going to be denied access to a cake because a baker is going to hide their hate behind religion,” he said.  Knowing this, Johns said he has dreamed for years […]

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Different fight, ‘same goal’: How the Black freedom movement inspired early gay activists

On April 25, 1965, three teenagers refused to leave Dewey’s Restaurant in Philadelphia after employees repeatedly denied service to “homosexuals and persons wearing nonconformist clothing,” according to Drum magazine, which was created by the Janus Society, an early gay rights group. The teens were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, and Janus Society members protested outside of the restaurant for the next five days, according to Marc Stein, a history professor at San Francisco State University. “Every single element of what we know of as Pride and gay rights and, especially, the pre-Stonewall homophile movement, was borrowed from the Black Freedom Movement.” […]

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Rand Paul criticized for trans ‘gender mutilation’ remarks in Rachel Levine hearing

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Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., compared gender-affirming surgery to “genital mutilation” during confirmation hearings Thursday for Dr. Rachel Levine, President Joe Biden’s nominee for assistant secretary of health. If approved, Levine will become the first openly transgender federal official to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. Paul, a former ophthalmologist, was questioning Levine about transition-related care for transgender youth when he said that “genital mutilation is considered particularly egregious because … it is nearly always carried out on minors and is a violation of the rights of children.” Sen. Paul compares gender-affirming health care for minors to ‘genital mutilation’ FEB. 25, […]

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House expected to vote on sweeping LGBTQ rights bill next week

Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., reintroduced the Equality Act in the House of Representatives on Thursday, with a vote on the sweeping LGBTQ rights bill expected next week. The move brings the bill one step closer to potentially establishing the first federal discrimination protections for LGBTQ people. Specifically, it would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in employment, housing, credit, education, public spaces, public funding and jury service. The Equality Act passed the Democrat-controlled House in May 2019, but it stalled in the Republican-controlled Senate. Now that Democrats have taken control of the Senate, advocates are hopeful that the bill […]

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Arizona legislator compares transgender people to farm animals

An Arizona state representative is facing an ethics complaint after he compared transgender people to farm animals at a Wednesday committee hearing. The hearing was for House Bill 2725, which would require state identification documents to contain only a male or female gender marker. The bill pre-emptively bans nonbinary people, who are neither exclusively male nor female, from using gender-neutral X markers on their IDs, even though Arizona law doesn’t currently permit that. ‘It’s dehumanizing’ Transgender rights advocate on Arizona bill limiting gender options FEB. 12, 202102:10 State Rep. John Fillmore, the bill’s sponsor, said during the hearing that he “proposed […]

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Former WWE superstar Gabbi Tuft comes out as transgender

Former World Wrestling Entertainment superstar Gabbi Tuft said she left the house and walked with her “head up high” for the first time Thursday, after she came out as transgender. She cried when she recalled the moment. “I felt so happy,” she told NBC News. “My hair wasn’t in my face, and I wasn’t clenching my fists and hiding my nails. It just felt so amazing.” Tuft officially announced the news on social media Thursday. In an Instagram photo, she sat alongside an image of herself prior to her transition. “This is me,” she wrote in the caption. “Unashamed, unabashedly me. […]

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Alabama’s Trans ID Law Requiring Proof of Surgery is Unconstitutional, Court Rules

Alabama’s policy requiring transgender people to have undergone gender-affirming surgery before they can get state IDs that accurately reflect their gender identities is unconstitutional, a federal court ruled this month. Fewer than 10 states now require proof of surgery to update the gender marker on a driver’s license. The Alabama case began in 2018, when three transgender people — Darcy Corbitt, Destiny Clark and an unnamed third person — sued the state after they were denied driver’s licenses that reflected their genders, opposed to their sexes assigned at birth, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. “The policy for driver’s licenses, […]

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