The Advocate

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Kamala Harris thrills crowd with surprise appearance at iconic West Hollywood gay bar

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Former Vice President Kamala Harris spent part of Pride Month visiting a place that has long served as both a sanctuary and stage for LGBTQ+ Americans. On Saturday evening, Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, made an unannounced visit to The Abbey, the landmark West Hollywood gay bar that has occupied a singular place in American LGBTQ+ life for decades. Harris moved through the crowd, greeting patrons, posing for photos, shaking hands, and offering hugs. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. For roughly 20 minutes, according to witnesses, one of […]

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Donald Trump built a White House spectacle around beautiful men and muscle. During Pride Month

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I’ve been covering Donald Trump for The Advocate since 2019, through his first term, through his off years sulking and griping at Mar-a-Lago, and now through his nightmare return to the White House over the last two years. In that time, one thing has become unmistakably, almost comically clear: Donald Trump loves a beautiful man. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. Not that he would ever say so out loud. “Women, I like. Men, no, I don’t have any interest,” Trump actually felt like he had to announce that, […]

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Senators clash over whether parents or politicians should decide on trans youth care

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A Senate hearing on gender-affirming care for minors on Wednesday became a fight over who gets to make decisions for transgender children, whether politicians should override doctors and parents, and whether the Trump administration’s escalating campaign against gender-affirming care is rooted in concern for children or hostility toward transgender people. The hearing, convened by Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, came as the administration has intensified efforts to restrict care, including Justice Department subpoenas seeking records from providers that treat transgender minors. The committee listed three witnesses, including Dr. Kurt Miceli, chief medical officer of anti-trans and anti-diversity activist group […]

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At least 5 GOP-led states have a new Pride Month tradition — renaming June

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“If you can’t lick ’em, join ’em,” a conservative Indiana senator famously advised nearly a century ago. Today’s Republicans appear to have taken that lesson to heart, working overtime to create GOP-branded alternatives to Pride Month that celebrate traditional marriage, “nuclear families,” and what some governors are calling “fidelity.”  Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders became the latest Republican official to join the trend Monday, the start of Pride Month, issuing a proclamation declaring June “Fidelity Month” to celebrate “fidelity to God, family, community, and country.” Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. The announcement was unveiled through […]

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Pete Buttigieg emerges as early favorite for 2028 Democratic nomination

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Pete Buttigieg is leading the field of potential Democratic presidential contenders for 2028, according to a new national poll. The latest Emerson College Polling survey, released this week, found Buttigieg at 18 percent support among Democratic primary voters, narrowly ahead of California Gov. Gavin Newsom at 16 percent. New York U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez followed at 11 percent, while Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and former Vice President Kamala Harris each received 10 percent. Another 18 percent of voters said they remain undecided. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. The results offer an early snapshot of a Democratic Party still searching for its […]

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Running for office while LGBTQ+ increasingly means preparing for violence

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After years of escalating anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric in American politics, a new national report suggests the consequences are no longer confined to campaign ads, legislative fights, or online outrage. For many LGBTQ+ candidates, the threats have become intensely personal and increasingly physical. The threats arrive in direct messages, voicemail inboxes, comment sections, and late-night emails. Sometimes they follow candidates home. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. One LGBTQ+ candidate reported that a neighbor shot at their house after they advocated for transgender rights. Another described being shoved off a […]

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Trump’s FCC is eyeing warnings for trans TV content. Rights groups are pushing back

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For decades, LGBTQ+ Americans fought to be visible on television screens that either erased them entirely or treated them as punchlines, predators, or cautionary tales. Now, a coalition of more than 40 civil rights, free expression, and LGBTQ+ advocacy groups says the federal government is flirting with reviving that history in a new form. This time, the government wants to put warning labels on shows that include transgender and nonbinary people. In a joint filing submitted Friday to the Federal Communications Commission, organizations including GLAAD, Human Rights Campaign, PEN America, PFLAG National, Lambda Legal, and others, warned that a recent FCC inquiry into television ratings could pave the way for government-backed stigmatization […]

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Trans salutatorian’s powerful graduation speech puts Mississippi school’s mistreatment on display

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His commencement speech was greeted with applause and even cheers, but Jonas Hole, Salutatorian of the Class of 2026 at his Mississippi high school, had to endure being called “young lady,” being misgendered, and deadnamed by the same administrators who handed him his diploma.  “Despite my own self-acceptance, others judged me without understanding me. I became my label, and it felt as if my achievements, hardships, personality, all became irrelevant for the sole fact that I present myself differently,” he said. Hole identifies as transmasculine. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your […]

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Meet the Democrat poised to become Georgia’s first transgender state lawmaker

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When Bentley Hudgins talks about democracy, they rarely begin with ideology. They talk about brown water running from neighborhood taps. About losing housing after an apartment complex changed ownership. About sleeping in a 1997 Dodge Dakota pickup truck during a brutal Georgia summer. About being disbelieved by doctors for years before finally receiving treatment that restored their hearing. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. And they talk about the exhaustion of watching politicians spend years targeting transgender people while basic problems remain unsolved. Support Independent Journalism LGBTQ+ stories deserve to […]

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Chicago community raises more than $40K for husband of gay man killed in alleged stalker shooting

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More than 400 people have donated upwards of $40,000 for the husband of a beloved Chicago gay community member, who prosecutors say was gunned down by his spouse’s ex-partner after years of alleged harassment and stalking claims that had previously reached the courts. The killing of Nicholas “Pup Tugger” Calzaretta, 37, has shaken Chicago’s LGBTQ+ leather and pup communities and intensified scrutiny over the limits of protective orders in cases involving escalating threats and intimate partner violence. Neighbors watched from behind police tape as officers flooded a quiet residential block in Chicago’s Edgewater neighborhood. Children were arriving at nearby schools. And beside Calzaretta’s body, […]

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