National

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Florida book ban forces libraries to weigh up ‘nuclear option’ of removing fiction

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The ramifications of Florida’s book ban laws may be reaching new heights, as evidenced by a discussion on book moderation in a Florida school board meeting. During a 16 June Clay County School Board workshop, published to YouTube, district leaders openly discussed “nuclear options” for dealing with the constant flood of book challenges, including closing high school libraries altogether or stripping them down to nonfiction only while they carefully review books for content deemed unsuitable for students. “There doesn’t seem to be an effective moderate option,” the district’s chief academic officer, Rodger Dailey, told board members. “The options on the table are kind […]

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Cops busted making anti-trans & racist comments after accidentally bugging their own office

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An animal rights activist accidentally recorded a cop degrading a trans woman after her bodycam was confiscated during a protest. Three years later, she has shared the recording online. In 2023, Gemma Barnes was protesting outside the police station in the U.K. city of Norwich, located in Norfolk County, after police decided not to prosecute a man whom surveillance footage caught seeming to intentionally run over a pigeon with his mobility scooter before returning to beat it to death with his walking stick. Barnes alleged cops pushed her to the ground, arrested her, and took her bodycam, according to The Mirror. […]

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‘No child has two dads’ billboards spark outrage across rural Ohio

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Billboard advertisements from a Seattle-based organization called Them Before Us popped up across rural Ohio as part of its campaign against LGBTQ+ families. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. The billboard reads, “No child has two dads. No child has two moms,” with the “two dads” and “two moms” in rainbow lettering. Megan Tucker-Manly, a resident of Northwest Ohio, was one of the first to spot the billboards in Lima. Her post with a photo of the billboards quickly went viral reaching over 7,000 […]

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Trump hijacks White House Correspondents’ Dinner redo with antigay jabs, anti-trans mockery & lies

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President Donald Trump used the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Association dinner Friday night to target two prominent gay journalists, mock transgender actress Dylan Mulvaney and deliver a sprawling rally-style address before hundreds of members of the press. Trump made an apparent antigay insinuation about CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, called independent journalist Don Lemon “the dumbest man on television” and offered a strange comparison between CNN White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins and Mulvaney. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. The speech moved from TikTok views to the UFC fight held on the […]

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Conservatives want us to forget our own power by erasing LGBTQ+ history. We won’t let them.

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As the Trump administration celebrates America’s historic semiquincentennial – the two and a half centuries that have passed since the 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence – it’s important to note that the president and his political party have spent the past several years actively erasing LGBTQ+ Americans and other marginalized groups from public history. The administration removed words like “transgender” and “queer” from the official website for the Stonewall National Monument; it has cut funding for diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts and grants that support LGBTQ+ community programs and research of all sorts; Republican school and library boards have removed LGBTQ+-related books from shelves […]

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Trump administration formally ends Biden-era LGBTQ+ foster care protections

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The Trump administration has officially rescinded a Biden-era rule that was designed to help ensure LGBTQ+ children in foster care could access safe, supportive, and affirming placements. Originally introduced in April 2024, the rule required child welfare agencies receiving federal funding to identify designated foster placements equipped to meet the needs of LGBTQ+ young people. It also included training requirements for agencies and sought to ensure LGBTQ+ children had access to age-appropriate support and services. Although the rule never took effect after a federal judge vacated it in 2025, the administration has now formally removed it altogether. The Department of Health and Human […]

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Phoenix leather bar wins liquor license after months of objection from billionaire neighbor

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Nightlife promoter Matthew Moody has big plans for Phoenix’s up-and-coming gayborhood in the Melrose district: a leather bar called the Barracks. Along with “Eagle” and “Anvil,” the “Barracks” name has a long history and is a shout-out to the leather community everywhere. Moody used to DJ at the bar of the same name in Palm Springs, California, before it closed in 2024. Now he’s brought what’s left of that bar 400 miles east to another desert outpost, where he hopes to resurrect it. Artwork, like pieces portraying a vintage motorcycle and larger-than-life-size Tom of Finland leather men, loiter along one […]

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Religious parents sue school district over staff using child’s chosen pronouns

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A pair of religious parents have filed a lawsuit against a Maryland school district after teachers respected their child’s request to use a masculine name and pronouns at school without first informing them. The lawsuit, filed Wednesday (8 July) in federal court against Anne Arundel County Public School District, seeks to force educators to stop using the student’s chosen name and pronouns, instead requiring staff to refer to the child by their birth name and the pronouns associated with their sex assigned at birth. The parents, identified in court only as John and Jane Doe, are being represented by the conservative legal organisation America […]

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Trump tried to stop a drag activist group from getting an honorific history marker. He failed.

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Ohio’s lead historical society, the Ohio History Connection (OHC) recently dedicated an official state historical marker to recognize The Rubi Girls, a comedic drag troupe that raised over $3 million for local and region HIV, LGBTQ+, and other community groups over the last 40 years, The Buckeye Flame reported. The OHC unveiled the marker on May 3 outside the Rubi Clubhouse, where the group rehearses, in Dayton’s South Park neighborhood. Tim Farquhar, a Rubi Girls founding member, expressed gratitude that the marker was able to get erected despite the federal government ending funding for LGBTQ+-related historical markers last year. “Ours was the last […]

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Gunman killed after opening fire outside North Carolina gay bar

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Police shot and killed an armed man outside a gay bar in Asheville, North Carolina. Shakey’s staff said in a social media post that police were called after a man who had been ejected from the bar earlier that night for concerning behavior was seen in the parking lot brandishing a gun, according to ABC affiliate WLOS. The Instagram post is no longer publicly available. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. Asheville police officers responded to the dive bar around 1:57 a.m. Wednesday after receiving a report that […]

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