The Supreme Court on Monday took up job discrimination cases that could for the first time resolve at a national level whether lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender workers can be fired based on their identity.
The cases come as federal courts as well as independent agencies within the Trump administration remain divided over whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which says that employers may not discriminate based on “sex,” prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
There is no national law that explicitly bars discrimination on those grounds. State and local laws barring such discrimination do exist. About half of the country’s LGBT population lives in states that allow employment discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, according to MAP, an LGBT advocacy think tank.
The Department of Health and Human Services announced this week that it intends to ax an Obama-era measure that called for data collection on LGBTQ foster youth and parents.
The data included the sexual orientation and gender identity of youth in foster care, along with their foster parents, adoptive parents or legal guardians.
The stated goal of the rule, adopted in December 2016, at the end of the Obama administration, was “to help meet the needs of LGBTQ youth in foster care.”
The Trump administration delayed its implementation and is now proposing to remove the LGBTQ data elements entirely.
“While we understand the importance of collecting sexual orientation data … we must balance this with the need to collect accurate data per the statue and in a manner that is consistent with children’s treatment needs,” the department said.N
A third of states have asked that the requirement be dropped over concerns that collecting data on sexual orientation may be perceived as “intrusive and worrisome to those who have experienced trauma and discrimination as a result of gender identity or sexual orientation,” HHS said.
The proposed rule reversal has raised concerns among many LGBTQ and child welfare advocates who say that current data collection practices leave them in the dark about how many LGBTQ youth there are in care and what unique obstacles they may face.
“Identifying those youth and being able to capture the disparity between non-LGBTQ youth and LGBTQ youth helps states and tribes to understand what their experiences are and be able to devise implement and deploy best practices,” Denise Brogan-Kator, chief policy officer at the LGBTQ advocacy group Family Equality Council, told NBC news.
In a 2014 study funded by HHS, researchers determined that one in five youth in foster care identified as LGBTQ, and they were twice as likely to suffer negative outcomes while in care.
“We knew it anecdotally, but we didn’t have the data to back it up,” Brogan-Kator said of the study’s findings. She added that systematic collection of such data is necessary to improve outcomes for LGBTQ children in care.
“We need to understand why and where those negative experiences occur and where they don’t,” Brogan-Kator added.
More than 40 child welfare organizations have already publicly opposed the rule change, which must go through a public comment period.
Christina Wilson Remlin, lead counsel at Children’s Rights, a nonprofit that has publicly opposed the rule reversal, said HSS was failing in its duty to protect children in state care by proposing to stop collecting data on LGBTQ foster youth and prospective parents.
“Many of these children have already been rejected by their families of origin,” she said. “We should do everything we can to provide them with safe and loving homes, including recruitment of diverse and affirming foster families.”
Remlin said collecting data on sexual orientation and gender identity is a “critical step toward addressing the needs” of LGBTQ youth and crucial to “holding government agencies accountable.”
“To stop collecting data on LGBTQ foster youth would only serve to render this vulnerable population invisible,” she added.
An official from the HHS Children’s Bureau said the Obama-era rule would have “drastically expanded unnecessary data elements required to be reported by child welfare agencies.”
“The modifications in the proposed rule would allow state and tribal child welfare agencies to focus more of their time and resources on child welfare — from prevention to foster care services to adoption and guardianship — and less on unnecessary data collection and paperwork,” the official said.
Brogan-Kator disagreed.
“It costs states and tribes so much more to deal with the negative outcomes when these youth experience homeless and incarceration,” Brogan-Kator said. “These kinds of burdens are significant. Reducing that will more than offset any extended costs there might be around it.”
This is not the only LGBTQ data the Trump administration is seeking to reverse course on. In 2017, the HHS removed questions about LGBTQ seniors from its annual survey of older Americans. A week later, the administration announced it would not collect information on LGBTQ identification on the 2020 census. And last year, the Department of Justice moved to scrap questions relating to sexual orientation and gender identity on its National Crime Victimization Survey.
A Mississippi man’s jaw was broken in two places during a brutal beating because his attackers thought he was gay, according to his family.
Trevor Gray’s jaw was wired shut after the horrifying attack in Waynesboro, Mississippi, on April 12.
According to the Clarion-Ledger, Gray met alleged attackers Landon McCaa and Toman Sion Brown at a local bar.
Mississippi man attacked ‘because he was different’
Gray was part of a group that went on to continue drinking at McCaa’s home when the bar closed, but some of the men turned on Gray and decided to attack him.
A video of the attack filmed on a mobile phone was circulated on social media, showing what appears to be McCaa repeatedly punching Gray.
The victim’s brother Cruz Gray alleged that the attack was motivated by sexuality, noting that Brown called him a “queer” during the beating.
Trevor Gray was attacked in Waynesboro, Mississippi (Facebook)
He told the newspaper: “This was an act of cruelty for no reason, because he was different.
“He’s not gay, but it wouldn’t matter if he were. No one deserves for this to happen to them.”
McCaa and Brown have been charged with aggravated assault, but Wayne County Sheriff Jody Ashley told the Clarion-Ledger that they could also face a federal hate crime charge.
Thousands raised to cover medical expenses
The community has rallied round Gray in the wake of the attack, with a GoFundMe set up to cover his medical expenses raising more than $14,000.
One donor said: “Not only is this such a dastardly deed, I have a son who is gay and I’m donating to show my unconditional love and support for him as well as Trevor. God holds all of His children in his love.”
Another added: “You did not deserve this, and there are people that you may never meet that love you and are praying for your physical and emotional health following this horrific attack. I am one of those people.”
In a statement to the newspaper, Trevor Gray said: “For as long as I can remember, my family has taught me to see the best in others.
“My peace in this situation comes from that. So, for those wondering, I’m not angry or vengeful; I’m not sad. I’m optimistic. The events of that night are small when weighed against the incredible amount of love and support people have shown me.
“My mouth will be wired up for the next several weeks, so if you see me and I don’t smile, know that I’m smiling on the inside. Most importantly, believe in the good, give someone a hug, and stay positive.”
The collection includes a number of LGBT icons, including trans actress Indya Mooreand the lawyers who helped decriminalise homosexuality in India.
The list also includes homophobic Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro. The Latin American leader is described by TIME as a “poster boy for toxic masculinity… intent on waging a culture war and perhaps reversing Brazil’s progress on tackling climate change.”
Janet Mock, the first trans woman of colour to write and direct for television, profiles Indya Moore who stars in Pose.
Mock wrote in TIME Magazine: “Writing her character Angel proved healing for me as a trans woman who had walked in those same platform shoes, longing for more than the crumbs society had thrown girls like us. But a greater gift has been watching Indya rise from an adolescence navigating foster care in the Bronx to critical acclaim as an actress and model using her voice to center the marginalized communities she comes from.”
TIME 100 picks Lawyers Arundhati Katju and Menaka Guruswamy
The list also includes Indian lawyers Arundhati Katju and Menaka Guruswamy, who helped orchestrate the overturning of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. The colonial-era law criminalised homosexual sex in India for 157 years.
The landmark judgment was the outcome of a long-term campaign organised by Katju and Guruswamy.
Their listing was written by Priyanka Chopra, who wrote: “The LGBTQ+ community has battled on both legal and social fronts for decades—for their fundamental rights, for privacy, for dignity, for safety and for love.”
“That is one of his great and seductive charms: the wonderful childlike enthusiasm he possesses. His sense of adventure and exploration, a boundless imagination, a brilliant mind and a wicked sense of humor,”
“He is a born storyteller, and, like the best of them, he is constantly pushing the limits. I have often marveled at his uncanny ability at capturing the zeitgeist,” Lange wrote.
Noteworthy queer allies
Lady Gaga also made the 2019 influencer list and Celine Dion wrote about her activism. “Whether it’s her unstoppable support for the LGBTQ community, or her anti-bullying campaigning, Lady Gaga’s voice is being heard where it really counts,” Dion said.
Queer icon Troye Sivan wrote about his friend Ariana Grande. “Her love of her fans and of music guide her every move. But my favorite moments with Ari are the quieter ones. When I, like so many, have been inspired by that resilience, love, care and heart in someone I’m lucky to call my friend,” Sivan said.
Taylor Swift also made the list. Shawn Mendes wrote about Swift and said: “I’ve been a Taylor Swift fan for as long as I can remember. But it wasn’t until I met and got to know her that I understood how wonderful a person she truly is.”
Sandra Oh, who stars in popular crime series Killing Eve is also listed, as well as singer Khalid who featured on the soundtrack for the gay romantic comedy Love, Simon.
A 29-year-old LGBTI journalist has been murdered while reporting on ‘dissident republican activity’ in Londonderry, Northern Ireland.
A masked gunman allegedly shot Lyra McKee to death while she covered riots in Londonderry – also known as Derry – on Thursday (18 April).
Police said a group known as the New IRA ‘are likely to be the ones behind this’.
Cell phone footage shows a masked gunman crouching down and opening fire with a handgun at about 11pm. McKee was wounded as she stood by a police SUV according to police.
‘A single gunman fired shots in a residential area of the city and as a result wounded Ms McKee. Officers quickly administered first aid before transporting her in the back of a landrover to hospital,’ said Assistant Chief Constable Mark Hamilton.
‘Tragically she died from her injuries. At this stage we believe her murder was carried out by a violent dissident republican.’
Hamilton appealed for witnesses to share information with police.
Assistant Chief Constable for District Policing Mark Hamilton | Photo: PSNI
Not long before her murder, McKee tweeted a photo of the riots with the caption ‘Derry tonight. Absolute madness’.View image on Twitter
McKee lived in Belfast where she edited media trade publication, Mediagazer. Forbes named her on its 30 under 30 in media list in 2016.
She had published a non-fiction novella about The Troubles in Northern Ireland called Angels with Blue Faces. Publishing house Faber & Faber had also given her a two-book deal, of which the first book The Lost Boys was due for release next year.
The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) described McKee as ‘one of the most promising journalists’ in Northern Ireland.
Hundreds of people have paid tribute to Mckee, including British Prime Minister Theresa May who said she ‘died doing her job with great courage’.
New IRA
Police reported an increased in ‘dissident republican activity’. Officer carried out a raid at Londonderry’s Creggan estate on Thursday night looking for weapons.
Law enforcement thought the estate to be a hotspot for the New IRA and police worried about violence breaking out to mark the anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising.
Police blamed the New IRA for McKee’s murder and a for bomb attack at the Derry City Courthouse last year.
Violence against journalists on the increase
McKee’s has become the 7th journalist murdered while doing their job in 2019 and the first in the UK. This comes off the back that 2018 was one of the deadliest ever for journalists according to Reporters Without Borders (RSF).
Before her death McKee was actually due to speak at a World Press Freedom Day event for Amnesty International.
‘Lyra was a great young journalist, whose commitment to truth was absolute and whose laughter could light up a room,’ said Patrick Corrigan, Northern Ireland programme director of Amnesty International.
‘The bitter irony was that Lyra was due to speak at an Amnesty International event at the Queen’s Film Theatre in Belfast on 4 May about the dangers of reporting violent conflicts.’
Corrigan went on to say ‘journalists put themselves on the frontline in the battle for truth every single day’.
‘Every day, it becomes more dangerous for reporters to do their job on behalf of us all,’ he said.
‘Lyra McKee was one of those courageous seekers after truth, with a life ahead of her and so much to give.’
Richard Green, a lawyer and psychiatrist who made a name for himself fighting for LGBTI rights, has died at 82.
He died of esophageal cancer at his home in London. His son, Adam Hines-Green, survives him.
Green spent decades of his life battling against LGBTI discrimination and oppression. Both his work as a lawyer and psychiatrist reflect the passion and resilience he possessed for this endeavor.
Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1936, he went on to study medicine at Johns Hopkins under John Money, a well-known sex and gender psychologist. When training as a psychiatrist at UCLA, he worked with gender identity expert Robert Stoller.
Two of his most well-known accomplishments happened a decade apart in 1962 and 1972.
In the first instance, Green successfully challenged Chester Morales’ deportation from the US. Morales, originally from Nicaragua, was being deported due to his homosexual identity.
Ten years later, he published a paper appealing to the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from the list of mental disorders. According to LGBTI activist Peter Tatchell, people advised him this course of action would ruin his career.
One year later, he appealed again, and the APA removed homosexuality from the list.
Pioneering LGBTI paths
Green’s commitment to LGBTI rights was broad and far-reaching.
In his medical career, he also advocated for gender confirmation surgery. In the 1960s, he began seeing transgender patients with Harry Benjamin.
Beyond medicine, he also fought for marriage equality and the rights of LGBTI parents.
In 1974, he appeared on the US television show The Advocates, participarting in a debate on marriage equality. He also testified in numerous court cases as an expert witness for LGBTI parents look to adopt or get custody rights to children from previous relationships.
In court, he also a witness and champion in several discrimination cases.
As Tatchell writes, Green’s work risked his ‘reputation and career to advance the understanding and acceptance of sexual and gender minorities’. Because of his contributions, several crucial strides towards equality were made.
The state of Nevada has banned gay and trans “panic” defences in criminal cases in an effort to prevent LGBT+ victims from being blamed for their own assaults and murders.
Gay and trans panic defences are still frequently deployed in criminal cases across the world in an effort to get more lenient sentences for homophobic and transphobic attacks.
The line of decence usually involves the perpetrator claiming they had a moment of “temporary insanity” brought on by unwanted sexual advances or suddenly discovering a person’s gender identity. The use of such defences has previously been banned in California and Illinois.
Nevada’s gay and trans ‘panic’ bill passed by 19 votes to 2
Representatives voted yesterday on the bill and it was passed by 19 votes to 2. The only two members to vote against the bill were Ira Hansen and Pete Goicoechea.
The bill says that “an alleged state of passion or provocation” in a perpetrator will not be considered a valid defence “if it resulted from… [the] sexual orientation or gender identity or expression of the victim.”
The wide-ranging bill also notes that gay and trans panic defences continue to appear in criminal cases across the United States. It notes that these defences are “surprisingly long-lived, historical artifacts and remnants of a time when widespread public antipathy was the norm for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons.”
“The bill says that gay and trans panic defences are ‘surprisingly long-lived, historical artifacts and remnants of a time when widespread public antipathy was the norm for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons.’”
– Nevada bill banning the use of gay and trans ‘panic’ defences
It also says that gay and trans panic defences appeal to “irrational fears and hatred of [LGBT+] people, thereby undermining the legitimacy of criminal prosecutions and resulting in unjustifiable acquittals or sentencing reductions.”
The bill concludes by noting that they want to “end the antiquated notion that the lives of [LGBT+ people] are worth less than the lives of other persons and to reflect a modern understanding of [LGBT] persons as equal to other persons under the law.”
Nevada bans gay and trans ‘panic’ defences in criminal cases (Pexels)
The most famous example of the ‘gay panic’ defence was in the Matthew Shepard case
The American Bar Association unanimously passed a resolution in 2013 which urged governments to provide guidance to jurors and prosecutors about the use of gay and trans panic defences.
In the same year, California became the first state in the US to ban gay and trans panic defences.
Meanwhile, Democrats filed a bill to Congress last year in an effort to outlaw the use of such defences nationwide.
The best known use of the gay panic defence in the US was in the murder case of Matthew Shepard. He was killed in a violent attack in 1998 in which he was beaten, robbed, tied to a fence and left to die.
His killers, Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson, attempted to argue in court that they suffered “a moment of insanity” when Shepard made sexual advances towards them.
A gay foreign policy expert who worked in the Obama administration on international LGBT issues has declared his intention to run for U.S. Senate in Colorado.
Daniel Baer, who’s 42 and a former U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Security & Cooperation in Europe, announced his candidacy Tuesday in an email blast referencing his spouse, Brian Walsh.
“Like many of you, Brian and I are dismayed by the chaos unfolding in Washington under this president,” Baer said. “But we’ve also realized that the best way to find hope and optimism is by putting ourselves on the line, taking risks for the values we believe in, and fighting for the country we want.”
If Baer succeeds if his campaign bid, he’d become the first openly gay man elected to the U.S. Senate and would join Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), the first out lesbian elected to the Senate, and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), the first open bisexual elected to the Senate.
One of seven openly gay ambassadors in the Obama administration, Baer as U.S. ambassador to OSCE was charged with deescalating tensions in Europe during the Ukraine crisis in 2014.
Previously, Baer served as deputy assistant secretary for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights & Labor under Hillary Clinton when she was secretary of state. Baer worked on international LGBT issues, including the integration of LGBT human rights abuses in the State Department’s annual human rights report.
In a campaign video announcement titled “Driving Change,” Baer touts his foreign policy experience at OSCE as well his relationship with his spouse and their dog.
It’s not the first time Baer has pursued a run for Congress. In 2017, Baer launched a campaign to run for a U.S. House seat representing Colorado’s 7th congressional district. But Baer later dropped that bid after incumbent Rep. Ed. Perlmutter (D-Colo.) changed his mind and decided to keep the seat he said he’d vacate.
By seeking the Democratic nomination to run for U.S. Senate, Baer is potentially challenging Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), one of the most vulnerable senators up for election in 2020. According to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Gardner is currently polling eight points behind a generic Democratic on the ballot.
In an interview with the Denver Post, Baer touted his foreign policy experience in explaining why he’d be superior to the sitting Republican incumbent currently representing Colorado.
“Cory Gardner sits on the Foreign Relations Committee,” Baer said. “I think one of the things I offer as a candidate going up against him is that I can go toe-to-toe with Cory Gardner on foreign policy issues.”
But Baer is one of seven Democrats seeking their party’s nomination to run against Gardner and it remains to be seen if Baer will claim victory. The filing deadline and primary for Colorado aren’t yet scheduled.
It’s been less than four years since gay marriage was legalized in the U.S., and LGBTQ people still face hurdles in adopting children, joining the military and buying wedding cakes. But on primetime TV Monday night, a remarkable conversation took place: A presidential contender and one of the country’s most-watched cable news hosts discussed the weight of the metaphorical closet and their experiences in coming out as gay.
“You went through college, and then the Rhodes Scholarship process and getting the Rhodes scholarship and going to work for McKinsey and joining the Navy and deploying to Afghanistan and coming home and running for mayor in your hometown and getting elected before you came out at the age of 33,” MSNBC host Rachel Maddow said to Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana, on her show Monday night. “I think it would have killed me to be closeted for that long.”
“It was hard,” replied Buttigieg, who announced his bid for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination over the weekend. “It was really hard.”
“Coming out is hard, but being in the closet is harder,” said Maddow, a fellow Rhodes scholar who came out during college.
In addition to coming out to others, Buttigieg, now 37, revealed it also took him “plenty of time to come out to myself.”
“There were certainly plenty of indications by the time I was 15 or so that I could point back and be like, ‘Yeah, yeah, this kid’s gay,’ but I guess I just needed to not be,” he explained. “There’s this war that breaks out, I think, inside a lot of people when they realize they might be something that they’re afraid of, and it took me a very long time to resolve that.”
In addition to the struggles many people face coming out as gay, at the time Buttigieg was planning to come out, he was also an officer in the United States Navy Reserve and an elected official in Indiana. He told Maddow he assumed at the time that both roles were “totally incompatible with being out.”
Initially, Buttigieg said, the demands of his job as mayor forced him to put his personal life on the back burner.
“I did get a lot of meaning from that work, and in some ways, because it was so demanding, I almost didn’t mind for a sort of inordinately long time that I didn’t have much of a personal life,” he said. “The city was a jealous bride for a long time and kept me busy.”
However, a seven-month deployment to Afghanistan in 2014 really put him “over the top.”
“I realize that you only get to be one person,” he told Maddow. “You don’t know how long you have on this earth, and by the time I came back, I realized, ‘I’ve got to do something.’”
Buttigieg came out in a June 2015 op-ed in The South Bend Tribune just before the Supreme Court’s landmark Obergefell v. Hodges decision, which legalized same-sex marriage across the U.S.
“I was well into adulthood before I was prepared to acknowledge the simple fact that I am gay. It took years of struggle and growth for me to recognize that it’s just a fact of life, like having brown hair, and part of who I am,” Buttigieg wrote. “Like most people, I would like to get married one day and eventually raise a family. I hope that when my children are old enough to understand politics, they will be puzzled that someone like me revealing he is gay was ever considered to be newsworthy.”
When Maddow asked if Buttigieg thought coming out could cost him re-election, he revealed he was unsure.
“I felt like I had done a good job by the people of South Bend, and I had some level of trust that I would be rewarded for that with a re-election, but there’s no way to really know,” he said. “There’s no playbook, no executive in Indiana had ever been out, and so it was kind of a leap of faith.”
Buttigieg was re-elected in 2015 with nearly 80 percent of the vote — a wider margin than his election in 2011.
When it comes to the presidential election, Buttigieg said most people are “either supportive or even enthusiastic about the idea of the first out person going this far.” And he’s right: A recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found nearly 70 percent of U.S. voterswere either enthusiastic (14 percent) or comfortable (54 percent) with a gay or lesbian presidential candidate. This is up from 43 percent in 2006.View image on Twitter
Buttigieg told Maddow at the very least, he hopes his presidential campaign will make it easier “for the next person who comes along.”
The conversion between Maddow and Buttigieg garnered a significant amount of social media attention. The country singer Chely Wright, who is lesbian, revealed she was in “tears” watching the segment.
“I came out 9 years ago and I feel like now— in this very moment— there’s is a tangible shift,” she wrote on Twitter.
A transgender student who is studying at the University of Texas in Austin (UT) has lost his scholarship after Donald Trump’s trans military ban came into effect last week.
Map Pesqueira was awarded a national three-year Reserve Officers’ Training Corps scholarship to fund his studies, according to Daily Texas Online.
However, due to Trump’s trans military ban—which came into effect last Friday (April 12)—his scholarship has been revoked by the US Department of Defence. He is now at risk of not being able to continue his studies and has started a fundraiserto finish his degree.
Transgender student Map Pesqueira’s dream was to serve in the military
“Since I’ve already had top surgery, hormone replacement therapy, gender marker and [a] name change, I can’t go in under this policy,” Pesqueira said.
“I’d automatically be discriminated. I really do see [the policy] as a waste of resources, money, time and personnel. It’s made figuring out my future education so much harder.”
Pesqueira went to UT to study and achieve his dream of serving in the military and becoming a filmmaker. He hopes that he can pursue a career in the military in the future.
“Because I have started medically transitioning, my scholarship is now void.”
– Transgender student Map Pesqueira
He has started a GoFundMe with the goal of raising $20,000 so he can continue studying through his sophomore year.
In a lengthy post on his GoFundMe page, Pesqueira wrote: “Since I was a kid, one of my biggest dreams was to pursue a career in the Army to serve my country.
Specna Arms/Pexels
‘I can no longer afford to attend without financial assistance’
“I happen to be a transgender male who started medically transitioning in 2018. I have been on hormone replacement therapy and living in my preferred gender for 15 months, just recently had top surgery, and have legally changed my name and gender marker.
“In January of 2019, the Supreme Court gave the green light to the Department of Defense to begin implementing a new policy that prohibits transgender people who have begun their transition as well as transgender people with a gender dysphoria diagnosis from entering the military.
“Because I have started medically transitioning, my scholarship is now void.
“Since my scholarship is now invalid, I can no longer afford to attend without financial assistance. I received little financial aid from the university despite having a single mother with a low-income and struggled to pay my own way through my first year.
“Until now, I remained under the impression that my scholarship would take care of my remaining 3 years, but that is no longer the case.”
He is now pleading with people to help him raise the required funds to continue his education.
