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Lesbian couple get free wedding venue after ‘heart-crushing’ experience with initial locale

A gay Kansas couple found what they thought was the perfect wedding venue, until the owner told them her “deeply held religious beliefs” prevented her from celebrating their marriage. Wichita residents Ali Waggy and Jessica Robinson, who got engaged in July, toured the Barn at Grace Hill, a venue in Newton, earlier this month, the Wichita Eagle reported. Even before touring, Waggy said she knew she wanted to get married there, because “their barn is beautiful.” After the tour, Waggy said she followed up with an email about moving forward with booking the venue, but she received a “heart-crushing” response from […]

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Lawmakers in South Carolina approve ban on gender-affirming care for trans minors

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Lawmakers in South Carolina, USA, have approved a ban on gender-affirming care for trans youth.  On 18 January, the Republican-dominated House debated and voted “overwhelmingly” in favour of the bill, as per AP News. The bill prevents health professionals from performing gender-affirming surgery, prescribing puberty blockers and overseeing hormone therapy for patients under 18 years old. The bill also prevents those under the age of 26 – eight years past the age of majority in the Southern US state – from using Medicaid, the nation’s public health insurance program for those from a low-income background, to cover the cost of gender-affirming […]

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Texas’s anti-LGBTQ+ book ban law blocked by federal court

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A federal appeals court has issued an injunction against part of Texas’ book-banning law that requires book vendors to rate books for “sexually explicit” and “sexually relevant” materials. Vendors must submit those ratings every year to the Texas Education Agency (TEA), the agency overseeing public schools. The TEA can then overrule a vendor’s ratings and place vendors on a “noncompliant list,” forbidding schools from buying books from them if the vendors disagree with the TEA’s decisions. Two Texas bookstores — Austin’s BookPeople and Houston’s Blue Willow Bookshop — filed a lawsuit against the 2023 Restricting Explicit and Adult-Designated Educational Resources […]

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Queer people of colour don’t think they will live as long as their white peers, study finds

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Large numbers of queer young people of colour in the US believe they have a low life expectancy compared with their white peers, a new study has found. The research for LGBTQ+ youth mental-health charity The Trevor Projectshowed that, overall, 58 per cent of young queer people believe there is a high chance they will live to at least the age of 35, while 34 per cent view their chances as low. The remaining respondents were unsure. The report, which surveyed 28,524 LGBTQ+ people between the ages of 13 and 24, found that 59 per cent of young LGBTQ+ people of colour […]

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285 anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in state legislatures already this year and it’s still January

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After a record year for anti-LGBTQ+ legislation at the state level, 2024 is shaping up to be just as challenging. In 2023, more than 550 anti-LGBTQ+ bills were introduced across 43 states, and more than 80 were passed into law. So far in the new year, 285 have been introduced, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. Keep up with the latest in LGBTQ+ news and politics. Sign up for The Advocate’s email newsletter. These bills seek to limit LGBTQ+ people’s rights in education, health care, public accommodations, free speech and expression, and much more. A total of 130 would restrict students’ and teachers’ rights through […]

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Florida GOP lawmakers seek to ban rainbow flags in schools, saying they’re bad for students

A bill advanced by Florida Republicans on Wednesday would ban teachers and other government employees from displaying a rainbow flag — even wearing one as a lapel pin for a day — but they could hang the full-size flag of any “recognized nation” as long as they want, according to the bill’s sponsor. Flag displays that depict a “racial, sexual orientation and gender, or political ideology viewpoint” would be banned from any state or local government building, including public schools and universities, under the bill authored by GOP Rep. David Borrero. Opponents say the bill is inspired by hate. Borrero […]

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Two of the country’s largest transgender rights organizations will merge

Two of the country’s largest transgender rights organizations are merging, telling NBC News that joining forces will allow them to better combat years of conservative efforts to roll back trans rights. The National Center for Transgender Equality, or NCTE, a group that focuses primarily on federal policy reform, and the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund, or TLDEF, which works to advance trans rights through litigation, will merge by this summer to become Advocates for Trans Equality, or A4TE.  “We’ll be able to operate with double the influence, double the power,” said Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, the executive director of NCTE, who […]

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West Virginia Republicans want to ban transgender people from public spaces, call them ‘obscene’

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Republicans in West Virginia have upped the hostility among those on the right toward transgender people. There, the LGBTQ+ community is currently grappling with significant legislative challenges that have the potential to impact the rights and lives of transgender individuals drastically.  Multiple draconian bills were introduced in the state’s legislature this week, with advocates drawing attention to their severe implications. One forces mental health professionals to “cure” transgender people from their gender identity, and another categorizes transgender people as “obscene material,” essentially making transgender individuals’ existence in many public spaces illegal, independent journalist Erin Reed, who specializes in transgender-related legal coverage, reports. Yet another criminalizes their presence near schools. […]

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Supreme Court stays out of fight over transgender student bathroom access

The Supreme Court on Tuesday declined for now to weigh in on the contentious issue of bathroom access for transgender students by rejecting an Indiana school district’s appeal. The court left in place an appeals court ruling that required a middle school in Martinsville, Indiana, to allow a transgender boy to use the bathroom that corresponds with his gender identity. The student, identified in court papers as A.C., who has since graduated from John R. Wooden Middle School, is now in high school, where he is able to use his preferred bathroom. The Metropolitan School District of Martinsville had wanted the justices […]

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LGBTQ+ Victory Fund Endorses 14 More Candidates for the 2024 Election Cycle

LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, the only national organization dedicated to electing LGBTQ+ leaders to public office, endorsed 14 more out candidates for federal, state and local office around the country. LGBTQ+ Victory Fund has endorsed 82 candidates for the 2024 election cycle. LGBTQ+ Victory Fund endorses the following candidates: Elevated to Spotlight status: Steve Hansen (he/him)Mayor of Sacramento, CAPrimary: 3/5/2024General: 11/5/2024 Ethan Weaver (he/him)Los Angeles City Council, District 4, CAPrimary: 3/5/2024General: 11/5/2024 Malcolm Kenyatta (he/him)Pennsylvania Auditor GeneralPrimary: 4/23/2024General: 11/5/2024 Matthew Park (he/him)Knox County Commission, District 9, TNPrimary: 3/5/2024General: 8/1/2024 Non-Incumbent Candidates: Fidencio Gallardo (he/him)Los Angeles Unified School Board, District 5, CAPrimary: 3/5/2024General: 11/5/2024 […]

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