The “anti-gay” white couple who stood outside their mansion and pointed guns at Black Lives Matter protesters will “definitely” speak at the Republican Party convention this month.
Mark and Patricia McCloskey, who are both personal injury lawyers, made headlines around the world after they were filmed pointing guns at Black Lives Matter protesters from the steps of their palatial mansion in Portland Place, Missouri.
On Monday, August 17, the McCloskey’s lawyer told the New York Times that the couple would “definitely be speaking” at the Republican National Convention (RNC).
Albert Watkins said in an interview that Mark McCloskey, who threatened Black Lives Matter protesters with an AR-15, would speak at the Republican convention with his handgun-toting wife, Patricia, by his side.
However, Watkins added that Patricia was not expected to speak as “she is not built for this”.
The lawyer said that the couple would take part in a video presentation at the RNC, and added: “They, like many Americans, are horrified, if not mortified, at the prospect of their constitutional rights being compromised by the constitutional rights of others.
According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, they once sued their neighbourhood’s trustees to demand they enforce a document called the Trust Agreement, which prohibited unmarried people from living together.
Neighbours said it was because the McCloskeys “didn’t want gay couples living on the block”.
As the McCloskeys unsuccessfully appealed the case all the way to the state Supreme Court, trustees voted to impeach Patricia, accusing her of being anti-gay in 1992.
However, during a deposition in 2002 Mark refuted the claims, and said: “Certain people on Portland Place, for political reasons, wanted to make it a gay issue.”
Pete Buttigieg, who made waves in the Democratic presidential primary as a gay presidential candidate, made progress on LGBTQ rights a component of his message during his speech Thursday at the Democratic National Convention.
The range of Buttigieg’s remarks was the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” which enabled him to serve openly in the military; the Supreme Court ruling for marriage equality, which enabled him to marry Chasten Buttigieg; and this year’s Supreme Court decision barring anti-LGBTQ discrimination in employment.
“Now in 2020, it is unlawful in America to fire anyone because of who they are or who they love,” Buttigieg said. “The very ring on my finger reflects how this country can change. Love makes my marriage real, but political courage made it possible — including that of Joe Biden, who stepped out ahead of even this party when he said that marriage equality should be the law of the land.”
But Buttigieg, speaking at the venue in Indiana where me married his spouse, made the case more change is on the way.
“If so much can change between 2010 and 2020, imagine what 2030 could look like,” Buttigieg said. “Imagine what we could achieve — the coalition we are building this very season, gathering progressives and moderates, independents and even former Republicans, to help build a future where everyone belongs.”
Buttigieg also drew on his own historic candidacy for the White House, which he said couldn’t have happened in the time before he was born.
“The day I was born, close to where I’m standing, here in South Bend, the idea of an ‘out’ candidate seeking any federal office at all was laughable,” Buttigieg said. “Yet earlier this year I campaigned for the presidency, often with my husband at my side, winning delegates to this very convention.”
Watch Buttiigeg’s full remarks here (via NBC News):
The lead U.S. foreign aid agency has proposed a new policy on gender and women’s empowerment that eliminates any mention of transgender people or contraceptives, running counter to its own long-standing practices in deciding what programs to support.
The draft policy released by the U.S. Agency for International Development on Wednesday was billed as an update and replacement to the original 2012 policy, released under the Obama administration. Though written subtly, the agency’s gender policy is parsed closely by experts and grantees as a clue to the kind of initiatives the agency will prioritize, and it guides USAID’s grant-making and development work worldwide.
The updated policy has been in the works for months and has been the subject of much scrutiny and internal controversy. It states its goal as “a prosperous and peaceful world in which women, girls, men, and boys enjoy equal economic, social, cultural, civil, and political rights and are equally empowered to secure better lives for themselves, their families, their communities, and their countries.”
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USAID did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Perhaps the starkest difference is how the old and new policies refer to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people — indeed, whether those populations are mentioned at all. The 2012 policy mentions LGBT people twice — once in a footnote and once in a reference to partnering with LGBT advocates to advance gender equity. It also used the phrase “gender identity” eight times, in recognition of the transgender experience, in which a person’s assigned sex does not accord with their own gender identiity.
The new policy doesn’t use the acronym LGBT or its more inclusive variants or the words “lesbian,” “gay,” “bisexual,” “transgender” or “identity” at all.
“It sends a message when an overarching umbrella policy that is supposed to inform all of USAID’s practices and initiatives is missing those factors,” said Gayatri Patel, director of gender advocacy at CARE, a humanitarian organization, though she added it is difficult to know yet how the new policy will impact future USAID programming.
That omission sparked an internal email exchange among USAID officials this week, which was seen by ProPublica. A USAID official passed along a comment from a colleague, noting the exclusion of those words. In a response sent around an hour later, Timothy Meisburger, USAID’s director of the Center of Excellence on Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance, wrote that while staff should feel free to comment on the policy, they should “keep in mind that the policies of the current Administration may differ from those of previous Administrations, and that it is our duty as civil servants to faithfully execute the policy of the current Administration.”
Meisburger, a political appointee who joined the agency in 2017, did not respond to a text message and email requesting comment.
In a section on inclusivity, the 2012 policy is specific, saying it applies to people “regardless of age, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability status, religion, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, geographic area, migratory status, forced displacement or HIV/AIDS status.”
The new policy is far more vague, saying in its inclusivity section that the agency wants to ensure “all people, including those who face discrimination and thus may have limited access to a country’s benefits, legal protections, or social participation, are fully included and can actively participate in and benefit from development processes and activities.”
In a section on maternal health, the new draft policy mentions only “fertility awareness” and “healthy timing and spacing of pregnancies” as family planning methods, even though USAID has funded the provision of contraceptives in developing countries for decades. The 2012 policy discussed the global lack of access to contraceptives.
That change is in line with the Trump administration’s yearslong effort to advance its socially conservative views on family planning in the global arena.
“For the gender policy to be silent on that is another glaring omission,” Patel said.
Gender experts and advocates said the new policy falls far short of providing the up-to-date technical expertise that the agency needs to grapple with gender issues in development.
Officials at USAID warned that favoring Christian groups in Iraq could be unconstitutional and inflame religious tensions. When one colleague lost her job, they said she had been “Penced.”
“The field has progressed in the eight years since 2012,” said Susan Markham, USAID’s former senior coordinator for gender equality and women’s empowerment. “But this document does not do that. It is not based on technical advances or knowledge. It’s clearly a political document about the word gender.”
The proposed USAID policy also adopts the phrase “unalienable rights,” which did not appear in the 2012 version. That phrase mirrors the State Department’s Commission on Unalienable Rights, a panel launched by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in 2019.
When he unveiled the commission’s draft report in July, Pompeo derided the “proliferation of rights.” Critics say establishing such a hierarchy of rights endangers the lives and safety of vulnerable groups like LGBT people and women around the world. The commission’s draft report asserted that the two foremost unalienable rights, in the view of America’s founders, were the right to property and religious liberty, and describes same-sex marriage as a “divisive social and political” controversy.
The new policy is in tension with another set of USAID rules, the Automated Directives System, which lays out the agency’s organization and functions. A section of that rulebook dealing with gender, updated in 2017, addresses lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people and emphasizes the importance of gender identity when conducting analysis.
Officials at USAID have repeatedly pushed back release of the revised gender policy. It was originally slated for release in late 2019, said three people familiar with the process, and was delayed in part by the coronavirus pandemic. The policy rewrite has also been shrouded in secrecy, with outside advocates and even gender experts within the agency getting little chance to offer input until the very final stages.
Members of the public have until early next week to submit comments on the draft.
One official involved in the policy update process was Bethany Kozma, the USAID deputy chief of staff. Before joining the Trump administration in 2017, Kozma advocated against Obama-era guidelines that schools allow transgender students to use bathrooms that match their gender identity. During her time in the administration, she has played a key role in advancing conservative causes globally, such as opposing references to sexual and reproductive health in United Nations documents.
In the last few months, USAID’s leadership has been seeded with several right-wing political appointees, including Mark Kevin Lloyd, a Tea Party activist with a history of making and sharing anti-Islamic comments, who was named the agency’s new religious freedom adviser; Kozma, who was elevated to a higher position as the agency’s deputy chief of staff; and Merritt Corrigan, the agency’s former deputy White House liaison, who had made repeated anti-LGBT statements on social media. Corrigan left USAID this month after she unleashed a tirade against the agency on Twitter, though she later claimed she did not send those tweets.
HIV/AIDS service providers in Florida say the coronavirus pandemic has further exacerbated health care and economic disparities that many of their clients face.
Tatiana Williams is the co-founder and executive director of Transinclusive Group, a Fort Lauderdale-based organization that serves transgender people in South Florida. Williams is also the co-chair of South Florida FLUX, which advises AIDS Healthcare Foundation on trans-specific issues.
Williams on Aug. 11 told the Washington Blade during a telephone interview from Fort Lauderdale the pandemic “just really highlighted some of the challenges that are happening within the transgender community.”
“A lot of our clients were already dealing with unemployment, dealing with a lack of access to health care, dealing with a lot of these issues,” she said.
Williams said her organization’s Transinclusive Emergency Crisis Fund has been able to provide clients emergency housing and a host of other services that include help paying utility bills and medications.
“You had a lot of our clients working in these nightclubs that were closed down, so a lot of them immediately went into a position of survival mode and not having access to a lot of things,” she said. “With COVID, it just turned their lives upside down.”
Williams said problems with Florida’s unemployment system delayed payments to many Transinclusive Group clients who lost their jobs because of the pandemic. Williams told the Blade they “were behind” once they began to receive unemployment checks, and this delay created “gaps” in their medications.
“A lot of health care providers weren’t working at full capacity,” she said. “A lot of them weren’t even returning calls, so a lot of the clients, especially HIV-positive clients, hadn’t received care, so we had to go into the telemedicine mode and we were linking people back to care.”
Other HIV/AIDS service organizations in Florida have made similar adjustments in response to the pandemic.
Arianna Lint is a Peruvian woman with HIV who founded Arianna’s Center, a Wilton Manors-based organization that serves trans women with HIV.
She told the Blade on Aug. 3 during an interview at her office the pandemic has made her organization’s work “more difficult because we have (had) to invest more time” with teaching clients how to use technology to access health care. Lint said Arianna’s Center has also had to visit clients at their homes.
Stephen Fallon, co-founder and director of Latino Salud, another Wilton Manors-based organization that serves LGBTQ Latinos with HIV, during a July 23 Zoom call with other HIV/AIDS service providers that AIDS Healthcare Foundation organized said the majority of health care providers in his area remained open “to some extent” during the lockdown imposed when the pandemic began. Fallon said testing agencies were closed during this period.
“We were getting deluged with all the folks who needed testing services who couldn’t go anywhere,” he said.
Scott Pridgen is executive director of AH Monroe, an organization that serves people with HIV/AIDS in the Florida Keys.
AH Monroe has offices in Key West, Marathon, Tavernier and Key Largo.
Pridgen on Aug. 12 told the Blade during a telephone interview from Key West the pandemic has forced his organization to operate its offices virtually, “which is new because a lot of our case management, especially our older population that is living with HIV have other co-morbidities that require more of a physical, hands-on type of care versus doing it virtually.”
“We’ve had to take that into consideration,” said Pridgen.
The pandemic began during the height of the Keys’ tourism season, which Pridgen said is “when people make their money to carry them through during the slow season.”
Pridgen told the Blade that AH Monroe has been able to provide short-term mortgage, rent and utility assistance through grants from the CARES Act, the Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS (HOPWA) program and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of HIV Housing.
“The biggest need due to COVID-19 in Monroe County is housing, paying rent for someone or mortgages,” said Pridgen.
Pridgen added Keys residents “who’ve never asked for anything, ever, ever, (are) in line at the food bank or you’re handing them a bag of groceries.”
AIDS Healthcare Foundation Regional Director Dawn Averill is based in Pensacola, but works throughout Florida and the Deep South. Averill on the July 23 Zoom call echoed Pridgen’s observations about the pandemic’s impact.
“We’re actually seeing a lot of fear,” said Averill, referring to people with HIV/AIDS. “They’re fearful to go to the grocery store. They’re fearful to come to the office, to get their blood drawn, to see their families.”
Averill also noted “significant health disparities” in rural and urban areas that factor into health outcomes for people with HIV/AIDS.
State Rep. Carlos Guillermo Smith, who represents portions of Orlando in the Florida House of Representatives, on Aug. 14 noted to the Blade during a telephone interview that HIV rates in Florida are higher among trans people, people of color, undocumented immigrants and other vulnerable groups. Smith said efforts to curb the coronavirus’ spread have had a disproportionate impact on these populations.
“Quarantines and other COVID-related restrictions are also pushing people with HIV who are already vulnerable into isolation away from friends, chosen family,” he added.
South Florida remains state’s coronavirus epicenter
The Florida Department of Health on Tuesday said there have been 579,932 confirmed coronavirus cases in the state. Statistics also indicate the pandemic has killed 9,758 people in Florida.
Miami-Dade and Broward Counties remain the pandemic’s epicenter in Florida, with 25 and 12 percent of the state’s total cases respectively. Statistics indicate the coronavirus has killed 2,126 people in Miami-Dade County and 1,025 people in Broward County.
The Florida Department of Health reported 15,300 new coronavirus cases on July 12, compared to 3,838 new cases on Monday. A press release notes the rate of positive tests in the state on Tuesday were below 10 percent for the sixth consecutive days.
Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis nevertheless continues to face widespread criticism over his response to the coronavirus. Many of the HIV/AIDS service providers with whom the Blade spoke noted he has not imposed a statewide mask order and moved too quickly to reopen Florida.
“He’s shown time and time again that he is a politician over everything,” Equality Florida HIV Advocacy Coordinator Alejandro Acosta told the Blade on Aug. 14 during a telephone interview from Wilton Manors. “He makes health care decisions based on his politics and his personal beliefs and that is not conductive for a good public health outcome.”
Smith, who is also Equality Florida’s Central Florida Outreach Coordinator, told the Blade he welcomed DeSantis’ decision in March to lock down nursing homes and other long-term care facilities in order to curb the pandemic’s spread. Smith was nevertheless critical of the governor’s overall response.
“We’re the world’s epicenter of the pandemic and we still don’t even have a statewide mask order, which costs us nothing,” Smith told the Blade.
Smith also expressed concern over the Department of Health’s decision to reassign employees who worked on HIV and STI-related issues to fight the coronavirus.
The Department of Health on Tuesday declined to make anyone available to the Blade for an interview about efforts to protect vulnerable Floridians with HIV/AIDS during the pandemic.
“COVID-19 requires an unprecedented response at both the state and local level,” said the Department of Health in an email.
The Department of Health has yet to respond to a follow-up email about Smith’s concerns.
“We have an HIV workforce in Florida,” Smith told the Blade. “As a direct result of COVID-19, we’re just kind of seeing this trend of diversion of scientific and public attention away from HIV in Florida. That’s what has me concerned.”
“We could come out of the other end of this pandemic and realize that we have another public health crisis on our hands,” he added. “It’s a recipe for disaster if we don’t focus and if we don’t veer course when it comes to staying committed to HIV prevention.”
Two officials in Uganda are facing charges of torture and inhuman and degrading treatment in connection with the arrest of 20 men from an LGBT+ shelter.
In March harrowing footage emerged of a “bogus” coronavirus raid on the the Children of the Sun Foundation LGBT+ shelter in Kampala. The men were seen being whipped, chained, interrogated and publicly humiliated by a municipal mayor.
While some were released on health grounds, the majority spent almost 50 days in jail, during which time they were denied HIV medicine, legal counsel, and the ability to apply for bail.
The case attracted the attention of international human rights activists, and after sustained pressure the men were finally freed with all charges dropped and an order to be compensated US$1,341 each by the Ugandan government.
A criminal case is now underway thanks to the Human Rights Awareness and Promotion Forum (HRAPF), which initiated private proceedings after local police refused to take it on.
In a press release, the group decried the “myriad of forms of violence, ranging from taunting, flogging, scalding, subjection to corporal punishment, as well as denial of access to food, sanitary facilities and medication”.
According to 76 Crimes the Chief Magistrates Court of Wakiso has now issued a summons to the town councilman who headed the raid and beatings, Hajj Abdul Kiyimba, as well as prison officer Philimon Woniala.
“We believe that because the [prisoners] were perceived as LGBT+, the accused chairman and prisons officer and others who may torture, believe they can get away with such acts with impunity,” said Melanie Nathan, executive director of the African Human Rights Coalition.
“It is time to set an example – that even though LGBT+ people are criminalised under the penal codes of Uganda, there is no exception or excuse to torture any individual under any circumstances.”
She reiterated the unwarranted nature of the arrests, stating that while the men weren’t technically arrested for being gay, “if they were not perceived as such, they would not have been targets for arrest at all.”
She continued: “All said and done if ever there is a case exposing the exploitation of criminalisation of gay people, [this] is that case.”
The civil case against Kiyimba, Woniala and the state will be heard on September 23.
A longtime broadcaster for the Cincinnati Reds was suspended Wednesday after using an anti-gay slur on a hot mic during a game against the Kansas City Royals.
Thom Brennaman, a broadcaster and play-by-play announcer for Fox Sports Ohio, used the slur while preparing to introduce the team’s pregame show.
“If I have hurt anyone out there I can’t tell you how much I say from the bottom of my heart I am so very, very sorry,” he said.
Brennaman also acknowledged the uncertain fate of his job.
“I don’t know if I’ll be putting on this headset again,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s going to be for the Reds. I don’t know if it’s going to be for my bosses at Fox. I want to apologize for the people who sign my paycheck, for the Reds, for Fox Sports Ohio, for the people I work with, for anybody that I’ve offended here tonight.”
Shortly afterward, the Reds announced his suspension.
“The Cincinnati Reds organization is devastated by the horrific, homophobic remark made this evening by broadcaster Thom Brennaman,” the statement said. “He was pulled off the air, and effective immediately was suspended from doing Reds broadcasts.”
The Reds “will be addressing our broadcast team in coming days,” the statement said, adding that the organization has a zero-tolerance policy for discrimination.
“In no way does this incident represent our players, coaches, organization, or our fans,” the statement said. “We share our sincerest apologies to the LGBTQ+ community in Cincinnati, Kansas City, all across this country, and beyond.”
Brennaman’s father, Marty Brennaman, a former broadcaster and play-by-play announcer for the Reds, told the Cincinnati Enquirer on Wednesday that the language heard on the air doesn’t represent his son.
“As a dad, I hurt for him,” Marty Brennaman said. “What he said is not a reflection of who Thom Brennaman is. I know that’s not him. But I also feel terrible for the people the comment offended.”
Marty Brennaman said “an open mic is the biggest enemy you have.”
“The worst feeling in the world, if you’re not on the air, is that you say something and you hear it coming back into your headset,” he said.
Chris Seelbach, the first openly gay person elected to Cincinnati’s city council, condemned Brennaman’s comments Wednesday night on Twitter.
“The Brennaman family are Cincinnati sports icons with a powerful voice in our community, which makes it even more disgusting and totally unprofessional to hear such language used,” Seelbach wrote.
“It’s incredibly disappointing to hear Mr. Brennaman use such language of hate when our country is begging for unity,” the councilman said.
Fox Sports Ohio didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
MLB responded to a request for comment by referring NBC News to the Reds statement.
Jason Rae, who as the first openly gay secretary for the Democratic National Committee made his national debut Tuesday night reading the roll call for states in the formal nomination of Joe Biden, has a personal anecdote to tell about the presidential nominee.
When Rae was in a different role as a page in 2003 for the U.S. Senate, Biden, then a U.S. senator representing Delaware, introduced Rae to an important visitor.
“Then Sen.-Joe Biden came and said, ‘Hey, hey, come here, I got to show you something. I want you to meet somebody,’” Rae said. “And he came and introduced us to the Dalai Lama. Here’s a 16-year-old kid — fresh in D.C. from Wisconsin for me — and here’s the senator who is wanting to make sure that we get these experiences and having such interest in that.”
In addition to his duties as DNC secretary, Rae is one of 635 LGBTQ delegates to the 2020 Democratic National Convention. An uncommitted delegate representing his home state of Wisconsin, Rae hails from Glendale, Wis., a suburb of Milwaukee and just outside the city where the half-virtual, half-live convention is taking place.
For many Biden supporters across the country, the goal for the election is simple: Defeating President Trump and removing him from the White House. Rae, however, said from his perspective there’s more to it.
Rae, now 33, said the election for him is about making sure “we’re really going to move our country forward on a number of issues, including LGBTQ rights.”
“I know Joe Biden’s still gonna push to pass the Equality Act within his first 100 days, reverse Trump’s ban on transgender military service, really push in a holistic way,” Rae said. “I think the Biden-Harris administration understands that LGBTQ equality is a civil rights issue, and that they are going to take the concerns of our community forward.”
Rae is among LGBTQ delegates who spoke to the Washington Blade and said they don’t just want the election to be about getting ridding of Trump and anticipate results once Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris are elected.
Earl Fowlkes, a D.C.-based gay Black activist and chair of the Democratic Party’s LGBTQ Caucus, said “of course there’s more” than beating Trump and making that case will be a winning element to Biden’s election.
“I think we made a mistake in 2016 of believing saying that I’m not Trump is a winning formula,” Fowlkes said. “People have to have a reason to vote. It’s not just because of Trump and who he is, but because of what we offer in response to Trump’s policies. We’re offering comprehensive inclusive policies that will lift up all Americans, especially those who are most vulnerable, such as our transgender sisters and brothers and people who are poor.”
Fowlkes also said promises from Democrats have to be more than just talking points and must be acted upon swiftly in the next administration.
“It has to be really instituting policy changes, and in the first 100 days of the administration,” Fowlkes said. “It has to happen.”
The 635 delegates at the 2020 Democratic National Convention, which includes 30 transgender delegates, make up a sizable portion of the 3,979 delegates who are part of the event.
It’s also the most LGBTQ delegates ever at a Democratic convention, and by a sizable margin: In 2016, for example, the number was 515, and in 2012 the number was 550.
Fowlkes conceded his interaction with the LGBTQ caucus is limited because of the virtual nature of the convention, but was hopeful it would nonetheless infuse delegates with enthusiasm just before the election.
“We won’t have these huge rallies when you’ll be able to say the candidates all fell flat, or there’s a lot of enthusiasm people are carrying more than they’re sure before,” Fowlkes said. “We don’t have that so we’re gonna have to do really one-on-one and use social networks to really drill down deep and convince queer people to vote.”
The perspective there’s more to electing Biden than getting rid of Trump stands in contrast to the general public, according to a recent survey from the Pew Research Center made public last week.
A majority of Biden supporters — 56 percent — say their top reason for backing the candidate is “He is not Trump.” Other factors, including leadership, personality and policy, didn’t even break 20 percent.
For Trump supporters, the reasons for backing him were more spread out: 23 percent cited leadership, 21 percent cited policy, 17 percent said he’s for American values. “He is not Biden” came in at 19 percent.
Glen Paul Freedman, an Atlanta-based gay delegate for the Democratic convention, said getting rid of Trump is “a top priority,” but “it’s not just so much” that goal, citing among other issues the president’s authority to appoint justices to the Supreme Court.
“There’s other things that are outside LGBTQ rights, whether it be for you know personally for health care, or just in a society that treats people with dignity and respect,” Freedman said.
With Biden continuing to lead in the polls against Trump, LGBTQ advocates are also beginning to pile on the demands they want to see upon election of the Democratic nominee to the White House.
The LGBTQ Victory Institute, which trains LGBTQ political hopefuls and seeks to ensure LGBTQ people obtain appointments in the U.S. government, identified last week four specific goals for the next administration.
• Appoint a Senate-confirmed openly LGBTQ Cabinet member for the first time; • Nominate an openly LGBTQ U.S. Supreme Court justice for the first time; • Appoint openly LGBTQ woman ambassadors, LGBTQ ambassadors of color, and transgender ambassadors for the first time; and • Ensure openly LGBTQ people receive equitable representation among presidential appointees and that they reflect the full diversity of the LGBTQ community.
Annise Parker, former mayor of Houston and CEO of LGBTQ Victory Institute, said in a statement a coalition of 31 organizations will support the effort.
“Presidential appointees have tremendous influence over the policies and direction of federal agencies and the executive branch, so it is essential LGBTQ people are included both in high-level positions and throughout the next administration,” Parker said. “There is an LGBTQ person qualified to fill nearly every position in the next administration and this coalition is determined to help them navigate a complex appointments process to ensure we are well represented.”
Democrats are making promises they plan to deliver. Among them is Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), who was among the high-profile speakers at the convention’s LGBTQ Democratic caucus on Tuesday.
Cicilline in his remarks envisioned passage of the Equality Act, legislation that would update the Civil Rights Act to expand the prohibition on anti-LGBTQ discrimination under the law.
“With Joe Biden as our president, it will become the law of the land, so this is an important election for our count,” Cicilline said. “It is not an understatement to say our very democracy depends on it, but our community has a special interest in this, because we can elect a president and a vice president who have a long record committed to full quality for our community, and we’re fighting against a president who has in every way undermined full equality.”
Other high-profile speakers at the LGBTQ caucus were Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who represents the largest city to elect an openly LGBTQ mayor, as well as lesbian Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.). The virtual caucus had 5,390 page views from 3,050 unique devices, a spokesperson for the Democratic National Committee told the Blade.
It’s not that getting rid of Trump doesn’t have value in and of itself. LGBTQ delegates at the convention drew attention to anti-LGBTQ record to say getting rid of Trump would be a good thing.
Freedman, CFO and CEO of the Stacey Adams-backed Fair Fight Action, didn’t hold back in his assessment of Trump, saying Republicans supporting him are racist.
“I just think that a party with a leader who is a racist, and I believe that some of the people in his party are racists, and now feel that they have over the last four years — and even more going up into the election…been more public about their voice about being racist, and that they would like to see America turned back,” Freedman said. “So, I can’t imagine anyone who is voting does not see this or not understand why it is so important to make a huge change here in America.”
Rae said Biden, as well as his running mate Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), would bring a new day to the White House.
“Right now, we have an administration, right now in Donald Trump and Mike Pence, who have really used all of their power to fight against LGBTQ rights,” Rae said. “So for me, this is a struggle for our community, and this is an opportunity for us to elect two leaders in Joe Biden and Kamala Harris who are going to fight for the LGBT community, each and every day.”
Rae is confident LGBTQ lives would improve under Biden based in part on his interactions with the candidate. Since his time as a Senate page, Rae said he has spoken with Biden, both in his capacity as vice president and 2020 presidential candidate, most recently at the New Hampshire State Party Convention.
“Last fall we had an opportunity to chat for a little bit and I just really find them both to be — genuine is the best word I can find — because it’s real,” Rae said. “They are real people who really care.”
Footage which has alarmed LGBT+ activists in northern Belgium shows a group of boys barricading a street in broad daylight before pinning their victim down, hurling homophobic insults and violently punching them.
A week on since the video, of an attack in Leuven, went viral on Twitter, an investigation by Het Laatste Nieuws found that the perpetrators are tied to a gang called “Criminal Justice” who “hunt” queer people while proudly broadcasting their attacks onto social media.
Via Telegram, the group reportedly chat to around 600 other members who revel in seeing LGBT+ people being pummelled live on camera, chat logs seen by the outlet showed, with the 12 August clip being just one of a horrid array of incidents of violence.
Victim of anti-LGBT+ Belgium gang: ‘I had to get on my knees and apologise.’
Reporters found that the Telegram group is clogged with messages glorifying violently attacking LGBT+ people, while others actively search online for new victims. One message read: “Gays must be slaughtered.”
Around 400 photographs and video recordings are on the chat, the outlet said, including the Leuven attack, and allegedly include incidents in Blankenberge, Antwerp and Roeselare.
Attackers said they were willing to use knives and firearms, the chat logs showed, while testimonies from victims have described the Criminal Justice playbook as once of humiliation and psychological abuse.
One victim told HetLaatste Nieuws that in Groenplaats, Antwerp, he and a friend were targeted by the group. “A little further down the road from us, two men were playing loud music,” he said.
“When we left, they suddenly started to chase us. And a little later I was threatened via Instagram.
“I agreed to talk to them, which I shouldn’t have done. They threatened me badly.
“I had to get on my knees and apologise. What if I hadn’t? Then I would have been beaten badly.”
More chat records show that those involved in the Leuven attack – where the perpetrators shouted the Moroccon anti-gay slur “zemmel” at the victim – believed the victims involved were gay.
The mother and father of hate crime victim Matthew Shepard gave their full blessing to Joe Biden at the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday night (August 18).
Judy and Dennis Shepard joined several of Biden’s former rivals, including Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar, in wholeheartedly pledging their support for Biden, announcing their state’s votes and helping to formally nominate the Democrat.
Speaking from their home in Wyoming, the couple praised Biden’s efforts in helping to extend federal protections to LGBT+ people like their late son.
“After our son’s death in Wyoming, Joe Biden helped pass the legislation to protect LGBTQ Americans from hate crimes,” Dennis Shepard said during the Democratic National Convention roll call.
“He understands more than most our grief over Matt’s death. But we see in Joe so much of what made Matt’s life special: his commitment to equality, his passion for social justice, and his boundless compassion for others.”
The votes announced by the Shepards — who were joined in the roll call by Indiana’s Pete Buttigieg, gay Maine state rep Craig Hickman and representatives for the other 53 states and territories — mean that Biden is now the official Democratic nominee, and Kamala Harris the vice presidential nominee.
Matthew Shephard murdered at 21.
Matthew Shepard was a 21-year-old gay college student who was beaten, tortured and left to die in an anti-gay hate crime in 1998. His killers claimed that they had only intended to rob him but were moved to murder when Shepard made sexual advances towards them.
The case became one of the most prominent examples of the “gay panic” defence being used in an attempt to justify a homophobic hate crime, and it sparked a campaign to extend protections towards the LGBT+ community.
The State Department has appealed a federal judge’s ruling that said it must recognize the U.S. citizenship of a gay Maryland couple’s daughter who was born in Canada via surrogate.
U.S. District Judge Theodore D. Chuang in June ruled in favor of Roee Kiviti and Adiel Kiviti of Chevy Chase, Md., who legally married in California in 2013. Their daughter, Kessem Kiviti, was born in 2019. The State Department on Aug. 13 appealed Chuang’s decision to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va.
Lambda Legal; Immigration Equality and Morgan Lewis, a private law firm, represent the Kivitis. The two advocacy groups also represent Derek Mize and Jonathan Gregg, a gay couple from Atlanta who sued the State Department after it refused to recognize the U.S. citizenship of their daughter, Simone Mize-Gregg, who was born in England via surrogate.
The couples maintain their children are U.S. citizenships under Section 301(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act that states “a baby born abroad to married parents is a U.S. citizen at birth when both parents are U.S. citizens and one of them has resided in the United States at any point prior to the baby’s birth.”
“It’s sad that we have to continue this legal battle,” said Roee Kiviti in a press release that Lambda Legal issued on Monday.
“Once again, the State Department is refusing to recognize Roee and Adiel’s rights as a married couple,” added Immigration Equality Executive Director Aaron C. Morris. “The government’s attempts to strip Kessem of citizenship are unconstitutional, discriminatory, and morally reprehensible.”
A State Department spokesperson on Monday declined to comment.
“We decline to comment on pending litigation,” the spokesperson told the Washington Blade in an email.