Top Stories

/ /

Education Department Will Stop Tracking Bullying, Harassment, Assaults Of Nonbinary/Trans Students

Education site The K-12 Dive reports: The U.S. Department of Education is abandoning the collection of key civil rights data on the nation’s LGBTQ+ students, cutting out data and definitions related to the harassment, bullying and assaults of a student group that has been found to be more at-risk of such incidents. Changes to the 2025-26 survey questions — approved by the Office of Management and Budget in July — include eliminating schools’ reporting of how many students identify as nonbinary, how often they are victims of harassment and bullying, and whether school districts have policies prohibiting those incidents. The changes also […]

/ /

Canada Has Everything It Needs to End HIV. So Why Are Rates Rising Among Young Gay Men?

,

In 2019, when Marcus was 22 years old, he asked his family doctor for PrEP—a medication that prevents HIV from transmitting through sex. “My friends and I heard about PrEP during Pride, and all the ads said ‘talk to your family doctor,’” Marcus told Uncloseted Media. “So that’s what I did.” PrEP has been approved for HIV prevention in Canada since 2016—and America’s Food and Drug Administration did so in 2012. However, Marcus says his doctor had never heard of the medication. “He basically told me to be patient while he did some research and said I should use condoms,” he says. Just months […]

/ /

Layoff threat ignites labor fight at major transgender rights group

,

Less than a month after workers at Advocates for Trans Equality ratified a contract designed to protect their jobs, one of the nation’s most prominent transgender rights organizations warned that some of those jobs may disappear. Now, employees are accusing A4TE’s leadership of financial mismanagement, withholding essential information and violating the collective bargaining agreement the two sides spent more than a year negotiating. The Union for Trans Liberation said A4TE management notified union representatives after 5 p.m. July 20 that the organization was entering a period of “economic retrenchment.” Less than 24 hours later, A4TE sent donors an appeal saying it may “potentially eliminate […]

/ /

Kansas AG Demands Cities Repeal Ex-Gay Torture Bans

The Kansas Reflector reports: The Kansas attorney general demanded three cities repeal their bans on conversion therapy for minors following a U.S. Supreme Court decision that found such bans violate the First Amendment. Attorney General Kris Kobach sent letters Thursday to city officials in Lawrence, Prairie Village and Roeland Park, requesting they respond within 60 days to indicate whether they nullified their bans on conversion therapy. The collection of practices known as conversion therapy were designed to attempt to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. It is banned in 27 states and more than a dozen other countries, and it […]

/ /

The people who called AIDS God’s punishment for gays are helping measles make a comeback

MAGA, MAHA, or whatever we’re calling a cult of people determined to drag America back to 1830, is having another banner year. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported last Friday that the U.S. currently has the largest number of measles cases we’ve seen in 35 years, and it comes amid a dramatic slide in childhood vaccination rates. Maybe it’s time to bring back the covered wagons and live in simpler times when 40 percent of all children failed to reach adulthood. We’re well on our way. Growing up in the ’80s and ’90s, it was impossible to escape the hatred and hostility hurled […]

/ /

University of Alabama quietly abandons sexual orientation & gender identity nondiscrimination policy

,

The University of Alabama system quietly erased explicit protections for LGBTQ+ people from its nondiscrimination policy. The change, first reported by The Crimson White, appears to have been made sometime in November 2025, according to archived versions of the Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination Program pages for the system and its campuses in Birmingham and Huntsville. The pages previously listed “sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression” as protected categories, language that remains visible in documents hosted by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a […]

/ /

Since 2021, there have been efforts across the U.S. to ban books about marginalized groups from libraries and schools. Amanda Hunt refused to stay silent.

,

In October 2025, Amanda Hunt remembers watching as countless books at Oak Run Middle School in New Braunfels, Texas, were removed from her library. Students walked in and saw more empty shelves and fewer stories they had once been able to check out. “Every day, they’re like, ‘More boxes? More books to get rid of? More books to pull?’” Hunt, who was the lead librarian at the time, told Uncloseted Media. That month, Hunt says the New Braunfels Independent School District (ISD) had temporarily closed all four of its secondary-school libraries to audit its collections and assess whether they were in accordance […]

/ /

Ohio’s Democratic candidate for governor loses top LGBTQ+ grade over anti-trans remarks

,

Ohio LGBTQ+ advocacy and legal aid organization Equality Ohio has changed its grade of Ohio Democratic gubernatorial candidate Dr. Amy Acton from an “A” to “Pending” on its 2026 Candidate Scorecard. The change follows comments that Acton made to the Toledo Blade on June 30regarding the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision to uphold state bans on transgender athletes. Rather than voicing disagreement with the decision or commenting on Ohio’s current ban on transgender athletes, Acton employed anti-transgender language. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. “I do not support boys playing in […]

/ /

Scouting America drops diversity initiatives from event after pressure from the Pentagon

One of Scouting America’s biggest gatherings has eliminated dedicated spaces for gay youth, women and scouts of color as the organization faces pressure from the Pentagon to pull back diversity efforts. The changes at the National Jamboree, which ends Friday, reflect shifts made by Scouting America since the organization became a target of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over what he calls “woke” policies. Some scouts who had planned to attend the event in West Virginia said they backed out because Scouting America scrapped the inclusion initiatives it previously celebrated.  Hegseth threatened to end the Pentagon’s century-old partnership with Scouting America if it did not […]

/ /

North Carolina Republican lawmaker wants the state to police what transgender teachers can wear

,

A Republican North Carolina lawmaker says it “may be time” to require public school employees to wear clothing she considers “gender-appropriate” after objecting to a transgender music teacher’s attire. State Rep. Erin Paré complained in a post on her campaign Facebook page about the reported hiring of a transgender music teacher at an elementary school in the Wake County Public School System. Paré did not identify the teacher or the school but portrayed the teacher’s gender expression as a potential threat to children. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. “I’ve received your emails […]

«‹ 4 5 6 7›»