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Gays applaud Lieberman upon retirement announcement

Conn. senator credited with leading ‘Don’t Ask’ repeal effort

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Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn) announced his plans to retire in 2012 on Wednesday (Blade photo by Michael Key).

Gay advocates are commending Sen. Joseph Lieberman for the work he’s done during his career on LGBT issues — particularly repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” — in the wake of the lawmaker’s announcement that he’ll retire from the U.S. Senate next year.

Lieberman, who ran as aĀ vice-presidential candidate on the Democratic ticket in 2000,Ā announcedĀ he would not seek a fifth termĀ as a U.S. senator on Wednesday during a speech at the Mariott hotel in Stanford, Conn.

“At the end of this term, I will have served 24 years in the U.S. Senate and 40 years in elective office,” Lieberman said. “By my count, I’ve run at least 15 full-fledged campaigns — and that’s just in Connecticut, not counting the national campaigns I was involved in. So for me, it is time for another season, another purpose under Heaven.”

Lieberman said he’ll continue to work as a public servant for the remainder of his term and saidĀ his planned retirementĀ enables to devote his “full measure of [his] energy and attention to getting things done for Connecticut and our country.”

“I will keep doing everything in my power to keep building strong bridges across party lines, to keep our country safe to win the wars we are in and to make sure America’s leadership on the world stage is principled and strong,” Lieberman said.

While credited as an LGBT advocate, Lieberman is unpopular among voters in Connecticut, according to one poll, which possibly prompted his decision to retire.

A Public Policy Poll published in October found that he had a 57 percent disapproval rating and 66 percent of voters said they would vote against him in the 2012 election.

Lieberman invoked the ire of many in the liberal base for supporting Republican John McCain over now President Obama in the 2008 election and for opposing the public option and Medicare expansion as part of health care reform.

Despite the disappointment he inspired in many Democrats, the Connecticut senator leaves a legacy of being the champion of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal after his long fight to push a measure overturning the law through the Senate.

An opponent of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” since its passage in 1993, LiebermanĀ in MarchĀ introduced standalone legislation that would have repealed the military’s gay ban.

In May, Lieberman succeeded in attaching a repealĀ amendmentĀ in Senate Armed Services Committee to a major defense spending bill. After oppositionĀ successfully blocked the legislation from coming to the floor, Lieberman introduced new standalone repeal that found its way to the President Obama’s desk.

Alex Nicholson, executive director of Servicemembers United, said the importance of Lieberman’s contribution to theĀ “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal effort is difficult to describe in words.

“There are few people that I can say ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ simply would not have happened if it weren’t for them, and he’s one of them,” Nicholson said. “So his contribution has been immeasurable, literally.”

Nicholson said Lieberman’s ability to “put a lot of personal, moderate capital” into the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal effort was responsible for bringing Republican supportĀ to the legislation.

“His staff really did work on this issue for hours and hours a day at senior levels on his staff,” Nicholson said. “I felt a hugeĀ commitment there that hasn’t been matched in any other office that I’ve seen.”

Former Congressman Patrick Murphy, the Democratic lawmaker who led “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal in the U.S. House,Ā called Lieberman “a champion of equality” and said repeal of the military’s gay ban “would not have happened in the Senate without his effort.”

“His argument of why this policyĀ was so wrong and the real need to do this now was instrumental in making repeal a reality,” Murphy said.

Lieberman’s role on LGBT issues wasn’t limited to LGBT issues. He was a co-sponsor of a trans-inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act and in 1996 was among the 49 senators to vote in favor of the legislation.

The Connecticut senator also championed legislation known as the DomesticĀ Partnership Benefits & Obligations Act, whichĀ would provide health and pension benefits to the same-sex partners of federal employees. In 2009, the legislation was reported out of Senate committee, but never saw a vote on the Senate floor.

Michael Cole-Schwartz, a spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign,Ā called Lieberman “a longtime ally and advocate for the LGBT community,” particularly for his work on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal.

“He was an amazing ally in pushing everyday to make sure that we got over the finish line,” Lieberman said. “His hard work was certainly critical to that success.”

But Lieberman isn’t entirely supportive of the advancements sought by many in the LGBT community. Like President Obama, Lieberman doesn’t support marriage rights for gay couples and in 1996 voted in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act.

Still, Cole-Schwartz said Lieberman has been “consistently there” for LGBT activists in recent years.

“I think there is a long way for a number of our leaders to go in terms of recognizing our right to full and equal marriage, but his record aside from that has been stellar,” Cole-Schwartz said.

Despite Lieberman’s lack of support for same-sex marriage, Lieberman voted twice against the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would have made a ban on same-sex marriage part of the U.S. Constitution.

According to the Huffington Post, Democrats who could replace Lieberman include Susan Bysiewicz, a former Connecticut secretary of state, as well as Reps. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). Linda McMahon, a former World Wrestling Entertainment CEO and 2010 candidate for U.S. Senate, is widely expected to run again as a Republican contender.

But what’s next for Lieberman? Speculation has already emerged that he could replace Defense Secretary Robert Gates when he retires from his position sometime this year.

According to Politico, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) —Ā a longtime friend of Lieberman, even though he opposed him on the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal effort —Ā said he would support Lieberman’s nomination as defense chief should Obama name him to the post.

ā€œI really hope that the president would consider him,” McCain wasĀ quoted as saying.Ā “I hadnā€™t thought about it but I sure hope, whatever happens, he will play a major role on national security issues.ā€
Ā 
Nicholson said taking on the position as defense secretary would “certainly be fitting” for Lieberman because of his experience on the Senate Armed Services Committee and the SenateĀ Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee.
Ā 
“He has enormous experience being … a congressional diplomat of sorts —Ā going on trips overseas for foreign policy reasons,” Nicholson said. “His defense credentials are just undisputed.”
Ā 
Should Gates not issue certification for “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal before he exits as defense secretary — as law the signed by Obama requires to implement open service — Nicholson said Lieberman would be a shoe-in for issuing certification.
Ā 
“He was willing to introduce an immediate repeal bill,” Nicholson said. “So even before the certification option was a part of the legislation, he was willing to move forward with it.”
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U.S. Supreme Court

Supreme Court declines to hear case over drag show at Texas university

Students argue First Amendment protects performance

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The U.S. Supreme Court justices on June 30, 2022. ((Photo by Fred Schilling of the U.S. Supreme Court)

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday declined to hear a First Amendment case over a public university president’s refusal to allow an LGBTQ student group to host a drag show on campus.

The group’s application was denied without the justices providing their reasoning or issuing dissenting opinions, as is custom for such requests for emergency review.

When plaintiffs sought to organize the drag performance to raise money for suicide prevention in March 2023, West Texas A&M University President Walter Wendler cancelled the event, citing the Bible and other religious texts.

The students sued, arguing the move constituted prior restraint and viewpoint-based discrimination, in violation of the First Amendment. Wendler had called drag shows ā€œderisive, divisive and demoralizing misogyny,” adding that “a harmless drag show” was “not possible.”

The notoriously conservative Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, who former President Donald Trump appointed to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, ruled against the plaintiffs in September, writing that ā€œit is not clearly established that all drag shows are inherently expressive.”

Kacsmaryk further argued that the High Court’s precedent-setting opinions protecting stage performances and establishing that “speech may not be banned on the ground that it expresses ideas that offend” was inconsistent with constitutional interpretation based on ā€œtext, history and tradition.”

Plaintiffs appealed to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is by far the most conservative of the nation’s 12 appellate circuit courts. They sought emergency review by the Supreme Court because the 5th Circuit refused to fast-track their case, so arguments were scheduled to begin after the date of their drag show.

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Federal Government

EXCLUSIVE: USAID LGBTQ coordinator visits Uganda

Jay Gilliam met with activists, community members from Feb. 19-27

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U.S. Agency for International Development Senior LGBTQI+ Coordinator Jay Gilliam (Photo courtesy of USAID)

U.S. Agency for International Development Senior LGBTQI+ Coordinator Jay Gilliam last month traveled to Uganda.

Gilliam was in the country from Feb. 19-27. He visited Kampala, the Ugandan capital, and the nearby city of Jinja.

Gilliam met with LGBTQ activists who discussed the impact of the Anti-Homosexuality Act, a law with a death penalty provision for “aggravated homosexuality” that President Yoweri Museveni signed last May. Gilliam also sat down with USAID staffers.

Gilliam on Wednesday during an exclusive interview with the Washington Blade did not identify the specific activists and organizations with whom he met “out of protection.” 

“I really wanted to meet with community members and understand the impacts on them,” he said.

Consensual same-sex sexual relations in Uganda were already criminalized before Museveni signed the Anti-Homosexuality Act. Gilliam told the Blade he spoke with a person who said authorities arrested them at a community meeting for mental health and psychosocial support “under false pretenses of engaging in same-sex relations and caught in a video that purportedly showed him.” 

The person, according to Gilliam, said authorities outed them and drove them around the town in which they were arrested in order to humiliate them. Gilliam told the Blade that prisoners and guards beat them, subjected them to so-called anal exams and denied them access to antiretroviral drugs.

“They were told that you are not even a human being. From here on you are no longer living, just dead,” recalled Gilliam.

“I just can’t imagine how difficult it is for someone to be able to live through something like that and being released and having ongoing needs for personal security, having to be relocated and getting support for that and lots of other personal issues and trauma,” added Gilliam.

Gilliam said activists shared stories of landlords and hotel owners evicting LGBTQ people and advocacy groups from their properties. Gilliam told the Blade they “purport that they don’t want to run afoul of” the Anti-Homosexuality Act.

“These evictions really exacerbate the needs from the community in terms of relocation and temporary shelter and just the trauma of being kicked out of your home, being kicked out of your village and having to find a place to stay at a moment’s notice, knowing that you’re also trying to escape harm and harassment from neighbors and community members,” he said.

Gilliam also noted the Anti-Homosexuality Act has impacted community members in different ways.

Reported cases of violence and eviction, for example, are higher among gay men and transgender women. Gilliam noted lesbian, bisexual and queer women and trans men face intimate partner violence, are forced into marriages, endure corrective rape and lose custody of their children when they are outed. He said these community members are also unable to inherit land, cannot control their own finances and face employment discrimination because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.Ā Ā 

US sanctioned Ugandan officials over Anti-Homosexuality Act

The U.SĀ imposed visa restrictionsĀ on Ugandan officials shortly after Museveni signed the law. The World Bank Group later announcedĀ the suspension of new loansĀ to Uganda.

The Biden-Harris administration last October issued a business advisory that said the Anti-Homosexuality Act ā€œfurther increases restrictions on human rights, to include restrictions on freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly and exacerbates issues regarding the respect for leases and employment contracts.ā€ The White House has also removed Uganda from a program that allows sub-Saharan African countries to trade duty-free with the U.S. and has issued a business advisory for the country over the Anti-Homosexuality Act. 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Dec. 4, 2023, announced sanctions against current and former Ugandan officials who committed human rights abuses against LGBTQ people and other groups. Media reports this week indicate the U.S. denied MP Sarah Achieng Opendi a visa that would have allowed her to travel to New York in order to attend the annual U.N. Commission on the Status of Women.

Museveni, for his part, has criticized the U.S. and other Western countries’ response to the Anti-Homosexuality Act. 

Gilliam noted authorities have arrested and charged Ugandans under the law.Ā 

Two men on motorcycles on Jan. 3 stabbed Steven Kabuye, co-executive director of Coloured Voice Truth to LGBTQ Uganda, outside his home while he was going to work. The incident took place months after Museveni attended Uganda’s National Prayer Breakfast at which U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) spoke and defended the Anti-Homosexuality Act.

The State Department condemned the attack that Kabuye blamed on politicians and religious leaders who are stoking anti-LGBTQ sentiments in Uganda. Gilliam did not meet with Ugandan government officials while he was in the country.

“We in the U.S. government have already made it clear our stance with government officials on how we feel about the AHA, as well as broader human rights concerns in country,” said Gilliam. “That’s been communicated from the very highest levels.”

The Uganda’s Constitutional Court last Dec. 18 heard arguments in a lawsuit that challenges the Anti-Homosexuality Act. It is unclear when a ruling in the case will take place, but Gilliam said LGBTQ Ugandans with whom he met described the law “as just one moment.” 

“Obviously there is lots of work that has been done, that continues to be done to respond to this moment,” he told the Blade. “They know that there’s going to be a lot of work that needs to continue to really address a lot of the root causes and to really back humanity to the community.” 

Gilliam further noted it will “take some years to recover from the damage of 2023 and the AHA (Anti-Homosexuality Act) there.” He added activists are “already laying down the groundwork for what that work looks like” in terms of finding MPs, religious leaders, human rights activists and family members who may become allies.

“Those types of allyships are going to be key to building back the community and to continue the resiliency of the movement,” said Gilliam.

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Texas

Pornhub blocks Texas accessing site over age verification law

Court battle forced statute to take effect

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Washingtonporn Blade graphic

Aylo (formerly MindGeek) the largest global adult online entertainment conglomerate, owned by Canadian private equity firm Ethical Capital Partners, has restricted access to its platforms including its flagship Pornhub in Texas after a court battle forces the state’s age verification law to take effect.

Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton had appealed a U.S. District Court decision that enjoined him from enforcing House Bill 1181. Paxton and others argued that purveyors of obscene materials online needed to institute reasonable age-verification measures to safeguard children from pornography.Ā 

A week ago the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals partially vacated the original injunction, ruling that the age verification requirements are constitutional.Ā 

ā€œApplying rational-basis review, the age-verification requirement is rationally related to the governmentā€™s legitimate interest in preventing minorsā€™ access to pornography,ā€ the three judge panel of the 5th Circuit explained. ā€œTherefore, the age-verification requirement does not violate the First Amendment.ā€

While the court vacated the injunction against the age-verification requirement of the statute, it upheld the lower courtā€™s injunction against a separate section of the law that would require pornography websites to display a health warning on their landing page and all advertisements. 

Texas users are greeted with this notice.

The Houston Chronicle reported people who go to the site are now greeted with a long message from the company railing against the legal change as ā€œineffective, haphazard, and dangerous.ā€ The company calls for age verification by the makers of devices that let people on the internet, instead of individual websites.

Age verification legislation was enacted in several states in 2023 in addition to Texas, including North Carolina, Montana, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Utah and Virginia.

The new laws require users to provide digital confirmation via a certified approved third party vendor like London-based digital identity company Yoti. The other possibility would be a state approved digital ID such as the California DMVā€™s Wallet app, which contains a mobile driverā€™s license.

Users accessing Pornhub from within Louisiana are presented with a different webpage that directs them to verify their age with the stateā€™s digital ID system, known as LA Wallet. The law passed in 2022 subjects adult websites to damage lawsuits and state civil penalties as high as $5,000 a day if they fail to verify that users are at least 18 years old by requiring the use of digitized, state-issued driverā€™s licenses or other methods.

The Associated Press reported this past October that an adult entertainment groupā€™s lawsuit against a Louisiana law requiring sexually explicit websites to verify the ages of their viewers was dismissed by U.S. District Judge Susie Morgan in New Orleans.

Texas users are greeted with this notice.

Potential or existing Pornhub users in North Carolina and Montana are directed to a video that features adult film star Cherie DeVille, who recites a message also written under the video.

ā€œAs you may know, your elected officials in your state are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you access to our website. While safety and compliance are at the forefront of our mission, giving your ID card every time you want to visit an adult platform is not the most effective solution for protecting our users and in fact, will put children and your privacy at risk.ā€

ā€œMandating age verification without proper enforcement gives platforms the opportunity to choose whether or not to comply,ā€ the statement continues. ā€œAs weā€™ve seen in other states, this just drives traffic to sites with far fewer safety measures in place.ā€

ā€œUntil a real solution is offered, we have made the difficult decision to completely disable access to our website in [the aforementioned locales]ā€ the message ends with.

The company previously blocked Utah on May 7, 2023. CNN reported at the time:

Affected users are shown a message expressing opposition toĀ Senate Bill 287, the Utah law signed by Gov. Spencer Cox in March that creates liability for porn sites that make their content available to people below the age of 18.

ā€œAs you may know, your elected officials in Utah are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you access to our website,ā€ the message said. ā€œWhile safety and compliance are at the forefront of our mission, giving your ID card every time you want to visit an adult platform is not the most effective solution for protecting our users, and in fact, will put children and your privacy at risk.ā€

Courthouse News reportedĀ that after Virginiaā€™s bill was passed in June, state Sen. L. Louise Lucas, a Democrat, criticized the state for not creating a system for age verification, and instead leaving it up to websites to manage the process, citing security risks.Ā Ā 

ā€œWe passed a bill during this session to protect children from online porn. However the executive branch had an obligation to create a system for age verification,ā€Ā Lucas saidĀ on X, formerly Twitter. ā€œWe will continue our work to keep pornography out of the hands of minors ā€¦ but we will also work to ensure that this Governorā€™s error does not put the privacy of Virginians at further risk.ā€

Beyond the U.S. in the European Union, Pornhub and two more of the worldā€™s biggest porn websites face new requirements in the European Union that include verifying the ages of users, under the EUā€™s Digital Services Act.

According to a December 20 report from the Associated Press, Pornhub, XVideos and Stripchat have now been classed as ā€œvery large online platformsā€ subject to more stringent controls under the Digital Services Act because they each have 45 million average monthly users, according to the European Commission, the EUā€™s executive branch.

They are the first porn sites to be targeted by the sweeping Digital Services Act, which imposes tough obligations to keep users safe from illegal content and dodgy products, the Associated Press reported last month.

In addition to the adult entertainment websites, any violations are punishable by fines of up to 6% of global revenue or even a ban on operating in the EU. Some 19 online platforms and search engines have already been identified for stricter scrutiny under the DSA, including TikTok, Amazon, Facebook, Instagram, Google and more.

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