National
Activist: Russia LGBT rights record continues to deteriorate
Tarya Polvakova arrested last month in Moscow’s Red Square

A Russian activist earlier this week said the Kremlin’s LGBT rights record has continued to deteriorate since the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi ended.
Tarya Polyakova – a journalist and human rights advocate who is a member of a prisoners rights organization that Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alekhina of Pussy Riot founded – said during a conference call with reporters on March 19 that authorities recently charged the founder of an LGBT youth group under the country’s law that bans gay propaganda to minors.
They later dropped them.
“She thinks that this was pure luck,” said Polyakova.
Polyakova said a student who was recently attacked at school was beaten up by her parents after Russian child protective services told them she is a lesbian. The advocate further noted her friend last week lost her job after her boss discovered on her Facebook page that she was dating another woman.
“With this piece of legislation, our government basically gave [its] consent to treat people based on their personal characteristics, not on their criminal behavior,” said Polyakova, “and allow any homophobe out there to attack anyone who dares to come out as a gay person.”
Polyakova is among the 10 LGBT rights advocates police arrested in Moscow’s Red Square on Feb. 7 just before the Olympics’ opening ceremony as they tried to sing the Russian national anthem while holding rainbow flags. She said they remained in a local police station for several hours – and officers beat some of the advocates while in custody.
“The police were filming us on their mobile phones the whole time we were sitting in that cage like we were some sort of animals in a zoo,” said Polyakova.
Polyakova and the nine other LGBT rights advocates arrested in Red Square were scheduled to go on trial on Feb. 19 for unauthorized public assembly and incorrectly singing the Russian national anthem. Prosecutors have delayed their court appearance.
“I won’t be surprised if they charge me with treason or something,” said Polyakova. “This is Russia.”
Polyakova said several of her friends who participated in protests against Russia’s possible incursion into Ukraine and the annexation of the country’s Crimea region were taken into custody earlier this month. She said they spent two days in jail before they were “immediately dragged to court” and given 10 day sentences – they were released from detention earlier this week.
“All the LGBT activists are really concerned about the conflict in Crimea and we’re really standing up against war and military intervention in Ukraine,” Polyakova told the Washington Blade in response to a question about whether the ongoing conflict has worsened the Kremlin’s LGBT rights crackdown. “They cut us down when we try to raise our voices, but now we [have] temporarily stopped because we were charged.”
Russian LGBT rights advocates with whom the Blade spoke before and during the Olympics expressed concern their U.S. and European counterparts will no longer pay attention to their plight after the games end.
Retired Olympic diver Greg Louganis and the more than 300 others who participated in the Russian Open Games in Moscow that ended on March 2 faced bomb threats and other efforts that sought to disrupt the event. Shawn Gaylord of Human Rights First, who traveled to Sochi last month with gay Olympian David Pichler, said his organization continues to anticipate the reintroduction of a proposal in the Russian Duma that would allow authorities to take children away from their LGBT parents.
Lithuanian parliamentarians last week postponed the final vote on a bill that would have imposed fines on those who denigrate the “constitutional value of family life.” Lawmakers in neighboring Latvia and Kyrgyzstan have also proposed measures similar to the propaganda law that Russian President Vladimir Putin signed last June.
“It is really important that we don’t keep our eyes off of Russia and the LGBT community there,” said Gaylord.
Pichler and Gaylord during the conference call also discussed efforts in support of the campaign that urges the International Olympic Committee to add sexual orientation to the Olympic charter’s non-discrimination clause. They said the Obama administration and members of Congress are among those who have endorsed the effort.
Pichler added he feels the IOC should also take into account a potential host country’s LGBT rights record during the selection process.
“They should need to look into places when these issues come up and should never have an Olympic games in a location like this,” he said as he discussed Russia.
The conference call took place two days after President Obama issued an executive order authorizing U.S. officials to freeze the American assets of Yelena Mizulina, a state Duma deputy who sponsored the propaganda bill, and six other Russian officials over their country’s incursion into Ukraine that includes the annexation of Crimea.
The anti-gay lawmaker on Twitter said the White House’s decision to sanction her is revenge over the propaganda bill she introduced. Polyakova said another female member of the Duma announced she will support Mizulina and nobody is “going to back down on this law.”
“Regardless of the reason that she ended up on this list, we obviously think if the U.S. is going to respond to human rights concerns that we’re glad that she’s among the people who are facing this kind of response, regardless of how it may have come about,” said Gaylord.
Federal Government
UPenn erases Lia Thomas’s records as part of settlement with White House
University agreed to ban trans women from women’s sports teams

In a settlement with the Trump-Vance administration announced on Tuesday, the University of Pennsylvania will ban transgender athletes from competing and erase swimming records set by transgender former student Lia Thomas.
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights found the university in violation of Title IX, the federal rights law barring sex based discrimination in educational institutions, by “permitting males to compete in women’s intercollegiate athletics and to occupy women-only intimate facilities.”
The statement issued by University of Pennsylvania President J. Larry Jameson highlighted how the law’s interpretation was changed substantially under President Donald Trump’s second term.
“The Department of Education OCR investigated the participation of one transgender athlete on the women’s swimming team three years ago, during the 2021-2022 swim season,” he wrote. “At that time, Penn was in compliance with NCAA eligibility rules and Title IX as then interpreted.”
Jameson continued, “Penn has always followed — and continues to follow — Title IX and the applicable policy of the NCAA regarding transgender athletes. NCAA eligibility rules changed in February 2025 with Executive Orders 14168 and 14201 and Penn will continue to adhere to these new rules.”
Writing that “we acknowledge that some student-athletes were disadvantaged by these rules” in place while Thomas was allowed to compete, the university president added, “We recognize this and will apologize to those who experienced a competitive disadvantage or experienced anxiety because of the policies in effect at the time.”
“Today’s resolution agreement with UPenn is yet another example of the Trump effect in action,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement. “Thanks to the leadership of President Trump, UPenn has agreed both to apologize for its past Title IX violations and to ensure that women’s sports are protected at the university for future generations of female athletes.”
Under former President Joe Biden, the department’s Office of Civil Rights sought to protect against anti-LGBTQ discrimination in education, bringing investigations and enforcement actions in cases where school officials might, for example, require trans students to use restrooms and facilities consistent with their birth sex or fail to respond to peer harassment over their gender identity.
Much of the legal reasoning behind the Biden-Harris administration’s positions extended from the 2020 U.S. Supreme Court case Bostock v. Clayton County, which found that sex-based discrimination includes that which is based on sexual orientation or gender identity under Title VII rules covering employment practices.
The Trump-Vance administration last week put the state of California on notice that its trans athlete policies were, or once were, in violation of Title IX, which comes amid the ongoing battle with Maine over the same issue.
New York
Two teens shot steps from Stonewall Inn after NYC Pride parade
One of the victims remains in critical condition

On Sunday night, following the annual NYC Pride March, two girls were shot in Sheridan Square, feet away from the historic Stonewall Inn.
According to an NYPD report, the two girls, aged 16 and 17, were shot around 10:15 p.m. as Pride festivities began to wind down. The 16-year-old was struck in the head and, according to police sources, is said to be in critical condition, while the 17-year-old was said to be in stable condition.
The Washington Blade confirmed with the NYPD the details from the police reports and learned no arrests had been made as of noon Monday.
The shooting took place in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, mere feet away from the most famous gay bar in the city — if not the world — the Stonewall Inn. Earlier that day, hundreds of thousands of people marched down Christopher Street to celebrate 55 years of LGBTQ people standing up for their rights.
In June 1969, after police raided the Stonewall Inn, members of the LGBTQ community pushed back, sparking what became known as the Stonewall riots. Over the course of two days, LGBTQ New Yorkers protested the discriminatory policing of queer spaces across the city and mobilized to speak out — and throw bottles if need be — at officers attempting to suppress their existence.
The following year, LGBTQ people returned to the Stonewall Inn and marched through the same streets where queer New Yorkers had been arrested, marking the first “Gay Pride March” in history and declaring that LGBTQ people were not going anywhere.
New York State Assemblywoman Deborah Glick, whose district includes Greenwich Village, took to social media to comment on the shooting.
“After decades of peaceful Pride celebrations — this year gun fire and two people shot near the Stonewall Inn is a reminder that gun violence is everywhere,” the lesbian lawmaker said on X. “Guns are a problem despite the NRA BS.”
New York
Zohran Mamdani participates in NYC Pride parade
Mayoral candidate has detailed LGBTQ rights platform

Zohran Mamdani, the candidate for mayor of New York City who pulled a surprise victory in the primary contest last week, walked in the city’s Pride parade on Sunday.
The Democratic Socialist and New York State Assembly member published photos on social media with New York Attorney General Letitia James, telling followers it was “a joy to march in NYC Pride with the people’s champ” and to “see so many friends on this gorgeous day.”
“Happy Pride NYC,” he wrote, adding a rainbow emoji.
Mamdani’s platform includes a detailed plan for LGBTQ people who “across the United States are facing an increasingly hostile political environment.”
His campaign website explains: “New York City must be a refuge for LGBTQIA+ people, but private institutions in our own city have already started capitulating to Trump’s assault on trans rights.
“Meanwhile, the cost of living crisis confronting working class people across the city hits the LGBTQIA+ community particularly hard, with higher rates of unemployment and homelessness than the rest of the city.”
“The Mamdani administration will protect LGBTQIA+ New Yorkers by expanding and protecting gender-affirming care citywide, making NYC an LGBTQIA+ sanctuary city, and creating the Office of LGBTQIA+ Affairs.”
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