National
No DOMA repeal next year: Nadler
Rep. Jerrold Nadler said the Respect for Marriage Act, which would overturn the Defense of Marriage Act, won’t pass next year. (DC Agenda photo by Michael Key)
The sponsor of a bill that would overturn the Defense of Marriage Act said repeal won’t happen in this Congress and that efforts next year will instead be focused on building support on the issue.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said in an interview with DC Agenda that lawmakers will work on passing other pro-LGBT bills next year, and could take up legislation to repeal DOMA — known as the Respect for Marriage Act — at the end of the two-year session starting in 2011.
“The Respect for Marriage Act is a bill that we can’t pass right now; we know we can’t pass it right now,” he said.
Nadler said Congress won’t take up the DOMA repeal next year because other LGBT-related bills, including the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, legislation providing partner benefits for LGBT federal workers and a repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” are taking precedence. Supporters hope to pass those measures by the end of 2010.
“The Respect for Marriage Act comes up after that, maybe at the end of the next Congress, maybe afterward,” he said.
Nadler’s legislation would overturn DOMA, allowing the federal government to recognize same-sex marriages. It also has a “certainty provision” that would allow same-sex couples to marry in one state and still receive federal benefits even if they move to another state where gay nuptials aren’t recognized.
In lieu of passage in this Congress, Nadler said the task for supporters is to find more co-sponsors for the bill. As of Tuesday, the bill had 105 co-sponsors. Nadler predicted support would grow.
“And I think if some of these other bills pass, it’ll become more — the idea becomes less avant garde,” he said.
In response to Nadler’s remarks that a DOMA repeal won’t happen next year, Evan Wolfson, executive director of Freedom to Marry, said, “I don’t think we should begin the conversation about when it’s going to happen. I think we should begin the conversation with how do we build support and make it happen.”
“There are two ways to talk about our movement,” he said. “One is to talk about what it’s really about, to actually make the case for inclusion and fairness and freedom, to talk about why marriage matters. … The other is to spend all our time talking about the chess game or the political horse race, and we spend too much time on the latter and not enough time doing the former.”
Wolfson said supporters should begin the conversation “by each one of us calling our senators and member of Congress, asking them to sign on to the bill.”
Strategic decisions
Nadler’s prediction that a DOMA repeal won’t happen by the end of next year comes after other key potential supporters have said other LGBT legislation will be a priority.
At the time the Respect for Marriage Act was introduced in September, Drew Hammill, a spokesperson for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, said the speaker is “focused on legislative items that we can enact into law now,” including ENDA.
And gay Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) hasn’t signed on as a co-sponsor to Nadler’s bill, saying that lawmakers will instead focus on other LGBT issues this Congress and the bill’s certainty provision could cause political problems for House members seeking re-election.
Nadler said he hasn’t “had too many conversations” with Pelosi on the proposed DOMA repeal since it was introduced, but noted that the speaker has privately encouraged House members to co-sponsor the bill.
As for Frank, Nadler also said he hasn’t spoken much with the Massachusetts lawmaker on the issue since the bill’s introduction.
“We have a disagreement on the strategy on this obviously, as we had a disagreement on the strategy over the non-inclusive ENDA last [Congress] where we no longer have that disagreement,” he said. “And, I presume, in the end, we will not have a disagreement on this.”
Although supporters have said other bills will take priority this Congress, advocates for the DOMA repeal have hoped for congressional hearings on marriage by the end of next year.
But Nadler, who chairs a House Judiciary subcommittee with jurisdiction over marriage, said he wouldn’t commit to holding hearings on the issue by the end of next year and would hear only testimony “when we think it’s advantageous to do so.”
“And that’s a strategic decision, a tactical decision you have to make,” he said. “As things go on, we’ll have to see how things go. Right now, the thing is get the idea out there to get pressure built, to get more sponsors — and that’s the way to go.”
Asked whether Democratic leadership requested that he not hold hearings on marriage, Nadler replied, “No, they did not.”
Nadler said he expects a Senate companion to the Respect for Marriage Act would be introduced early next year, noting there are a number of potential sponsors for the Senate legislation.
Advocates have named Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) as a prime target in talks because he chairs a Senate Judiciary subcommittee with jurisdiction over marriage. Nadler said Feingold would “possibly” champion the Senate legislation.
Nadler said a Senate bill has yet to emerge so many months after the House introduction in September because potential supporters have been occupied with other tasks.
“Some of the people we’re dealing with are very busy with a number of other things,” he said. “There’s not a sense of urgency, the sense that this bill has to have a Senate sponsor right now because it’s going to pass right now, because it’s not, so we’re talking.”
Even without a sense of urgency among lawmakers, Nadler said he thinks DOMA should be repealed because it’s “a stain on the national honor.”
“Even if you didn’t have a lot of practical effects, which obviously it does have, it’s wrong to keep such things on the books,” he said. “The honor of the country demands we repeal it.”
Same-sex marriage is only legal in five states throughout the country, but Nadler predicted that number would grow in coming years, and would include his home state of New York.
The Empire State was seen to be on the precipice of legalizing same-sex marriage, but the hopes of supporters were dashed last week when the state Senate killed a bill that would have granted marriage rights for same-sex couples. Nadler, who served in the New York Assembly for 16 years before being elected to Congress, said same-sex marriage will nonetheless be legalized in the state in a few years.
“I’d be very surprised if New York didn’t pass a gay marriage bill in the next two years, and I’ve been studying New York politics for 40 years,” he said. “And as long as we keep a Democratic governor and state Senate in the next election, we’ll get a gay marriage bill relatively soon in New York.”
As the number of states with same-sex marriage grow, Nadler said support for the Respect for Marriage Act also will build.
“Especially as a number of states have gay marriage, and the sky doesn’t fall in, and nobody comes in and busts up regular marriages — other than what’s busting up anyway — I think the issue will recede in the sense that people will lose their sense of the novelty,” he said.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler said of his home state that ‘as long as we keep a Democratic governor and state Senate in the next election, we’ll get a gay marriage bill relatively soon in New York.’ (DC Agenda photo by Michael Key)
Gay immigration bill could join reform debate
Another bill Nadler is championing in the House is the Uniting American Families Act, which would enable gay Americans to sponsor their foreign partners for residency. With an effort to pass comprehensive immigration reform expected in Congress next year, advocates are trying to include UAFA as a provision in the larger legislation.
Nadler said the White House seems to want to take on immigration reform in the spring and said UAFA supporters will “make a major thrust to make this part of the comprehensive immigration reform debate.”
The lawmakers drafting comprehensive immigration reform legislation are Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). Nadler said it’s “hard to say” whether those bills would include a UAFA provision upon their introduction.
“There are a lot of cross pressures and we haven’t had those — we’ve started but we haven’t finished those conversations at this point,” he said.
But Steve Ralls, a spokesperson for Immigration Equality, said he’s “optimistic” immigration reform measures will include UAFA at their debut because supporters, including other lawmakers, immigration groups and LGBT groups, have been lobbying for an inclusive bill for some time.
“I don’t know what the final comprehensive immigration reform will look like, but I remain optimistic that it will include lesbian and gay families,” he said.
In the event that comprehensive immigration reform legislation doesn’t include UAFA when it debuts, Nadler said he’s working on making sure there are votes in the House Judiciary Committee to amend the bill to include such a provision.
Nadler said he’s “hopeful” there will be enough votes for an amendment, but added “that’ll be a big fight, if necessary.”
“I haven’t taken any votes or whip counts or done any kind of that work, but certainly it will be something that we’ll have to work at and the gay community and everybody will have to be pressuring the individual members of the committee,” Nadler said. “A lot of the members of the committee, the Democratic members especially, say they’re very great friends with the gay community … and this’ll be an opportunity to show that they are, bar none.”
One major obstacle that UAFA supporters will face is opposition from Catholic leaders. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has urged lawmakers to exclude the provision from immigration reform because church leaders support reform, but oppose the LGBT-specific provision.
Nadler said opposition to UAFA from Catholic leaders will make inclusion of the measure in the bill “a very difficult fight.”
“So, there will be some who will be tempted to say, ‘Wait a minute, let’s not alienate some of our major supporters on this legislation to pass it,’” he said. “There’ll be others of us saying, ‘Hey, no, if you’re doing a comprehensive bill, it’s got to be comprehensive. You can’t just leave certain people out.”
Even with opposition from Catholic leaders, Ralls said the list of religious groups who support the inclusion of UAFA in immigration reform “is very long and diverse,” and includes Quakers and Episcopalians.
“If the Conference of Catholic Bishops decides that they’re willing to throw the immigrant community under the bus because of the inclusion of LGBT couples, I think that would be a shame because, at the end of the day, immigration reform can help millions of families — both gay and straight — and that should be Congress’ priority.”
Asked whether he would support immigration reform legislation that doesn’t include a UAFA provision, Nadler replied, “I hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“All my efforts are designed to make sure it doesn’t come to that, so I’m not going to get into what happens at that point,” he said.
‘We will see a fair amount of action’
During his Agenda interview, Nadler also addressed arguments that the Obama administration and Congress haven’t made sufficient progress on LGBT issues since the start of this year.
The lawmaker said Congress has had a significant workload this year — including the passage of two annual budgets as well as stimulus and relief legislation for financial institutions — and that advocates for LGBT issues would be better to make judgments on Congress’ work at the end of next year.
“I think it would be very fair by the time the election rolls around next October to say we haven’t done enough on these issues,” he said. “I think a lot of things have been fermenting and cooking. I think we will see a fair amount of action on these issues in next year’s session.”
Asked whether President Obama could have spoken more forcefully on LGBT issues since the start of his administration, Nadler replied, “I think he could have been more forthright on some of them.” He declined to elaborate.
In response to recent criticism that lawmakers have been putting off action on ENDA, Nadler said some key supporters of the bill have been occupied with other issues. He noted the sponsor of the bill is Frank, who, as chair of the House Financial Services Committee, is also working on the Troubled Asset Relief Program legislation.
“Why aren’t we doing ENDA right now?” he said. “But what else are some of the key people doing? They’re over their heads with the financial reform, which no one anticipated six months ago. I suspect that once that is out of the way, which it should be soon, these kind of issues can come to the fore again.”
But John Aravosis, a gay blogger who has been leading an LGBT boycott of the Democratic National Committee, criticized the notion that Congress hasn’t acted on LGBT issues because lawmakers have been busy with other issues.
He said the Obama administration has found time to take swipes at the LGBT community by defending DOMA in court and, more recently, saying it couldn’t follow a court order from the Ninth Circuit judge to provide health benefits to the partner of a lesbian federal employee.
“It’s not enough just for them to say, ‘It’s been busy,’” he said. “Well, it hasn’t been busy — or so busy that they couldn’t take swipes at us.”
Aravois commended Nadler for being outspoken on LGBT issues, but questioned whether Nadler would criticize a Democratic Congress as a Democratic lawmaker, and whether Congress would, in fact, take up LGBT issues next year.
“Good luck passing gay rights legislation right before an election,” he said. “Democrats don’t have balls in off years — they certainly don’t have them right before elections, on gay issues especially.”
With regard to the LGBT legislation that Congress would take up next year, Nadler expressed uncertainty about the prediction that Congress would repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” next year as part of the authorization bill for the fiscal year 2011 defense budget. Frank told the media last month that was the way he envisioned repeal.
But Nadler said repeal through the defense budget might not be the best way to overturn “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” With the president calling for escalation of operations in Afghanistan, Nadler said such a provision would put more liberal members of Congress in a quandary over whether to vote for repeal and military operations at the same time.
“You don’t want to put people in the position of saying, ‘You vote against Afghanistan funding, you’re voting against [repealing] “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,”’ or vice-versa,” he said. “So maybe you need a new option or something. These are tactical considerations, which you have to look at as things unfold.”
Nadler said he, for example, didn’t “like this idea of sending more troops to Afghanistan,” although he supports a “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal.
With public approval polls showing support waning for Democrats, Nadler predicted congressional Democrats will lose seats in the 2010 election, but added a hope that the party won’t lose “too many” seats. He noted that the November results would largely depend on how well the economy is faring.
Even with Democrats potentially in danger, Nadler said he didn’t think lawmakers would avoid LGBT issues next year to reduce a perceived risk of alienating voters before the election.
“I think we’re going to face most of these issues this Congress, mostly next year,” he said. “I’m assuming that the gay community is going to keep the pressure on. I mean, don’t go to sleep because I said it as that. If the gay community keeps the pressure on, then I think that, yes, we’ll probably face most of these issues.”
National
Demonstrators disrupt OMB director hearing over PEPFAR
Capitol Police arrested five protesters
A group of protesters interrupted Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought during his testimony before Congress on Wednesday.
Vought was at the Cannon House Office Building to give testimony to the House Budget Committee.
Committee Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Texas) began the hearing by touting what he described as economic accomplishments of the Trump-Vance administration’s economic accomplishments. Ranking Member Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.) disputed those claims in his opening statement.
Boyle went on to admonish Vought for not attending a committee hearing in the previous year.
Vought, the “Project 2025” architect, was invited to speak after Arrington and Boyle made their statements.
Shortly after Vought began reading his statement, Housing Works CEO Charles King stood up in the gallery and began shouting, “PEPFAR saves lives: spend the money!”
The U.S. Capitol Police moved quickly to escort King from the room. Other activists began chanting with King as they unfolded signs bearing a picture of Vought’s face and statements such as, “Vought’s cuts kill people with AIDS,” and “Protect PEPFAR from Vought.”
The group of HIV/AIDS activists included independent activists, former U.S. Agency for International Development and PEPFAR staff, members of Health GAP, Housing Works, and the Treatment Action Group. Six activists were escorted from the hearing and the U.S. Capitol Police detained five of them.
The HIV/AIDS treatment activists protested at the hearing in response to the dismantling of global health programs, including PEPFAR, a federally-funded program credited with saving millions of lives from HIV/AIDS, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa.
“Russell Vought is directly responsible for illegally withholding Congressionally appropriated funds for PEPFAR and related global health initiative,” King said in a statement provided to the Washington Blade. “These funding disruptions have already contributed to preventable deaths and threaten to reverse decades of progress in the fight against HIV worldwide. Enough is enough. Congress must ensure Vought stops this deadly sabotage.”
National
HIV/AIDS group NMAC is ‘destabilized’ and in financial crisis: sources
Organization disputes allegations of mismanagement by new CEO
A statement sent to the Washington Blade by an anonymous source claiming to be a current staff member at NMAC, formerly known as the National Minority AIDS Council, alleges that the prominent HIV/AIDS advocacy organization is facing “a rapid and systemic collapse of leadership, governance, and ethical standards.”
The three-page detailed statement sent on April 4 by someone identifying himself only as “John Doe” includes multiple specific allegations that NMAC CEO Harold Phillips, who began his position in October 2025, “has destabilized the organization at every level,” including hiring nine new high-level appointees with salaries of $220,000 each who are performing “duplicative and unjustifiable roles.”
The Blade was able to corroborate some of the allegations by talking to two other knowledgable sources who spoke on condition of anonymity. Those sources said they had received the John Doe statement and believed many, if not most, of its allegations were accurate.
With a total staff of about 30 to 35 employees, the John Doe statement claims the high salaries of the nine new staff members have added to financial problems NMAC has been facing in recent years. It says that at least two NMAC staffers who raised concerns about Phillips’s actions were terminated on grounds of insubordination.
One of the two anonymous sources who spoke to the Blade said one of the dismissed staff members was considering filing a lawsuit against NMAC in response to the firing.
“An external firm was recently brought in to assess the organizational health,” the John Doe statement to the Blade says. “The findings were staggering — more than 50% of staff reported they are actively seeking employment elsewhere,” it says.
The Blade sent the John Doe statement to NMAC this week and asked for a response to the allegations.
NMAC spokesperson Jennifer Moore Phillips, who serves as chief strategy officer and who is not related to Harold Phillips, sent the Blade a short statement calling the John Doe allegations “false and purposefully misleading,” but which did not comment on each of the specific allegations.
“A recent anonymous letter containing unfounded allegations about NMAC makes claims that are simply false and purposefully misleading,” the NMAC statement says. “Evidenced by our new strategic plan and recent successful Biomedical HIV Prevention Summit in Chicago, NMAC’s new leadership is laser focused on delivering on our mission serving the HIV community with renewed energy and vision,” the statement concludes.
The Biomedical HIV Prevention Summit referred to in the statement, which took place in Chicago April 8-10 of this year, is one of the two largest HIV/AIDS related conferences that NMAC organizes each year. Jennifer Phillips said more than 1,400 people attended the event.
The largest NMAC event, the United States Conference on HIV/AIDS, the most recent of which was held in D.C. Sept. 4-7, drew more than 2,400 participants and was hailed by AIDS activists as a highly successful gathering of a diverse group of experts seeking to push for the end to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
One of the keynote speakers at that conference was Paul Kawata, who served as executive director and CEO of NMAC for 36 years and who delivered his farewell address at the conference following the announcement that he would retire on Oct. 7, 2025.
Many of the conference speakers praised Kawata, who became NMAC’s leader two years after its founding in 1987, as the leading force behind its growth and evolution into one of the nation’s leading HIV/AIDS advocacy organizations with a special outreach to people of color.
It was at that time that Harold Phillips, who served as director of the White House Office of AIDS Policy under then-President Joe Biden and who later joined NMAC as deputy director before the NMAC board named him Kawata’s successor as CEO, emerged as NMAC’s next leader.
“The Board has exuberantly elected Harold Phillips as our new CEO,” said Lance Toma, chair of the NMAC Board of Directors at the time Phillips’s appointment was announced. “In this unprecedented moment, there is no one more strategically positioned and experienced to lead our movement through what we know will be some of the most tumultuous and complicated times ahead,” the statement said.
The John Doe statement raising questions about Phillips’s actions and leadership says NMAC staff members formally appealed to the board of directors to intervene.
“The Board has remained silent, while Harold arrogantly told the staff that ‘the board has my back,’” the statement says.
The Blade has also attempted to reach out to Kawata by email for comment on how he feels NMAC is doing six months after his retirement. As of April 14, Kawata had not responded to the Blade’s inquiry.
According to the John Doe statement, NMAC officials have recently “sought external financial rescue,” including a visit by an NMAC official to California to request assistance from the pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences. “Without such intervention, layoffs seem imminent,” the statement says.
“This is not a functioning nonprofit,” the John Doe statement concludes. “It is an organization in crisis – bleeding resources, hemorrhaging staff, and operating without transparency, accountability, or governance,” it says, adding, “The communities NMAC serves, the donors who fund its mission, and the public at large deserve to know what is happening behind closed doors.”
By contrast, the NMAC website describes the organization as a highly functioning nonprofit continuing to lead the fight against HIV/AIDS.
“Launched in 1987 during the early years of the HIV/AIDS crisis in the United States, NMAC is a national HIV organization that offers capacity building, leadership development, policy education, and public engagement to end the HIV epidemic among communities most impacted in the United States,” a statement on the NMAC website says.
“In 2026, we mark 45 years of the HIV movement,” the statement adds. “NMAC continues to pivot to center the needs of people of color impacted by HIV by responding to political challenges that threaten federal funding and programs that have provided an essential survival safety net,” it says. “Simultaneously, as HIV treatment allows people to age with HIV, our whole-person approach extends to achieving optimal quality of life beyond attaining viral suppression.”
In its most recent action, NMAC issued a detailed press release on April 14 criticizing President Donald Trump’s proposed fiscal year 2027 budget provisions that call for cutting more than $1.5 billion in HIV prevention, substance use, housing and other programs. The release provides details on how the cuts would negatively impact important HIV prevention programs and urges Congress to reject the proposed cuts.
Federal Government
Inside the LGBTQ records of Todd Blanche and Markwayne Mullin
Two men are acting attorney general, DHS secretary
President Donald Trump became famous for his use of the phrase “You’re fired!” while hosting the reality TV show “The Apprentice” in the early 2000s. However, during his time in the Oval Office, he has attempted to distance himself from that image.
Despite those efforts, the phrase once again comes to mind as Trump has fired two high-level female Cabinet members within the past month: Pam Bondi and Kristi Noem.
Their replacements — Todd Blanche at the Justice Department and Markwayne Mullin at the Department of Homeland Security — bring records that, while different in depth, both reflect limited support for LGBTQ protections and, in some cases, direct opposition.
Todd Blanche
Acting attorney general
Little has been found regarding Todd Blanche’s LGBTQ history prior to his role as acting head of the Department of Justice. Unlike those who have worked within the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division or served as state attorneys general, he has not developed a public-facing legal ideology on LGBTQ issues.
Blanche attended American University for his undergraduate studies — like fellow Trump attorney Michael Cohen — where he met his future wife, Kristin, who was studying at nearby Catholic University in D.C.
He began his legal career as an intern at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, which eventually became a full-time position. He later worked as a paralegal in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York while attending Brooklyn Law School at night. Blanche graduated cum laude in 2003. He and his wife later married and had two children.
Blanche left the U.S. attorney’s office in 2014, taking a job in the Manhattan office of the law firm WilmerHale. In September 2017, he moved to Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP, where he was a partner in the White Collar Defense and Investigations practice.
In his personal capacity, he represented several figures associated with Donald Trump and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, including Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort, businessman Igor Fruman, and attorney Boris Epshteyn.
In 2024, Blanche switched from Democrat to Republican, aligning himself with Trump’s political orbit. He later served as Trump’s personal defense attorney in the New York State case that led to Trump’s 2024 conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to cover up hush-money payments to bisexual adult film star Stormy Daniels.
Now the highest-ranking official at the Justice Department, Blanche has played a central role in overseeing the department and has been involved in leadership decisions tied to several controversial actions affecting LGBTQ people.
In a letter to New York Attorney General Letitia James, Blanche declared that the Justice Department “will not sit idly by while you attempt to use your office to force harmful procedures on our most vulnerable population,” if legal action were taken against NYU Langone. The hospital had “permanently” ended a program earlier that month after the Trump-Vance administration threatened to pull all federal funding if it continued prescribing puberty blockers and hormones to minors.
Blanche wrote that “the Justice Department believes the law is clear, and anti-discrimination laws cannot be used to force NYU Langone to perform sex-rejecting procedures on children.”
“As just one example, your office’s position would require a hospital to prescribe certain medications for certain diagnoses, regardless of the hospital’s or its doctors’ independent medical determination about the propriety of such treatment,” he said.
Blanche also echoed his predecessor’s public stance on limiting LGBTQ-related protections at the federal level, aligning with Bondi’s sentiments in June 2025 regarding the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6–3 decision that restricted LGBTQ history lessions in schools and limits lower federal courts from issuing nationwide injunctions — rulings that have often blocked Trump administration policies.
Calling it “another great decision that came down today,” Blanche argued that the ruling “restores parents’ rights to decide their child’s education,” adding: “It seems like a basic idea, but it took the Supreme Court to set the record straight, and we thank them for that. And now that ruling allows parents to opt out of dangerous trans ideology and make the decisions for their children that they believe is correct.”
In December 2025, a Justice Department memo stated that, “effective immediately,” prisons and jails would no longer be held responsible for violations of standards meant to protect LGBTQ people from harassment, abuse, and rape under the Prison Rape Elimination Act. The law, passed unanimously by Congress in 2003, requires that incarcerated people be screened for their risk of sexual assault, including consideration of LGBTQ status, and applies to all correctional facilities.
Additionally, when the Justice Department, under Blanche’s deputy leadership and at Trump’s behest, attempted to force Children’s National Hospital in D.C. to turn over medical records related to gender-affirming care, U.S. District Judge Julie R. Rubin ruled that the effort “appears to have no purpose other than to intimidate and harass.”
Blanche is also described as having a “strong belief in executive authority.”
Markwayne Mullin
Secretary of Homeland Security
While Blanche’s record is defined more by recent actions than a long paper trail, Markwayne Mullin brings a more established history on LGBTQ issues from his time in Congress.
The head of the Department of Homeland Security has served in Congress since 2013, in both the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate. He has been actively engaged in shaping restrictions and aligns with broader cultural rhetoric that frames anti-LGBTQ speech as protected expression.
In May 2016, Mullin criticized the Department of Education and the Justice Department’s “Dear Colleague” letter on transgender students, arguing that trans girls should not use girls’ restrooms in public schools.
By January 2021, Mullin and then-Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard had introduced a bill to prevent trans women from participating in women’s sports.
Mullin was not recorded as voting on the final passage of the Respect for Marriage Act, which codified federal recognition of same-sex and interracial marriage.
In 2023, Mullin received a rating of just 6 percent from the Human Rights Campaign.
While serving in the Senate and as a member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, Mullin has been a vocal critic of policies aimed at expanding LGBTQ inclusion in federal programs. He has participated in broader Republican efforts questioning equity-based implementation of the Older Americans Act, including guidance related to sexual orientation and gender identity in aging services, arguing such policies could have unintended consequences.
Mullin also makes history as the first Native American — and a citizen of the Cherokee Nation — to lead the Department of Homeland Security.
He was among the 147 Republicans who voted to overturn the 2020 presidential election results despite no evidence of widespread fraud, and was present in the House on Jan. 6.
The Washington Blade reached out to DHS and the DOJ for comment on the two cabinet choices’ records on LGBTQ rights. DHS responded, telling the Blade, “Secretary Mullin’s record at the Department of Homeland Security will be one of protecting ALL Americans,” while the DOJ has yet to respond.
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Comings & Goings
Minimal version of ‘Streetcar Named Desire’ heading to Dupont Underground
