National
LGBT Democrats defend Obama at DNC winter meeting
The Democratic National Committee’s LGBT Americans Caucus is giving high marks to President Obama and the Democratic Party’s efforts to advance LGBT rights over the past year, caucus members said this week.
Veteran Democratic activist Rick Stafford of Minnesota, who chairs the LGBT Caucus, said members at the Feb. 5 meeting were impressed with DNC Chair Timothy Kaine, a former Virginia governor, and gay White House official Brian Bond. Both addressed the LGBT Caucus during the DNC’s annual winter meeting.
Stafford told DC Agenda that Kaine “talked about the achievements, but he also talked about the frustration he knows our community has on some issues, with the lack of forward progress.”
“He hears that and he wants the community to know he hears that,” Stafford said. “But he also talked about the accomplishments the administration has made on our issues, and many of us believe they are very important.”
Stafford said Bond, who serves as deputy director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, outlined “a litany of impressive achievements” by the Obama administration on gay-related issues. He noted that Bond also acknowledged concern among many LGBT supporters that Congress has been slow to pass several gay-related bills.
Kaine also talked about “the importance of the 2010 elections so that we don’t slide back,” Stafford said. He noted that Kaine told the caucus “the national party is committed in terms of the outreach to our community and to highlight the issues and the achievements that we have made in this administration for our community and where we need to go forward.”
Meetings of the 25-member LGBT Americans Caucus come at a time when some LGBT activists have called for a boycott of DNC fundraisers. The activists, led by longtime gay Democratic activist and fundraiser David Mixner and gay blogger John Aravosis, have said the boycott is aimed at pressuring the DNC and the administration to more aggressively push the Democratic-controlled Congress to pass several LGBT-related bills.
Mixner and Aravosis have said the boycott should be limited to the DNC and that people should continue to contribute money to individual Democratic candidates who are supportive on LGBT issues.
Among the bills that Mixner and Aravosis want Congress to pass is the long stalled Employment Non-Discrimination Act, also known as ENDA, which would bar job discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Other congressional action sought by activists is repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law preventing gays, lesbians and bisexuals from serving openly in the military, and repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which bars legally married same-sex couples from receiving nearly 1,200 federal rights and benefits associated with marriage.
“What we are saying is people should absolutely hold off on their donations until the party comes through on their promises, and then continue supporting them,” Aravosis said. “But currently they’re not coming through.”
LGBT Caucus members Earl Fowlkes of Washington, D.C., who supported Obama’s presidential campaign, and Heather Mizeur, a member of the Maryland House of Delegates, joined Stafford in strongly opposing the boycott. The three said withholding contributions to the DNC would hurt efforts to elect LGBT-supportive Democratic candidates to Congress and state legislatures.
Also expressing opposition to the boycott was Barbara Siperstein, president of Stonewall Democrats of New Jersey and the first openly transgender person to be named to the DNC.
“I share, from my own experience, the frustration they’re talking about,” Siperstein told DC Agenda. “But very honestly, I disagree with a strategy of boycotting the DNC. I can only see it as unsuccessful for our community. It can only help the Republicans.”
Siperstein, Fowlkes and Mizeur each said the Democratic leaders in Congress and most congressional Democrats strongly support the LGBT-related bills in question. They note that a small group of moderate and conservative Democrats have so far withheld support for some or all of these bills. And with nearly all congressional Republicans opposed to the bills, supporters have been unable to line up the votes needed to pass the LGBT bills, the three said.
“You can’t blame the party or the president for that,” said Siperstein.
Mizeur, whose Maryland district includes the largely Democratic and suburban Montgomery County, said she’s “never been for a boycott.”
“But I think that our contributions should come with some strings attached, if you will,” she said. “They need to come along with conversations about how ‘I am an LGBT American who is investing in this party and this money I want to see goes toward an agenda that includes “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” [repeal] and marriage equality,’ and you go down the list.”
Aravosis, however, said the approach suggested by Mizeur and other DNC supporters doesn’t appear to have worked.
He said the national party angered many LGBT Democrats in November when it remained silent during a heated campaign in Maine over a ballot measure that struck down same-sex marriage in the state.
DNC-sponsored phone canvassers reminded Maine residents to vote, but made no mention of the anti-gay ballot measure. And the canvassers urged Maine political activists to participate in an operation urging New Jersey voters to support the failed re-election bid of Democratic Gov. John Corzine.
Aravosis called the development “outrageous,” noting that the DNC effectively ignored an anti-gay campaign in Maine while asking Democrats in Maine to get involved in a New Jersey race.
“The point isn’t to stop helping New Jersey,” said Aravosis. “The point is we don’t want them to keep avoiding gay issues. And that’s what they did.”
Stafford said DNC officials have acknowledged that “miscommunication” between the DNC and the Maine Democratic Party resulted in the national party apparatus not providing resources to help defeat the ballot measure. The state party in Maine strongly opposed the ballot measure.
The Maine flap prompted several members of the LGBT Americans Caucus and non-gay supporters to introduce a resolution at the DNC meeting last week to address this problem, Stafford and other caucus members said. The resolution, which the full DNC approved, requires the DNC and its grassroots arm, Organizing for America, to follow the lead of state parties on a wide range of issues, including state ballot measures.
Fowlkes, who has been active in organizing black LGBT Pride events in D.C. and other cities, said the Obama administration has come up short only in failing to communicate as well as it could its “extensive” record of support for LGBT issues during its first year in office.
“A lot of the focus of the LGBT community has been misplaced in blaming Obama and putting pressure only on Obama,” Fowlkes said. “But what we also have to understand is that there are moderate Democrats, conservative Democrats [in Congress]. Some of those people have to be brought along, and that’s where the LGBT community can be putting pressure on those people to make them come along with the administration and vote the correct way.”
U.S. Supreme Court
Supreme Court to consider bans on trans athletes in school sports
27 states have passed laws limiting participation in athletics programs
The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to hear two cases involving transgender youth challenging bans prohibiting them from participating in school sports.
In Little v. Hecox, plaintiffs represented by the ACLU, Legal Voice, and the law firm Cooley are challenging Idaho’s 2020 ban, which requires sex testing to adjudicate questions of an athlete’s eligibility.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals described the process in a 2023 decision halting the policy’s enforcement pending an outcome in the litigation. The “sex dispute verification process, whereby any individual can ‘dispute’ the sex of any female student athlete in the state of Idaho,” the court wrote, would “require her to undergo intrusive medical procedures to verify her sex, including gynecological exams.”
In West Virginia v. B.P.J., Lambda Legal, the ACLU, the ACLU of West Virginia, and Cooley are representing a trans middle school student challenging the Mountain State’s 2021 ban on trans athletes.
The plaintiff was participating in cross country when the law was passed, taking puberty blockers that would have significantly reduced the chances that she could have a physiological advantage over cisgender peers.
“Like any other educational program, school athletic programs should be accessible for everyone regardless of their sex or transgender status,” said Joshua Block, senior counsel for the ACLU’s LGBTQ and HIV Project. “Trans kids play sports for the same reasons their peers do — to learn perseverance, dedication, teamwork, and to simply have fun with their friends,” Block said.
He added, “Categorically excluding kids from school sports just because they are transgender will only make our schools less safe and more hurtful places for all youth. We believe the lower courts were right to block these discriminatory laws, and we will continue to defend the freedom of all kids to play.”
“Our client just wants to play sports with her friends and peers,” said Lambda Legal Senior Counsel Tara Borelli. “Everyone understands the value of participating in team athletics, for fitness, leadership, socialization, and myriad other benefits.”
Borelli continued, “The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit last April issued a thoughtful and thorough ruling allowing B.P.J. to continue participating in track events. That well-reasoned decision should stand the test of time, and we stand ready to defend it.”
Shortly after taking control of both legislative chambers, Republican members of Congress tried — unsuccessfully — to pass a national ban like those now enforced in 27 states since 2020.
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.”
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