National
Obama cheered at Pride reception
Family leave, hospital visitation changes announced
During a White House reception keyed to Pride month, President Barack Obama said change begins not in Washington but ‘with acts of compassion — and sometimes defiance — across America.’ (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
President Barack Obama encouraged LGBT people to stand up for their rights and who they are during a White House reception Tuesday where attendees greeted him with cheers and applause.
At a celebration commemorating June as Pride month, Obama commended the invitees for their work and said their visit was a reminder that the change he called for during his presidential campaign “never comes — or at least never begins — in Washington.”
“It begins with acts of compassion — and sometimes defiance — across America,” he said. “And it begins when these impositions of conscience start opening hearts that had been closed, and when we finally see each other’s humanity, whatever our differences.”
Unlike many of Obama’s LGBT critics, people at the Pride reception welcomed the president warmly with thunderous applause and cheers as he and Vice President Joseph Biden entered the East Room, where the reception was held.
An estimated 300 people were expected to attend the event, although the actual number in attendance appeared closer to 100 as the event took place.
According to people familiar with Tuesday’s reception, invitees were restricted to the heads of state equality groups, U.S. House members, LGBT people with compelling stories and a contingent of LGBT youth. The leaders of national LGBT organizations didn’t receive invitations.
During the event, Obama addressed two changes his administration is making to afford more rights to LGBT people and their families. The newly announced changes cap off a series of pro-LGBT changes his administration has made in recent weeks in apparent connection with June as Pride month.
The first change, formally issued earlier in the day by the Labor Department, sets new rules to reinterpret the Family & Medical Leave Act to include same-sex couples and their children.
“And in an announcement today, the Department of Labor made clear that under the Family & Medical Leave Act, same-sex couples — as well as others raising children — are to be treated like the caretakers that they are,” Obama said.
According to a statement from the Labor Department, the Obama administration reinterpreted the definition of “son and daughter” under FMLA to extend family leave rights to any worker who cares for a child, including the same-sex partner of a biological parent.
FMLA, enacted in 1993, allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave during any 12-month period to care for loved ones, or themselves, and allows employees to take time off from work for the adoption or the birth of a child.
Obama also touted recent actions by the Department of Health & Human Services following through on an April hospital memorandum. Obama’s order directed HHS to work on implementing regulations in which hospitals receiving Medicare and Medicaid funding must allow same-sex partners to have hospital visitation rights and the ability to make emergency medical decisions for each other.
The president said Health & Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on Tuesday sent a letter asking hospitals “to adopt these changes now — even before the rule takes effect.”
Following the White House Pride reception, the Department of Health & Human Services made public the letter that Sebelius sent to hospitals with the request for “voluntary support” until new regulations are published.
“Your actions could spare many patients the pain of being separated from a loved one during an admission to a hospital — often one of the most anxious times in their lives,” Sebelius wrote.
In addition to announcing new administrative changes, the president also renewed his call for legislative changes to eliminate discrimination against LGBT people.
Obama reiterated his call to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, citing his belief that LGBT couples “deserve the same rights and responsibilities afforded to any married couple in this country.” He also called on Congress to approve a trans-inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act.
“No one in America should be fired because they’re gay,” Obama said. “It’s not right, it’s not who we are as Americans, and we are going to put a stop to it.”
Obama also called for an end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” citing recent congressional votes to repeal the statute and an upcoming vote in the full Senate on the defense budget bill to which repeal language is attached.
“We have never been closer to ending this discriminatory policy,” Obama said. “And I’m going to keep on fighting until that bill is on my desk and I can sign it.”
The president said the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal compromise Congress pushed forward is the best way to approach an end to the law because the measure allows the Pentagon to complete its review by the end of this year.
Obama said the review process is important not only to have the votes for passage in Congress, but to ensure “the change is accepted and implemented effectively.”
A number of high-profile LGBT Americans were at the reception, including some who’ve recently made headlines.
Notables included Constance McMillan, the lesbian high school student from Aberdeen, Miss. who was barred from taking her girlfriend to prom; Janice Langbehn, a lesbian whose inability to see her dying partner in the hospital prompted Obama to issue the hospital memorandum; and Chely Wright, the country music singer who recently came out as lesbian and performed earlier this month at Capital Pride.
Also in attendance were Reps. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) and Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.), as well as gay Reps. Jared Polis (D-Pa.) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.).
Other attendees were high-ranking members of the Obama administration, including White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and Tina Tchen, director of the White House Office of Public Engagement.
Openly gay administration officials at the event included John Berry, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management; Fred Hochberg, president of the U.S. Export-Import Bank; Nancy Sutley, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality; and Brian Bond, LGBT liaison for the White House.
Tuesday’s reception capped a series of other events this week in various executive departments celebrating June as Pride month. These celebrations featured remarks from high-profile officials in the Obama administration, including U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
At the White House reception, the contingent of LGBT youth received special attention from Obama for what he said was bravely standing up for themselves and seeking visibility.
“It’s not easy standing up all the time and being who you are,” he said. ”But they’re showing us the way forward. These young people are helping to build a more perfect union, a nation where all of us are equal; each of us is free to pursue our own versions of happiness.”
Obama said the young LGBT people at the White House reception served as a reminder that “we all have an obligation to ensure that no young person is ever made to feel worthless or alone — ever.”
Among the LGBT youth present at the White House reception was Morgan Keenan, an advisor for an LGBT youth group based in St. Louis, Mo. known as Growing American Youth.
Keenan said prior to the president’s remarks, Obama met with 15 or 16 young people who identified as LGBT — including two young people who came as part of Keenan’s delegation from St. Louis.
“For the youth that I brought, it’s going to change their world,” Keenan said. “They’re going to come out of there different than when they went in, but I hope that he listens to them.”
People at the event — many of whom were donors and contributors to the Democratic Party — largely had kind words about Obama and the progress his administration has made on LGBT issues.
Estevan Garcia, a gay pediatrician and New York resident, said he came to the reception representing the Family Equality Council, a national LGBT family organization to which he noted he often donates.
Garcia said family issues are particularly important to him and his partner because he’s married and has three children. He described the president’s remarks during the reception as “right on.”
“We’re big supporters and have been for a while,” Garcia said. “We felt that he really is working behind the scenes a little bit to push our causes.”
Garcia said the advancement of LGBT issues is “a slow process” and he’s willing to give Obama “the benefit of a doubt” on the matter.
Similarly appreciative of Obama’s efforts was George Meldrum, a gay Democratic lobbyist and activist from Wilmington, Del.
“I like the direction he’s going,” Meldrum said. “I understand the nature of politics and I’m very patient, partly because of the nature of the work that I do. Politics is all about compromise.”
Meldrum, 62, commended Obama for making pro-LGBT changes through administrative action, which he said enables the president to move forward without going through the legislative system, where he might not find success.
“He’s saying the right things and I think he’s doing the right things,” Meldrum said. “His plate is very full. We’re one of the things on that plate.”
But one reception attendee who was critical of the Obama administration’s progress was Alexandra Beninda, a transgender D.C. resident and Democratic activist.
Beninda said the president’s remarks during the reception — as they were during his campaign — were “very hopeful and encouraging and all that,” but she’s seeking more.
“I do get feeling that a lot more could be done and wonder what direction we can point them in terms of trying to get things done,” she said.
Citing concern about the failure so far to pass ENDA, Beninda said current law is creating an environment where “people are getting fired from their jobs and being denied jobs on a daily basis.”
“Basically, what it comes down to is you have an administration and a Democratic Legislature that is allowing discrimination on a regular basis and not taking the right steps to do anything about it,” she said.
Beninda said she wants Obama to be “a lot more forceful” with Congress to prompt lawmakers to action on ENDA and other pro-LGBT bills.
U.S. Supreme Court
Nine trans activists arrested outside Supreme Court
Gender Liberation Movement organized demonstration against Skrmetti ruling
On Friday afternoon, nine transgender organizers and allies were arrested on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court for blocking the street and protesting the recent U.S. v. Skrmetti ruling.
The ruling, decided 6-3 by the conservative majority on Wednesday, upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors. The decision will allow states to pass laws restricting gender-affirming care for minors and further minimizes bodily autonomy.
The nine arrested were part of a larger group of more than 30 protesters wearing colors of the trans Pride flag— pink, blue, and white, — standing outside of the nation’s highest court. Organizers unfurled large cloths in pink, blue, and white, shared personal testimonies about how their gender-affirming care was a matter of life and death, released pink and blue smoke, and saw nine trans participants take their hormone replacement therapy.
The protest was led by the Gender Liberation Movement, an organization that “builds direct action, media, and policy interventions centering bodily autonomy, self-determination, the pursuit of fulfillment, and collectivism in the face of gender-based sociopolitical threats.” Among the nine arrested was GLM co-founder Raquel Willis.
Before being arrested, Willis spoke to multiple media outlets, explaining that this decision was an overreach of power by the Supreme Court.
“Gender-affirming care is sacred, powerful, and transformative. With this ruling in U.S. v. Skrmetti, we see just how ignorant the Supreme Court is of the experiences of trans youth and their affirming families,” said Willis. “Everyone deserves the right to holistic healthcare, and trans youth are no different. We will continue to fight for their bodily autonomy, dignity, and self-determination just like previous generations. No court, no law, no government gave us our power, and none can take it away.”
GLM co-founder Eliel Cruz also spoke to media outlets about the Skrmetti ruling, calling it “a historical moment of fascist attacks,” and encouraged the LGBTQ community to “organize and fight back.”
“As a cisgender man, I stand in solidarity with the trans community during these escalating attacks on their safety, well-being, right to exist in this world, and ability to live a future free of violence,” Cruz said. “I’m enraged at the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold a ban on gender-affirming care for youth. My heart hurts for the families and young people who this will negatively impact and harm.”
The Washington Blade reached out to Capitol Police for comment.
A spokesperson said the nine activists were arrested for violating D.C. Code §22-1307 — “Crowding, Obstructing, or Incommoding” — on First Street, N.E., after receiving three warnings.
National
FDA approves new twice-yearly HIV prevention drug
Experts say success could inhibit development of HIV vaccine
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on June 18 approved a newly developed HIV/AIDS prevention drug that only needs to be taken by injection once every six months.
The new drug, lenacapavir, which is being sold under the brand name of Yeztugo by the pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences that developed it, is being hailed by some AIDS activists as a major advancement in the years-long effort to end the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the U.S. and worldwide.
Although HIV prevention drugs, known as pre-exposure prophylaxis medication or PrEP, have been available since 2012, they initially required taking one or more daily pills. More recently, another injectable PrEP drug was developed that required being administered once every two months.
Experts familiar with the PrEP programs noted that while earlier drugs were highly effective in preventing HIV infection – most were 99 percent effective – they could not be effective if those at risk for HIV who were on the drugs did not adhere to taking their daily pills or injections every two months. Experts also point out that large numbers of people at risk for HIV, especially members of minority communities, are not on PrEP and efforts to reach out to them should be expanded.
“Today marks a monumental advance in HIV prevention,” said Carl Schmid, executive director of the D.C.-based HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute, in a statement released on the day the FDA announced its approval of lenacapavir.
“Congratulations to the many researchers who spent 19 years to get to today’s approval, backed up by the long-term investment needed to get the drug to market,” he said.
Schmid added, “Long-acting PrEP is now not only effective for up to six months but also improves adherence and will reduce HIV infections – if people are aware of it and payers, including private insurers, cover it without cost-sharing as a preventive service.”
Schmid and others monitoring the nation’s HIV/AIDS programs have warned that proposed large scale cuts in the budget for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by the administration of President Donald Trump could seriously harm HIV prevention programs, including PrEP-related efforts.
“Dismantling these programs means that there will be a weakened public health infrastructure and much less HIV testing, which is needed before a person can take PrEP,” Schmid said in his statement.
“Private insurers and employers must also immediately cover Yeztugo as a required preventive service, which means that PrEP users should not face any cost-sharing or utilization management barriers,” he said.
In response to a request by the Washington Blade for comment, a spokesperson for Gilead Sciences released a statement saying the annual list price per person using Yeztugo in the U.S. is $28,218. But the statement says the company is working to ensure that its HIV prevention medication is accessible to all who need it through broad coverage from health insurance companies and some of its own support programs.
“We’ve seen high insurance coverage for existing prevention options – for example, the vast majority of consumers have a $0 co-pay for Descovy for PrEP in the U.S. – and we are working to ensure broad coverage for lenacapavir [Yeztugo],” the statement says. It was referring to the earlier HIV prevention medication developed by Gilead Sciences, Descovy.
“Eligible insured people will get help with their copay,” the statement continues. “Gilead’s Advancing Access Copay Savings Program may reduce out-of-pocket costs to as little as zero dollars,” it says. “Then for people without insurance, lenacapavir may be available free of charge for those who are eligible, through Gilead’s Advancing Access Patient Assistance Program.”
Gilead Sciences has announced that in the two final trial tests for Yeztugo, which it describes as “the most intentionally inclusive HIV prevention clinical trial programs ever designed,” 99.9 percent of participants who received Yeztugo remained negative. Time magazine reports that among those who remained HIV negative at a rate of 100 percent were men who have sex with men.
Time also reports that some HIV/AIDS researchers believe the success of the HIV prevention drugs like Gilead’s Yeztugo could complicate the so-far unsuccessful efforts to develop an effective HIV vaccine.
To be able to test a potential vaccine two groups of test subjects must be used, one that receives the test vaccine and the other that receives a placebo with no drug in it.
With highly effective HIV prevention drugs now available, it could be ethically difficult to ask a test group to take a placebo and continue to be at risk for HIV, according to some researchers.
“This might take a bit of the wind out of the sails of vaccine research, because there is something so effective in preventing HIV infection,” Time quoted Dr. David Ho, a professor of microbiology, immunology, and medicine at New York’s Columbia University as saying.
National
Activists rally in response to Supreme Court ruling
‘We won’t bow to hatred: we outlive it’
Politicians, LGBTQ activists, and allies gathered at the Lutheran Church of the Reformation in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Washington, D.C. on Wednesday following the ruling by the United States Supreme Court in the case of U.S. v. Skrmetti. The Supreme Court upheld a Tennessee ban on gender-affirming healthcare for transgender adolescents in a 6-3 decision.
A rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court was called for by the American Civil Liberties Union, Lambda Legal and other organizations following the high court ruling on Wednesday. However, due to a thunderstorm and flood watch, the scores of activists who were to attend the rally were directed to a Lutheran church down the street from the court. Undeterred, activists and community leaders were joined by U.S. Senators Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) for an indoor rally at the church.
“We know that freedom is not inevitable,” Markey told the crowd. “It is fought for by people who said ‘no’ in the face of health cuts, ‘no’ in the face of discrimination, ‘no’ in the face of invasive laws that ban life-saving and life-affirming healthcare and ‘no’ to this anti-justice, anti-freedom agenda.”
Also speaking at the rally was Deirdre Schifeling, chief political advocacy officer of the National ACLU.
“We believe transgender rights matter,” Schifeling stated. “Transgender kids matter and deserve love, support and the freedom to shape their own futures. I am still processing how the Supreme Court could disagree with such an obvious truth.”
“Today’s ruling shows us that unfortunately these attacks on our freedom will not end here,” Schifeling continued. “The Trump administration and extremist politicians across the country are continuing to target our right — our human right — to control our own bodies.”
“If politicians think that we are going to sit back and be defeated, that we are going to let them strip our rights and freedoms away without a fight, they’ve got another think coming,” Schifeling said. “We will never back down. We will never back down or give up. We will organize, we will mobilize and we will fight to protect trans rights in our communities, in our legislatures, in our elections, and in court rooms across the country.”
“Today, the highest court in this land decided that the bodily autonomy of trans youth, specifically trans youth of Tennessee and states with bans harming youth across the country do not matter,” said trans advocate Hope Giselle-Godsey.
“The opponents of trans equality think that today is a victory, but history will remember it as a moment that sharpened us and not silenced us,” Giselle-Godsey continued.
“So yes, today we grieve for the people in those states where those bans exist, but we grieve in motion,” Giselle-Godsey said. “To the system that thinks that it won today, just like every other time before: you will lose again. Because we won’t bow to hatred: we outlive it. We out-organize it. We out-love it. We are still here and we are not finished yet.”
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