National
Byrd ‘evolved’ on LGBT issues
Despite mixed track record, W.Va. senator was beloved

Sen. Robert Byrd, who died Monday after serving six decades in Congress, slowly moved from opposing to backing several LGBT civil rights bills. (Photo courtesy of Byrd’s office)
U.S. Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia, who died Monday after serving a record 57 years in the U.S. Senate, evolved from a socially conservative Democrat who opposed nearly all LGBT civil rights initiatives to an elder lawmaker who backed several important pro-gay bills.
“I think you can say that he moved forward and started to understand the basic humanity of all West Virginians, including LGBT West Virginians,” said Stephen Skinner, an attorney who serves as president of the board of the statewide LGBT group Fairness West Virginia.
Skinner, a native West Virginian who said he spoke with Byrd many times over the years, acknowledged that the senator said many “bad things” about LGBT-related issues.
But Skinner joined many political observers in West Virginia to remember Byrd this week more for the massive infusion of federal funds and resources he secured for his state that resulted in economic development and jobs for residents long plagued by poverty.
“I would say he was universally beloved, including by the LGBT people in the state, whose affection for him often override most of his decisions” on LGBT-related issues, Skinner said.
“Everywhere you go, we were all affected by what he did. And everybody believes he did so much for the country that everything he did for the state was deserved,” said Skinner.
Allison Herwitt, director of legislative affairs for the Human Rights Campaign, pointed to HRC’s congressional scorecard ratings for Byrd, which range from a low of 13 of 100 for the 108th Congress to a high of 60 two years ago in the 110th Congress, the most recent rating.
HRC gave him ratings in the 25-to-35 range in most years beginning in the 1990s. The ratings are based on votes, stances and attitudes toward LGBT- and AIDS-related issues.
“Over the years he’s had a very mixed record on LGBT equality,” Herwitt said.
Among other things, Byrd voted in 1996 for the Defense of Marriage Act, which bars the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages. That same year, he voted against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would have banned most private-sector employers from engaging in employment discrimination based on sexual orientation.
In a lengthy floor speech during the Senate debate on DOMA, Byrd cited how some historians linked the decline and fall of the ancient Roman Empire to homosexuality.
“But when it came to being there for hate crimes and on ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ he voted for equality and moving forward,” Herwitt said. “And so he is one of those people that, over the course of his political career, he certainly has evolved on our issues.”
Byrd voted last year for a hate crimes measure that authorizes the federal government to prosecute crimes that target people for their sexual orientation or gender identity. The measure became the first LGBT-inclusive civil rights bill to pass Congress.
Earlier this year, Byrd supported a compromise provision to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in a close vote in the Senate Armed Services Committee. Capitol Hill sources said Byrd’s staff on the committee helped draft the compromise language that was credited with persuading enough members of the panel to pass it.
Byrd’s position on a proposed constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage was less clear. When same-sex marriage opponents proposed the Federal Marriage Amendment before the Senate in 2004, Byrd voted to end a filibuster backed by Senate Democratic leaders, who sought to block the measure from coming up for a full vote.
A motion to end the filibuster failed by a vote of 48 to 50; two senators were absent at the time of the vote. Sixty votes are needed to end filibusters.
Some observers considered a vote for ending the filibuster a sign that senators supported the amendment. But Skinner said members of Byrd’s staff told him that Byrd “opposed messing with the constitution” on matters of same-sex marriage and planned to vote against the amendment if it reached the floor for a direct vote.
A gay former member of Byrd’s staff, who spoke this week on condition of anonymity, said Byrd was a strong advocate of full debate on important issues before the Senate. The former staffer agreed with Skinner’s assessment that Byrd, a recognized constitutional scholar, would likely have voted against the same-sex marriage amendment in a direct Senate vote.
“I don’t think he understood gays,” said the former staffer. “It was not part of his social lexicon. Yet it was clear that there had been an evolution on gay issues.”
Herwitt said Byrd appeared to have been influenced by the greater visibility of LGBT people in his home state and throughout the country.
“I think as the country evolves on our issues, so do peoples’ understanding of what LGBT equality means for people,” she said. “I’m sure in the beginning of his career, when people weren’t out and living open and honestly, it was different. As he made it through the end of his career, he was working on Capitol Hill where people who are working for you and working for other senators are out and openly gay, so I think that also has an impact.”
New York
Men convicted of murdering two men in NYC gay bar drugging scheme sentenced
One of the victims, John Umberger, was D.C. political consultant

A New York judge on Wednesday sentenced three men convicted of killing a D.C. political consultant and another man who they targeted at gay bars in Manhattan.
NBC New York notes a jury in February convicted Jayqwan Hamilton, Jacob Barroso, and Robert DeMaio of murder, robbery, and conspiracy in relation to druggings and robberies that targeted gay bars in Manhattan from March 2021 to June 2022.
John Umberger, a 33-year-old political consultant from D.C., and Julio Ramirez, a 25-year-old social worker, died. Prosecutors said Hamilton, Barroso, and DeMaio targeted three other men at gay bars.
The jury convicted Hamilton and DeMaio of murdering Umberger. State Supreme Court Judge Felicia Mennin sentenced Hamilton and DeMaio to 40 years to life in prison.
Barroso, who was convicted of killing Ramirez, received a 20 years to life sentence.
National
Medical groups file lawsuit over Trump deletion of health information
Crucial datasets included LGBTQ, HIV resources

Nine private medical and public health advocacy organizations, including two from D.C., filed a lawsuit on May 20 in federal court in Seattle challenging what it calls the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’s illegal deletion of dozens or more of its webpages containing health related information, including HIV information.
The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington, names as defendants Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and HHS itself, and several agencies operating under HHS and its directors, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and the Food and Drug Administration.
“This action challenges the widespread deletion of public health resources from federal agencies,” the lawsuit states. “Dozens (if not more) of taxpayer-funded webpages, databases, and other crucial resources have vanished since January 20, 2025, leaving doctors, nurses, researchers, and the public scrambling for information,” it says.
“These actions have undermined the longstanding, congressionally mandated regime; irreparably harmed Plaintiffs and others who rely on these federal resources; and put the nation’s public health infrastructure in unnecessary jeopardy,” the lawsuit continues.
It adds, “The removal of public health resources was apparently prompted by two recent executive orders – one focused on ‘gender ideology’ and the other targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion (‘DEI’) programs. Defendants implemented these executive orders in a haphazard manner that resulted in the deletion (inadvertent or otherwise) of health-related websites and databases, including information related to pregnancy risks, public health datasets, information about opioid-use disorder, and many other valuable resources.”
The lawsuit does not mention that it was President Donald Trump who issued the two executive orders in question.
A White House spokesperson couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on the lawsuit.
While not mentioning Trump by name, the lawsuit names as defendants in addition to HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., Matthew Buzzelli, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Jay Bhattacharya, director of the National Institutes of Health; Martin Makary, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration; Thomas Engels, administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration; and Charles Ezell, acting director of the Office of Personnel Management.
The 44-page lawsuit complaint includes an addendum with a chart showing the titles or descriptions of 49 “affected resource” website pages that it says were deleted because of the executive orders. The chart shows that just four of the sites were restored after initially being deleted.
Of the 49 sites, 15 addressed LGBTQ-related health issues and six others addressed HIV issues, according to the chart.
“The unannounced and unprecedented deletion of these federal webpages and datasets came as a shock to the medical and scientific communities, which had come to rely on them to monitor and respond to disease outbreaks, assist physicians and other clinicians in daily care, and inform the public about a wide range of healthcare issues,” the lawsuit states.
“Health professionals, nonprofit organizations, and state and local authorities used the websites and datasets daily in care for their patients, to provide resources to their communities, and promote public health,” it says.
Jose Zuniga, president and CEO of the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (IAPAC), one of the organizations that signed on as a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said in a statement that the deleted information from the HHS websites “includes essential information about LGBTQ+ health, gender and reproductive rights, clinical trial data, Mpox and other vaccine guidance and HIV prevention resources.”
Zuniga added, “IAPAC champions evidence-based, data-informed HIV responses and we reject ideologically driven efforts that undermine public health and erase marginalized communities.”
Lisa Amore, a spokesperson for Whitman-Walker Health, D.C.’s largest LGBTQ supportive health services provider, also expressed concern about the potential impact of the HHS website deletions.
“As the region’s leader in HIV care and prevention, Whitman-Walker Health relies on scientific data to help us drive our resources and measure our successes,” Amore said in response to a request for comment from the Washington Blade.
“The District of Columbia has made great strides in the fight against HIV,” Amore said. “But the removal of public facing information from the HHS website makes our collective work much harder and will set HIV care and prevention backward,” she said.
The lawsuit calls on the court to issue a declaratory judgement that the “deletion of public health webpages and resources is unlawful and invalid” and to issue a preliminary or permanent injunction ordering government officials named as defendants in the lawsuit “to restore the public health webpages and resources that have been deleted and to maintain their web domains in accordance with their statutory duties.”
It also calls on the court to require defendant government officials to “file a status report with the Court within twenty-four hours of entry of a preliminary injunction, and at regular intervals, thereafter, confirming compliance with these orders.”
The health organizations that joined the lawsuit as plaintiffs include the Washington State Medical Association, Washington State Nurses Association, Washington Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Academy Health, Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, Fast-Track Cities Institute, International Association of Providers of AIDS Care, National LGBT Cancer Network, and Vermont Medical Society.
The Fast-Track Cities Institute and International Association of Providers of AIDS Care are based in D.C.
U.S. Federal Courts
Federal judge scraps trans-inclusive workplace discrimination protections
Ruling appears to contradict US Supreme Court precedent

Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas has struck down guidelines by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission designed to protect against workplace harassment based on gender identity and sexual orientation.
The EEOC in April 2024 updated its guidelines to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), which determined that discrimination against transgender people constituted sex-based discrimination as proscribed under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
To ensure compliance with the law, the agency recommended that employers honor their employees’ preferred pronouns while granting them access to bathrooms and allowing them to wear dress code-compliant clothing that aligns with their gender identities.
While the the guidelines are not legally binding, Kacsmaryk ruled that their issuance created “mandatory standards” exceeding the EEOC’s statutory authority that were “inconsistent with the text, history, and tradition of Title VII and recent Supreme Court precedent.”
“Title VII does not require employers or courts to blind themselves to the biological differences between men and women,” he wrote in the opinion.
The case, which was brought by the conservative think tank behind Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation, presents the greatest setback for LGBTQ inclusive workplace protections since President Donald Trump’s issuance of an executive order on the first day of his second term directing U.S. federal agencies to recognize only two genders as determined by birth sex.
Last month, top Democrats from both chambers of Congress reintroduced the Equality Act, which would codify LGBTQ-inclusive protections against discrimination into federal law, covering employment as well as areas like housing and jury service.