Connect with us

National

World news in brief

Gay priest won’t become UK bishop & more

Published

on

Gay priest won’t become UK bishop

LONDON — A Church of England committee has decided against nominating a gay priest to become a bishop, according to British news reports.

Church officials would not comment, but the July 8 Daily Telegraph reported that the Very Rev. Jeffrey John was rejected as a potential nominee to become bishop of Southwark in south London. Other newspapers had similar reports.

John was nominated to become bishop of Reading in 2003, but withdrew in the face of an uproar from conservatives, according to the Associated Press. He is now the dean of St. Albans cathedral.

John, although united in a civil partnership with his long-term partner, has declared he is celibate, conforming to Anglican teaching.

Church officials had not confirmed news reports that John was on a list of candidates considered by a Crown Nominations Commission, which met last week behind closed doors.

The Associated Press quoted Rev. Colin Coward, director of Changing Attitude, as saying the development was “painfully disappointing news for Jeffrey, who has lived through a week in which his identity and reputation have been pored over, analyzed and attacked once again by conservative forces in the church in a way which I can only describe as poisonous.”

Coward’s group is devoted to promoting the full inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in the Church of England and the wider Anglican Communion, where issues of sexuality have caused much acrimony and deep splits.

Mexico City sees 271 gay weddings in 4 months

MEXICO CITY — Mexico City has seen 271 gay and lesbian couples get married since the capital enacted the first law in Latin America explicitly allowing same-sex marriages.

The Associated Press reported the city government says there have been 142 marriages between men and 129 between women in the four months since the law took effect March 4.

The government said July 6 that 18 foreigners were among those married, and the rest were Mexican citizens. The largest number of marriages occurred in the first month after the law took effect.

Mexico’s Supreme Court is considering challenges to the law, which applies only to the capital, but the measure will remain in effect while the review is under way. A decision is expected sometime in August.

Facebook group finds big support in homophobia fight

DUNHAM, England — A new Facebook group that supports LGBT users, Wiping Out Homophobia on Facebook, has become one of the web site’s fastest growing pages.

Page founder Kelvin Patrick O’Neil said the group, which drew 3,000 fans on its founding day two months ago, now has more than 30,000 fans.

“Eight weeks ago I was flicking through Facebook, when I came across a homophobic page,” said O’Neil, who lives in Dunham, England. “I was so appalled that I decided to report it. To make sure that Facebook got the message, I sent a link of the group to all my friends so that they could also report it. Minutes later, they had sent me replies with links to other pages, so I decided to collate them on one page so that all of my friends could join in order to report these pages.”

O’Neil said that page, Wiping Out Homophobia on Facebook, drew 3,000 fans the same day he created it.

“So far, the members have … had over 900 profiles, groups and pages removed for hate speech,” O’Neil said. Other group actions have included signing a petition to stop a gay activist from being deported and crashing three anti-gay web sites.

Wiping Out Homophobia on Facebook is similar to other politically-driven Facebook pages in that it contains relevant links, comments and photos. It’s online at facebook.com/WOHOF.

“Through our daily posts, we have educated, informed and entertained with supportive slogans, humorous pictures, news reports and links,” O’Neil said. “I now have 14 administrators … [and] together we work 24/7 making, stealing and uploading links and pics, so that people can post them to their walls.”

O’Neil said the daily activity provides free publicity for the page while spreading awareness of anti-gay pages.

Advertisement
FUND LGBTQ JOURNALISM
SIGN UP FOR E-BLAST

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

Published

on

(Washington Blade photo by Michael K. Lavers)

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.

Continue Reading

National

Medical groups file lawsuit over Trump deletion of health information

Crucial datasets included LGBTQ, HIV resources

Published

on

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is named as a defendant in the lawsuit. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

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.

Continue Reading

U.S. Federal Courts

Federal judge scraps trans-inclusive workplace discrimination protections

Ruling appears to contradict US Supreme Court precedent

Published

on

Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas (Screen capture: YouTube)

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.

Continue Reading

Popular