National
ENDA blame game underway
Dems cite GOP opposition; others fault Senate leadership

LGBT activists targeted Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) last week, urging him to advance ENDA. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Democratic senators are blaming Republican obstructionism for the Senate’s failure to advance the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, but others say a lack of strategy is preventing a vote.
The plight of ENDA in the Senate received renewed attention last week when GetEqual staged a protest in Las Vegas blocking traffic on Las Vegas Boulevard and demanding Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) take action.
The legislation, stalled in the House and Senate, would prohibit job bias against LGBT people in most public and private workforce scenarios.
Democratic supporters say Republican opposition is preventing Senate action on the bill.
Assistant Majority Leader Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) said Democratic leadership wants to move forward with ENDA, but noted difficulties in moving any item on the legislative agenda forward.
“We have a tough time moving anything on the calendar because of Republican filibusters,” Durbin said.
Still, Durbin said a vote on the legislation in September after lawmakers return from August recess is “possible,” while adding that timeframe is a “pretty hectic period.” He noted that a vote would more likely come in the period following the November election.
Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee where ENDA is pending, on Tuesday expressed similar grievances about Republican obstructionism.
Asked what’s keeping the legislation from coming to a Senate vote, Harkin simply replied, “Republicans.”
“It’s one of my priority items,” Harkin said. “I’d like to move it, but [I’m] not certain we’re going to have the time.”
Harkin said he couldn’t immediately recall if any particular part of the measure was causing controversy and keeping it from coming to a Senate vote.
“There’s been a lot of objections by certain Republicans on it,” Harkin said. “As far as I’m concerned, they’re not legitimate. I couldn’t even enumerate them right now, I forget what they are.”
Mara Keisling, executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, also blamed Republicans for the failure to advance ENDA in the Senate. She also cited what she called a “general dysfunction” in the chamber as a problem.
“It’s certainly not all about ENDA,” she said. “It’s certainly, certainly not about transgender inclusion in ENDA. They can’t get campaign finance reform through, they can’t get, sometimes, job bills through.”
On Tuesday, Democratic leadership tried to move forward on a campaign finance reform bill known as the DISCLOSE Act. Republicans, who hold 41 of 100 seats in the chamber, were unified in their opposition and able to filibuster a motion to proceed with the legislation.
Still, ENDA is likely to fare better with Republicans in the Senate because the legislation has two GOP co-sponsors, Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine.
R. Clarke Cooper, executive director of the Log Cabin Republicans, dismissed the notion that Republicans were holding up ENDA in the Senate and said “only the current Senate majority leadership can truly answer” why ENDA isn’t on the calendar.
“Blaming the minority leadership for the majority’s disorganization and lack of planning this year is simplistic and, frankly, lazy,” Cooper said. “Both sides of the aisle are frustrated with the lack of activity.”
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), the sponsor for ENDA in the Senate, is hoping House passage of ENDA would jumpstart interest in passing it in the Senate, according to his office.
“I think, at this point, it’s kind of something that we’re waiting for the House to pass to build a little momentum here in the Senate, and then hopefully get going on it here,” said Mike Westling, a Merkley spokesperson.
But in response to inquiries on why the House hasn’t moved forward with the bill, House leadership pointed to the lack of a strategy for ENDA in the Senate.
“We should encourage the Senate to develop a course for ENDA to ensure that when the House passes the legislation, the Senate can move quickly to send the legislation to the president’s desk,” Drew Hammill, a spokesperson for U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, earlier told the Blade.
Asked whether any discussions on a strategy to advance ENDA in the Senate have taken place, Durbin replied, “We have not reached that level.”
Harkin said he hadn’t yet done a whip count on the legislation and wasn’t sure whether the legislation would have 60 votes to pass.
“I just know that initial inquiries about getting a time limit on it were unfruitful,” he said. “So, without a time limit, we’re not going to bring anything up.”
Harkin said Senate leadership is “always looking” for other bills that could serve as a vehicle to move ENDA forward as an amendment, but didn’t name any potential legislation.
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.