National
‘Gambling with lives and livelihoods’
Some fear ‘Don’t Ask’ repeal doomed if September vote is delayed
Supporters of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal are pushing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to schedule a vote on the issue in September as some fear further delay would entirely derail efforts to overturn the law this year.
Alex Nicholson, executive director of Servicemembers United, said the prospects for passing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal are “reduced significantly” if Reid doesn’t schedule a vote on the fiscal year 2011 defense authorization before lawmakers break for the election.
“The failure of [the defense authorization bill] and [‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’] to get floor time and a vote in September or first week of October will be Reid’s alone,” Nicholson said. “Bumping it off to lame duck is gambling with our community’s lives and livelihoods – the same risk we demanded Obama not take by putting off the vote until next year.”
Winnie Stachelberg, senior vice president for external affairs at the Center for American Progress, also emphasized the importance of having a vote on the defense authorization bill and “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in September.
“It’s important that this happen in September because there are folks who don’t want to deal with this in a lame duck or next year,” she said.
On May 27, the Senate Armed Services Committee voted to include language that would lead to repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in the defense authorization bill and reported the language as a whole to the Senate floor.
But Reid hasn’t yet scheduled a vote for the legislation on the Senate floor. Some Capitol Hill insiders have said they’re expecting the bill to come up in September, although doubts are emerging about having a vote before the month is out.
Nicholson said he thinks Reid may not schedule a vote on the defense authorization bill in September because he’s reluctant to force members to vote on controversial measures prior to the election.
The consequence of not having a vote by the end of the first week of October, Nicholson said, is that all the gains made so far over “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” will be “put at great risk.”
“Once the Senate goes into recess for election season, anything could happen,” Nicholson said. “So putting the [‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’] vote off until after October is simply gambling with this very important issue. I don’t see how we will be able to forgive the president or Sen. Reid if that happens, because between the two of them they have the power to make sure that risk is not taken.”
Stachelberg emphasized the importance of finishing legislative action on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” before the Pentagon working group completes its study on the issue on Dec. 1.
“In other words, the Pentagon’s hands will be tied to implement the recommendations if “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” isn’t repealed,” she said. “They’ll have to wait to come back and do that next year, and that’s a problem.”
Jim Manley, a Reid spokesperson, said the Senate is planning to have a vote in September on defense authorization, but noted Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) opposition to moving the bill to the floor just before lawmakers broke for August recess.
“When we get back in September, we’ll continue to try and work on an agreement to get the bill to the floor as quickly as possible,” Manley said. “Now that the primary is over, hopefully Sen. McCain will relent in his objection and allow us to take the bill to the floor.”
McCain’s office didn’t respond to the Blade’s request for comment on whether he would continue his objection to a vote.
Other high-profile items are on the Senate agenda for September. Manley said legislation to assist small businesses would be a priority, along with bills related to tax break extensions as well as various conference reports.
When asked whether scheduling time for those bills would mean putting off a vote on the defense authorization bill, Manley replied, “I don’t do hypotheticals.”
Other observers say putting off a vote on the defense authorization bill could be the end for “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal if Republicans take control of Congress.
Politico’s Morning Defense reported last week that lobbyists are predicting the defense authorization bill would “come to a screeching halt” if the GOP wins a majority in November and a vote on the legislation hasn’t taken place by that time.
“They provide a couple of reasons: The level of partisan bickering is likely to intensify, and waiting and letting Republicans handle those bills next year will allow the Democrats to play the blame game,” Politico reports.
Nicholson also said a Republican takeover this fall could thwart any attempt for repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” this year.
“Unfortunately, a takeover of even one house of Congress by a leadership cadre that is hostile to repealing [‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’] could put the breaks on all of the progress we have made so far, and even begin to reverse a lot of that progress,” he said.
A lack of pressure from the White House is also seen as a concern for those seeking a Senate vote on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” this September.
Nicholson said it’s unclear whether the White House will push to have a vote on the defense authorization bill when the Senate returns from August recess.
“If the president were pressuring Sen. Reid to move the defense bill in September, it would likely get done,” Nicholson said. “But the White House does not always want bills coming up on the same timeline that we do.”
Nicholson said Obama could eliminate the uncertainty over a vote on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” by “publicly call[ing] for Sen. Reid to bring up the defense authorization bill in September.”
Shin Inouye, a White House spokesperson, said in response to an inquiry on whether the president would push for a vote on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in September that the president remains committed to the issue.
“The president has made clear that he wants [‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’] repealed and he continues to work with Congress to make sure this happens,” Inouye said.
The White House
USCIS announces it now only recognizes ‘two biological sexes’
Immigration agency announced it has implemented Trump executive order

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on Wednesday announced it now only “recognizes two biological sexes, male and female.”
A press release notes this change to its policies is “consistent with” the “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” executive order that President Donald Trump signed shortly after he took office for the second time on Jan. 20.
“There are only two sexes — male and female,” said DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin in a statement. “President Trump promised the American people a revolution of common sense, and that includes making sure that the policy of the U.S. government agrees with simple biological reality.”
“Proper management of our immigration system is a matter of national security, not a place to promote and coddle an ideology that permanently harms children and robs real women of their dignity, safety, and well-being,” she added.
The press release notes USCIS “considers a person’s sex as that which is generally evidenced on the birth certificate issued at or nearest to the time of birth.”
“If the birth certificate issued at or nearest to the time of birth indicates a sex other than male or female, USCIS will base the determination of sex on secondary evidence,” it reads.
The USCIS Policy Manuel defines “secondary evidence” as “evidence that may demonstrate a fact is more likely than not true, but the evidence does not derive from a primary, authoritative source.”
“Records maintained by religious or faith-based organizations showing that a person was divorced at a certain time are an example of secondary evidence of the divorce,” it says.
USCIS in its press release notes it “will not deny benefits solely because the benefit requestor did not properly indicate his or her sex.”
“This is a cruel and unnecessary policy that puts transgender, nonbinary, and intersex immigrants in danger,” said Immigration Equality Law and Policy Director Bridget Crawford on Wednesday. “The U.S. government is now forcing people to carry identity documents that do not reflect who they are, opening them up to increased discrimination, harassment, and violence. This policy does not just impact individuals — it affects their ability to travel, work, access healthcare, and live their lives authentically.”
“By denying trans people the right to self-select their gender, the government is making it harder for them to exist safely and with dignity,” added Crawford. “This is not about ‘common sense’—it is about erasing an entire community from the legal landscape. Transgender, nonbinary, and intersex people have always existed, and they deserve to have their identities fully recognized and respected. We will continue to fight for the rights of our clients and for the reversal of this discriminatory policy.”
Federal Government
Mass HHS layoffs include HIV/AIDS prevention, policy teams
Democratic states sue over cuts

Tuesday began a series of mass layoffs targeting staff, departments, and whole agencies within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who reportedly plans to cut a total of 10,000 jobs.
On the chopping block, according to reports this week, is the Office of Infectious Disease and HIV/AIDS Policy. A fact sheet explaining on the restructuring says “a new Administration for a Healthy America (AHA) will consolidate the OASH, HRSA, SAMHSA, ATSDR, and NIOSH, so as to more efficiently coordinate chronic care and disease prevention programs and harmonize health resources to low-income Americans.”
The document indicates that “Divisions of AHA include Primary Care, Maternal and Child Health, Mental Health, Environmental Health, HIV/AIDS, and Workforce, with support of the U.S. Surgeon General and Policy team.”
“Today, the Trump administration eliminated the staff of several CDC HIV prevention offices, including entire offices conducting public health communication campaigns, modeling and behavioral surveillance, capacity building, and non-lab research,” said a press release Tuesday by the HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute.
The organization also noted the “reassignments” of Jonathan Mermin, director of the National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, and Jeanne Marrazzo, director of the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Both were moved to the Indian Health Service.
“In a matter of just a couple days, we are losing our nation’s ability to prevent HIV,” said HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute Executive Director Carl Schmid. “The expertise of the staff, along with their decades of leadership, has now been destroyed and cannot be replaced. We will feel the impacts of these decisions for years to come and it will certainly, sadly, translate into an increase in new HIV infections and higher medical costs.”
The group added, “We are still learning the full extent of the staff cuts and do not know how the administration’s announced reorganization of HHS will impact all HIV treatment, prevention, and research programs, including President Trump’s Ending the HIV Epidemic initiative,” but “At the moment, it seems that we are in the middle of a hurricane and just waiting for the next shoe to drop.”
A group of 500 HIV advocates announced a rally planned for Wednesday morning at 8 a.m., at the U.S. Capitol lawn across from the Cannon House Office Building, which aims to urge Congress to help stop the cuts at HHS.
“Over 500 advocates will rally on Capitol Hill and meet with members of Congress and Hill staff to advocate for maintaining a strong HIV response and detail the potential impact of cuts to and reorganization of HIV prevention and treatment programs,” the groups wrote.
The press release continued, “HHS has stated that it is seeking to cut 10,000 employees, among them 2,400 CDC employees, many doing critical HIV work. It also seeks to merge HIV treatment programming into a new agency raising concerns about maintaining resources for and achieving the outstanding outcomes of the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program.”
On Tuesday a group of Democratic governors and attorneys general from 23 states and D.C. filed a lawsuit against HHS and Kennedy seeking a temporary restraining order and injunctive relief to halt the funding cuts.
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention withdrew approximately $11.4 billion in funding for state and community health departments during the COVID-19 pandemic response, along with $1 billion to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
“Slashing this funding now will reverse our progress on the opioid crisis, throw our mental health systems into chaos, and leave hospitals struggling to care for patients,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said.
State Department
Former US envoy for global LGBTQ, intersex rights slams Trump
Former President Joe Biden appointed Jessica Stern in 2021

Jessica Stern, the former special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights, says the work that she and her colleagues did under the Biden-Harris administration is “being systematically dismantled.”
“As the person who was responsible for leading U.S. foreign policy on LGBTQI+ issues, it’s been very difficult for the past two months to see that work being systematically dismantled,” she told the Washington Blade on March 19 during a telephone interview.
Stern was the executive director of Outright International, a global LGBTQ and intersex advocacy group, when then-President Joe Biden appointed her in June 2021.
The promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights was a cornerstone of the Biden-Harris administration’s overall foreign policy. These efforts specifically included the decriminalization of consensual same-sex sexual relations and marriage equality efforts in countries where activists said they were possible through the legislative or judicial processes.
The Trump-Vance administration’s decision to freeze most U.S. foreign aid spending for at least 90 days has had a devastating impact on the global LGBTQ and intersex rights movement. President Donald Trump’s executive order that bans the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers has prompted Germany and several other European countries to issue travel advisories for transgender and nonbinary people who are planning to visit the U.S.
Stern said the Trump-Vance administration “has studied the anti-LGBTQI strategies of other countries and basically imported the worst ideas from around the world: The most violent, the most dehumanizing, the most targeting strategies.” Stern added these policies have emboldened Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Argentine President Javier Milei and other anti-LGBTQ heads of state.
“It’s one thing when a small country that has limited global reach implements anti-LGBTQI laws and policies. It’s another thing when one of the world’s superpowers does so,” Stern told the Blade. “There’s no question that the U.S.’s regression on LGBTQI rights is actually going to accelerate backlash against LGBTQI people around the world.”
“We provide political legitimacy to those ideas, but also we’re forging new alliances and coalitions, and we’re pushing these ideas on other countries,” she added. “So, it’s not a passive action. The U.S. government currently is actively funding and disseminating anti-LGBTQI hatred around the world.”
Former State Department colleagues ‘afraid every day’
The Trump-Vance administration in a Feb. 3 statement that defended its efforts to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development noted examples of the organization’s “waste and abuse” included $2 million for “sex changes and ‘LGBT activism'” in Guatemala and $1.5 million to “advance diversity, equity and inclusion in Serbia’s workplaces and business communities.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio last month said 83 percent of USAID contracts have been cancelled, and the remaining will “now be administered more effectively under the State Department.”
Rubio after the Trump-Vance administration froze nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending issued a waiver that allowed the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate.
The Blade has previously reported PEPFAR-funded programs in Kenya, South Africa, and elsewhere have suspended services and even shut down because of a lack of U.S. funding. UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima on March 24 said 6.3 million more people around the world will die of AIDS-related complications over the next four years if the U.S. does not fully restore its foreign assistance.
Stern said her former State Department colleagues are “afraid every day.”
“They never know, ‘Am I going to be fired today?’ “Am I going to be put on administrative leave?’,” she said. “I cannot even imagine what it’s like to go to work every day.”
Stern told the Blade her former colleagues tell her that “there’s not a lot of foreign policy work happening because there’s so much disruption being caused by DOGE (the Department of Government Efficiency).”
“Entire departments have been decimated,” she said, noting one of them has lost 60 people. “It’s almost inconceivable to figure out how to restructure your work when your resources have been decimated.”

Stern described herself as “an eternal optimist” when the Blade asked whether she thinks the U.S. can ever stand for LGBTQ and intersex rights abroad.
“You have to believe in human rights,” she said.
Stern said former Secretary of State Antony Blinken as “an ally on LGBTQI issues.” Stern also said many of her now former State Department colleagues thanked her and her team for their work before they left government.
“There’s so much compassion from straight and cisgendered allies, from career officials, people that are not human rights experts or specialists, people that don’t focus on the well-being of LGBTQI people, but people that care very much about the United States standing for its values, the rule of law, equality for all, and this notion that it is in our national interest to ensure that there is safety, prosperity, and well-being for people around the world,” she said.
“The situation we find ourselves in will not last forever,” added Stern. “What we have to do is figure out how to hold the line right now, and how to organize for the future.”
She stressed ways to “hold the line” include litigation, protests, letters-to-the-editor, demanding accountability from lawmakers.
“There’s so much to do,” said Stern.

Stern is currently teaching at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, and is writing about her experience as the “first-ever human rights expert to be the special U.S. envoy for LGBTQI rights.” Stern also told the Blade that she is working to launch a new organization.
“I love being an activist again,” she said. “If there was ever a time when activists are needed, it’s now.”
“I am really proud to have rejoined the resistance,” added Stern.
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