National
DOJ appeals lesbian Air Force officer’s reinstatement
But Witt able to resume service in U.S. military
The Obama administration is appealing a federal district court’s decision to reinstate back into the U.S. Air Force a lesbian nurse who was discharged under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
On Tuesday, the U.S. Justice Department filed an appeal notice with the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asking the appellate body to reconsider a decision by a Washington State district court to allow Maj. Margaret Witt back into the Air Force.
The three-page notice gives no explanation for why the Obama administration is appealing Witt v. Air Force and simply states that “notice is hereby given” that the Justice Department has made the filing.
In September, U.S. District Court Judge Ronald Leighton ruled that Witt, who was discharged in 2006 after serving in the Air Force for 19 years as a flight nurse, should be allowed back into the military.
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said in a statement the administration filed the appeal as it “traditionally does when acts of Congress have been held unconstitutional,” but said this filing “in no way diminishes” President Obama’s commitment to repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” legislatively this year.
“Indeed, it clearly shows why Congress must act to end this misguided policy,” Gibbs added.
Gibbs said the president and administration officials “have been working with the Senate” to move forward during the lame duck session with passage of the fiscal year 2011 defense authorization bill, which contains repeal language.
But Jon Davidson, legal director for Lambda Legal, blasted the Obama adminstration for appealing to a higher court the decision to reinstate Witt.
“Notwithstanding President Obama’s concession that the military’s current anti-gay policies are hurting national security, his administration is continuing to pursue the discharge of a decorated officer who did not ‘tell,’ who would not have even been investigated under the military’s current guidelines, and whose discharge has been found not to promote unit cohesion or morale,” Davidson said.
Davidson called the decision to appeal the district court’s ruling — in addition to not suspending discharges pending review of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell — a “significant failure on the part of our nation’s Commander in Chief.”
Doug NeJaime, who’s gay and a law professor at Loyola Law School, said he thinks the decision to appeal the Witt ruling is consistent with the Obama administration’s decision to appeal U.S. District Court Judge Virginia Phillip’s recent ruling that struck down “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
“So just as the government is appealing the substance of Judge Philip’s decision …, the government is appealing the substantive decision here as well,” NeJaime said. “While disappointing, it is in some ways consistent with the appeal in Log Cabin Republicans.”
In a statement, Witt said she’s “thrilled” to be able to resume her service in the Air Force and said the people in her unit “are like family members.”
“Thousands of men and women who are gay and lesbian honorably serve this country in our military,” she said. “Many people forget that the U.S. military is the most diverse workforce in the world — we are extremely versed in adaptation.”
According to the ACLU of Washington, which represented Witt in the litigation, Witt will be the first openly gay person to serve in the military due to a court order.
NeJaime said he thinks the Obama administration’s decision not to seek a stay on Witt’s reinstatement as it appeals the case is the result of pressure to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
“Given all the pressure on the administration in light of the failed attempts to repeal [‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’], it seems appropriate that the government would not seek to prevent Major Witt’s service pending appeal,” NeJaime said.
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.
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Federal judge scraps trans-inclusive workplace discrimination protections
