National
Protesters gather to support Manning
Gay service member accused in Wikileaks scandal; Quantico demonstration held


Several hundred protesters gathered Sunday at Quantico, where PFC Bradley Manning is being held in connection with the Wikileaks scandal. This photo was taken at an earlier demonstration demanding Manning’s release at the White House. (Photo by Diane Perlman)
There were many memorable images from last Sunday’s protest aimed at calling attention to the plight of a gay service member accused of treason by the federal government, but two images stood out above all others.
The line of riot police, hooded with glass visors and carrying truncheons and heavy shields, standing silent at first, shoulder to shoulder, buffed out with padded body armor, flanked by other riot police with lunging dogs, and other hulking men carrying automatic weapons, and even an armored Humvee, its engine running, and the full line now several hundred strong.
The other image appeared peaceful. A line of demonstrators walking forward, toward the police, linking their arms also, but singing while walking down Virginia Route 1, not carrying weapons but bouquets, to deliver flowers to the foot of the Iwo Jima monument there, the replica statue at the gates of the Quantico Marine Corps Base.
MORE IN THE BLADE: SUPPORTERS WORTY ABOUT TORTURE IN BRADLEY MANNING DETENTION
That’s where PFC Bradley Manning has been held in solitary confinement for eight months in pre-trial detention, waiting for the charges against him to be presented, including one carrying the death penalty. Manning is the accused whistleblower, the alleged source of the explosive Wikileaks revelations from secret documents released by Julian Assange, that detail case after case of alleged U.S. government misconduct.
Manning, a gay man, is accused of “aiding the enemy,” and has been “tortured” while in custody, according to his attorney, in an alleged attempt to wring a confession from him. A court martial could lead to life in prison or possibly execution.
About 500 protesters chanting “Free Bradley Manning” had met several hours earlier on a muddy field a few hundred yards away from the monument and the gate, now both walled off by police barriers to prevent the crowd from entering the base.
It began as demonstrations usually do, with a raised platform, and microphones and speakers, amid banners and placards. Speakers included Marine Corps veteran and famed Vietnam War-era whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, who released to Richard Nixon’s great embarrassment the Pentagon Papers; retired Marine Corps Captain David McMichael, now 83 but still ramrod straight, whose last post was as a company commander at Quantico; Army Colonel, retired after 29 years in uniform, and former State Department official, Ann Wright; and Manning’s close personal friend, David House, an expert on information economics, who met Manning in January 2010 at an open-house meeting of a group of computer technology enthusiasts at Boston University.
Manning’s arrest as a suspect accused of handing over 250,000 U.S. diplomatic cables to Wikileaks, came in May 2010 when he had returned to his duty station as an Army intelligence analyst stationed with a combat team near Baghdad. Those charges came in July last year, updated this month with further charges including the capital one of “aiding the enemy.” The first of the Wikileaks cables were published in February 2010, with newspapers including the New York Times publishing the rest from November onward.
Manning has never said he was the source for the documents, written by 250 embassies and consulates in 180 countries, which had been downloaded from SIPRNet, the classified State Department computer deposit for diplomatic cables. But he is alleged to have contacted a former computer hacker, Adrian Lamo, and sent him several encrypted e-mails and then chatted with Lamo online. Lamo later told the FBI that Manning had basically said that he was the Wikileaks source.
Those documents included military war logs and documents from both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars as well as the so-called “Collateral Murder” video, shot from a U.S. military Apache helicopter gunship in July 2007 of an airstrike and published by Wikileaks in April 2010, showing the deaths of civilians including two journalists for the Reuters news agency.
Below are excerpts from some of Sunday’s speeches.
ELLSBERG:
“I feel shame as a Marine myself that members of the Marine Corps are torturing Bradley Manning by keeping him in solitary confinement 23 hours a day, and sometimes forcing him to sleep naked and stand in the nude for inspection …
“President Obama could stop that with one phone call,” continued the 72-year-old Ellsberg, as cries from the crowd of “yes, he can” echoed among other shouts of “shame.”
While saying that the burden of proof is on the authorities to prove that Manning passed the classified documents to Wikileaks, something Manning hasn’t admitted, Ellsberg declared of Manning that “if he did do what he’s charged with, then Bradley Manning is an American hero,” noting of himself, that “while this may sound self-serving or boastful, but I was the Bradley Manning of my day … I was called a traitor, as he is, and Bradley Manning is no more of a traitor than I was, and he’s not, and I’m not!”
McMICHAEL:
“Thank you all for being here, this has become a notorious event and cause celebre around the world.” He then expressed his personal “outrage at the way the prosecution of Bradley Manning is being conducted, and the harsh conditions in which he is being held, so severe as to violate both U.S. and international law, and you could call it torture.”
McMicheal read further from his letter to the president about Manning that “the lesser evil is not a good enough reason to support you again,” and that in 2012 he would, though “a loyal Democrat,” oppose Obama for re-election.
WRIGHT:
“I’m horrified at how a member of the U.S. military is being treated, right here at Quantico, and we want this stuff to stop! Let’s get Bradley Manning fair treatment while he’s in pre-trial detention, so he can get an honest trial, and he should be treated with respect” until his trial, instead of with “cruel and unusual punishment.”
HOUSE:
“It’s stuff like this that gives Bradley Manning hope, and when I tell him there are people like you in the ‘transparency’ movement, his eyes light up. If he’s guilty of the things he’s charged with, if he’s the man who released the Wikileaks documents, I consider him a hero of the highest order … and he is not an exception, as a whistleblower, but he is a herald of things to come. … I hope Barack Obama is listening to this!”
Later, House told the Blade that Manning “considers himself to be a very ethical person and an American patriot,” and that “he’s a very humble, intelligent and kind individual.”
After the speakers finished and the rally ended, an event orchestrated beforehand with police authorities, including those from the Virginia State Police and the Prince William County Police, allowed six activists, including Ellsberg, McMichael and Wright, to pass through police barriers, cross Route 1, and approach the Iwo Jima statue. However, they were kept back from entering Marine Corps Base property and were forced to toss their bouquets of red and white carnations through an opening onto the base of the statue.
Then they sat down, in the middle of the highway, and then, at the mournful sound of a bugler, the assembled crowd burst through the barriers and thronged onto the highway joining the six, and many of them also sat down. And for two hours the chants and songs and prayers were heard, until finally, after the protesters refused to vacate the intersection, the police moved in and arrested one by one about 30 of those still seated, including Ellsberg and Wright, on misdemeanor charges of unlawful assembly, and impeding access to the road.
Marine Col. Thomas V. Johnson, a spokesperson for the base, said access to the Iwo Jima memorial was denied because protest activity is not permitted on base grounds. But he also said that, “we’re pleased that people were able to express their First Amendment rights in a manner that did not infringe upon base property.”
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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