National
Top story of 2011: ‘Don’t Ask’ is history
Gay service members rejoin military, come out after anti-gay law disappears


President Obama signed the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ in December 2010, but it didn’t take effect until September 2011. (Blade photo by Michael Key)
The anti-gay law known as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” finally came to an end on Sept. 20 after prohibiting open gays from serving in the U.S. military for 18 years.
No other news event had as much impact on the LGBT community as the lifting of the ban — allowing an estimated 66,000 gay people to begin serving openly — which is why we’re naming the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” as the story of the year for 2011.
The law came to an end thanks to repeal legislation that President Obama signed into law in December 2010. The bill provided for an end to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” after 60 days passed following certification from the president, the defense secretary and the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
After months of training and preparing service members for open service, Obama and defense leaders sent notification to Congress that they had certified an end to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” on July 22. In accordance with the repeal legislation, the ban was lifted 60 days later from the books.
Alex Nicholson, executive director of Servicmembers United, said the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was the result of “persistent hard work of unwavering advocates, especially those who have been directly impacted by this issue, and some courageous politicians over the past six years.”
“As a result, those who continue to serve can sleep easier tonight knowing that they can no longer be arbitrarily fired because of their sexual orientation,” Nicholson said. “Justice has prevailed and ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ is dead.”
According to Servicemembers United, an estimated 14,346 service members were discharged under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” over the course of 18 years before the ban was lifted.
Aubrey Sarvis, executive director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, called the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” a “historic milestone along the journey to achieving LGBT equality in America’s military.”
“Thanks to veterans, active duty, leaders, allies and supporters everywhere, this is a monumental day for our service members and our nation,” Sarvis said. “Indeed, we have taken a tremendous leap forward for LGBT equality in the military.”
In the wake of lifting the ban, a number of service members who had previously kept their sexual orientation hidden made public the fact that they are gay. Air Force 1st Lt. Josh Seefried, co-director of the group OutServe who formerly went under the alias J.D. Smith, was among those who made his sexual orientation known.
Seefried, a New Jersey-based finance director for the Air Force, said during a news conference on Sept. 20 that being able to take part fully in the military family was particularly important to him.
“That’s what the military brags about so much is having that aspect of being part of the family, being part of the team,” Seefried said. “I almost resented the Air Force for not giving me that opportunity to be part of that team, not being able to bring someone to an event. Now I feel like I can go back to work and I can be part of that team now and actually be honest.”
Capt. Sarah Pezzat, a D.C.-based Marine Corps reservist who served in operations in Haiti, Iraq and Somalia, said at the same event that the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” made Sept. 20 feel markedly different than previous days.
“For me, it feels different because I’ve been waiting for this day for a long time,” Pezzat said. “I can post about it on Facebook, I can tell my co-workers if I want to what I did last weekend, things like that.”
The end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” preceded a number of other firsts for the U.S. military after the implementation of open service. For example, at the Marine Corps balls throughout the country where attendees celebrated the service’s 236th birthday, gay Marines attended with same-sex partners for the first time.
Observers have also said the end of the military’s ban would make gay service members more visible, and, in turn, build on efforts to advance same-sex marriage or employment non-discrimination protections for LGBT people.
Jeff Krehely, director of the LGBT research and communications project at the Center for American Progress, said prior to the lifting of the ban that open service would be significant for many Americans — not just those in the military.
“‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ repeal is huge and tremendous, but I think there are much larger implications for society because a lot of people really respect the military,” Krehely said.
The White House
Biden’s Pride month proclamation: ‘Our nation faces another inflection point’
States across the country have passed anti-LGBTQ laws

Just as the 1969 Stonewall riots marked a transformational time for LGBTQ civil rights in America, the country now faces another critical inflection point, President Joe Biden said in the White House’s proclamation Wednesday honoring Pride month.
This moment is precipitated by the wave of hateful anti-LGBTQ legislation moving through state and local legislatures across the country and amid the escalating violence and threats of violence against the community, the statement notes:
“In 2023 alone, state and local legislatures have already introduced over 600 hateful laws targeting the LGBTQI+ community. Books about LGBTQI+ people are being banned from libraries. Transgender youth in over a dozen states have had their medically necessary health care banned. Homophobic and transphobic vitriol spewed online has spilled over into real life, as armed hate groups intimidate people at Pride marches and drag performances, and threaten doctors’ offices and children’s hospitals that offer care to the LGBTQI+ community. Our hearts are heavy with grief for the loved ones we have lost to anti-LGBTQI+ violence.”
Biden drew parallels between the “LGBTQI+ protestors” who “bravely stood their ground” against the law enforcement dispatched to arrest them more than 50 years ago and the youth organizers leading walkouts in response to discriminatory education laws, along with the “young people and their parents [who] are demonstrating unimaginable courage by testifying in state capitols in defense of their basic rights.”
The statement reaffirms the Biden-Harris administration’s commitment to standing “proudly with the LGBTQI+ community in the enduring struggle for freedom, justice and equality,” chronicling some of the major steps the administration has taken on this front.
Biden highlighted his issuance, on his first day in office, of an executive order prohibiting anti-LGBTQ discrimination, along with his signage last year of the Respect for Marriage Act, which codified protects for the rights of same-sex couples that might otherwise be jeopardized by the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority.
The statement then noted the administration’s moves to protect LGBTQ youth by ordering federal agencies to: Combat conversion therapy, “end the crisis of homelessness among LGBTQI+ youth and adults,” and address anti-LGBTQ discrimination in foster care.
Meanwhile, Biden said, the Justice Department is fighting against discriminatory laws targeting transgender youth, while the U.S. Departments of Education and Health and Human Services have drafted rules that would better protect anti-LGBTQ discrimination “in healthcare, at school and in sports” and the White House is developing ways to combat online harassment and abuse that “disproportionately target LGBTQ people.”
Finally, the White House noted: Its rollout last year of the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline for LGBTQ youth, who can now reach specially trained counselors by dialing 988 and then three; the administration’s appointment of historic numbers of LGBTQ appointees at all levels of the federal government; and its repeal of bans preventing trans people from serving in the U.S. Armed Forces.
From passing federal nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ Americans via the Equality Act to addressing “the crisis of violence against transgender women and girls of color,” Biden acknowledged the work that lies ahead.
“This month and every month,” his proclamation concludes, “let us celebrate the pride that powers the movement for LGBTQI+ rights and commit to doing our part to help realize the promise of America, for all Americans.”
Pentagon
Defense secretary orders cancellation of drag show at Nev. Air Force base
Event was to have taken place at Nellis AFB on Thursday

A previously scheduled drag show to kick off Pride month on the sprawling Nellis Air Force Base, an advanced combat aviation training facility for the U.S. Air Force northeast of Las Vegas, was cancelled Wednesday according to a Pentagon official, after U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stepped in.
A Pentagon source familiar with the matter told the Washington Blade that Milley informed Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr., that it is not Pentagon policy to fund drag shows on bases and the show needed to be canceled or moved off base.
The issue over drag performances was a focus at a House Armed Services Committee hearing earlier this year on March 29, when anti-LGBTQ Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) demanded in an angry tone that Austin and Milley explain why drag queen story hours were being hosted on U.S. military installations. The Florida Republican mentioned bases in Montana, Nevada, Virginia and Germany.
In a highly publicized incident in May 2022, Stars and Stripes reported that the Commanding General of the 86th Airlift Wing at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany had a drag queen story time, that was to be held in honor of Pride month cancelled.
According to Stars and Stripes, the 86th Air Wing’s public affairs sent a statement to a radical-right anti-LGBTQ news outlet in Canada, the Post Millennial, which had requested comment to its article about the event and also accused the Air Force of pushing a more “woke” agenda among servicemen.
In a press release, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) took partial credit for the cancellation.
Rubio sent a letter to U.S. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall regarding the Air Force Library at Ramstein hosting a “Drag Queen Story Time” event for young children of servicemembers.
Rubio urged him to cancel the event, discipline the staff involved in planning and hosting the event and respond to questions on whether other installations both at home and around the world have done similar events. Following receipt of Rubio’s letter, the Air Force canceled the event.
“The last thing parents serving their nation overseas should be worried about, particularly in a theater with heightened geopolitical tensions, is whether their children are being exposed to sexually charged content simply because they visited their local library,” Rubio wrote.

A Pentagon official referring to the drag show at Nellis said Milley was visibly angry about the decision to host the event on base after being informed about it earlier this week.
The drag show was scheduled for Thursday, but Maj. Gen. Case A. Cunningham, the commander of the U.S. Air Force Warfare Center at Nellis was informed in the past few days that it must either be canceled or moved off base.
On May 23, Gaetz sent a letter to Austin and Milley, alleging that the “pervasive and persistent use of taxpayer dollars for drag events,” had a June 1 Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., event scheduled.
Gaetz went on to write that “Nellis Air Force Base has announced a so-called ‘family-friendly’ drag organized by the Nellis LGBTQ+ Pride Council for June 1, 2023. In this latest outright attack on children, this event is being advertised as having no minimum age requirement.”
In his letter Gaetz also demanded to know:
- Does the DoD feel it’s appropriate for children to attend a sexualized drag performance?
- Why are base commanders defying your intent and direction by facilitating drag events?
- If this event goes forward, whether on June 1 or a later scheduled date, please provide an explanation regarding your justification for why you allowed the event to take place.
According to a spokesperson for the U.S. Air Force Warfare Center, Nellis, in June 2021 the base had hosted a Pride month drag show titled “Drag-u-Nellis.” The spokesperson noted the 2021 show was intended to promote inclusivity and diversity.
Alabama
Ala. extends ban on transgender female athletes to universities
Republican Gov. Kay Ivey signed bill on Tuesday

Governor Kay Ivey on Tuesday signed House Bill 261, which limits transgender students to playing sports in public colleges and universities only with “their biological sex assigned at birth.”
“Look, if you are a biological male, you are not going to be competing in women’s and girls’ sports in Alabama. It’s about fairness, plain and simple,” said Ivey in a statement released by her office.
House Bill 261 was approved 26-4 in the Alabama Senate and 83-5 in the House of Representatives. In the vote in the House more than a dozen lawmakers abstained from the vote.
Ivey had previously signed legislation in 2021 banning trans female athletes from competing in K-12 girls sports. At the time she signed that bill the governor had noted that “Alabama remains committed to protecting female athletes at all levels and upholding the integrity of athletics.”
Carmarion D. Anderson-Harvey, Alabama state director of the Human Rights Campaign, said the legislation is part of a “systematic attack against LGBTQ+ people” in Alabama and elsewhere.
“In just two years, [Ivey] and extremist lawmakers in Alabama have passed four anti-LGBTQ+ bills. From dictating what bathrooms we can use to blatantly ignoring the actual problems in women’s sports, these politicians are making Alabama an increasingly hostile place for transgender people and the LGBTQ+ community as a whole,” Anderson-Harvey said.
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