National
Obama touts LGBT achievements at White House reception
POTUS pledges to be LGBT advocate as long as he’s president
President Obama addresses White House Pride event attendees (Blade file by Michael Key)
President Obama pledged at this year’s White House Pride reception that he’ll continue to be an advocate for the LGBT community for as long as he’s in the White House, calling on attendees to dream big and “as openly as you want.”
“And as long as I have the privilege of being your president, I promise you, you won’t just have a friend in the White House, you will have a fellow advocate — for an America where no matter what you look like or where you come from or who you love, you can dream big dreams and dream as openly as you want,” Obama said.
The reception comes near the conclusion of Obama’s first term — and he wasn’t shy about touting his pro-LGBT achievements over the past three-a-half years, including repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and dropping defense of the Defense of Marriage Act in court. Repealing the military’s gay ban got the most applause from the audience; the runner up was dropping defense of DOMA in court.
One other significant action by Obama was also included in his remarks: his recent endorsement of marriage equality.
“And Americans may be still evolving when it comes to marriage equality — but as I’ve indicated personally, Michelle and I have made up our minds on this issue,” Obama said.
Attendees fill East Room for White House Pride reception (Blade photo by Michael Key)
An estimated 500 people came to the event, which took place in the East Room of the White House. A military band welcomed guests. Attendees munched on hors d’oeuvres served on tables adorned with red and pink roses.
Those who came largely consisted of LGBT advocates from around the country and LGBT people who held important roles in the federal government. Among the attendees were openly gay members of the Obama administration, including Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry, chair of the Export-Import Bank Fred Hochberg and chair of the Council on Environmental Quality Nancy Sutley. Also on hand: Gavin Newsom, lieutenant governor of California; gay actor Matt Bomer; and gay MSNBC anchor Thomas Roberts.
Obama noted that his administration has seen many achievements on LGBT rights as he encouraged attendees to continue pressing forward
“After decades of inaction and indifference, you have every reason and right to push, loudly and forcefully, for equality,” Obama said. “But three years ago, I also promised you this: I said that even if it took more time than we would like, we would see progress, we would see success, we would see real and lasting change. And together, that’s what we’re witnessing.”
Another success that Obama mentioned was the lifting of the HIV travel ban. The president acknowledged this action has enabled D.C. to host the International AIDS Conference in July — marking the first time the United States has hosted the conference since 1990.
While touting his accomplishments, Obama said “we’ve got more to do” and identified two LGBT issues that he said still need to be addressed further: passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and bullying in schools.
“Americans may feel more comfortable bringing their partners to the office barbecue, but we’re still waiting for a fully inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act,” Obama said. “Congress needs to pass that legislation, so that no American is ever fired simply for being gay or transgender.”
The reception marks the fourth time that Obama has hosted a Pride reception at the White House. In each of the three previous years of his administration, the president has held a reception to commemorate June as Pride month.
This year’s Pride reception marks the first time openly gay service members participated while in uniform. A handful wearing uniforms from the various military branches could be seen mingling in the crowd, although they declined to talk to reporters during the event.
Josh Seefried, co-director of OutServe, was among the active duty service members who participated and said afterward he was proud to attend.
“I was incredibly proud to be there not only with the people we worked side by side with to repeal ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ but for the first time with my military peers as well,” Seefried said. “It was surreal.The president’s speech showed leadership from the top and I’m proud to call him my commander-in-chief.”
Numerous attendees told the Washington Blade at the event they were thrilled to receive invitations and show their support for Obama as Election Day approaches.
Mark Segal, publisher of the Philadelphia Gay News (Blade photo by Michael Key)
Mark Segal, publisher of the Philadelphia Gay News, said it’s important for the LGBT community to work to re-elect Obama after he took a political risk by coming out for marriage equality.
“I think it’s interesting that’s he taken such a major chance in support for this community, and I hope this community answers that challenge,” Segal said.
Mary Burns, executive director of the Indianapolis, Ind., based Indiana Youth Group, said she was “ecstatic” to attend the reception and doesn’t know anyone else who’s been invited to the White House.
“Just because we got invited, we’re celebrities in Indianapolis,” Burns said. “It’s very significant to us. We’re fighting a constitutional amendment [against marriage equality] in Indiana, and so the fact that we can come to the White House for a reception just says that the government isn’t all against us.”
Attendees at the event universally said they don’t believe presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney would host a similar Pride event if he’s elected to the White House.
Michael Rogers, a gay D.C. activist and another attendee at the reception, said he doubts there would be any LGBT advances under a Romney administration.
“He’s so bound to the right-wing, especially in a first term that you just won’t see anything,” Rogers said. “You’ll see his social policy pushed off on some right-winger and [Romney will] care about destroying the economy. What they want to create is apartheid; they want to hold all the money for the rich, white people when more and more the country is becoming people of color and more diversity.”
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), one of the members of Congress who was in attendance, expressed satisfaction with Obama’s inclusion of marriage equality in his speech — but was particularly happy Obama mentioned a trans-inclusive ENDA in his remarks.
“A few years ago, there was a major rift in the Democratic caucus, and in the gay community,” Nadler said. “When we put a bill on the floor for ENDA, it was not inclusive, and you wouldn’t do that today. Compare that a few years ago to today, when the president specifically mentioned an inclusive ENDA, and the president specifically comes out in favor of repealing DOMA and in favor of marriage equality. That’s tremendous change.”
Some LGBT advocates used the occasion of the White House Pride reception to press Obama to take administrative action against workplace discrimination against LGBT people.
Jacob Tobia, a gay 20-year-old student from Duke University, sought to deliver a letter to Obama calling on him to issue an executive order requiring federal contractors to have non-discrimination policies based on sexual orientation and gender identity. In April, the White House announced it wouldn’t issue such a directive at this time, but advocates have continued to press the administration.
Tobia, director of LGBTQ Policy for Duke student government, said he spoke briefly with the president following his remarks, but the message was taken by an aide.
“I don’t know if it’ll actually get to the president; I hope it will,” Tobia said. “But I shook his hand and got to say, ‘Mr. President, I wrote you a letter about the executive order, and I hope you’ll get a chance to read it.’ He said, ‘OK.'”
Tobia said he feels the executive order would help him personally because he resides in a state with no law protecting LGBT people against discrimination.
“It’s a very good possibility that I could be working in my home state and someone could give me my two weeks and say, ‘You’re fired,’ because I’m gay,” Tobia said. “With the job market the way it is, it’s really scary that I could be fired from my job just for being gay.”
The reception took place on the same day that Obama issued an executive order along the lines of the DREAM Act to protect young, undocumented immigrants pursuing college education or military service from deportation. According to the Associated Press, a few hundred young people rallied before the White House in support of the move before the reception started.
State Department
State Department implements anti-trans bathroom policy
Memo notes directive corresponds with White House executive order
The State Department on April 20 announced employees cannot use bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity.
The Daily Signal, a conservative news website, reported the State Department announced the new policy in a memo titled “Updates Regarding Biological Sex and Intimate Spaces, Including Restrooms.”
The State Department has not responded to the Washington Blade’s request for comment on the directive.
“The administration affirms that there are two sexes — male and female — and that federal facilities should operate on this objective and longstanding basis to ensure consistency, privacy, and safety in shared spaces,” State Department spokesperson Tommy Piggot told the Daily Signal. “In line with President Trump’s executive order this provides clear, uniform guidance to the department by grounding policy in biological sex as determined at birth.”
President Donald Trump shortly after he took office in January 2025 issued an executive order that directed the federal government to only recognize two genders: male and female. The sweeping directive also ordered federal government agencies to “effectuate this policy by taking appropriate action to ensure that intimate spaces designated for women, girls, or females (or for men, boys, or males) are designated by sex and not identity.”
The Daily Signal notes the new State Department policy “does not prohibit single-occupancy restrooms.”
National
I’m telling the scared little girl I once was it’s okay to feel free
This week is Lesbian Visibility Week
Uncloseted Media published this article on April 23.
By SOPHIE HOLLAND | At 13 years old, I remember looking in the mirror in my Toronto bathroom and thinking, “Yeah, I’m a lesbian.” At the time, I thought it was a dirty word. Thinking back, it could be because the first time I heard it was when a family member said, “I don’t know what a lesbian is, they are like aliens.”
And although I walked around in camouflage Crocs with a rainbow My Little Pony charm, plaid knee-length shorts and a shark tooth necklace (yes, these are all, in my opinion, stereotypically lesbian apparel!), I didn’t feel like I fit the mold. The longer I thought about it, the worse I felt, so I buried my feelings deep inside.
Now I am 25, and I have been out since I was 22. Three years ago, I never could have imagined that I’d be working for a queer news publication and celebrating Lesbian Visibility Week, an annual event meant to honor and uplift lesbian perspectives and highlight the hardships our community faces. To me, LVW is so important because, frankly, it has been an absolute shit show getting here, to a place where I feel love and joy most days.
I think back to the frustration of constantly being asked, “Do you have a boyfriend?” Of watching princess movies and seeing a broken girl only find herself when her prince charming arrives. I remember listening to music that was always about heterosexual relationships. I remember feeling left out in high school when, one by one, my friends got boyfriends.
I tried the boyfriend, and I tried really hard for it to work at a large detriment to my wellbeing. I brainwashed myself into thinking I was probably bisexual, which I told my closest friends around 16 and unsuccessfully told my parents at the same age. I was probably subconsciously using this as a litmus test of their acceptance and to soothe the anxiety I felt around my sexuality.
Learning to love who I am did not only come from me unraveling my internalized lesbophobia and dissecting the oppressive societal messages of heteronormativity. It came from meeting an awesome community of lesbians and queers. I found people who understood my worldview and who showed me the ropes. I no longer had to stutter over concepts like lesbian loneliness or my frustration with misogynistic straight men.
They all just got it.
Without this community, I am not sure if I could be as warm and confident in myself as I am today.
And while I still experience homophobia, like being spat on while walking with an ex in downtown Toronto or having a stranger yell in my face “Are you fucking lesbians?” in Kensington Market, the joy and love still outweighs the nasty.
So, as the sentimental dyke that I have become, I decided to ask a set of lesbians in my orbit — including my friends as well as Uncloseted staffers, board members and followers — if they would share a little bit about what makes them love being a lesbian. And now, I can share it with all of you. Here they are. Happy LVW!
Timi Sotire
Falling in love with her was a reset. I felt like a kid again, hopeful about the future. We’ve had to overcome many obstacles to be together, but I’d choose her in every lifetime. I was sick with a long-term health condition when we met, and hanging out with Sophia really helped me with my recovery after my surgery.
Bella Sayegh
Being a lesbian is one of the most beautiful things in the world. To be authentically yourself in resistance and joy is so special within the lesbian community.
Parker Wales
When I met Liv, I finally understood why almost every song is about love.
Gillian Kilgour
There is no connection quite as perfect as between lesbians, no one sees me like my lesbians do.
Chyna Price
There’s many things I love about being a lesbian. But here are my top three:
- There’s just a deeper understanding when it comes to being loved by another woman.
- The next one would be the sense of community, especially being a POC masculine-presenting lesbian. I don’t feel like I’m cosplaying as someone else like I felt like I was doing before I came out.
- There’s so much history going back to the 1800s on how we found and fought for our love. That fight makes me proud because it shows me … that we’ve [found] ways to express our love even when it was misunderstood, illegal and deemed as madness.
Hope Pisoni
Before I knew I was a lesbian, romantic relationships seemed suffocating — it felt like everyone would expect me to act my part in the meticulous performance that is heterosexuality. But meeting my spouse and discovering our identities together showed me just how freeing it could be to love without a script to follow.
Leital Molad
It was the joy of watching the New York Sirens defeat the Toronto Sceptres at our first professional women’s hockey game — surrounded by hundreds (maybe thousands?) of cheering lesbians.
Angela Earl
I spent years building a life that looked right. But I never felt settled, and eventually I started asking what would actually make me happy. Coming out was about more than who I love, it was letting go of everything I was told to be. The last few years have felt like coming home to a life that had been waiting for me.
Tali Bray
What I love about being a lesbian is what I love about being in love … the wonder and joy of “oh, this is what it’s supposed to feel like.” I love moving through the world with women.
Izzy Stokes
I didn’t fall in love until I realized that queerness was an option. My queer friends have helped me see so much more than I grew up seeing. I’m so proud of us, and I’m so grateful for my lesbian community.
Nandika Chatterjee
When I met my fiancée is when I started to feel most like myself. That meant loving myself for who I am and embracing my identity as a lesbian. I felt free in a way I have never before. That’s the long and short of it.
Liz Lucking
The love and joy of being a lesbian is getting to live the life I dreamed of but never thought I would get to have!
Reflections
As I read these beautiful entries, it’s not lost on me that we’re still living in a world where lesbians are more likely to struggle with maternity problems, fetishization, and compulsory heterosexuality — not to mention the intersectional pressures of racism from both inside and outside the queer community. That’s part of why, according to a 2024 survey, 22 percent of LGBTQ women have attempted suicide, and 66 percent have sought treatment for trauma.
So if you are a lesbian who isn’t out or doesn’t feel safe, I hope you read this and can glean some hope from these messages. So when you look in the mirror, you know that it’s okay to release the weight — which can feel so heavy — of a heteronormative world.
We still have a long fight until all lesbians can feel safe to be themselves, but this is a community that does not back away from the tough, from the joy, from being loud and from all the other things that it takes to start a small revolution.
Hell yeah, lesbians! Here’s to you.
*I am signing off with my cat on my lap and a pride flag over my head <3.
Cuba
Trans parent charged with kidnapping, allegedly fled to Cuba with child
Cuban authorities helped locate Rose Inessa-Ethington
Federal authorities have charged a transgender woman with kidnapping after she allegedly fled to Cuba with her 10-year-old child.
An affidavit that Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agent Jennifer Waterfield filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Utah on April 16 notes the child is a “biological male who identifies as a female” and “splits time living with divorced parents who share custody” in Cache County, Utah.
Waterfield notes the child on March 28 “was supposed to be traveling by car to” Calgary, Alberta, “for a planned camping trip with his transgender mother, Rose Inessa-Ethington, Rose’s partner, Blue Inessa-Ethington, and Blue’s 3-year-old child.”
The affidavit notes the group instead flew from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Mexico City on March 29. Waterfield writes the Inessa-Ethingtons and the two children then flew from Mérida, Mexico, to Havana on April 1.
The 10-year-old child called her biological mother on March 28 after they arrived in Canada. The custody agreement, according to the affidavit, required Rose Inessa-Ethington to return the child to her former spouse on April 3.
“Interviews of MV [Minor Victim] 1’s family members provided significant concerns for MV 1’s well-being, as MV 1 was born a male, however, identifies as a female child, which is largely believed to be due to manipulation by Rose Inessa-Ethington,” reads the affidavit. “Concerns exist that MV 1 was transported to Cuba for gender reassignment surgery prior to puberty.”
The affidavit indicates authorities found a note in the Inessa-Ethingtons’ home with “instruction from a mental health therapist located in Washington, D.C., including instruction to send the therapist the $10,000.00 and instructions on gender-affirming medical care for children.”
The affidavit does not identify the specific “mental health therapist” in D.C.
A Utah judge on April 13 ordered Rose Inessa-Ethington to “immediately” return the child to her former spouse. The former spouse also received sole custody.
“Your affiant believes that due to the extensive planning and preparation exhibited by both Rose Inessa-Ethington and Blue Inessa-Ethington to isolate MV 1 and take MV 1 to Havana, Cuba, without notifying or requesting permission from MV 1’s mother indicates they are likely not planning to return to the United States,” wrote Waterfield.
The affidavit notes Cuban authorities found the Inessa-Ethingtons and the child.
A press release the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah issued notes the Inessa-Ethingtons “were deported from Cuba” on Monday “with the assistance of the FBI.”
The couple has been charged with International Parental Kidnapping. The Inessa-Ethingtons were arraigned in Richmond, Va., on Monday. The press release notes a federal court in Salt Lake City will soon handle the case.
The New York Times reported the child is now back with their biological mother.
“We are grateful to law enforcement for working swiftly to return the child to the biological mother,” said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Melissa Holyoak of the District of Utah in the press release.
The case is unfolding against the backdrop of increased tensions between Washington and Havana after U.S. forces on Jan. 3 seized now former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
President Donald Trump shortly after he took office in January 2025 issued an executive order that directed the federal government to only recognize two genders: male and female. A second White House directive banned federally-funded gender-affirming care for anyone under 19.
The U.S. Supreme Court last year in the Skrmetti decision upheld a Tennessee law that bans gender-affirming care for minors.
Cuba’s national health care system has offered free sex-reassignment surgeries since 2008.
Activists who are critical of Mariela Castro, the daughter of former President Raúl Castro who spearheads LGBTQ issues as director of Cuba’s National Center for Sexual Education, have previously told the Washington Blade that access to these procedures is limited. The Blade on Wednesday asked a contact in Havana to clarify whether Cuban law currently allows minors to undergo sex-reassignment surgery.
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