National
Melissa Harris-Perry discusses voter suppression, marriage
Tulane University professor’s MSNBC show began in February
Melissa Harris-Perry (Photo courtesy of MSNBC)
MSNBC anchor Melissa Harris-Perry stressed during an interview with the Washington Blade last week that voter suppression efforts continue to impact transgender Americans.
“They don’t look like what their photo IDs are,” she said from New Orleans. “So if they are self-presenting in front of an election official and they have an ID that says male or female and they’re sort of gender self-presenting in a non-conforming way, of course you end up with the possibility of shame or embarrassment or not being believed to be who you are.”
Harris-Perry had been scheduled to moderate a town hall on voter suppression and discrimination during the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual Legislative Conference at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in D.C. on Sept. 20, but she remained in New Orleans after Hurricane Isaac destroyed her home late last month. Harris-Perry further stressed that another problem for trans voters who have undergone sex-reassignment surgery face is they don’t have birth certificates with names and gender markers that “are not informative of what their current life is.”
“All of those things impact the ability of people to have the kind of state-issued ID that is allowable in a lot of these states around voting,” she said. “And so the idea that a person would be a perfectly eligible American citizen who has an opinion about voting and is kept out of it because of those sorts of issues — it goes to the heart of helping us understand that these efforts are really voter suppression efforts, not efforts to keep the election process above board.”
Harris-Perry further credited Rev. Al Sharpton with bringing the issue of voter suppression to mainstream cable news. She applauded “The Nation” and other progressive and LGBT media outlets for their coverage of the issue, but Harris-Perry said that the broader conversation around it remains what she described as particularly narrow.
“Part of it is we get stuck in a historical framework around Jim Crow and our memory of Jim Crow or what we think Jim Crow was about was primarily about keeping black folks from the polls. And that’s both true, but also insufficient,” she said. “It also had the effect of keeping old people out, people without education, folks without resources of all kinds. It had a huge impact among poor whites in the U.S. south. I think we haven’t had a clear enough understanding of just how broad suppression is, how many different groups it impacts. And we have talked about it primarily as a race-based issue in order to keep black folks from voting from the black president. That is undoubtedly part of the story, but it’s also only part of the story. And I do worry that we keep ourselves from having a truly broad-based coalition that we could have if we were clearer about the impact that on women who marry and change their names, and the impact that this has on queer voters and the impact that this has on students as well on poor people, people with disabilities, older folks and black and brown people. It’s actually massive what these efforts to do in terms of limiting our democracy.”
Harris-Perry said she has a better understanding of the issue and its specific impact on trans people because she said her gender non-conforming niece frequently confronts questions when she presents herself as male, but her student ID lists her gender as female.
“Because I am tuned into that, I have a sense of it but I don’t think that it has been part of our civil rights framework to say wait a minute yes, race is important here, but here’s how race is at the intersection of all of these other identities as well,” said Harris-Perry. “We’re only just kind of getting to the back end of the third wave of the feminist struggle. So part of it is ignorance, but that’s only part of it. The other part of it is for many folks they are actively homophobic and disinterested in whether or not these sort of suppression efforts impact LGBT communities and as a matter of political strategy they think talking about it is a bad idea for building the coalitions they hope to build for social action. So the fact is there are four communities and black communities who are certainly happy to take it too far or are maybe insufficiently motivated by knowing that their fellow citizens who are gay and/or queer are also impacted by this. It just doesn’t move them politically.”
LGBT issues a frequent topic on Harris-Perry’s show
Harris-Perry has frequently discussed LGBT-specific issues on her eponymous show since it began in February.
Mara Keisling, executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, appeared on an hour-long segment called “Being Transgender in America” in April alongside author Kate Bornstein and trans New York City Council candidate Mel Wymore. Harris-Perry also interviewed Dr. Scout of the Fenway Institute’s Network for LGBT Health Equity in Boston who proposed to his girlfriend, Liz Margolies of the National LGBT Cancer Network, during the White House’s LGBT Pride month reception.
Harris-Perry also appeared in a video for the Human Rights Campaign’s Americans for Marriage Equality campaign in June. She said she has been a part of the movement for nuptials for same-sex couples “for a long time,” but she conceded she has what she described as a “deep ambivalence about marriage as the driving policy issue” after the repeal of the ban on openly gay and lesbian servicemembers.
“My husband is a civil rights advocate in the area of housing and we just see how important the state laws are in housing and education and in employment are and what a deep material impact they have,” said Harris-Perry. “Sometimes marriage feels symbolic comparatively to the impact that those kinds of material policies have on people’s lives. And so in certain ways, even though I’ve always been an advocate of marriage equality because anything else seems patently discriminatory and unfair, it hasn’t been important. And of course I support that, but here are my big issues of these other things.”
She said remarrying changed her perspective.
“I’ve been married and divorced. My joke was that divorce had cured me of marriage and part of why I had a lot of resistance to marriage at the top of the equation — I felt like it was sort of pushing that there’s only one kind of family and all of that, but then I made the decision to remarry and the fact is that’s all that i had to do. I just one day I decided I wanted to be married to my life-partner and I did,” said Harris-Perry. “I never had to justify it or explain it. I never had to petition anyone about it and in fact I experienced almost exclusively positive repercussions rather than any negative ones (and by that I mean from other people.) And it was such a reminder of how profound a privilege it is to be able to make decisions that are profoundly personal without the interference of government. We live in Louisiana where people cannot marry, and yet we could. It was such a reminder of how important that is, how important privacy is to our sense of equality and humanity that it became an even more deeply personal issue.”
Black voters “not going to be punishing” Obama over marriage
Harris-Perry spoke to the Blade less than two months before the presidential election. Voters in Maine, Maryland, Washington and Minnesota will also consider same-sex marriage ballot measures and a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban nuptials for gays and lesbians on Election Day.
She stressed that she feels that black voters will continue to support President Obama in spite of his support of marriage rights for same-sex couples.
She added she feels Obama’s position has actually caused others within the black community to evolve on the issue — the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s Board of Directors passed a resolution in support of marriage rights for same-sex couples less than two weeks after the president publicly backed it during an interview with ABC News’ Robin Roberts. Hip hop mogul Jay-Z and rapper 50 Cent subsequently backed the issue.
“It’s a signal to queer communities that this president is in a position where in a second term he will back-up this evolution in personal opinion with an additional evolution on policy,” said Harris-Perry. “Certainly with compared to his opponent, the choice is exceedingly clear now and there’s no doubt from that my perspective that’s helpful. This is a president who’s going to go down in history no matter what. From the moment he’s elected he was going to be in the history books, so let’s be in the history not on the side of the restriction of civil rights. It doesn’t really go that well for anybody, ever.”
Harris-Perry, who commutes to New York from New Orleans on the weekends for her show, remains a political science professor at Tulane University. “The Root” last week named her it’s most influential black person between 25-45, but she stressed living in the Big Easy and particularly in the city’s poor and predominantly African American 7th Ward helps her keep things in perspective.
“I said, ‘oh man that’s so great,’” said Harris-Perry, referring to “The Root” designation. “And I have been all over this city today and talked to a dozen people — everybody from the insurance adjusters to the woman I bought my pants over at the White House Black Market, and none of those people have any idea that I have a TV show. They do not care. And it is really lovely and humbling and extremely important to continue to live in a world where the things that matter to people are real-life issues rather than fame or status.”
Florida
Fla. Senate passes ‘Anti-Diversity’ bill that could repeal local LGBTQ protections
Bipartisan coalition urges Florida House to reject ‘extremism’ measure
The Florida Senate on March 4 voted 25-11 to approve an “Anti-Diversity in Local Government” bill that critics have called a sweeping and extreme measure that, among other things, could repeal local LGBTQ rights protections.
According to Equality Florida, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization, if approved by the Florida House of Representatives and signed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, the bill “would ban, repeal, and defund any local government programming, policy, or activity that provides ‘preferential treatment or special benefits’ or is designed or implemented’ with respect to race, color, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or gender identity.”
In a March 4 statement, Equality Florda added that the bill would also threaten city and county officials with removal from office “for activities vaguely labeled as DEI,” with only limited exceptions.
The Florida House was scheduled to vote on the bill on Monday, March 9, with opponents hopeful that a broad coalition of both Democratic and Republican lawmakers would secure enough votes to defeat the bill.
“Once again, Gov. DeSantis and Florida lawmakers are advancing one of the most sweeping and extreme bills in the country — this time threatening decades of local progress supporting diverse communities, including the LGBTQ community,” said Equality Florida Senior Political Director Joe Saunders. “This legislation is a sledgehammer aimed at cities and counties that recognize and address the diversity of the people they serve,” he said.
Among the LGBTQ organizations that could be adversely impacted by the bill is the highly acclaimed Stonewall National Museum, Archives and Library located in Fort Lauderdale.
Robert Kesten, the Stonewall organization’s president and CEO, told the Washington Blade the organization receives some funding from Broward County, in which Fort Lauderdale is located, and the city of Fort Lauderdale has provided support by purchasing tables at some of the museum’s fundraising events.
“Based on this legislation, hose things would be gone,” he said. “We also are based in a government building. So, we don’t know what potential side effects that could have.” He noted that the building in question is owned by Broward County and leased by Fort Lauderdale, with the bill’s vaguely worded provision making it unclear whether Stonewall would be forced to leave its building.
“It’s unknown, and we’re really in unchartered waters,” he said.
U.S. Capitol Police on Thursday arrested 13 HIV/AIDS activists in the Cannon House Office Building Rotunda.
The activists — members of Housing Works, Health GAP, and the Treatment Action Group — joined former PEPFAR staffers in demanding full funding of the program that President George W. Bush created in 2003. They chanted “AIDS cuts kill, PEPFAR now!” and unfurled banners from the Rotunda’s second floor that read “Trump and (Office of Management and Budget Director Russell) Vought kill people with AIDS worldwide,” “Over 200,000 deaths since January 2025,” and “Hands off PEPFAR” before their arrest.
(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
This protest is the latest against the Trump-Vance administration’s HIV/AIDS policies since it took office.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Jan. 28, 2025, issued a waiver that allowed PEPFAR and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during a freeze on nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending. HIV/AIDS service providers around the world with whom the Washington Blade has spoken say PEPFAR cuts and the loss of funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, which officially closed on July 1, 2025, has severely impacted their work.
The State Department last September announced PEPFAR will distribute lenacapavir in countries with high prevalence rates. Zambia is among the nations in which the breakthrough HIV prevention drug has arrived.
The New York Times last summer reported Vought “apportioned” only $2.9 billion of $6 billion that Congress set aside for PEPFAR for fiscal year 2025. (PEPFAR in the coming fiscal year will use funds allocated in fiscal year 2024.)
Bipartisan opposition in the U.S. Senate prompted the Trump-Vance administration last July withdraw a proposal to cut $400 million from PEPFAR’s budget. Vought on Aug. 29, 2025, said he would use a “pocket rescission” to cancel $4.9 billion for HIV/AIDS prevention and global health programs and other foreign aid assistance initiatives that Congress had already approved.
The White House in January announced an expansion of the global gag rule to ban U.S. foreign aid for groups that promote “gender ideology.” President Ronald Reagan in 1985 implemented the original regulation, also known as the “Mexico City” policy, which bans U.S. foreign aid for groups that support abortion and/or offer abortion-related services. The Council for Global Equality and other groups say the expanded rule will adversely impact HIV prevention efforts around the world.
A press release that Housing Works and Health GAP issued on Thursday notes more than $977 million “in appropriated PEPFAR funding for HIV prevention and treatment was unspent by the end of fiscal year (FY) 2025 — triple amount unspent at the end of FY 2024.”
“Activists predict this backlog will worsen rapidly in FY 2026 unless Congress immediately reasserts its Constitutionally-mandated oversight authority,” notes the press release.
The press release also indicates funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s PEPFAR programs “will run out” by April 1 because “only 45 percent of their FY26 funding has been transferred from the State Department.
“Unless funding is transferred immediately, CDC’s global HIV programs across sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and the Caribbean will grind to a halt,” notes the press release.
The activists demanded Trump, Vought, Rubio, and Congress do the following:
- Activists are calling for full obligation of appropriated PEPFAR funds and rejection of growing political interference in global and domestic HIV programs
- Immediately release already-appropriated, unobligated PEPFAR funds
- Break the blackout on PEPFAR data, so Congress and people with HIV know how funding is being spent and can program based on data
- Activists are calling for full obligation of appropriated PEPFAR funds and rejection of growing political interference in global and domestic HIV programs.
“PEPFAR has saved more than 26 million lives and changed the trajectory of an epidemic,” said Housing Works CEO Charles King. “However, the Trump administration’s decision, over the objection of Republicans in Congress, to freeze PEPFAR funding has caused decades of progress to come undone and has been a death sentence for people with HIV relying on life-saving treatment. The U.S. must immediately restore PEPFAR funding and regain our standing in the global fight against HIV.”
King is among the activists who were arrested.
(Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
Texas state Rep. James Talarico won a hard-fought primary Tuesday to become the state’s Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, defeating U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett in one of the year’s most closely watched and competitive Democratic contests.
Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian and three-term lawmaker from Round Rock, was declared the winner by the Associated Press early Wednesday morning after a closely tracked vote count that drew national attention.
“Tonight, the people of our state gave this country a little bit of hope,” Talarico told the AP. “And a little bit of hope is a dangerous thing.”
With 52.8% of the vote to Crockett’s 45.9%, Talarico secured the nomination outright, avoiding a runoff and capping months of sharp contrasts between the two candidates over strategy, messaging, and how best to compete statewide in Texas. Democrats hope the competitive primary — and the relatively narrow margin — signals growing momentum in a state that has not elected a Democrat to the U.S. Senate since 1988.
Talarico has long expressed support for the LGBTQ community, a position he highlights prominently on his campaign website. Under the “Issues” section, he directly addresses assumptions that might arise from his faith and background as a seminarian in a deeply conservative state.
“My faith in Jesus leads me to reject Christian Nationalism and commit myself to the project of democracy,” his website reads. “Because that’s the promise of America: a democracy where every person and every family — regardless of religion, race, gender, sexual orientation, or any other difference between us — can truly be free and live up to their full potential.”
Crockett struck a conciliatory tone following her defeat, emphasizing party unity ahead of November.
“This morning I called James and congratulated him on becoming the Senate nominee,” Crockett told Politico. “Texas is primed to turn blue and we must remain united because this is bigger than any one person. This is about the future of all 30 million Texans and getting America back on track.”
Talarico also drew national attention earlier in the race when “Late Show” host Stephen Colbert said he was initially unable to air an interview with the state legislator due to potential FCC concerns involving CBS. The episode sparked a broader political debate.
Brendan Carr, chair of the Federal Communications Commission, appointed by President Donald Trump, told reporters the controversy was a “hoax,” though he also acknowledged Talarico’s ability to harness the moment to build support as an underdog candidate. The interview was later released online and garnered millions of views, boosting Talarico’s national profile.
In November, Talarico will face the winner of the Republican primary between incumbent Sen. John Cornyn and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who have been locked in a bruising GOP contest. Rep. Wesley Hunt was also in the Republican primary field. The GOP race is expected to head to a May runoff.
In a joint statement, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chair Kirsten Gillibrand praised Talarico’s victory and framed him as a candidate capable of broad appeal.
“As an eighth-generation Texan, former middle school teacher, and Presbyterian seminarian, James will be a fighter for Texans from all walks of life and of all political stripes,” they said. “In November, Texans will elect a champion for working people: James Talarico.”
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