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Marines prohibit anti-gay discrimination at spousal clubs

But change won’t affect Ft. Bragg controversy

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United States Marines, gay news, Washington Blade
United States Marines, gay news, Washington Blade

The Marine Corps has new policy prohibiting spousal clubs from discriminating against gay partners (Public domain photo by Charlie Chavez)

The Marine Corps has adopted a new policy requiring all spousal clubs operating on its installations to admit same-sex partners or face eviction, although the new policy doesn’t extend to a spouses’ club at North Carolina’s Ft. Bragg that has been the subject of controversy.

According to the Associated Press, the Marine Corps Commandant’s Staff Judge Advocate Major Gen. Vaughn Ary sent an email to legal offices throughout the service noting spousal clubs must adhere to a non-discrimination policy that includes various categories including gender. Ary reportedly said discrimination against same-sex couples would qualify as gender discrimination.

“We would interpret a spouses club’s decision to exclude a same-sex spouse as sexual discrimination because the exclusion was based upon the spouse’s sex,” the memo reportedly states.

Capt. Eric Flanagan, a Marine Corps spokesperson, told the Washington Blade the service can’t control the actions of independent organizations, but anticipates compliance.

“While the Marine Corps cannot directly control the actions of independent organizations such as spouses’ clubs, we expect that all who are interested in supporting Marine Corps Family Readiness would be welcome to participate and will be treated with dignity and respect,” Flanagan said.

The memo comes on the heels of controversy at the Association of Bragg Officers’ Spouses in Army’s Fort Bragg in North Carolina, which denied admission to a same-sex spouse. Ashley Broadway, the wife of Fort Bragg-based Army Lt. Col. Heather Mack, was denied admittance to that club.

The Marine Corps email reportedly refers to the controversy at the Army base and said the event had “caused quite a stir” cautioning, “We do not want a story like this developing in our backyard.”

Allyson Robinson, executive director of OutServe-SLDN, praised the new Marine Corps policy and urged Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to make a similar policy effective for all services within the U.S. military.

“The Marine Corps guidance issued today is a breakthrough and a clear indication that General Amos meant what he said when he promised Marines would lead the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,'” Robinson said. “Secretary Panetta should use his authority immediately to bring consistency across the services with regard to this issue and in doing so, a greater measure of equity to gay and lesbian service members and their families.”

The Defense Department didn’t respond in time for this posting to a request for comment on whether the Marine Corps policy would be extended across other services.

According to OutServe-SLDN, Broadway was notified in an email that Fort Bragg will issue “Friends of Bragg” passes to same-sex spouses that show a marriage certificate and whose military spouse sponsors them. According to the organization, that pass — which is specific to Fort Bragg — will allow the spouses access to the installation without going through the inspection lane, but won’t however, allow shopping privileges at the post exchange or commissary, nor any other service granted to military dependents. There’s no indication that the Association of Bragg Officers’ Spouses will grant membership based on this “Friends” pass.

“The ‘consolation prize’ offered by Ft. Bragg’s leaders to Ashley Broadway and others does nothing to remedy the situation at hand — the ongoing discrimination by the Association of Bragg Officers’ Spouses — nor does it truly advance equity for gay and lesbian service members and their families,” Robinson said. “Ft. Bragg had the opportunity to lead here. Instead, its leaders delayed, equivocated and made excuses. Now that opportunity is lost.”

LGBT advocates have been calling for a secretarial directive to implement certain benefits for troops with same-sex partners — such as joint duty assignments, issuance of military IDs, use of the commissary and family housing — which are offered to troops with opposite-sex spouses. The Pentagon has said it has been examining this issue since “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was lifted in 2011, but no action has been taken.

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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

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(Washington Blade photo by Michael K. Lavers)

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.

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National

Medical groups file lawsuit over Trump deletion of health information

Crucial datasets included LGBTQ, HIV resources

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HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is named as a defendant in the lawsuit. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

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.

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U.S. Federal Courts

Federal judge scraps trans-inclusive workplace discrimination protections

Ruling appears to contradict US Supreme Court precedent

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Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas (Screen capture: YouTube)

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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