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Anti-gay briefs ‘mischaracterized’ study

Child Trends says its research doesn’t pertain to same-sex parents

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Paul Clement, gay news, Washington Blade
Paul Clement, gay news, Washington Blade

Former U.S. solicitor general Paul Clement filed the anti-gay DOMA brief (Public domain photo)

Attorneys who submitted anti-gay briefs to the Supreme Court in favor of California’s Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act are continuing the mischaracterization of a 2002 study on child development to suggest same-sex parents are less fit than opposite-sex parents, according to the non-profit that produced the study.

The 2002 study — which is is referenced in both the DOMA and Prop 8 briefs filed on Tuesday — is titled “Marriage from a Child’s Perspective: How Does Family Structure Affect Children and What Can We Do About It?” and was produced by the D.C.-based non-profit Child Trends, an organization that seeks to improve the lives of children by through research.

Carol Emig, president of Child Trends, said in a statement to the Washington Blade that attorneys who wrote these briefs misconstrued the group’s study in arguments against same-sex marriage because the findings say nothing about the quality of life for children raised by same-sex parents.

“The Child Trends brief in question summarizes research conducted in 2002, when same-sex parents were not identified in large national surveys,” Emig said. “Therefore, no conclusions can be drawn from this research about the well-being of children raised by same-sex parents.”

Emig added, “We have pointed this out repeatedly, yet to our dismay we continue to see our 2002 research mischaracterized by some opponents of same-sex marriage.”

Child Trends’ study concludes, among other things, that “the family structure that helps children the most is a family headed by two biological parents.” The study makes references to children raised by single parents and stepparents, but no explicit reference to same-sex parents is found in the report.

In the DOMA brief, signed by attorneys House General Counsel Kerry Kircher and former U.S. solicitor general Paul Clement, the Child Trends study is cited on page 47 as part of an argument that having DOMA on the books encourages childrearing by biological parents.

“Of course, only relationships between opposite-sex couples can result in children being raised by both of their biological parents,” the brief adds. “Therefore, when government offers special encouragement and support for relationships that can result in mothers and fathers jointly raising their biological children, it rationally furthers its legitimate interest in promoting this type of family structure in a way that extending similar regulation to other relationships would not.”

In the Prop 8 brief, signed by lead attorneys with ProtectMarriage.com, Andrew Pugno and Charles Cooper, the Child Trends study is referenced on page 37 as “a leading survey of social science research” under the argument that Proposition 8 furthers responsible procreation and child bearing.

“Because same-sex relationships cannot naturally produce offspring, they do not implicate the State’s interest in responsible procreation and childrearing in the same way that opposite-sex relationships do,” the brief states.

Attorneys affiliated with ProtectMarriage.com and the House Republican-led Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group didn’t respond to the Blade’s request for comment on the apparent misuse of the study in their legal briefs. The DOMA brief was filed in the case of Windsor v. United States and the Prop 8 brief was filed in the case of Hollingsworth v. Perry.

The reference to the study isn’t the first time anti-gay forces have referenced that study as part of their argument against same-sex marriage, nor is this the first time that Child Trends has objected to use of its research for anti-gay purposes.

In his 136-page ruling against Prop 8 issued in 2010, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker tore into David Blankenhorn, president of the Institute for American Values, for relying on the Child Trends study among others during testimony as evidence that parenting by same-sex parents is inadequate.

“Blankenhorn’s conclusion that married biological parents provide a better family form than married non-biological parents is not supported by the evidence on which he relied because the evidence does not, and does not claim to, compare biological to non-biological parents,” Walker writes.

David Blankenhorn, also citied the Child Trends brief as part of a 2008 essay titled “Gay marriage deprives children,” in September 2008 when Proposition 8 was headed for the ballot. In a letter to the editor, Emig also objected to the use of her group’s study for that argument.

“In research studies, the number of gay parents, even in large national surveys, has been too small to allow for separate analyses,” Emig wrote. “What is needed is a large-scale study of a representative sample of same-sex couples. Clearly, a better understanding of the diversity, strengths, and challenges faced by varied types of families is needed to better inform debates such as this one.”

While opposing marriage equality at the time, Blankenhorn has since reversed his views on same-sex marriage and now accepts it.

Similar objections were voiced in 2012 by Child Trends in the Kennebec Journal when Protect Marriage Maine brought up the study during the campaign to legalize same-sex marriage at the ballot in Maine and in the Minneapolis Star Tribune when Minnesota for Marriage cited the study as a reason for passing the failed anti-gay marriage amendment there.

Jon Davidson, legal director at Lambda Legal, said the citing of this research in the Prop 8 and DOMA briefs is “dishonest, shameful, and, in my view, unprofessional.”

“These misrepresentations have not only been pointed out by the researchers before, but have been repeatedly debunked by the party and amicus briefs in these cases — and in expert testimony at trial in Perry and in expert witness declarations in Windsor — yet the attorneys fighting against marriage equality continue to baldly misrepresent the actual findings of this and the other research on which they purport to rely,” Davidson said.

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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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