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LGBT advocates outside Supreme Court remain ‘optimistic’

Same-sex couples on Monday gathered to await marriage decisions

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Proposition 8, Prop 8, DOMA, Defense of Marriage Act, Supreme Court, gay rights, gay marriage, same-sex marriage, marriage equality, gay news, Washington Blade

Activists held signs and a flag in front of the Supreme Court in hopes of a decision on the Proposition 8 and Defense of Marriage Act cases. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Same-sex marriage supporters who gathered outside the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said they remain hopeful the justices will strike down Californiaā€™s Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act.

ā€œWeā€™re hopeful and optimistic that even out of a conservative court is going to come a strong opinion for equality,ā€ Jonathan Lewis of Brookline, Mass., told the Washington Blade as he stood outside the court with his husband of nearly six years, Jonathan Adlar, and their 10-week-old son.

David Baker, a D.C. resident who is originally from Salt Lake City, held a sign outside the Supreme Court that read ā€œGay Mormon for marriage equality.ā€

He told the Blade shortly after he learned the justices would not issue a ruling on the Prop 8 and DOMA cases until at least Tuesday that he feels ā€œcivil marriage is a civil right.ā€ Baker, who is also a member of Affirmation, an LGBT Mormon group, added same-sex couples in Utah and other states without marriage rights for gays and lesbians would receive federal benefits if the justices strike down DOMA.

ā€œWhatā€™s going through my mind is a lot of hopes and prayers that things break our way ā€” that things break for the right side of history,ā€ Baker said.

Gays and lesbians can legally marry in nine states and D.C.

Delawareā€™s same-sex marriage law will take effect on July 1. Gays and lesbians in Minnesota and Rhode Island will be able to exchange vows as of August 1, while four Michigan lawmakers on Monday introduced a bill that would allow nuptials for same-sex couples in their state.

Supreme Court passersby largely support same-sex marriage

One man held a poster of a gay couple kissing with the word ā€œsodomyā€ written beneath it as he stood across the street from the Supreme Court on Monday as the decisions were announced. The vast majority of passersby and others who have gathered outside the court over the last week, however, have supported same-sex marriage.

ā€œIt will change everyoneā€™s lives, make it so much more fair and equitable,ā€ Mara McKennen of Richmond, Va., told the Blade on Friday as she watched Dennis Niekro and Paul Richmond of Columbus, Ohio, and 24 other same-sex couples marry at the Supreme Court.

Elizabeth North of Florida added she feels a decision that would strike down DOMA would help same-sex marriage advocates in the Sunshine State who last week launched a campaign to overturn a 2008 constitutional amendment that bans nuptials for gays and lesbians.

ā€œIt just gives us a leg to stand on,ā€ she told the Blade. ā€œIt gives us something to fight with.ā€

Gwenn Andrix, a transgender woman from Bowling Green, Ohio, who also traveled to D.C. on Friday to attend the mass same-sex wedding that took place outside the Supreme Court, agreed as she held LGBT and trans Pride flags.

ā€œIā€™m hoping they (the justices) move the country forward,ā€ she told the Blade.

Kris Perry, Sandy Stier, Paul Katami, Jeff Zarillo, Proposition 8, Prop 8, DOMA, Defense of Marriage Act, Supreme Court, gay rights, gay marriage, same-sex marriage, marriage equality, gay news, Washington Blade

Kris Perry and Sandy Stier and Paul Katami and Jeff Zarillo, plaintiffs in the Proposition 8 case, enter the Supreme Court. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Kris Perry and Sandy Stier and Paul Katami and Jeff Zarillo, plaintiffs in the Prop 8 case, did not speak to reporters as they left the Supreme Court with Ted Olson and David Boies and Human Rights Campaign President Chad Griffin, who co-founded the American Foundation for Equal Rights that filed the lawsuit against Californiaā€™s voter-approved same-sex marriage ban.

ā€œObviously we all want to get these rulings and are hopeful that theyā€™re going to be everything we want,ā€ Freedom to Marry President Evan Wolfson told the Blade on Monday as he left the Supreme Court. ā€œWhat we know is no matter what the court does, we have to keep pushing. And we have victory within reach as long as we keep reaching.ā€

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State Department

Transgender, nonbinary people file lawsuit against passport executive order

State Department banned from issuing passports with ‘X’ gender markers

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(Bigstock photo)

Seven transgender and nonbinary people on Feb. 7 filed a federal lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s executive order that bans the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers.

Ashton Orr, Zaya Perysian, Sawyer Soe, Chastain Anderson, Drew Hall, Bella Boe, and Reid Solomon-Lane are the plaintiffs in the class action lawsuit the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Massachusetts, and the private law firm Covington & Burling LPP filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. The lawsuit names Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio as defendants.

Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken in June 2021 announced the State Department would begin to issue gender-neutral passports and documents for American citizens who were born overseas.

Dana Zzyym, an intersex U.S. Navy veteran who identifies as nonbinary, in 2015 filed a federal lawsuit against the State Department after it denied their application for a passport with an ā€œXā€ gender marker. Zzyym in October 2021 received the first gender-neutral American passport.

The State Department policy took effect on April 11, 2022.

Trump signed the executive order that overturned it shortly after he took office on Jan. 20. Rubio later directed State Department personnel to ā€œsuspend any application requesting an ā€˜Xā€™ sex marker and do not take any further action pending additional guidance from the department.ā€  

ā€œThis guidance applies to all applications currently in progress and any future applications,” reads Rubio’s memo. “Guidance on existing passports containing an ā€˜Xā€™ sex marker will come via other channels.ā€

The lawsuit says Trump’s executive order is an “abrupt, discriminatory, and dangerous reversal of settled United States passport policy.” It also concludes the new policy is “unlawful and unconstitutional.”

“It discriminates against individuals based on their sex and, as to some, their transgender status,” reads the lawsuit. “It is motivated by impermissible animus. It cannot be justified under any level of judicial scrutiny, and it wrongly seeks to erase the reality that transgender, intersex, and nonbinary people exist today as they always have.”

Solomon-Lane, who lives in North Adams, Mass., with his spouse and their three children, in an ACLU press release says he has “lived virtually my entire adult life as a man” and “everyone in my personal and professional life knows me as a man, and any stranger on the street who encountered me would view me as a man.”

ā€œI thought that 18 years after transitioning, I would be able to live my life in safety and ease,” he said. “Now, as a married father of three, Trumpā€™s executive order and the ensuing passport policy have threatened that life of safety and ease.”

“If my passport were to reflect a sex designation that is inconsistent with who I am, I would be forcibly outed every time I used my passport for travel or identification, causing potential risk to my safety and my familyā€™s safety,ā€ added Solomon-Lane.

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Federal Government

Education Department moves to end support for trans students

Mental health services among programs that are in jeopardy

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The U.S. Department of Education headquarters in D.C. (Photo courtesy of the GSA/Education Department)

An email sent to employees at the U.S. Department of Education on Friday explains that “programs, contracts, policies, outward-facing media, regulations, and internal practices” will be reviewed and cut in cases where they ā€œfail to affirm the reality of biological sex.ā€

The move, which is of a piece with President Donald Trump’s executive orders restricting transgender rights, jeopardizes the future of initiatives at the agency like mental health services and support for students experiencing homelessness.

Along with external-facing work at the agency, the directive targets employee programs such as those administered by LGBTQ resource groups, in keeping with the Trump-Vance administration’s rollback of diversity, equity, and inclusion within the federal government.

In recent weeks, federal agencies had begun changing their documents, policies, and websites for purposes of compliance with the new administration’s first executive action targeting the trans community, ā€œDefending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.ā€

For instance, the Education Department had removed a webpage offering tips for schools to better support homeless LGBTQ youth, noted ProPublica, which broke the news of the “sweeping” changes announced in the email to DOE staff.

According to the news service, the directive further explains the administration’s position that ā€œThe deliberate subjugation of women and girls by means of gender ideology ā€” whether in intimate spaces, weaponized language, or American classrooms ā€” negated the civil rights of biological females and fostered distrust of our federal institutions.”

A U.S. Senate committee hearing will be held Thursday for Linda McMahon, Trump’s nominee for education secretary, who has been criticized by LGBTQ advocacy groups. GLAAD, for instance, notes that she helped to launch and currently chairs the board of a conservative think tank that “has campaigned against policies that support transgender rights in education.”

NBC News reported on Tuesday that Trump planned to issue an executive order this week to abolish the Education Department altogether.

While the president and his conservative allies in and outside the administration have repeatedly expressed plans to disband the agency, doing so would require approval from Congress.

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State Department

Protesters demand US fully restore PEPFAR funding

Activists blocked intersection outside State Department on Thursday

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HIV/AIDS activists block an intersection outside the State Department on Feb. 6, 2025. They were demanding the Trump-Vance administration to fully restore PEPFAR funding. (Photo courtesy of Housing Works)

Dozens of HIV/AIDS activists on Thursday protested outside the State Department and demanded U.S. officials fully restore President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief funding.

The activists ā€” members of Housing Works, Health GAP, and the Treatment Action Group ā€” blocked an intersection for an hour. Health GAP Executive Director Asia Russell told the Washington Blade that police did not make any arrests.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Jan. 24 directed State Department personnel to stop nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending for 90 days in response to an executive order that President Donald Trump signed after his inauguration. Rubio later issued a waiver that allows PEPFAR and other ā€œlife-saving humanitarian assistanceā€ programs to continue to operate during the freeze.

The Blade on Wednesday reported PEPFAR-funded programs in Kenya and other African countries have been forced to suspend services and even shut down because of a lack of U.S. funding.

ā€œPEPFAR is a program that has saved 26 million lives and changed the trajectory of the global HIV/AIDS epidemic,” said Housing Works CEO Charles King in a press release. “The recent freeze on its funding is not just a bureaucratic decision; it is a death sentence for millions who rely on these life-saving treatments. We cannot allow decades of progress to be undone. The U.S. must immediately reaffirm its commitment to global health and human dignity by restoring PEPFAR funding.” 

ā€œWe demand Secretary Rubio immediately reverse his deadly, illegal stop-work order, which has already disrupted life-saving HIV services worldwide,” added Russell. “Any waiver process is too little, too late.”

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