News
4 Dutch LGBT advocates arrested in Russia
First foreigners charged under anti-gay propaganda to minors ban
Groningen LGBT President Kris van der Veen (Photo courtesy of Kris van der Veen/Groningen LGBT Foundation)
Russian authorities on Sunday arrested four Dutch LGBT rights advocates for violating the country’s anti-gay propaganda law.
The Russian online newspaper Lenta reported that police detained the activists at a summer camp in the city of Murmansk in the northwestern part of the country during a human rights seminar in which a local LGBT advocacy group was participating. The publication said Kris van der Veen, president of LGBT Groningen, a Dutch LGBT advocacy organization, gave a lecture on gay rights.
Rolf Jurjens of LGBT Groningen confirmed to the Washington Blade from the Netherlands that authorities had arrested van der Veen in Murmansk on Sunday.
Jurjens said van der Veen and the three other Dutch LGBT rights advocates had traveled to the city to film a documentary about gay life in Russia. Local media reports indicate van der Veen interviewed a 17-year-old teenager before authorities took him and the three other activists into custody.
The four activists had been scheduled to appear in a Murmansk court earlier on Monday, but authorities have released them from custody.
Officials reportedly fined them 3,000 rubles ($92.80.)
They are also expected to eventually return to the Netherlands.
“We are still in Murmansk,” van der Veen wrote on his Facebook page in Dutch earlier on Monday. “It is about the documentary, gay propaganda. It is good, but it’s still very vague what’s next.”
Van der Veen and the three other LGBT Groningen members are the first foreigners charged under the “promotion of homosexuality” to minors ban that President Vladimir Putin signed into law in June.
Putin earlier this month signed a second bill that prohibits same-sex couples from other countries from adopting Russian children.
These two laws came into effect against the backdrop of increasing anti-LGBT discrimination and violence in Russia.
Two men in the southern Russia city of Volgograd and on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the country’s Far East have been killed during what local authorities have described as anti-gay attacks in recent months.
Police in St. Petersburg on June 29 arrested 40 LGBT activists and a handful of nationalists who challenged them during a gay rights rally. Authorities in the Russian capital on May 24 arrested 30 LGBT rights advocates who tried to stage a Pride celebration outside Moscow City Hall.
Members of Coming Out, a Russian LGBT advocacy group in St. Petersburg, will go on trial on Thursday under the country’s “foreign agent” law that came into effect last fall.
The U.S. State Department, the European Union and various human rights organizations have repeatedly criticized Russian lawmakers and Putin over their opposition to LGBT rights in the country. Actor Harvey Fierstein is among the growing number of those who have called for a boycott of the 2014 Winter Olympics scheduled to take place in Sochi in February.
“American and world leaders must speak out against Mr. Putin’s attacks and the violence they foster,” the actor and playwright wrote in an op-ed the New York Times published on July 21. “The Olympic Committee must demand the retraction of these laws under threat of boycott.”
“The United States places great importance on the protection of the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all people, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender persons around the world,” State Department spokesperson Noel Clay told the Blade in a statement on Monday. “We call on Russia to uphold its international commitments regarding freedom of assembly and freedom of expression.”
Jasmine Heiss of Amnesty International also criticized Russian authorities over the Dutch activists’ arrest.
“Ultimately, Amnesty International sees the legislation as an affront to free expression and an attack on minority rights, whether applied to Russian citizens or foreign tourists in Russia,” she said. “As the arrests showed, the legislation represents government sponsored intolerance and violates the prohibition of discrimination.”
The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
Congratulations to Gil Pontes III on his recent appointment to the Financial Advisory Board for the City of Wilton Manors, Fla. Upon being appointed he said, “I’m honored to join the Financial Advisory Board for the City of Wilton Manors at such an important moment for our community. In my role as Executive Director of the NextGen Chamber of Commerce, I spend much of my time focused on economic growth, fiscal sustainability, and the long-term competitiveness of emerging business leaders. I look forward to bringing that perspective to Wilton Manors — helping ensure responsible stewardship of public resources while supporting a vibrant, inclusive local economy.”
Pontes is a nonprofit executive with years of development, operations, budget, management, and strategic planning experience in 501(c)(3), 501(c)(4), and political organizations. Pontes is currently executive director of NextGen, Chamber of Commerce. NextGen Chamber’s mission is to “empower emerging business leaders by generating insights, encouraging engagement, and nurturing leadership development to shape the future economy.” Prior to that he served as managing director of The Nora Project, and director of development also at The Nora Project. He has held a number of other positions including Major Gifts Officer, Thundermist Health Center, and has worked in both real estate and banking including as Business Solutions Adviser, Ironwood Financial. For three years he was a Selectman, Town of Berkley, Mass. In that role, he managed HR and general governance for town government. There were 200+ staff and 6,500 constituents. He balanced a $20,000,000 budget annually, established an Economic Development Committee, and hired the first town administrator.
Pontes earned his bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth.
Kansas
ACLU sues Kansas over law invalidating trans residents’ IDs
A new Kansas bill requires transgender residents to have their driver’s licenses reflect their sex assigned at birth, invalidating current licenses.
Transgender people across Kansas received letters in the mail on Wednesday demanding the immediate surrender of their driver’s licenses following passage of one of the harshest transgender bathroom bans in the nation. Now the American Civil Liberties Union is filing a lawsuit to block the ban and protect transgender residents from what advocates describe as “sweeping” and “punitive” consequences.
Independent journalist Erin Reed broke the story Wednesday after lawmakers approved House Substitute for Senate Bill 244. In her reporting, Reed included a photo of the letter sent to transgender Kansans, requiring them to obtain a driver’s license that reflects their sex assigned at birth rather than the gender with which they identify.
According to the reporting, transgender Kansans must surrender their driver’s licenses and that their current credentials — regardless of expiration date — will be considered invalid upon the law’s publication. The move effectively nullifies previously issued identification documents, creating immediate uncertainty for those impacted.
House Substitute for Senate Bill 244 also stipulates that any transgender person caught driving without a valid license could face a class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine. That potential penalty adds a criminal dimension to what began as an administrative action. It also compounds the legal risks for transgender Kansans, as the state already requires county jails to house inmates according to sex assigned at birth — a policy that advocates say can place transgender detainees at heightened risk.
Beyond identification issues, SB 244 not only bans transgender people from using restrooms that match their gender identity in government buildings — including libraries, courthouses, state parks, hospitals, and interstate rest stops — with the possibility for criminal penalties, but also allows for what critics have described as a “bathroom bounty hunter” provision. The measure permits anyone who encounters a transgender person in a restroom — including potentially in private businesses — to sue them for large sums of money, dramatically expanding the scope of enforcement beyond government authorities.
The lawsuit challenging SB 244 was filed today in the District Court of Douglas County on behalf of anonymous plaintiffs Daniel Doe and Matthew Moe by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Kansas, and Ballard Spahr LLP. The complaint argues that SB 244 violates the Kansas Constitution’s protections for personal autonomy, privacy, equality under the law, due process, and freedom of speech.
Additionally, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a temporary restraining order on behalf of the anonymous plaintiffs, arguing that the order — followed by a temporary injunction — is necessary to prevent the “irreparable harm” that would result from SB 244.
State Rep. Abi Boatman, a Wichita Democrat and the only transgender member of the Kansas Legislature, told the Kansas City Star on Wednesday that “persecution is the point.”
“This legislation is a direct attack on the dignity and humanity of transgender Kansans,” said Monica Bennett, legal director of the ACLU of Kansas. “It undermines our state’s strong constitutional protections against government overreach and persecution.”
“SB 244 is a cruel and craven threat to public safety all in the name of fostering fear, division, and paranoia,” said Harper Seldin, senior staff attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Rights Project. “The invalidation of state-issued IDs threatens to out transgender people against their will every time they apply for a job, rent an apartment, or interact with police. Taken as a whole, SB 244 is a transparent attempt to deny transgender people autonomy over their own identities and push them out of public life altogether.”
“SB 244 presents a state-sanctioned attack on transgender people aimed at silencing, dehumanizing, and alienating Kansans whose gender identity does not conform to the state legislature’s preferences,” said Heather St. Clair, a Ballard Spahr litigator working on the case. “Ballard Spahr is committed to standing with the ACLU and the plaintiffs in fighting on behalf of transgender Kansans for a remedy against the injustices presented by SB 244, and is dedicated to protecting the constitutional rights jeopardized by this new law.”
National
After layoffs at Advocate, parent company acquires ‘Them’ from Conde Nast
Top editorial staff let go last week
Former staff members at the Advocate and Out magazines revealed that parent company Equalpride laid off a number of employees late last week.
Those let go included Advocate editor-in-chief Alex Cooper, Pride.com editor-in-chief Rachel Shatto, brand partnerships manager Erin Manley, community editor Marie-Adélina de la Ferriére, and Out magazine staff writers Moises Mendez and Bernardo Sim, according to a report in Hollywood Reporter.
Cooper, who joined the company in 2021, posted to social media that, “Few people have had the privilege of leading this legendary LGBTQ+ news outlet, and I’m deeply honored to have been one of them. To my team: thank you for the last four years. You’ve been the best. For those also affected today, please let me know how I can support you.”
The Advocate’s PR firm when reached by the Blade said it no longer represents the company. Emails to the Advocate went unanswered.
Equalpride on Friday announced it acquired “Them,” a digital LGBTQ outlet founded in 2017 by Conde Nast.
“Equalpride exists to elevate, celebrate and protect LGBTQ+ storytelling at scale,” Equalpride CEO Mark Berryhill said according to Hollywood Reporter. “By combining the strengths of our brands with this respected digital platform, we’re creating a unified ecosystem that delivers even more impact for our audiences, advertisers, and community partners.”
It’s not clear if “Them” staff would take over editorial responsibilities for the Advocate and Out.
Comings & Goings
Kansas passes bathroom bounty hunter bill
ACLU sues Kansas over law invalidating trans residents’ IDs
After layoffs at Advocate, parent company acquires ‘Them’ from Conde Nast
Spring into sold
New book profiles LGBTQ Ukrainians, documents war experiences
PHOTOS: Queen of Hearts
Two very different views of the State of the Union
Va. activists preparing campaign in support of repealing marriage amendment
