Politics
New Mexico AG won’t defend state marriage law
King latest to determine prohibition on same-sex marriage unconstitutional


New Mexico Attorney General Gary King won’t defend state law against a lawsuit marriage equality (Photo public domain)
The attorney general of New Mexico has become the latest chief legal authority in a state to declare he won’t defend its marriage law in court.
In a 29-page filing on Tuesday, Attorney General Gary King said New Mexico’s marriage law is unconstitutional because the state constitution’s guarantee of equal protection to citizens demands same-sex couples “be permitted to enjoy the benefits of marriage.”
“There is no doubt that Article II [Section] 18 of the New Mexico Constitution requires the state to treat equally any of its citizens seeking legal recognition of their marriage, and that any statutory scheme interfering with that guarantee is flatly unconstitutional,” King said.
King issued the opinion in the case of Hanna v. Salazar, a state lawsuit that the National Center for Lesbian Rights and the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico filed on behalf of Alexander Hanna and Yon Hudson, a Santa Fe couple seeking marriage rights.
Taking a line from the Obama administration’s views on the Defense of Marriage Act, King argues that same-sex couples should be permitted to marry in New Mexico because the marriage law should be subject to heightened scrutiny, or a greater assumption it’s unconstitutional. The opinion maintains gay people are a suspect class based on their history of discrimination and their political powerlessness.
King, who’s expected to run for governor, is the latest in a series of state attorneys general who have elected not to defend a state’s marriage law on the basis that it prohibits same-sex couples from marrying. Others are California Attorney General Kamala Harris and Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan. Most recently, Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane said she won’t defend her state’s marriage law against a lawsuit filed by American Civil Liberties Union.
Chris Stoll, a staff attorney for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, praised King for joining other attorneys general in deciding not to defend a law prohibiting same-sex couples from marrying.
“It’s great to see Attorney General King join many state officials around the country who have decided that excluding same-sex couples from marriage is indefensible under the constitution,” Stoll said. “These laws serve only to harm same-sex couples and demean their families and children while helping no one.”
The office of New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, a Republican who opposes same-sex marriage, didn’t respond to multiple requests from the Washington Blade to comment on King’s position.
But King’s opinion goes further than just determining that the state’s marriage law is unconstitutional. The filing also rejects an argument that same-sex marriage is already legal in New Mexico because the marriage law is gender neutral and doesn’t explicitly ban same-sex marriage.
King says the marriage law currently doesn’t allow same-sex marriage because the New Mexico’s statutory scheme uses both gender-specific and non-gender specific terms and because other states that had similar statutes determined gay couples can’t marry.
“State courts in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Minnesota have considered analogous statutory schemes and concluded a mix of gender-specific and gender-neutral terminology does not convey the right for same sex couples to marry,” King writes.
The position that same-sex marriage is already legal in New Mexico under current law was a view put forward by Santa Fe officials, including the city’s mayor, David Coss, as part of a resolution approved in March.
Further, the attorney general rejects an argument that the New Mexico Supreme Court should issue a writ of mandamus so that plaintiffs in the case can receive a marriage license before the lawsuit ends. The couple had a filed a petition for mandamus as part of the relief.
“Issuing a writ of mandamus would to Respondent would thus represent an expansion of the jurisdiction conferred by Article VI [Section 3] and presents the very real threat of overloading the court’s docket with mandamus actions concerning any dispute a party has with any local and county official: county tax assessment protests, local zoning disputes, and any other dispute concerning only county or local officials would all be fair game,” King writes.
The opinion comes on the heels of a request from NCLR and ACLU for the New Mexico Supreme Court to issue a different writ of mandamus and take up the case so that it doesn’t have to proceed through lower courts. Stoll said that petition before the court is still pending.
“It asks the court to hold that the New Mexico Constitution requires the state to permit same-sex couples to marry, and also to respect the marriages of those married in other states,” Stoll said. “That petition remains pending alongside the one the attorney responded to yesterday.”
Congress
Top Congressional Democrats reintroduce Equality Act on Trump’s 100th day in office
Legislation would codify federal LGBTQ-inclusive non-discrimination protections

In a unified display of support for LGBTQ rights on President Donald Trump’s 100th day in office, congressional Democrats, including leadership from the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, reintroduced the Equality Act on Tuesday.
The legislation, which would prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, codifying these protections into federal law in areas from jury service to housing and employment, faces an unlikely path to passage amid Republican control of both chambers of Congress along with the White House.
Speaking at a press conference on the grass across the drive from the Senate steps were Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), House Democratic Whip Katherine Clark (Mass.), U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (Wis.), who is the first out LGBTQ U.S. Senator, U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (Calif.), who is gay and chairs the Congressional Equality Caucus, U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas (N.H.), who is gay and is running for the U.S. Senate, U.S. Sen. Cory Booker (N.J.), and U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley (Ore.).
Also in attendance were U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride (Del.), who is the first transgender member of Congress, U.S. Rep. Dina Titus (Nev.), U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley (Ill.), and representatives from LGBTQ advocacy groups including the Human Rights Campaign and Advocates 4 Trans Equality.
Responding to a question from the Washington Blade on the decision to reintroduce the bill as Trump marks the hundredth day of his second term, Takano said, “I don’t know that there was a conscious decision,” but “it’s a beautiful day to stand up for equality. And, you know, I think the president is clearly hitting a wall that Americans are saying, many Americans are saying, ‘we didn’t vote for this.'”
A Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll released Sunday showed Trump’s approval rating in decline amid signs of major opposition to his agenda.
“Many Americans never voted for this, but many Americans, I mean, it’s a great day to remind them what is in the core of what is the right side of history, a more perfect union. This is the march for a more perfect union. That’s what most Americans believe in. And it’s a great day on this 100th day to remind our administration what the right side of history is.”
Merkley, when asked about the prospect of getting enough Republicans on board with the Equality Act to pass the measure, noted that, “If you can be against discrimination in employment, you can be against discrimination in financial contracts, you can be against discrimination in mortgages, in jury duty, you can be against discrimination in public accommodations and housing, and so we’re going to continue to remind our colleagues that discrimination is wrong.”
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which was sponsored by Merkley, was passed by the Senate in 2013 but languished in the House. The bill was ultimately broadened to become the Equality Act.
“As Speaker Nancy Pelosi has always taught me,” Takano added, “public sentiment is everything. Now is the moment to bring greater understanding and greater momentum, because, really, the Congress is a reflection of the people.”
“While we’re in a different place right this minute” compared to 2019 and 2021 when the Equality Act was passed by the House, Pelosi said she believes “there is an opportunity for corporate America to weigh in” and lobby the Senate to convince members of the need to enshrine federal anti-discrimination protections into law “so that people can fully participate.”
Politics
George Santos sentenced to 87 months in prison for fraud case
Judge: ‘You got elected with your words, most of which were lies.’

Disgraced former Republican congressman George Santos was sentenced to 87 months in prison on Friday, after pleading guilty last year to federal charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
“Mr. Santos, words have consequences,” said Judge Joanna Seybert of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. “You got elected with your words, most of which were lies.”
The first openly gay GOP member of Congress, Santos became a laughing stock after revelations came to light about his extensive history of fabricating and exaggerating details about his life and career.
His colleagues voted in December 2023 to expel him from Congress. An investigation by the U.S. House Ethics Committee found that Santos had used pilfered campaign funds for cosmetic procedures, designer fashion, and OnlyFans.
Federal prosecutors, however, found evidence that “Mr. Santos stole from donors, used his campaign account for personal purchases, inflated his fund-raising numbers, lied about his wealth on congressional documents and committed unemployment fraud,” per the New York Times.
The former congressman told the paper this week that he would not ask for a pardon. Despite Santos’s loyalty to President Donald Trump, the president has made no indication that he would intervene in his legal troubles.
Congress
Democratic lawmakers travel to El Salvador, demand information about gay Venezuelan asylum seeker
Congressman Robert Garcia led delegation

California Congressman Robert Garcia on Tuesday said the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador has agreed to ask the Salvadoran government about the well-being of a gay asylum seeker from Venezuela who remains incarcerated in the Central American country.
The Trump-Vance administration last month “forcibly removed” Andry Hernández Romero, a stylist who asked for asylum because of persecution he suffered because of his sexual orientation and political beliefs, and other Venezuelans from the U.S. and sent them to El Salvador.
The White House on Feb. 20 designated Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang, as an “international terrorist organization.” President Donald Trump on March 15 invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which the Associated Press notes allows the U.S. to deport “noncitizens without any legal recourse.”
Garcia told the Washington Blade that he and three other lawmakers — U.S. Reps. Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.), Maxine Dexter (D-Ore.), and Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.) — met with U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador William Duncan and embassy staffers in San Salvador, the Salvadoran capital.
“His lawyers haven’t heard from him since he was abducted during his asylum process,” said Garcia.
The gay California Democrat noted the embassy agreed to ask the Salvadoran government to “see how he (Hernández) is doing and to make sure he’s alive.”
“That’s important,” said Garcia. “They’ve agreed to that … we’re hopeful that we get some word, and that will be very comforting to his family and of course to his legal team.”

Garcia, Frost, Dexter, and Ansari traveled to El Salvador days after House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.) denied their request to use committee funds for their trip.
“We went anyways,” said Garcia. “We’re not going to be intimidated by that.”
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on April 14 met with Trump at the White House. U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) three days later sat down with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who the Trump-Vance administration wrongfully deported to El Salvador on March 15.
Abrego was sent to the country’s Terrorism Confinement Center, a maximum-security prison known by the Spanish acronym CECOT. The Trump-Vance administration continues to defy a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that ordered it to “facilitate” Abrego’s return to the U.S.
Garcia, Frost, Dexter, and Ansari in a letter they sent a letter to Duncan and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday demanded “access to” Hernández, who they note “may be imprisoned at” CECOT. A State Department spokesperson referred the Blade to the Salvadoran government in response to questions about “detainees” in the country.
Garcia said the majority of those in CECOT who the White House deported to El Salvador do not have criminal records.
“They can say what they want, but if they’re not presenting evidence, if a judge isn’t sending people, and these people have their due process, I just don’t understand how we have a country without due process,” he told the Blade. “It’s just the bedrock of our democracy.”

Garcia said he and Frost, Dexter, and Ansari spoke with embassy staff, Salvadoran journalists and human rights activists and “anyone else who would listen” about Hernández. The California Democrat noted he and his colleagues also highlighted Abrego’s case.
“He (Hernández) was accepted for his asylum claim,” said Garcia. “He (Hernández) signed up for the asylum process on an app that we created for this very purpose, and then you get snatched up and taken to a foreign prison. It is unacceptable and inhumane and cruel and so it’s important that we elevate his story and his case.”
The Blade asked Garcia why the Trump-Vance administration is deporting people to El Salvador without due process.
“I honestly believe that he (Trump) is a master of dehumanizing people, and he wants to continue his horrendous campaign to dehumanize migrants and scare the American public and lie to the American public,” said Garcia.
The State Department spokesperson in response to the Blade’s request for comment referenced spokesperson Tammy Bruce’s comments about Van Hollen’s trip to El Salvador.
“These Congressional representatives would be better off focused on their own districts,” said the spokesperson. “Instead, they are concerned about non-U.S. citizens.”