National
Phoenix mayor celebrates pro-LGBT ranking
Arizona capital receives perfect score in annual HRC index

Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton said extending rights to LGBT residents is good for his city’s economy.
“We’re a big city; we’re a young city; we’re a city that got hammered during the recession,” he told the Washington Blade in an interview this week. “I need every single person in my city to have every opportunity to be successful.”
Stanton spoke to the Blade a day after the Human Rights Campaign released its annual index that ranks cities based on whether their laws and policies specifically include sexual orientation and gender identity and expression. It also examined other factors that include whether a city’s police department has an LGBT liaison and if officials reported 2011 hate crimes statistics to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Phoenix is among the 25 cities around the country that include Philadelphia, Seattle and Atlanta that received a perfect score in the index. The Arizona capital, which is the sixth largest city in the U.S., is one of only eight cities in states without LGBT-inclusive anti-discrimination laws that garnered such a ranking.
“It’s a recognition by me that I want the very best and brightest people to stay here in Phoenix, including our LGBT community,” Stanton told the Blade. “I want them to make sure they feel fully supported by their city government.”
Arizona voters in 2006 rejected a proposed state constitutional amendment that would have defined marriage as between a man and a woman. They approved an identical measure two years later.
Gov. Jan Brewer in 2009 signed a budget into law that eliminated health benefits for same-sex partners of state employees.
Lambda Legal and the D.C. law firm Perkins Coie subsequently filed a lawsuit challenging the law on behalf of 10 state employees. The U.S. Supreme Court in June declined to hear Brewer’s appeal of a U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals injunction that blocked the governor from enforcing the benefits ban.
The Phoenix City Council in February approved a measure that bans anti-LGBT discrimination in employment, housing, public accommodations and government contracts. Stanton also co-chairs a Freedom to Marry coalition of nearly 400 mayors from across the country who support marriage rights for same-sex couples.
“Companies want to move to or increase jobs in locations where the laws are similar to their corporate policies about supporting all of their employees, including the LGBT community,” Stanton told the Blade. “For us to be able to retain the best and the brightest and attract the best and the brightest, we have to have laws that say we want the best and the brightest.”
Arizona Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake are among the 10 Republicans in the U.S. Senate who voted for a transgender-inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act on Nov. 7.
Stanton said he is “very proud” of the GOP lawmakers for backing ENDA and for what he described as their leadership on efforts in support of a comprehensive immigration reform measure that remains stalled in Congress.
“I cannot believe the House will not take that up,” Stanton told the Blade, discussing House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio)’s reluctance to allow an ENDA vote in his chamber. “ENDA is a no-brainer.”
Stanton also applauded bisexual Arizona Congresswoman Kyrsten Sinema who represents portions of south Phoenix, Scottsdale, Mesa and Chandler and the city of Tempe.
He told the Blade that Sinema was “public about her sexuality” during the time they worked together when he was on the Phoenix City Council and she was in the state legislature. Stanton said he doesn’t give her sexual orientation “a second thought.”
“I’m proud of her for who she is and how she represents our state,” he said. “I’m proud she represents us in Washington for all that she does, including the diversity that she brings to Congress. She’s an amazing person as people in Washington are learning, but we’ve known about her here for a long time already.”
Federal Government
RFK Jr.’s HHS report pushes therapy, not medical interventions, for trans youth
‘Discredited junk science’ — GLAAD

A 409-page report released Thursday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services challenges the ethics of medical interventions for youth experiencing gender dysphoria, the treatments that are often collectively called gender-affirming care, instead advocating for psychotherapy alone.
The document comes in response to President Donald Trump’s executive order barring the federal government from supporting gender transitions for anyone younger than 19.
“Our duty is to protect our nation’s children — not expose them to unproven and irreversible medical interventions,” National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya said in a statement. “We must follow the gold standard of science, not activist agendas.”
While the report does not constitute clinical guidance, its findings nevertheless conflict with not just the recommendations of LGBTQ advocacy groups but also those issued by organizations with relevant expertise in science and medicine.
The American Medical Association, for instance, notes that “empirical evidence has demonstrated that trans and non-binary gender identities are normal variations of human identity and expression.”
Gender-affirming care for transgender youth under standards widely used in the U.S. includes supportive talk therapy along with — in some but not all cases — puberty blockers or hormone treatment.
“The suggestion that someone’s authentic self and who they are can be ‘changed’ is discredited junk science,” GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis said in a statement. “This so-called guidance is grossly misleading and in direct contrast to the recommendation of every leading health authority in the world. This report amounts to nothing more than forcing the same discredited idea of conversion therapy that ripped families apart and harmed gay, lesbian, and bisexual young people for decades.”
GLAAD further notes that the “government has not released the names of those involved in consulting or authoring this report.”
Janelle Perez, executive director of LPAC, said, “For decades, every major medical association–including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics–have affirmed that medical care is the only safe and effective treatment for transgender youth experiencing gender dysphoria.
“This report is simply promoting conversion therapy by a different name – and the American people know better. We know that conversion therapy isn’t actually therapy – it isolates and harms kids, scapegoats parents, and divides families through blame and rejection. These tactics have been used against gay kids for decades, and now the same people want to use them against transgender youth and their families.
“The end result here will be a devastating denial of essential health care for transgender youth, replaced by a dangerous practice that every major U.S. medical and mental health association agree promotes anxiety, depression, and increased risk of suicidal thoughts and attempts.
“Like being gay or lesbian, being transgender is not a choice, and no amount of pressure can force someone to change who they are. We also know that 98% of people who receive transition-related health care continue to receive that health care throughout their lifetime. Trans health care is health care.”
“Today’s report seeks to erase decades of research and learning, replacing it with propaganda. The claims in today’s report would rip health care away from kids and take decision-making out of the hands of parents,” said Shannon Minter, legal director of NCLR. “It promotes the same kind of conversion therapy long used to shame LGBTQ+ people into hating themselves for being unable to change something they can’t change.”
“Like being gay or lesbian, being transgender is not a choice—it’s rooted in biology and genetics,” Minter said. “No amount or talk or pressure will change that.”
Human Rights Campaign Chief of Staff Jay Brown released a statement: “Trans people are who we are. We’re born this way. And we deserve to live our best lives and have a fair shot and equal opportunity at living a good life.
“This report misrepresents the science that has led all mainstream American medical and mental health professionals to declare healthcare for transgender youth to be best practice and instead follows a script predetermined not by experts but by Sec. Kennedy and anti-equality politicians.”
The White House
Trump nominates Mike Waltz to become next UN ambassador
Former Fla. congressman had been national security advisor

President Donald Trump on Thursday announced he will nominate Mike Waltz to become the next U.S. ambassador to the U.N.
Waltz, a former Florida congressman, had been the national security advisor.
Trump announced the nomination amid reports that Waltz and his deputy, Alex Wong, were going to leave the administration after Waltz in March added a journalist to a Signal chat in which he, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and other officials discussed plans to attack Houthi rebels in Yemen.
“I am pleased to announce that I will be nominating Mike Waltz to be the next United States ambassador to the United Nations,” said Trump in a Truth Social post that announced Waltz’s nomination. “From his time in uniform on the battlefield, in Congress and, as my National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz has worked hard to put our nation’s Interests first. I know he will do the same in his new role.”
Trump said Secretary of State Marco Rubio will serve as interim national security advisor, “while continuing his strong leadership at the State Department.”
“Together, we will continue to fight tirelessly to make America, and the world, safe again,” said Trump.
Trump shortly after his election nominated U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) to become the next U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Trump in March withdrew her nomination in order to ensure Republicans maintained their narrow majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.
U.S. Federal Courts
Second federal lawsuit filed against White House passport policy
Two of seven plaintiffs live in Md.

Lambda Legal on April 25 filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of seven transgender and nonbinary people who are challenging the Trump-Vance administration’s passport policy.
The lawsuit, which Lambda Legal filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland in Baltimore, alleges the policy that bans the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers “has caused and is causing grave and immediate harm to transgender people like plaintiffs, in violation of their constitutional rights to equal protection.”
Two of the seven plaintiffs — Jill Tran and Peter Poe — live in Maryland. The State Department, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and the federal government are defendants.
“The discriminatory passport policy exposes transgender U.S. citizens to harassment, abuse, and discrimination, in some cases endangering them abroad or preventing them from traveling, by forcing them to use identification documents that share private information against their wishes,” said Lambda Legal in a press release.
Zander Schlacter, a New York-based textile artist and designer, is the lead plaintiff.
The lawsuit notes he legally changed his name and gender in New York.
Schlacter less than a week before President Donald Trump’s inauguration “sent an expedited application to update his legal name on his passport, using form DS-5504.”
Trump once he took office signed an executive order that banned the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers. The lawsuit notes Schlacter received his new passport in February.
“The passport has his correct legal name, but now has an incorrect sex marker of ‘F’ or ‘female,'” notes the lawsuit. “Mr. Schlacter also received a letter from the State Department notifying him that ‘the date of birth, place of birth, name, or sex was corrected on your passport application,’ with ‘sex’ circled in red. The stated reason was ‘to correct your information to show your biological sex at birth.'”
“I, like many transgender people, experience fear of harassment or violence when moving through public spaces, especially where a photo ID is required,” said Schlacter in the press release that announced the lawsuit. “My safety is further at risk because of my inaccurate passport. I am unwilling to subject myself and my family to the threat of harassment and discrimination at the hands of border officials or anyone who views my passport.”
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 “X” gender marker. Zzyym in October 2021 received the first gender-neutral American passport.
Lambda Legal represented Zzyym.
The State Department policy took effect on April 11, 2022.
Trump signed his executive order shortly after he took office in January. Germany, Denmark, Finland, and the Netherlands are among the countries that have issued travel advisories for trans and nonbinary people who plan to visit the U.S.
A federal judge in Boston earlier this month issued a preliminary injunction against the executive order. The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of seven trans and nonbinary people.
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