News
Utah calls on Supreme Court to halt same-sex marriages
Private attorney Monte Stewart listed as ‘counsel of record’ for the state
Utah Gov. Gary Herbert is calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to halt same-sex marriages in Utah (Photo public domain).
After nearly 11 days have passed with marriage equality in Utah, state officials on Tuesday formally made their request with the U.S. Supreme Court to halt same-sex marriages taking place in the state.
Attorneys for Utah officials — Gov. Gary Herbert (R) and newly sworn-in Attorney General Sean Reyes — filed the 26-page stay request with U.S. Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who’s responsible for the Tenth Circuit.
“As a result of the district court’s injunction, numerous same-sex marriages are now occurring every day in Utah,” the request states. “And each one is an affront not only to the interests of the state and its citizens in being able to define marriage through ordinary democratic channels…but also to this court’s unique role as final arbiter of the profoundly important constitutional question that is so carefully preserved in Windsor.”
Gay couples have started marrying in Utah since Dec. 20, when U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled the 2004 state ban on same-sex marriage known as Amendment 3 was unconstitutional.
After appealing the decision to the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, state officials have made several stay requests to halt the same-sex marriages. Following decisions from the district court and the Tenth Circuit to deny the stay requests, state officials swore to take up the matter with the Supreme Court.
Now that the stay request is before the high court, Sotomayor has the option of referring the request to all of her colleagues on the bench, who would provide the final word on whether a stay would be granted on same-sex marriages.
However, if Sotomayor goes it alone and decides against the stay, Utah officials may select any justice on the Supreme Court — such as a justice with an anti-gay reputation like U.S. Associate Justice Antonin Scalia — and make a final attempt to request a stay.
Doug NeJaime, who’s gay and law professor at the University of California, Irvine, said he expects Sotomayor to refer the request to the entire court, but isn’t able make a prediction on what will happen.
“Even justices sympathetic to the cause of same-sex marriage may think that a stay makes sense so as not to rush a substantive resolution by the court,” NeJaime said. “Last term we saw that the Court was hoping to let the issue keep moving forward without settling it, but the Utah case puts the issue back before the court very soon after Windsor and Hollingsworth. It’s unclear what will happen, but there are likely some justices hoping to hold off on deciding the big question.”
According to SCOTUSblog, Sotomayor has already requested a response to the Utah stay application by noon on Friday. Until that time, the court won’t take action on the stay.
Beefing up their arguments in their initial requests, Utah officials base their request for a stay, among other reasons, on the likelihood the Supreme Court will take up the marriage issue and on the Supreme Court’s ruling against Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act.
“And if DOMA’s non-recognition was an impermissible ‘federal intrusion on state power’ to define marriage, surely there is at least a good prospect that a majority of this court will ultimately hold the district court’s far more intrusive order and injunction valid, and in so doing vindicate the prerogative of Utah and its citizenry to retain the traditional definition of marriage if they so choose,” the request states.
Utah officials also express concern for same-sex couples marrying in the Utah in the event that a ruling from a higher court would abrogate their unions, saying a stay is needed to “avoid needless injuries to same-sex couples and their families that would follow.”
According to the Salt Lake Tribune, more than 1,225 marriage licenses were issued in Utah in the first six days of marriage equality between Dec. 20 and Dec 26. Of those, at least 74 percent were issued to same-sex couples.
Twice in the stay request, Utah officials cite a 2012 report from Mark Regnerus as evidence for why same-sex parents aren’t as fit biological opposite-sex parents. That report has been debunked for failing to control for error.
James Magleby, an attorney at Magleby & Greenwood PC representing same-sex couples in the case, chided Utah state officials for pursing the stay on same-sex marriages.
“It doesn’t have to be this way,” Magleby said. “The State of Utah should carefully consider its other options, in particular the fiscally responsible decision by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, to save his state from further legal expenditures and to put a divisive issue in the past, by deciding not to pursue an appeal from an analogous ruling.”
Utah state officials are calling on the Supreme Court to halt same-sex marriages as they’ve indicated they’re collaborating with outside counsel to the defend the marriage law. In a statement on its website last week, the attorney general’s office said it was putting off the stay request for a few days “[d]ue to the necessity of coordination with outside counsel.”
Consistent with what was reported earlier, the stay request indicates Monte Stewart, a private attorney with Stewart, Taylor & Morris and a history of advocacy against same-sex marriage, is listed as counsel of record for the state. A founder of Utah-based Marriage Law Foundation, Stewart has written numerous tracts in opposition to marriage equality, including a 2008 article in the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy titled, “Marriage Facts.”
According to the Deseret News, the cost for Utah to hire outside counsel to defend the state’s marriage law is expected to reach nearly $2 million. Moreover, state lawmakers support the decision to defend the law at that cost. House Speaker Becky Lockhart reportedly said after House leaders heard the projected cost from Reyes, they “felt comfortable telling him, ‘Move forward with what you think is in the best interest of the state.'”
Utah sources familiar with the decision to hire outside counsel say state officials are doing so because the attorney general is too fresh on the job and because the state wants an expert on the subject matter to defend the marriage law.
Fred Sainz, the Human Rights Campaign’s vice president of communications, said in a statement last week that hiring outside counsel to defend the marriage law would be a bad move for Utah.
“Defending discrimination is indefensible,” Sainz said. “Defending discrimination while spending millions of taxpayer dollars to do it is beyond explanation. It is an affront to all Utahans that their hard-earned tax dollars – money that should be going into schools, roads or health programs – will instead be used to cement the state on the wrong side of history.”
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Congratulations to Raffi Freedman-Gurspan on being appointed Associate Director, Federal Funding & Infrastructure Office, at the Massachusetts Executive Office for Administration & Finance. Freedman-Gurspan will be returning to her hometown of Boston and joining Gov. Maura Healey’s Administration. Freedman-Gurspan served in both the Obama and Biden administrations as well as worked in LGBTQ and redistricting advocacy during her 11 years in D.C.
Freedman-Gurspan was the first openly transgender person on the White House staff when she worked for President Obama. She most recently served at the U.S. Department of Transportation in former Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s office, as Deputy Director of Public Engagement. Previously she worked with the National Redistricting Action Fund/The All On The Line Campaign, as Deputy States Director. She worked for the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) as Director of External Relations. In the Obama White House, she worked in the Office of Public Engagement, as Senior Associate Director. She was the White House Liaison to the LGBTQ community responsible for management of all public inquiries on matters regarding LGBTQ people, including recommending public responses to senior leadership, assisting in drafting administration talking points, and coordinating stakeholder engagement with the White House offices. She worked with the White House, Presidential Personnel Office (PPO), as Outreach and Recruitment Director.
Prior to that she was on the staff of Commonwealth of Massachusetts, House of Representatives Office of State Rep. Carl Sciortino, as legislative director, and worked for the City of Somerville, Health Department, Office of Commissions, Somerville, Mass., as LGBTQ Liaison.
Freedman-Gurspan served on the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, the Presidentially Appointed Council; and as a member, and Board Member, Boston University, College of Arts and Sciences, Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies Program.
She earned her bachelor’s degree in Political Science and Norwegian, concentration in Nordic Studies, from St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minn.
District of Columbia
Murdered Israeli embassy officials were supporters of D.C.’s LGBTQ synagogue
Bet Mishpachah calls fatal shooting outside Capital Jewish Museum ‘devastating’
The two Israeli embassy officials who were shot to death outside D.C.’s Capital Jewish Museum Wednesday evening, May 21, were strong supporters of Bet Mishpachah, D.C.’s LGBTQ supportive synagogue, according to a statement it released.
“We are especially devastated by the loss of our dear colleague and friend of Bet Mishpachah, Sarah Milgram, and her soon to be fiancé, Yaron Lischinsky,” the LGBTQ synagogue said in a May 22 statement.
“Sarah was the liaison between Bet Mishpachah and the Israeli Embassy, working closely with our staff and clergy,” the statement says. “Her warmth, professionalism, and deep commitment to building bridges within the Jewish community made her not only a trusted partner but a beloved part of our extended congregational family,” according to the statement.
A statement also released on May 22 by the office of the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia says Chicago resident Elias Rodriguez, 30, has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder along with other weapons related charges in connection with the shooting deaths of Milgram and Lischinsky.
Officials with the D.C. police and the FBI, which has joined D.C. police in continuing to investigate the case, have said Rodriquez arrived in D.C. from Chicago one day prior to the shooting and appears to have targeted an event taking place at the Capital Jewish Museum for violence at the time it was hosting an event called “Young Diplomats Reception,” in which Israeli Embassy officials were in attendance.
Police and FBI officials have said Rodriguez allegedly shot Milgrim and Lischinsky after they left the Capital Jewish Museum at the conclusion of the event. The museum is located at 575 3rd Street, N.W.
“Surveillance footage reportedly shows Rodriquez walking past the victims before turning and firing multiple rounds,” the U.S. Attorney’s statement says. “After the victims fell, he allegedly continued firing at close range, including as one attempted to crawl away,” it says, adding, “Investigators recovered a 9 mm handgun and 21 spent shell casings at the scene.”
Police have said Rodriguez walked into the Capital Jewish Museum after the shooting and was detained by security guards until D.C. police arrived. Witnesses said he began to shout, “free, free Palestine” before police took him into custody.
“Make no mistake, this attack was targeted, antisemitic violence,” said Steven Jenson, an FBI assistant director working on the investigation. “The FBI will continue to pursue all leads and use all available resources to investigate this heinous murder,” he said in the statement.
The fatal shooting took place five days after the Capital Jewish Museum opened a special exhibition called “LGBT Jews in the Federal City” on May 16. “This landmark exhibition explores a turbulent century of celebrations, activism, and change in the nation’s capital by D.C.’s LGBTQ+ Jewish community,” the museum said in a statement announcing the exhibition.
Photos and documents related to Bet Mishpachah make up a prominent part of the exhibition.
During a May 22 press conference organized by the U.S. Attorney for D.C., Jeanine Pirro, to provide an update on the investigation into the two murders, Pirro and FBI official Jensen referred to the two murders as a hate crime and terrorist act.
In response to a question from the Washington Blade asking if investigators were looking into whether the LGBTQ exhibition at the Capital Jewish Museum might have played some role in Gonzales’s motive for targeting the museum, Pirro responded to the question.
“So, we are looking into absolutely everything,” she said. “There is so much information we’re looking at. And I must tell you, coming from New York, I’ve never seen the cooperation and coordination that I’m seeing here. It was immediate. It was instant. It was coordinated. And my hat’s off to this area. We’re going to clean it up, thank you,” she said in ending the press conference.
Josh Maxey, Bet Mishpachah’s executive director, said he and Israeli Embassy official Milgram became friends during their two-and-a-half-year interaction working on joint events between the embassy and Bet Mishpachah.
“This became a wonderful two and a half years journey of putting events together, of hosting events together, doing different programs for the community,” Maxey told the Blade. Among the activities the two worked on, he said, was the embassy’s annual LGBTQ Pride event.
Maxie said his own grieving over the death of Milgram and her boyfriend Lischinsky was heightened by the fact that he spoke with her by phone on the day of the shooting shortly before she arrived at the Jewish Museum over plans about this year’s LGBTQ Pride events.
“Sarah really championed us to be included in Israeli events,” Maxey said. “And so, I am just devastated that this true embodiment of an ally was so viciously and violently taken away from us.”
Delaware
Delaware marriage equality bill advances out of committee
Measure will now go before full state Senate
The bill that would amend Delaware’s state constitution to codify same-sex marriage advanced out of the Senate Executive Committee on Wednesday and now goes to the Senate chamber for a vote. If passed, the vote would go on to the House.
Three members of the committee voted favorable and one voted on its merits, meaning the member recommends the chamber take action on the legislation but does not take a position on what action should be taken.
Senate Bill 100 was introduced in April by Democratic Sen. Russ Huxtable of the sixth district of Delaware and has 21 co-sponsors. It is the first leg of an amendment to the Delaware Constitution. The act would “establish the right to marry as a fundamental right and that Delaware and its political subdivisions shall recognize marriages and issue marriage licenses to couples regardless of gender.”
Senate Substitute One was adopted in lieu of the original bill on May 16. SB 100 originally focused exclusively on marriage equality relating to gender and the bill was tweaked to include protection for all classes that fall under Delaware’s Equal Rights Amendment, including race, color, national origin, and sex.
The Wednesday committee meeting heard testimony on SS 1 for SB 100 from individuals and organizations, including John Reynolds, Deputy Policy and Advocacy Director of Delaware’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.
“After hard fought recent victories, the rights of LGBTQ Americans are under attack in many places across our country,” Reynolds said during his testimony. “It is important that Delaware be proactive and serve as a firewall protecting individual civil liberties. SS 1 for SB 100 is an example of this important work cementing the protections for marriage equality in our state constitution.”
According to Sen. Huxtable, the ACLU helped provide feedback on some of the bill’s language. Reynolds said the ACLU thought it was important to testify because this is a moment when so much is changing.
“These attacks are not just on specific communities, they’re on this concept of equality and liberty,” Reynolds told the Washington Blade. “We need to build these firewalls to both prevent harm to folks on the frontline of these attacks but also ensure that we don’t set very problematic and damaging standards that can be used to roll back protections for large [swaths] of our population.”
SS 1 for SB 100 requires a vote of two-thirds of the members elected to each house of the General Assembly to pass. If passed, the next General Assembly after the next general election also has to pass it. Delaware is the only state in the country that can amend its state constitution without a vote of the people.
The Respect for Marriage Act was passed by the United States Congress in 2022 and signed into law by then-President Joe Biden. It codifies the right to same-sex and interracial marriage, requiring all states to recognize validly performed marriages from other states, regardless of whether they allow same-sex marriage within their own borders.
In Virginia, a bill codifying marriage equality was signed into law in 2024. California, Colorado and Hawaii have also passed amendments to codify same-sex marriage into their constitutions.
“We at the ACLU of Delaware are very excited that SS 1 for SB 100 passed out of committee yesterday,” Reynolds said. “It represents both Sen. Huxtable and the Delaware Legislature’s clear commitment to proactively protecting people’s rights within the LGBT community and outside to ensure that in this moment of uncertainty, we don’t sit idly by and wait for the worst to happen but take control of the things that we can to build the communities that we want.”
Calendar: May 23-29
Comings & Goings
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Murdered Israeli embassy officials were supporters of D.C.’s LGBTQ synagogue
US hate groups fuel anti-LGBTQ rights movement in Africa
Looking back at 50 years of Pride in D.C
WorldPride events round-up
Pope Leo XIV: Family based on ‘stable union between a man and a woman’
Wes Moore signs HIV decriminalization bill
