National
Second gay couple alleges discrimination at Colombia airport
Spouses separated by American Airlines staff
From left, César Zapata and Hunter Carter. (Photo courtesy of César Zapata)
A prominent same-sex marriage advocate and his husband are the second gay couple in less than a month to accuse American Airlines personnel at a Colombian airport of wrongfully separating them before boarding a flight to the U.S.
Hunter Carter, who represents three Chilean couples in a same-sex marriage lawsuit before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and spearheads other efforts in support of gay nuptials throughout Latin America, and César Zapata told the Washington Blade on Monday an American Airlines ticket agent at the airport in the Colombian city of Medellín, where the couple has a home, asked them why they were traveling together as they tried to check in to their Miami-bound flight on Jan. 18. The men, who married in Connecticut in 2008 and again in New York in 2012, said they told the agent they were “a family traveling together.”
“She had this look on her face,” Carter told the Blade from New York. “She looked over to the manager and she said, ‘well I need to speak to the manager.’ We sort of knew something was funny.”
Carter said the manager whom he identified as Héctor Carmona told them they needed to separate because airline policy states only “male-female couples can be treated as legally married” and can go through pre-flight security screenings together. Carter told the Blade that American Airlines had never treated him and Zapata separately.
“We buy tickets together; we travel together,” said Carter.
Carter told the Blade that Carmona said to “do what you have to do” when he said he was going to file a complaint. Carter said Carmona then told Zapata to stand back.
“By now everybody was watching,” said Carter. “That was humiliating.”
Carter told the Blade he was given a luggage tag on which to write Carmona’s name.
He said Carmona approached him “intimidatingly close to me, face-to-face” after he took his picture and said he needed his permission to take it. Carter posted it to his Twitter page with a caption that read “Carmona separated us like strangers. Only MF=married. Homophobe or AA policy?” before he and Zapata flew to Miami.
“I said, ‘no, in fact I do not,’” Carter told the Blade as he recalled the exchange he said he had with Carmona. “This is a public place and you just humiliated me and I’m taking the picture for proof.”
Hunter Carter and César Zapata say Héctor Carmona, an American Airlines manager at the Medellín, Colombia, airport, unfairly separated them during a pre-flight security screening before boarding their flight to Miami on Jan. 18. (Photo by Hunter Carter)
The alleged incident took place less than five weeks after Ana Elisa Leiderman said an American Airlines ticket agent at the Medellín airport separated her from her wife, Verónica Botero, and their two small children as they tried to check in to their Miami-bound flight.
An American Airlines spokesperson told the Blade the company regrets “the circumstances” that Leiderman, Botero and their family faced before their Dec. 13 flight to the U.S.
The spokesperson said airport personnel in Medellín “followed existing security screening rules mandated” by the Transportation Security Administration.”
American Airlines stressed to the Blade it had “flagged for TSA” prior to the incident with Leiderman and Botero that “same-sex and opposite sex married couples faced different screening procedures.” The spokesperson added the company has recommended that TSA officials “revisit and update the process so that all married couples can be treated equally in the future.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees TSA, told the Blade it does not conduct airport security screenings outside the United States.
The two alleged incidents took place against the ongoing debate over marriage rights for same-sex couples in Colombia.
The country’s highest court in 2011 ruled lawmakers had two years to extend the same benefits to same-sex couples that heterosexuals receive through marriage. The deadline passed last June amid lingering confusion as to whether gays and lesbians could actually tie the knot in the South American country because the ruling did not explicitly contain the word “marriage.”
Colombian Inspector General Alejandro Ordóñez Maldonado has spearheaded efforts to challenge the handful of same-sex marriages that have taken place in the country since last July.
“The procurador (general inspector in Colombian Spanish) has become… for a certain segment of the population, a kind of hero,” Zapata told the Blade as he discussed the way he said Carmona treated him and Hunter. “I guess this guy felt like he was some kind of procurador trying to defend the morals of the country.”
Arizona
Shooting outside gay bar in Ariz. leaves three dead
Tucson police investigating double murder-suicide as a hate crime
Three people were fatally shot outside a gay bar in Tucson, Ariz., early Monday morning, about a mile from the city’s nightlife district.
Police have said the shooting, which took place in the parking lot of Venture-N bar at 1239 N. 6th Ave., was likely a hate crime and a double murder-suicide following a verbal altercation.
The suspect, Ousman Ceesay, allegedly shot Vincent Anthony Siqueiros and Cameron Davis Capara while they were outside the club around 12:30 a.m. Monday.
Reports show Capara and Siqueiros were pronounced dead at the scene. Ceesay died after being taken to a local hospital with gunshot wounds.
Police have also said that Ceesay was carrying a list of LGBTQ businesses at the time of the shooting.
Arizona Public Media has said police are investigating the case as a hate crime because the suspect was carrying a note containing the names of multiple LGBTQ-associated businesses.
“I am deeply saddened that another senseless loss of life has happened in our community,” Tucson Police Chief Monica Prieto said in a statement. “Bias-based crimes are especially heinous and have no place in our community.”
According to Prieto, there is no imminent threat to the community, and the Tucson Police Department is working to provide extra protection to various LGBTQ businesses across town.
Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva, who represents the area, issued a statement condemning the act of violence, which appears to have been at least in part motivated by homophobia.
“I am disgusted and deeply saddened to learn of a targeted act of hate and the cold-blooded murder of two members of our LGBTQIA+ community, Vincent Siqueiros and Cameron Capara, at the Venture-N bar in Tucson last night. This horrific attack is a painful reminder that even in welcoming communities like Tucson, hate and violence against the LGBTQIA+ community still exist.”
“When that hate is combined with easy access to firearms, the consequences can be deadly. I am sick and tired of Congress refusing to lift a finger to protect our communities while, every day, dozens of people are shot and killed across the country. It does not have to be this way. The House of Representatives is returning to session this week, and our first action should be passing common-sense gun safety reforms that we know can save lives.”
Other federal lawmakers also condemned the shooting.
The Congressional Equality Caucus, which is made up of federal legislators advancing LGBTQ interests, issued a statement after news broke.
“Our hearts are with the friends and loved ones of the victims of this devastating attack outside a Tucson gay bar and with the Tucson LGBTQI+ community,” it said on X. “No one should fear violence because of who they are — and we’re going to continue fighting to build a world where no one does.”
The Human Rights Campaign, the largest LGBTQ organization in the country, released a statement following the shooting.
“We are heartbroken by the loss of Vincent Anthony Siqueiros and Cameron Davis Capara and our hearts are with their families, loved ones, and the entire Tucson LGBTQ+ community. Once again, we are reminded that gun violence robs people of their lives, destroys families, and devastates communities.”
A candlelight vigil honoring the victims is planned for Sept. 2 at 6:30 p.m. at Catalina Park in North Tucson.
Congress
HRC president campaigns for Chris Pappas in NH
Gay congressman running to succeed retiring U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen
Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson on Sunday campaigned for U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.) in New Hampshire.
Robinson traveled to Manchester, the state’s largest city, nine days before the Sept. 8 primary that will determine who will vie for retiring U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.)’s seat.
We’re hitting the pavement across New Hampshire to fight for a freer, fairer future for everyone.
Glad to have Human Rights Campaign President @KelleyJRobinson join us for a canvass launch in Manchester today. pic.twitter.com/XWCEaQxy4o
— Chris Pappas (@ChrisPappasNH) August 30, 2026
Former U.S. Sen. John E. Sununu, who represented New Hampshire in the U.S. Senate from 2003-2009, will face off against former U.S. Sen. Scott Brown, who represented Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate from 2010-2013, in the Republican primary.
Karishma Manzur is among the Democrats challenging Pappas.
A poll the University of New Hampshire Survey Center released on Aug. 26 shows Sununu is ahead of Brown. The same survey shows Pappas ahead of Manzur and his other Democratic challengers.
The UNH Survey Center poll shows Sununu ahead of Pappas by a 45-43 percent margin if they were to face off in the general election. The margin of error is +/-2.1 percent.
Pappas would become the first openly gay man elected to the U.S. Senate if he were to win in November.
National
Milo Yiannopoulos deported to UK
ICE arrested far-right provocateur in New Orleans on Thursday
Editor’s note: The Department of Homeland Security on Saturday said Milo Yiannopoulos has been deported to the U.K.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Thursday arrested far-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos.
A DHS spokesperson in a statement sent to the Washington Blade said ICE arrested Yiannopoulos, who they described as “an illegal alien from the United Kingdom,” at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.
The DHS spokesperson said Yiannopoulos “legally entered the country” in New York on May 14, 2019.
“He chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s laws,” said the spokesperson.
The DHS spokesperson said an immigration judge on July 22 “issued a final order of removal” for Yiannopoulos “after failing to show up for his immigration hearing.” The Times-Picayune newspaper in New Orleans on Friday reported Yiannopoulos is being held at an ICE detention center in Alexandria, La., which is about 200 miles northwest of the Crescent City.
“He will remain in ICE custody pending removal,” said the DHS spokesperson.
Yiannopoulos has, among other things, repeatedly targeted transgender people and Muslims.
The American Conservative Union, which organizes the annual Conversative Political Action Conference, in 2017 disinvited Yiannopoulos from speaking at that year’s CPAC after a video in which he appeared to condone sex between adults and underage boys emerged. Yiannopoulos subsequently resigned from Breitbart News, a far-right news website, where he had been a senior editor.
Yiannopoulos later that year married his boyfriend in Hawaii. The far-right provocateur in 2021 claimed he was an “ex-gay.”
The Australian government in 2019 banned Yiannopoulos from entering the country “on character grounds.” Yiannopoulos was also banned from Facebook, Twitter (now X), and other social media platforms.
The Times-Picayune reported Yiannopoulos “most recently worked for” Ye, formerly known as Kanye West.
The controversial rapper is scheduled to perform in New Orleans on Friday.
Laura Loomer, a far-right conspiracy theorist who is close to President Donald Trump, has called for Yiannopoulos’s deportation. Loomer on Friday wrote on X that she “reported him to ICE and the FBI” after he “called for me to be assassinated.”
PHOTOS: Miss Gay Old Bay
SUNFESTIVAL takes center stage as Rehoboth Beach closes out summer
Anne Arundel schools now need parent permission to call trans students by preferred names
Shooting outside gay bar in Ariz. leaves three dead
‘People don’t see me. They see a trend’
San Francisco, long a queer safe haven, remains competitive for homebuyers
Trans, nonbinary Americans find refuge in the Netherlands
Calendar: August 28-September 3
‘Teenage Sex and Death’ has never been more entertaining
Actor Tim Curry dies at 80
-
California4 days agoSan Francisco, long a queer safe haven, remains competitive for homebuyers
-
Netherlands5 days ago
Trans, nonbinary Americans find refuge in the Netherlands
-
Calendar5 days ago
Calendar: August 28-September 3
-
Movies5 days ago
‘Teenage Sex and Death’ has never been more entertaining
