News
Looking back: Gay mentions during State of the Union
Clinton, Bush and Obama addressed gays during speeches before Congress
Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama each mentioned issues relevant to the LGBT community during their State of the Union addresses. (Photos public domain)
The State of the Union address is considered a pivotal speech for U.S. presidents in shaping their agenda for the year ahead, and the last three haven’t shied from including LGBT people in their proposed policies.
Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama each made references to policy items affecting LGBT people. Clinton was the first, Bush’s proposed policies were entirely negative and Obama has incorporated LGBT people into his speeches consistently.
The Washington Blade has complied a list of mentions of LGBT issues in State of the Union speeches, all of which were made in recent times. The list doesn’t include mentions of HIV-related items, although Clinton, Bush and Obama each called on Congress to appropriate funds to combat the disease in their speeches.
1999 — Clinton calls for hate crimes, ENDA passage
President Clinton made a reference to two pieces of landmark legislation during his 1999 State of the Union, calling on Congress to pass hate crimes protections legislation and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.
“Discrimination or violence because of race or religion, ancestry or gender, disability or sexual orientation, is wrong, and it ought to be illegal,” Clinton said. “Therefore, I ask Congress to make the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and the Hate Crimes Prevention Act the law of the land.”
After the murder of gay college student Matthew Shepard near Laramie, Wyo., in 1996, Clinton had endorsed legislation to make violent crimes based on anti-gay animus part of federal law. Clinton was also known as a supporter of ENDA, a bill that in its current version would bar workplace discrimination against LGBT people.
2000 – Clinton makes first explicit reference of ‘gay’
The next year, Clinton tried again to encourage Congress to pass hate crimes protection legislation and ENDA, saying for the first time during a State of the Union address the word “gay.”
Clinton made the appeal to pass both pieces of legislation when talking about incidents of hate crimes against minorities throughout the country.
“We saw a young man murdered in Wyoming just because he was gay,” Clinton said. “Last year we saw the shootings of African Americans, Asian Americans, and Jewish children just because of who they were. This is not the American way, and we must draw the line. I ask you to draw that line by passing without delay the Hate Crimes Prevention Act and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.”
After Clinton’s call, hate crimes legislation received a floor vote in 2000 as part of an amendment to the major Pentagon budget legislation. No attempt was made to pass ENDA on the floor that year.
Congress passed hate crimes legislation nine years later under President Obama; ENDA continues to languish in Congress and no explicit federal non-discrimination protections for LGBT workers are in place.
2004 — Bush calls for anti-gay constitutional amendment
Preparing for his re-election campaign, President George W. Bush made a reference in his 2004 State of the Union speech affecting gay people, but in a negative way.
In the year after the Massachusetts Supreme Court legalized marriage equality, Bush used his speech to call for a U.S. constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, saying “a strong America must also value the institution of marriage.”
“Activist judges, however, have begun redefining marriage by court order, without regard for the will of the people and their elected representatives,” Bush said. “On an issue of such great consequence, the people’s voice must be heard. If judges insist on forcing their arbitrary will upon the people, the only alternative left to the people would be the constitutional process. Our nation must defend the sanctity of marriage.”
Following his call for a Federal Marriage Amendment, both chambers of the Republican-controlled Congress vote on the measure, but the measure failed in both chambers.
Bush’s call for the amendment so invoked the ire of then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who was present in the audience, that he elected on his own to issue marriage licenses to gay couples in San Francisco City Hall. His actions were later rescinded by the California Supreme Court.
2005 — Bush renews call for federal marriage amendment
Fresh off his re-election win after campaigning on a Federal Marriage Amendment and the passage of 11 state constitutional anti-gay marriage amendments, Bush renewed his call for a Federal Marriage Amendment.
“Because marriage is a sacred institution and the foundation of society, it should not be redefined by activist judges,” Bush said. “For the good of families, children, and society, I support a constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage.”
Although Congress had additional Republican majorities since the previous votes in 2004, the measure failed yet again in both the House and the Senate.
2006 — Bush isn’t done with the FMA
Despite the previous failures of the Federal Marriage Amendment, Bush continued to express concerns about the advancement of same-sex marriage in his 2006 State of the Union address.
“Yet many Americans, especially parents, still have deep concerns about the direction of our culture and the health of our most basic institutions,” Bush said. “They’re concerned about unethical conduct by public officials and discouraged by activist courts that try to redefine marriage.”
That would be the last time Bush would express concerns about same-sex marriage during a State of the Union address. On Election Day in 2006, Democrats won control of both chambers of Congress, giving them control of the floor.
2009 — Obama omits gays from first speech
Although he would later be known for building a record on LGBT rights, President Obama made no explicit reference to LGBT issues during a speech before a joint session of Congress during his first year in office. All his future speeches would make some reference to gay-related issues.
The omission is in line with the perception that Obama was reluctant to tackle LGBT issues, which had proved thorny for President Clinton during his first year in office.
Because the speech was at the start of his first term, the address also technically wasn’t a State of the Union address, but a speech before a joint session of Congress.
2010 — Obama pledges to work to repeal “Don’t Ask’
Obama’s first mention of any gay issue during a State of the Union address was in 2010 in which he pledged to move forward with the process of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal.
“This year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are,” Obama said.
Amid increasing pressure for Obama to act on ending the ban on openly gay service members, LGBT advocates widely praised the words — even those critical of him for not taking executive action to stop the discharges.
And Obama’s words during the speech were prophetic. After a 10-month study at the Pentagon and long struggle of moving legislation through the Congress to repeal the 1993 law, Obama signed legislation at the end of the year repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
2011 — Obama pledges to finish the job on ‘Don’t Ask’ repeal
A month after having signed the repeal into law, Obama made another reference to the ban on open service by pledging to certify “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” by the end of the year.
“Our troops come from every corner of this country,” Obama said. “They’re black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American. They are Christian and Hindu, Jewish and Muslim. And yes, we know that some of them are gay. Starting this year, no American will be forbidden from serving the country they love because of who they love.”
Although President Obama signed repeal legislation in the previous month, the ban would only be lifted after he, the defense secretary and the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff certified the military was ready for repeal.
With no timetable included in the repeal legislation for when certification would have to take place, Obama’s words allayed concerns the process would go on indefinitely with no formal lifting of the ban on open service.
But Obama immediately giving those reassurances called on colleges to allow military recruiters on campuses. Many had barred there presence because they perceived the ban on open service as discriminatory.
“And with that change, I call on all our college campuses to open their doors to our military recruiters and ROTC,” Obama said. “It is time to leave behind the divisive battles of the past. It is time to move forward as one nation.”
Those words drew concern from transgender advocates because although the ban on openly gay service was lifted, the ban on openly trans service was — and remains — still in place.
2012 — Obama includes gays in shout-out to U.S. troops
As part of a general effort to tout “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal heading into his re-election campaign, Obama in his 2012 State of the Union listed gay troops as among those serving in the armed forces.
“When you put on that uniform, it doesn’t matter if you’re black or white, Asian, Latino, Native American; conservative, liberal; rich, poor; gay, straight,” Obama said.
By this time, certification for open service in the U.S. military had already taken place months ago in September and gay service members were serving openly without fear of discharge.
But that was the only explicit LGBT mention during the State of the Union address, prompting advocates at the time to express disappointment he went no further.
2013 — Obama touts benefits for gay troops
Obama won praise from advocates for his 2013 State of the Union speech by making two references to the gay community, one overt and the other less explicit.
The most overt reference was an appeal to the nation to agree that gay service members are entitled to the same spousal benefits as straight troops.
“We will ensure equal treatment for all servicemembers and equal benefits for their families, gay and straight,” Obama said.
Just weeks earlier under significant pressure from LGBT advocates, the Pentagon pledged to move forward with partner benefits for gay troops available under the law and would have them in place later in the year.
But he also made an implicit gay reference early on in the speech by saying he wants the economy to work for Americans regardless of “who you love” — an apparent reference to gay people that some took as a veiled reference to ENDA.
“It is our unfinished task to restore the basic bargain that built this country: the idea that if you work hard and meet your responsibilities, you can get ahead, no matter where you come from, no matter what you look like or who you love,” Obama said.
2014 — What will happen?
It remains to be seen whether Obama will make any LGBT references in his 2014 State of the Union address on Tuesday. LGBT advocates are calling on him to ask Congress to pass ENDA, pledge to sign an executive order barring LGBT discrimination among federal contractors and explicitly use the word “transgender.”
Colombia
LGBTQ Venezuelans in Colombia uncertain about homeland’s future
US forces seized Nicolás Maduro and his wife on Jan. 3
BOGOTÁ, Colombia — LGBTQ Venezuelans who live in Colombia remain uncertain about their homeland’s future in the wake of now former-President Nicolás Maduro’s ouster.
José Guillén is from Mérida, a city in the Venezuelan Andes that is roughly 150 miles from the country’s border with Colombia. He founded an LGBTQ organization that largely focused on health care before he left Venezuela in 2015.
Guillén, whose mother is Colombian, spoke with the Washington Blade on Jan. 9 at a coffee shop in Bogotá, the Colombian capital. His husband, who left Venezuela in 2016, was with him.
“I would like to think that (Venezuela) will be a country working towards reconstruction in a democracy,” said Guillén, responding to the Blade’s question about what Venezuela will look like in five years.
American forces on Jan. 3 seized Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, at their home in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, during an overnight operation.
Maduro and Flores on Jan. 5 pleaded not guilty to federal drug charges in New York. The Venezuelan National Assembly the day before swore in Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president, as the country’s acting president.
Hugo Chávez died in 2013, and Maduro succeeded him as Venezuela’s president. Subsequent economic and political crises prompted millions of Venezuelans to leave the country.
The Blade in 2021 reported Venezuelan authorities raided HIV/AIDS service organizations, arrested their staffers, and confiscated donated medications for people with HIV/AIDS. Tamara Adrián, a member of the Venezuelan opposition who in 2015 became the first openly transgender person elected to the National Assembly, told the Blade she had to take security precautions during her campaign because government supporters targeted her.
The Blade on Jan. 8 spoke with a Venezuelan AIDS Healthcare Foundation client who said Maduro’s ouster “is truly something we’ve been waiting for for 26 or 27 years.” Another Venezuelan AHF client — a sex worker from Margarita Island in the Caribbean Sea who now lives in Bogotá — echoed this sentiment when she spoke with the Blade two days later.
“I love the situation of what’s happening,” she said during a telephone interview.
Sources in Caracas and elsewhere in Venezuela with whom the Blade spoke after Jan. 3 said armed pro-government groups known as “colectivos” were patrolling the streets. Reports indicate they set up checkpoints, stopped motorists, and searched their cell phones for evidence that they supported Maduro’s ouster.
“In the last few days, it seems there are possibilities for change, but people are also very afraid of the government’s reactions and what might happen,” Guillén said.
“Looking at it from an LGBT perspective, there has never been any recognition of the LGBT community in Venezuela,” he noted. “At some point, when Chávez came to power, we thought that many things could happen because it was a progressive government, but no.”
Luis Gómez is a lawyer from Valencia, a city in Venezuela’s Carabobo state. He and his family since he was a child have worked with autistic children through Fundación Yo Estoy Aquí, a foundation they created.
Gómez was in high school in 2013 when Maduro succeeded Chávez. He graduated from law school in 2018. Gómez in November 2020 fled to Colombia after he became increasingly afraid after his mother’s death that authorities would arrest him because of his criticism of the government.
The Colombian government in December 2025 recognized him as a refugee.
Gómez during a Jan. 9 interview in Bogotá discussed his initial reaction to Maduro’s ouster.
“I’m 28 years old, and 27 of those years have been in dictatorship,” Gómez told the Blade. “I had never experienced anything like this, which is why it had such a strong impact on me.”
Gómez said he initially thought the operation to seize Maduro and Flores was similar to an attempted coup that Chávez led in 1992. Gómez added he quickly realized Jan. 3 was different.
“The last thing we thought would happen was that Maduro would be wearing an orange jumpsuit in prison in New York,” he told the Blade. “It’s also important that those of us outside (of Venezuela) knew about it before those inside, because that’s the level of the lack of communication to which they have subjected all our families inside Venezuela.”
Gómez said Maduro’s ouster left him feeling “a great sense of justice” for his family and for the millions of Venezuelans who he maintains suffered under his government.
“Many Venezuelans, and with every reason, around the world started celebrating euphorically, but given our background and our understanding, we already knew at that moment what was coming,” added Gómez. “Now a new stage is beginning. What will this new stage be like? This has also generated uncertainty in us, which the entire citizenry is now experiencing.”
Trump ‘puts us in a very complex position’
U.S. chargé d’affaires Laura Dogu on Jan. 31 arrived in Caracas to reopen the American embassy that closed in February 2019.
Tens of thousands of people on Jan. 7 gathered in Bogotá and elsewhere in Colombia to protest against President Donald Trump after he threatened Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who was once a member of the now disbanded M-19 guerrilla movement. The two men met at the White House on Tuesday.
Both Gómez and Guillén pointed out Rodríguez remains in power. They also noted her brother, Jorge Rodríguez, is currently president of the National Assembly.
“Delcy has been a key figure in the regime for many years,” said Guillén. “In fact, she was one of the toughest people within the regime.”
Gómez and Guillén also spoke about Trump and his role in a post-Maduro Venezuela.
“Donald Trump, especially in this second term, has played a very particular role in the world, especially for those of us who, genuinely, not falsely or hypocritically, truly defend human rights,” said Gómez. “It puts us in a very complex position.”
Gómez told the Blade the operation to seize Maduro and Flores was “not an invasion for us.”
“It’s not a military intervention,” said Gómez. “It was the beginning, or I would even dare to say the end of the end.”
He acknowledged “there are interests at play, that the United States doesn’t do this for free.” Gómez added U.S. access to Venezuelan oil “for us, at this point, is not something that matters to us.”
“Venezuelans have received nothing, absolutely nothing from the resources generated by oil. We live without it,” he said. “The only ones getting rich from the oil are the top drug traffickers and criminals who remain in power.”
Guillén pointed out the U.S. “has always been one of the biggest buyers of oil from Venezuela, and perhaps we need that closeness to rebuild the country.”
“I also feel that there is a great opportunity with the millions of Venezuelans who left the country and who would like to be part of that reconstruction as well,” he said.
“Logically it’s sad to see the deterioration in the country, the institutions, even the universities in general,” added Guillén. “Those of us who are outside the country have continued to move forward and see other circumstances, and returning to the country with those ideas, with those new approaches, could provide an opportunity for change. That’s what I would like.”
Editor’s note: International News Editor Michael K. Lavers was on assignment in Colombia from Jan. 5-10.
District of Columbia
D.C. bar Rush facing eviction on charge of failing to pay rent
Landlord says $201,324 owed in back payments, late fees
The owners of the building at 14th and U Streets, N.W. where D.C.’s newest LGBTQ bar and nightclub Rush opened on Dec. 5, 2025, filed a complaint in D.C. Superior Court on Feb. 3 seeking Rush’s eviction on grounds that the bar has failed to pay its required rent since last May.
According to the court filing by building owners Thomas and Ioanna Tsianakas Family Trust and Thomas Tsianakas Trustee, Rush owes $141,338.18 in back rent, $19,086.19 for utilities, and $40,900 in late fees, coming to a total of $201,324.37.
Rush owner Jackson Mosley didn’t immediately respond to a Feb. 5 phone message from the Washington Blade seeking comment on the court filing seeking his eviction from the building located at 200114th Street, N.W., with its entrance around the corner on U Street.
WUSA 9 TV news reported in a Feb. 5 broadcast that Mosley said he “doesn’t see why the eviction notice is news and called it a ‘formality.’” The WUSA report adds that Mosley said he and the Rush landlord “have no bad blood” and if the action did reach the point of eviction he would file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy to restructure the lease and his debts.
The eviction court filing follows a decision by the city’s Alcoholic Beverage and Cannabis Board on Dec. 17 to suspend Rush’s liquor license on grounds that its payment check for the liquor licensing fee was “returned unpaid.” The liquor board reissued the license three days later after Mosley paid the fee with another check
He told the Blade at the time that the first check did not “bounce,” as rumors in the community claimed. He said he made a decision to put a “hold” on the check so that Rush could change its initial decision to submit a payment for the license for three years and instead to arrange for a lower payment for just one year at a time.
Around that same time several Rush employees posted social media messages saying the staff was not paid for the bar’s first month’s pay period. Mosley responded by posting a message on the Rush website saying employees were not paid because of a “tax related mismatch between federal and District records,” which, among other things, involved the IRS.
“This discrepancy triggered a compliance hold within our payroll system,” his statement said. “The moment I became aware of the issue I immediately engaged our payroll provider and began working to resolve it,” he said.
But WUSA 9 reports in its Feb. 5 broadcast about the eviction issue that at least some of the now former employees say they still have not been paid since their first paycheck failed to come on Dec. 15.
Superior Court online records for the eviction case show that a “Remote Initial Hearing” for the case has been scheduled for March 30 before a Landlord & Tenant Judge.
National
Human Rights Watch sharply criticizes US in annual report
Trump-Vance administration ‘working to undermine … very idea of human rights’
Human Rights Watch Executive Director Philippe Bolopion on Wednesday sharply criticized the Trump-Vance administration over its foreign policy that includes opposition to LGBTQ rights.
“The U.S. used to actually be a government that was advancing the rights of LGBT people around the world and making sure that it was finding its way into resolutions, into U.N. documents,” he said in response to a question the Washington Blade asked during a press conference at Human Rights Watch’s D.C. offices. “Now we see the opposite movement.”
Human Rights Watch on Wednesday released its annual human rights report that is highly critical of the U.S., among other countries.
“Under relentless pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, and persistently undermined by China and Russia, the rules-based international order is being crushed, threatening to take with it the architecture human rights defenders have come to rely on to advance norms and protect freedoms,” said Bolopion in its introductory paragraph. “To defy this trend, governments that still value human rights, alongside social movements, civil society, and international institutions, need to form a strategic alliance to push back.”
The report, among other things, specifically notes the U.S. Supreme Court’s Skrmetti decision that uphold a Tennessee law banning gender-affirming medical interventions for minors.
The Trump-Vance administration has withdrawn the U.S. from the U.N. LGBTI Core Group, a group of U.N. member states that have pledged to support LGBTQ and intersex rights, and the U.N. Human Rights Council. Bolopion in response to the Blade’s question during Wednesday’s press conference noted the U.S. has also voted against LGBTQ-inclusive U.N. resolutions.
Maria Sjödin, executive director of Outright International, a global LGBTQ and intersex advocacy group, in an op-ed the Blade published on Jan. 28 wrote the movement around the world since the Trump-Vance administration took office has lost more than $125 million in funding.
The U.S. Agency for International Development, which funded myriad LGBTQ and intersex organizations around the world, officially shut down on July 1, 2025. The Trump-Vance administration last month announced it will expand the global gag rule, which bans U.S. foreign aid for groups that support abortion and/or offer abortion-related services, to include organizations that promote “gender ideology.”
“LGBTQ rights are not just a casualty of the Trump foreign policy,” said Human Rights Watch Washington Director Sarah Yager during the press conference. “It is the intent of the Trump foreign policy.”
The report specifically notes Ugandan authorities since the enactment of the country’s Anti-Homosexuality Act in 2023, which punishes “‘carnal knowledge’ between people of the same gender” with up to life in prison, “have perpetrated widespread discrimination and violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, their families, and their supporters.” It also highlights Russian authorities “continued to widely use the ‘gay propaganda’ ban” and prosecuted at least two people in 2025 for their alleged role in “‘involving’ people in the ‘international LGBT movement’” that the country’s Supreme Court has deemed an extremist organization.
The report indicates the Hungarian government “continued its attacks on and scapegoating of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people” in 2025, specifically noting its efforts to ban Budapest Pride that more than 100,000 people defied. The report also notes new provisions of Indonesia’s penal code that took effect on Jan. 2 “violate the rights of women, religious minorities, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, and undermine the rights to freedom of speech and association.”
“This includes the criminalization of all sex outside of marriage, effectively rendering adult consensual same-sex conduct a crime in Indonesia for the first time in the country’s history,” it states.
Bolopion at Wednesday’s press conference said women, people with disabilities, religious minorities, and other marginalized groups lose rights “when democracy is retreating.”
“It’s actually a really good example of how the global retreat from the U.S. as an actor that used to be very imperfectly — you know, with a lot of double standards — but used to be part of this global effort to advance rights and norms for everyone,” he said. “Now, not only has it retreated, which many people expected, but in fact, is now working against it, is working to undermine the system, is working to undermine, at times, the very idea of human rights.”
“That’s definitely something we are acutely aware of, and that we are pushing back,” he added.
Calendar: February 6-12
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