National
SPECIAL REPORT: Poverty in the LGBT community
Studies show image of ‘gay affluence’ is a myth
Kadeem Swenson told the Blade in 2010 that his parents kicked him out of the house for being gay. He spent a year living in abandoned buildings in D.C. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Editor’s note: This week, the Blade kicks off a special yearlong focus on poverty in the LGBT community. The occasional series will examine the problem with special reports from D.C. and around the country. To share your ideas or personal story, visit us on Facebook or email [email protected].
As the 50th anniversary of the U.S. war on poverty launched by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964 is commemorated this year, LGBT advocates are pointing to little noticed studies showing that the rate of poverty in the LGBT community is higher than that of the general population.
In a 2013 report analyzing data from the U.S. Census Bureau and other data measuring poverty in the United States, the Williams Institute, a research arm at the University of California Law School in Los Angeles that specializes in LGBT issues, concludes that rates of poverty are higher than the general population among gay men and lesbians between the ages of 18-44 and gay men and lesbians living alone.
The report shows that couples – both gay and straight – tend to have a lower rate of poverty than single people and the population as a whole. But it found that the poverty rate for lesbian couples is higher than that of gay male couples and opposite-sex couples and the poverty rate of same-sex African-American couples is higher than it is for opposite-sex African-American couples.
Among the report’s findings that surprised LGBT activists were data showing that bisexual men and women had poverty rates of 25.9 percent and 29.4 percent respectively – higher than gay men (20.5 percent) and lesbians (22.7 percent). The report says the same set of data show that heterosexual men had a poverty rate of 15.3 percent compared to a rate of 21.1 percent for heterosexual women.
“The LGB poverty data help to debunk the persistent stereotype of the affluent gay man or lesbian,” the Williams Institute report says.
“Instead, the poverty data are consistent with the view that LGB people continue to face economic challenges that affect their income and life chances, such as susceptibility to employment discrimination, higher rates of being uninsured, and a lack of access to various tax and other financial benefits via exclusion from the right to marry,” the report says.
The report uses the U.S. Census Bureau definition of poverty for 2012 in its analysis of LGBT poverty levels based on family income. That definition lists the “poverty line” for a single person household as an annual income of $11,815 or less. The poverty line for a two-person household was $15,079, and for a four-person household was $23,684 in 2012.
Researchers with the Williams Institute say this graph summarizes their findings of higher poverty rates among samples of mostly LGB and some LGBT people in the U.S. The bar graph on the left represents data taken from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2010 American Community Survey (ACS). The chart in the center is taken from data from the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s 2010 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG). The chart at right is from a 2012 phone survey conducted by the Gallup Poll organization. (Graph courtesy of the Williams Institute)
Trans poverty ‘extraordinarily high’
A separate study prepared jointly by the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force in 2011, called “Injustice at Every Turn,” shows dramatically higher rates of poverty and homelessness among transgender Americans in each state, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories.
Kylar Broadus, senior policy counsel and director of the Trans Civil Rights Project for The Task Force, called the poverty rate in the transgender community “extraordinarily high.” He said a key factor leading to economic hardship among transgender people is the persistent problem of employment discrimination.
“There’s double the national rate of unemployment,” he said in discussing the trans community of which he said he’s a member. “And once we’re employed 90 percent of those surveyed reported experiencing harassment and discrimination on the job,” he noted in pointing to the NCTE-Task Force study.
“Forty-seven percent said they experienced adverse outcomes such as being fired, not hired or denied promotions because of being transgender or gender non-conforming,” Broadus said.
He said the respondents reported various forms of housing discrimination that are contributing factors to homelessness in the transgender community. According to the study, 19 percent of respondents reported having been refused a home or an apartment to rent and 11 percent reported being evicted because of their gender identity or expression.
“Nineteen percent experienced homelessness at some point in their lives because they were transgender or didn’t conform as well, and then 55 percent were denied access to shelters,” he said.
Another study released by the Williams Institute last week reports that 2.4 million LGBT adults, or 29 percent, “experienced a time in the last year when they did not have enough money to feed themselves or their family.”
The study, written by Williams Institute demographer Gary Gates, found that LGBT people are more likely to rely on the federal food stamp program for assistance than their heterosexual counterparts.
“One in four bisexuals (25 percent) receive food stamps,” the report says, “34 percent of LGBT women were food insecure in the last year; and LGBT African Americans, Native Americans, and Native Hawaiians experienced food insecurity in the last year at rates of 37 percent, 55 percent, and 78 percent respectively,” the report says.
LGBT homeless rate high in San Fran
Yet another report released last June found that 29 percent of the homeless population in San Francisco identified as LGBT. The report, which was part of the city’s biennial homeless count, included for the first time a count of the number of homeless people who identified themselves as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Brian Bassinger, director of the San Francisco-based AIDS Housing Alliance, which provides services to the HIV and LGBT communities, said although the finding to some degree reflects the high LGBT population in San Francisco, which is 15 percent, he believes LGBT people make up a sizable percent of the homeless population in other cities throughout the country.
Bassinger said he also believes the 29 percent figure for San Francisco is most likely an under count and that the actual number is higher.
“LGBT people in the shelter system here are regularly targeted for violence, harassment and hate crimes, which are very well documented,” he said.
Since much of the effort to count homeless people in the city takes place at shelters, large numbers of LGBT homeless people are not counted because they generally avoid the shelters out of fear of harassment and violence, Bassinger said.
He said his group also closely monitors a development in San Francisco threatening to push the city’s older LGBT population into poverty and which may be occurring in other cities – the enormous rise in the cost of housing due to gentrification and a booming real estate market. Those who for years have lived in popular gay neighborhoods as tenants are being displaced by the conversion of rental apartment buildings and houses into upscale condominiums, Bassinger said.
“Long-term San Franciscans who have spent decades building the system to deliver access to equal treatment under the law here in San Francisco are getting displaced by all of these people moving into our community,” he said.
And because they can no longer afford to live in San Francisco many are being forced to move to other parts of the state or other states that are less LGBT friendly and don’t have the support community they came to enjoy for so many years, according to Bassinger.
The Williams Institute’s 2013 report, meanwhile, analyzes data from four surveys of the U.S. population with a demographic breakdown that included mostly gay men, lesbians, and bisexuals as well as a smaller, combined “LGBT” sample.
The four surveys were conducted by these organizations or government agencies:
• The 2010 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau with a sample of more than 500,000 and which included data from same-sex couple households.
• The National Survey of Family Growth conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics from 2006-2010 included a sample of more than 19,000 people throughout the country, including people who identified as LGB, the Williams Institute study says.
• The California Health Interview Survey conducted by UCLA’s Center for Health Policy Research in collaboration with California Department of Public Health surveyed more than 50,000 Californians, including LGB adults from 2007 to 2009.
• A Gallup Daily Tracking Poll conducted between June 1 and Sept. 30, 2012 with a sample of more than 120,000 adults from 18 and older, included people who identified themselves as LGBT in all 50 states and D.C. The poll was conducted by phone.
The report includes these additional findings on the subject of poverty in the LGBT community:
• African-American same-sex couples have poverty rates more than twice the rate of different-sex married African Americans.
• One-third of lesbian couples and 20.1 percent of gay male couples who don’t have a high school diploma are in poverty, compared to 18.8 percent of heterosexual couples.
• Lesbian couples living in rural areas are more likely to be poor (14.1 percent) compared to 4.5 percent of lesbian couples in large cities; 10.2 percent of gay male couples who live in small metropolitan areas are poor compared with just 3.3 percent of gay male couples who live in large metropolitan areas.
• Nearly one in four children living with a male same-sex couple and 19.2 percent of children living with a female same-sex couple is in poverty. This compares with 12.1 percent of children living with married heterosexual couples who are in poverty.
• African-American children in gay male households have the highest poverty rate (52.3 percent) of any children in any household type.
• 14 percent of lesbian couples and 7.7 percent of gay male couples received food stamps, compared to 6.5 percent of straight married couples. In addition, 2.2 percent of same-sex female couples received government cash assistance compared to 0.8 percent of women in different-sex couples. And 1.2 percent of men in same-sex couples received cash assistance compared to 0.6 percent of men in different-sex couple relationships who received cash assistance.
The report’s co-author Lee Badgett, a Williams Institute senior fellow and professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, said it’s difficult to draw a conclusion from the Williams Institute and other studies as to why there are higher poverty levels in the LGBT community.
“The people that I know who worked with LGBT people in poverty talk about the reasons being very complex,” she said.
“I suspect that there are lots of disadvantages that people face, whether it’s in the labor market or in schools and that maybe somehow they kind of come together, that they are sort of cumulative over time and make people more vulnerable to poverty. But I think we don’t really know exactly why that happens,” Badgett told the Blade.
In the Williams Institute report, she and co-authors Laura Durso and Alyssa Schneebaum call for further studies to explore the factors that contribute both to “poverty and economic resilience” within the LGBT community.
“Our analyses highlight different demographic subpopulations that may be particularly at-risk; however, we are unable to take a more fine-grained approach to identifying factors that contribute to poverty in these different communities,” the report says.
“Identifying the conditions under which individuals and families descend into and escape from poverty will aid service organizations and government agencies in designing interventions to address this significant social problem,” the report concludes.
Broadus of the Task Force said discrimination and bias make up at least some of the conditions that force LGBT people into poverty.
“We are less economically secure as a community due to suffering at the hands of discrimination in employment, marriage, insurance and less familial and societal support,” he said. “The LGBT community as a whole lives at the margins and some at the margins of the margins such as women, people of color and children. When some of our community is vulnerable we are all vulnerable.”
Federal Government
Markwayne Mullin confirmed as next DHS secretary
Okla. senator to succeed Kristi Noem
The U.S. Senate confirmed Markwayne Mullin as the next secretary of Homeland Security on Monday, as the agency continues to grapple with what lawmakers have described as a “never-ending” funding standoff, with Democrats attempting to withhold funding from one of the nation’s largest and most costly agencies.
Mullin — a Republican senator from Oklahoma, former mixed martial arts fighter, and plumbing business owner — was confirmed in a 54–45 vote. Two Democrats — U.S. Sens. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) — sided with Republicans in supporting his confirmation.
The new agency head is expected to follow the policy direction set by President Donald Trump, emphasizing stricter immigration enforcement. This includes proposals to support immigration agents at polling sites and to cut funding to so-called “sanctuary cities.”
Mullin replaces Kristi Noem, who was fired earlier this month following a widely scrutinized 2-day congressional hearing on Capitol Hill.
During the hearing, Noem faced intense questioning over her response to several crises, including the fatal shooting of two American citizens in Minneapolis by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, a $220 million border security advertising campaign that featured her on horseback near Mount Rushmore amid one of the largest federal workforce reductions in U.S. history, and the federal response to major natural disasters such as the July 2025 Texas floods and Hurricane Helene in 2024.
Noem had previously drawn criticism for a series of policy decisions in South Dakota that broadly focused on restricting the rights of LGBTQ individuals. In 2023, she signed House Bill 1080, banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors. She also signed legislation and executive orders restricting trans athletes’ participation in women’s sports, as well as the state’s “Religious Freedom Restoration Act,” which critics argued enabled discrimination against LGBTQ individuals. Additionally, the state canceled contracts related to LGBTQ support services — including suicide prevention and health care navigation programs‚ and later agreed to a $300,000 settlement with trans advocacy group, The Transformation Project.
Despite her removal from DHS, Noem will remain in the Trump-Vance administration as a special envoy for the “Shield of the Americas,” an initiative aimed at promoting U.S. influence in the Western Hemisphere, including efforts to counter cartel networks, reduce Chinese influence, and manage migration.
The new head of DHS has served in Congress since 2013, in both houses of the federal legislature. While in the Senate and a member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, Mullin has been a vocal critic of policies aimed at expanding LGBTQ inclusion. He led a group of lawmakers in urging the Administration for Community Living to reverse a rule requiring states to prioritize Older Americans Act services based on sexual orientation and gender identity, arguing the policy could have unintended consequences.
Mullin also makes history as the first Native American — and a citizen of the Cherokee Nation — to lead the Department of Homeland Security. He was also among the 147 Republicans who voted to overturn the 2020 presidential election results despite no evidence of widespread fraud, and was present in the U.S. House of Representatives chamber on Jan. 6.
Federal Government
Protesters say SAVE Act targets voters, transgender youth
Bill described as ‘Jim Crow 2.0’
Members of Congress, advocates, and people from across the country gathered outside the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday to protest proposed federal legislation that voting rights activists have deemed “Jim Crow 2.0.”
The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act would amend the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 to require in-person proof of citizenship for anyone seeking to vote in U.S. elections.
President Donald Trump has also pushed for the proposed legislation to include a section that would ban gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors, even with parental consent, and prohibit trans people from participating in school or professional sports consistent with their gender identity rather than their sex assigned at birth.
In addition to changing voter registration requirements, the bill would limit acceptable forms of identification to documents such as a birth certificate or passport — records that the Brennan Center for Justice estimates more than 21 million Americans do not have — effectively restricting access to the ballot. It would also ban online voter registration, DMV voter registration efforts, and mail-in voter registration.
A 2021 investigation by the Associated Press found that fewer than 475 people voted illegally or improperly, a tiny fraction of the estimated 160 million Americans who voted in the 2020 election.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) spoke at the event.
“It will kick millions of American citizens off the rolls. And they don’t even require you to be told,” the highest-ranking Democrat in the Senate told protesters and reporters outside the Capitol. “If this law passes — and it won’t — you’re gonna show up in November … and they’ll say… sorry, you’re no longer on the voting rolls.”
He, like many other speakers, emphasized the bill in the context of American history, pointing to what he described as its racist roots and its impact on Black and brown Americans.
“I have called this act, over and over again, Jim Crow 2.0 … because they know it’s the truth.”
U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) was one of the lawmakers leading opposition to the legislation and spoke at the rally.
“It’s not just voting rights that are on the line — our democracy is on the line,” the California lawmaker said. “It’s not a voter I.D. bill. It’s a bait and switch bill.”
He added historical context, noting the significance of voting rights legislation passed more than 60 years ago. In 1965, Alabama civil rights activists marched to protest barriers to voter registration. Alabama state troopers violently attacked peaceful demonstrators at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, using tear gas, clubs, and whips against more than 500 — mostly Black — protesters.
“61 years ago — not to the day — but this week, President Lyndon Johnson came to the Capitol and addressed a joint session of Congress in the wake of Bloody Sunday and pushed Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act,” Padilla said. “61 years later, Donald Trump and this Republican majority wants to take us backwards. We’re not gonna let that happen.”
U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) also spoke, emphasizing that he views the effort as a Republican-led and Trump-backed attempt to restrict voting access, particularly among Black, brown, and predominantly Democratic communities.
“President Trump told Republicans when they were meeting behind closed doors that ‘The SAVE Act will guarantee Republicans win the midterms and ensure they do not lose an election for 50 years,’” Luján said. “The first time I think Donald Trump’s been honest … This voter suppression bill is only that. Taking away vote by mail? I hope my Republican colleagues from states that voted for Donald Trump or where vote by mail is popular have the courage and the backbone to stand up and say no to this nonsense, because their constituents are going to push back.”
U.S. Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.) also spoke.
“Our Republican colleagues have already cut Medicaid, Medicare, people don’t know how they’re gonna be able to afford energy,” she said, providing context for the broader political moment. “We’re in the middle of a war that they can’t even get straight while we’re in it and don’t have a way to get out of it. And we are now faced with defending our democracy?”
She then showed the crowd something that she said has been with her throughout her political journey in Washington.
“I brought with me something that I carried on the day that I was sworn into the House of Representatives when I was elected in 2016, and I carried it with me on the day that I was sworn in as United States senator. And I also carried it with me when I was trapped up in the gallery on Jan. 6 and all I could think to do was pray … This document allowed my great great great grandfather, who had been enslaved in Georgia, to have the right to vote. We took this and turned it into a scarf. It is the returns of qualified voters and reconstruction code from 1867. This is my proof of what we’ve been through. This is also our inspiration.”
“I got to travel between the Edmund Pettus Bridge two times. And even as I thought about this moment, I recognized that while we wish we weren’t in it, while we don’t know why we’re in it, I do know we were made for it … So I came today to tell you that, um, just like the leader said, that he calls it Jim Crow 2.0. I call it Jim Crow 2.NO.”
Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the largest LGBTQ advocacy organization in the U.S., also spoke, highlighting the impact of the bill’s proposed provisions affecting trans people.
“This bill is not about saving America. This bill is about stealing an election. This bill is about suppressing voters,” Robinson said. “This bill not only tries to disenfranchise voters that deserve their right to vote, it also tries to criminalize trans kids and their families … It tries to criminalize doctors providing medically necessary care for our trans youth.”
The SAVE Act passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Feb. 11 but has not yet been considered in the U.S. Senate.
Idaho
Idaho advances bill to restrict bathroom access for transgender residents
HB 752 passed in state House of Representatives on Monday
The Idaho House of Representatives passed House Bill 752 on Monday, a measure that would make it a crime for a person to use a bathroom other than the one designated for their “biological sex.”
The story was first reported by the Idaho Capitol Sun after the bill cleared the House.
House Bill 752 would make it a criminal offense — either a misdemeanor or a felony, depending on the number of prior offenses — for individuals who “knowingly and willfully” enter a bathroom or changing room designated for the opposite sex.
The bill would apply to public buildings, including government-owned spaces, and places of “public accommodation,” a category that includes private businesses.
According to the bill’s text, it would “prohibit a person from entering a restroom or changing room designated for the opposite sex; provide a penalty; provide exceptions; define terms; and declare an emergency and provide an effective date.”
A first offense would be a misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in prison. A second or subsequent offense within five years would be a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison.
The bill passed in a 54–15 vote on Monday. Six Republicans broke with their party’s majority to join nine Democrats in opposing the measure.
The bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Cornel Rasor, a Republican from Sagle near the Washington-Idaho border, told House lawmakers that the legislation is intended to protect women and girls.
“It prevents discomfort and voyeurism escalation and assaults, while preserving single-user options and narrow exceptions so no one is denied access for emergency aid,” Rasor said.
State Rep. Chris Mathias, a Democrat from Boise, disagreed, arguing that the legislation would unfairly target transgender Idahoans.
“The truth of the matter is — and I know a lot of people don’t want to say it — but forcing people who don’t look like the sex they were assigned at birth, or transgender folks, to use other people’s bathrooms is going to put a lot of people in danger,” Mathias said.
The Idaho American Civil Liberties Union made a statement about the bill following its passage.
“Idaho lawmakers continue pushing these harmful, invasive bathroom laws, yet cannot present credible evidence that transgender people using gender-aligned bathrooms threaten public safety,” the Idaho ACLU said. “The bill does nothing to address real criminal acts, such as sexual assault or voyeurism, and disregards concerns from law enforcement about the burden enforcement would place on local resources.”
In addition to human rights advocates, who have spoken out against similar bills advancing in state legislatures across the country, Idaho law enforcement groups have also opposed the measure. They argue that the way the legislation is written would “pose significant practical enforcement challenges,” noting that officers are tasked with maintaining public safety — not conducting gender checks or policing bathroom access.
During a committee hearing last week, law enforcement representatives and several trans Idahoans testified that the bill would make many residents less safe.
“Officers responding to a complaint would be placed in the difficult position of determining an individual’s biological sex in order to enforce the statute,” Idaho Fraternal Order of Police President Bryan Lovell wrote. “In many circumstances, there is no clear or reasonable way for officers to make that determination without engaging in questioning or investigative actions that could be viewed as invasive and inappropriate.”
The Idaho Sheriffs’ Association requested that lawmakers amend the bill to require that individuals be given an opportunity to leave a bathroom immediately before facing potential prosecution.
The bill now heads to the Idaho Senate for consideration. To become law, it must pass both chambers and avoid a veto from the governor.
A separate bathroom bill, House Bill 607, which would be enforced through civil lawsuits, passed the House last month but has not yet received a committee hearing in the Senate.
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