News
Malta lawmakers approve civil unions, adoption bill
Constitutional amendment to ban anti-LGBT discrimination also passed
(Photo public domain)
Lawmakers in the small island nation located south of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea also approved a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban anti-LGBT discrimination.
“Malta is now more liberal and more European and it has given equality to all its people,” said Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, who leads the country’s Labor Party, after the vote as Reuters reported.
Paulo Côrte-Real, co-chair of the ILGA-Europe Executive Board, also applauded the vote in the predominantly Catholic country that only legalized divorce in 2011.
“We warmly welcome today’s historic vote for Malta and particularly pay tribute to Maltese politicians and Maltese LGBTI activists,” he said. “The adoption of the civil union law is a result and an example of a successful partnership built between the decision makers and the civil society.”
The Associated Press reported opposition lawmakers from the conservative Nationalist Party abstained from the vote. Auxiliary Bishop Charles Scicluna of the Archdiocese of Malta is among those who also spoke out against the civil unions and second-parent adoption measure.
Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Portugal and Spain are among the countries in which same-sex couples can legally marry.
The movement to extend marriage rights for gays and lesbians has also advanced in other parts of Europe over the last year.
Same-sex couples began to tie the knot in England and Wales on March 29.
A law that will allow gays and lesbians to legally marry in Scotland takes effect later this year. Gay Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, who took office last December, said he hopes his country will extend marriage rights to gays and lesbians in 2014.
An Italian court last week ruled the Tuscan city of Grosseto must recognize the marriage of a gay couple who tied the knot in New York in 2012.
The Irish government next year will hold a referendum on whether to extend marriage rights to same-sex couples.
Croatian voters last December overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment that defines marriage as between a man and a woman. Hungary, Latvia and other European countries also prohibit gay nuptials.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili late last month proposed a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as between a man and a woman in the former Soviet republic. The country already bans nuptials for gays and lesbians.
Iran
Grenell: ‘Real hope’ for gay rights in Iran as result of nationwide protests
Former ambassador to Germany claimed he has sneaked ‘gays and lesbians out of’ country
Richard Grenell, the special presidential envoy for special missions of United States, said on X on Tuesday that he has helped “sneak gays and lesbians out of Iran” and is seeing a change in attitudes in the country.
The post, which now has more than 25,000 likes since its uploading, claims that attitudes toward gays and lesbians is shifting amid massive economic protests across the country.
“For the first time EVER, someone has said ‘I want to wait just a bit,’,” the former U.S. ambassador to Germany wrote. “There is real hope coming from the inside. I don’t think you can stop this now.”
Grenell, who was named as Trump’s nominee in December 2024, has been a longtime supporter of the president and has been commended for his loyalty during both Trump administrations.
“Richard Grenell is a fabulous person, A STAR,” Trump posted on Truth Social days before his official appointment to the ambassador role. “He will be someplace, high up! DJT”
Iran, which is experiencing demonstrations across all 31 provinces of the country — including in Tehran, the capital — started as a result of a financial crisis causing the collapse of its national currency. Time magazine credits this uprising after the U.N. re-imposed sanctions in September over the country’s pursuit of nuclear weapons.
As basic necessities like bread, rice, meat, and medical supplies become increasingly unaffordable to the majority of the more than 90 million people living there, citizens took to the streets to push back against Iran’s theocratic regime.
Grenell, who was made president and executive director of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts last year by Trump, believes that people in the majority Shiite Muslim country are also beginning to protest on human rights abuses.
Iran is among only a handful of countries in which consensual same-sex sexual relations remain punishable by death, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Virginia
Mark Levine loses race to succeed Adam Ebbin in ‘firehouse’ Democratic primary
State Del. Elizabeth Bennett-Parker won with 70.6 percent of vote
Gay former Virginia House of Delegates member Mark Levine (D-Alexandria) lost his race to become the Democratic nominee to replace gay state Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria) in a Jan. 13 “firehouse” Democratic primary.
Levine finished in second place in the hastily called primary, receiving 807 votes or 17.4 percent. The winner in the four-candidate race, state Del. Elizabeth Bennett-Parker, who was endorsed by both Ebbin and Gov.-elect Abigail Spanberger received 3,281 votes or 70.6 percent.
Ebbin, whose 39th Senate District includes Alexandria and parts of Arlington and Fairfax Counties, announced on Jan. 7 that he was resigning effective Feb. 18, to take a job in the Spanberger administration as senior advisor at the Virginia Cannabis Control Authority.
Results of the Jan. 13 primary, which was called by Democratic Party leaders in Alexandria, Arlington, and Fairfax, show that candidates Charles Sumpter, a World Wildlife Fund director, finished in third place with 321 voters or 6.9 percent; and Amy Jackson, the former Alexandria vice mayor, finished in fourth place with 238 votes or 5.1 percent.
Bennett-Parker, who LGBTQ community advocates consider a committed LGBTQ ally, will now compete as the Democratic nominee in a Feb. 10 special election in which registered voters in the 39th District of all political parties and independents will select Ebbin’s replacement in the state senate.
The Alexandria publication ALX Now reports that local realtor Julie Robben Linebery has been selected by the Alexandria Republican City Committee to be the GOP candidate to compete in the Jan. 10 special election. According to ALX Now, Lineberry was the only application to run in a now cancelled special party caucus type event initially called to select the GOP nominees.
It couldn’t immediately be determined if an independent or other party candidate planned to run in the special election.
Bennett-Parker is considered the strong favorite to win the Feb. 10 special election in the heavily Democratic 39th District, where Democrat Ebbin has served as senator since 2012.
Congress
Van Hollen speaks at ‘ICE Out for Good’ protest in D.C.
ICE agent killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis on Jan. 7
U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) is among those who spoke at an “ICE Out for Good” protest that took place outside U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s headquarters in D.C. on Tuesday.
The protest took place six days after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis.
Good left behind her wife and three children.
(Video by Michael K. Lavers)
Grenell: ‘Real hope’ for gay rights in Iran as result of nationwide protests
Rollback of health IT standards will harm LGBTQ patients
Mark Levine loses race to succeed Adam Ebbin in ‘firehouse’ Democratic primary
National LGBTQ Task Force brings Creating Change conference back to D.C.
Van Hollen speaks at ‘ICE Out for Good’ protest in D.C.
Hundreds protest ICE killing of Renee Nicole Good in D.C.
PHOTOS: ‘ICE Out For Good’
A Shakespearean tragedy comes to life in exquisite ‘Hamnet’
Calendar: January 9-15
