The State Department is reportedly considering withholding assistance for Zambians with HIV unless the country’s government allows the U.S. to access more of its minerals.

The New York Times on Monday reported Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a memo to State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs staffers wrote the U.S. “will only secure our priorities by demonstrating willingness to publicly take support away from Zambia on a massive scale.” The newspaper said it obtained a copy of the letter.

Zambia is a country in southern Africa that borders Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Angola, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The Times notes upwards of 1.3 million Zambians receive daily HIV medications through PEPFAR. The newspaper reported Rubio in his memo said the Trump-Vance administration could “significantly cut assistance” as soon as May.

“Reports of (the) State Department withholding lifesaving HIV treatment in return for mining concessions in Zambia does not make us safer, stronger, or more prosperous,” said U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on Tuesday. “Monetizing innocent people’s lives further undermines U.S. global leadership and is just plain wrong.”

The Washington Blade has reached out to the State Department for comment.

Zambia received breakthrough HIV prevention drug through PEPFAR

Rubio on Jan. 28, 2025, issued a waiver that allowed PEPFAR and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during a freeze on nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending. HIV/AIDS service providers around the world with whom the Blade has spoken say PEPFAR cuts and the loss of funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, which officially closed on July 1, 2025, has severely impacted their work.

The State Department last September announced PEPFAR will distribute lenacapavir in countries with high prevalence rates. Zambia two months later received the first doses of the breakthrough HIV prevention drug.

Kenya and Uganda are among the African countries have signed health agreements with the U.S. since the Trump-Vance administration took office.

The Times notes the countries that signed these agreements pledged to increase health spending. The Blade last month reported LGBTQ rights groups have questioned whether these agreements will lead to further exclusion and government-sanctioned discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

For 113 days, Allan Marrero has been in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, while his husband, Matthew Marrero, has been using every available avenue to secure his release.

Since Nov. 24, 2025, Allan—originally from the Cayman Islands—has been held at multiple detention facilities across the United States. His detention began after what was meant to be a routine, good-faith marriage-based green card interview at Federal Plaza in New York City, marking two years of marriage with Matthew.

Advocates, including Rev. Amanda Hambrick Ashcraft, Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis, and attorney Alexandra Rizio, have been actively involved in supporting the couple and navigating the legal challenges posed by ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The case highlights the Trump-Vance administration’s aggressive use of immigration enforcement to detain and deport individuals, even in circumstances where applicants have established legal claims to remain in the U.S.

Timeline of Allan’s detainment

On Nov. 24, Allan and his husband Matt arrived at 26 Federal Plaza in New York City for what was supposed to be a routine, marriage-based green card interview. They were accompanied by Rev. Amanda Hambrick Ashcraft, a minister from Middle Church in Manhattan, where the couple attended and Matthew sang in the choir.

They arrived early for their 8 a.m. appointment, prepared and hopeful. Despite growing news coverage about increased immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump, they believed in the process and felt confident they had done everything right.

“They brought with them a three-inch binder documenting their entire life together—photos, letters, legal records, and other evidence,” Ashcraft said.

“From the moment you get to Federal Plaza, the process is extremely traumatic—and that’s by design,” she explained. “There’s nothing warm or intuitive about it. It’s dehumanizing, and parts of it feel barbaric.”

Immediately after meeting the USCIS officer, something felt off.

“We came with a three-inch binder of our entire life—photos, letters, everything,” Matt said. “We were dressed up, ready, confident we had done everything right. The first thing she said was, ‘I don’t want that. Take it all apart.’ That was the moment I knew something wasn’t right.”

The officer then asked the couple for their passports—something neither of them had on hand. That seemed to be strike two, signaling that, just as with previous steps in this process, the interview was already off course because of the woman behind the desk.

As the couple was told to move to a new room for their interview, Ashcraft was denied entry with them. This struck all three as odd; Ashcraft had attended immigration and green card interviews before to provide spiritual guidance and bolster claims of legitimacy, with no issues. Coupled with the initial hostility over the binder, it was a clear sign that the day would not go as hoped.

“There’s no real policy—it’s whoever is in front of you deciding what the rules are at that moment,” Ashcraft added. “Whatever they say goes. That’s what makes it so dangerous.”

Inside the tightly controlled interview, tensions escalated.

“I looked over at my husband when she asked how we met—just instinct. He’s the love of my life,” Matt said. “She snapped her fingers in my face and said, ‘Don’t look at him.’ We’re telling our love story, and I’m not even allowed to look at my husband.”

The officer then raised questions about a missed immigration hearing for Allan in 2022. 

Allan had lived in the United States since 2013 and had been diligent about maintaining his legal status and personal growth. During that time, he had entered a rehabilitation program for alcohol addiction—a commitment that, coincidentally, caused him to miss the scheduled court hearing. Medical records explained by Alexandra Rizio, Allan’s attorney, corroborate this.

Because the judge did not know Allan was in rehab, a removal order was issued in his absence.

“He didn’t realize that he had a removal order in his name,” Rizio, the Make the Road New York attorney, explained. “When you have a removal order, it means ICE can pick you up at any moment. He walked into that interview completely unaware that he was at risk of being arrested on the spot.”

The officer acknowledged that their marriage was legitimate but denied Allan’s green card application. She told them they would need to appear before an immigration judge, signaling that his journey to legal status was far from over and still subject to the whims of others.

“She told us, ‘Out of the goodness of my heart, I’ll let you leave today. I could have called ICE, but I won’t,’” Matt recalled. “My husband started crying, I was a wreck.”

Despite that comment, the couple was escorted through a series of back hallways. Allan’s file was handed off to ICE officers, and the supervisor walked away.

“They walked us down this long hallway, took his file, handed it to ICE agents, and just left. No explanation, no warning. Suddenly they’re telling him to put his hands behind his back, and I’m standing there asking, ‘What is happening?’”

The gravity of the situation escalated.

“He was crying, I was crying, we were hugging, and I kept saying, ‘It’s going to be okay,’” Matt said. “And then they just pulled him away into an elevator and left me there. It happened so fast it didn’t even feel real.”

A supervisor entered briefly to distinguish between what could be controlled inside the office and what could not be controlled outside. Rizio called this a deliberate choice to intensify the emotional pressure.

“What the officer could have done was say, ‘You have a removal order—go hire a lawyer,’” Rizio said. “That would have been the humane and reasonable response. Instead, ICE was called, and they arrested him.”

Outside the room, Ashcraft heard the chaos unfold.

“The next thing I heard was Matthew screaming down the hallway: ‘Amanda! Amanda! They took him!’” she recounted. “That’s how it happened—just like that, after everything they had prepared.”

For the next 36 hours, Matt had no information about his husband’s whereabouts.

“For 36 hours, I had no idea where my husband was,” he said. “No phone call, no information, nothing. It felt like he had just disappeared.”

The following morning, Matt’s mother and sister drove down from Connecticut to help. They returned to Federal Plaza with Allan’s anxiety medication and contact information, only to be told minutes later that Allan was no longer there. The couple could not locate him through the ICE online system. Only after contacting an attorney did they learn he had been transferred to Delaney Hall, a detention facility in New Jersey.

Matt and Allan’s mother drove to Delaney Hall in Newark, an industrial area where families—including children—waited in the rain. Inside, staff initially insisted Allan was not present, despite documentation proving otherwise. After long delays, they were finally allowed to see him.

This was the first time Matt felt the point-blank homophobia of the detention system.

“When I finally saw him, they told us we couldn’t touch,” Matt said. “I’m watching straight couples kiss and hold each other, but I can’t even hold my husband’s hand.”

“You ripped my husband away, didn’t tell me where he was for 36 hours, and now I’m not allowed to console him?” he added. “It was so cold—it felt completely inhuman.”

Conditions inside detention quickly became grueling.

“He was moved in the middle of the night, chained at his wrists and ankles, not told where he was going,” Matt said. “They kept the cuffs on for days—he had cuts and bruises.”

“The worst part isn’t even the facilities—it’s the transport,” Matt continued. “You’re chained like an animal, trying to eat a bologna sandwich and drink water while shackled. You can barely move your body.”

Allan remained at Delaney Hall for approximately two weeks. One night, he told Matt that groups of detainees were being taken out in the middle of the night without warning. Shortly afterward, he was among them.

Around 12:30 a.m., Allan called to say he was being moved. He and others were gathered in a visitation room and held for hours without food or beds. By midday, they were shackled again, loaded onto transport, and flown out of state. His location once again disappeared from the ICE tracking system.

Over the next several days, Allan was moved through multiple locations, including a holding area near an airport in Phoenix, where detainees were kept in overcrowded, tent-like enclosures without seating. He remained in restraints for extended periods and was denied access to his medication.

From there, he was transferred through facilities in Texas and Louisiana before ultimately being sent to a remote detention site in the Florida Everglades, informally known as “Alligator Alcatraz.”

Conditions there were severe. Detainees were held in cages with dozens of men in each enclosure. Sanitation was poor, with overflowing toilets near sleeping areas. Exposure to the elements and limited access to medical care caused Allan’s health to deteriorate. Phone calls were limited to short, scheduled windows.

“He told me about being in a cage in the Everglades—30 men, toilets overflowing next to where they sleep,” Matt said. “There were signs about poisonous snakes, and he said, ‘If one shows up, I’m going to die—there’s nobody here.’”

“ICE officers would tell them, ‘You’re a burden to your family. Just sign your self-deportation papers,’” Matt added. “He would call me crying, saying, ‘Just let me go, forget about me.’ That’s psychological warfare.”

Ashcraft reflected on the system’s cruelty.

“At every step, it feels designed to be as insular, as cruel, and as impenetrable as possible,” she said. “At every turn, we’re seeing a new kind of cruelty…Someone will say, ‘They can’t do that,’ and we have to say, ‘Actually, they are.’”

Eventually, Allan was transferred to a detention facility in Natchez, Miss., where conditions were more stable and he was finally able to receive his prescribed medications. Around this time, his legal case began to shift.

His attorney submitted documentation showing that the missed 2022 hearing had occurred while he was in a verified rehabilitation program. The same immigration judge who had issued the original removal order agreed to reopen the case and rescinded that order, restoring Allan’s standing.

“The judge agreed with us and granted bond. At that point, we thought he would be released and we could move forward. That’s how the system is supposed to work,” Rizio said.

In early February, a bond hearing was scheduled. Matt traveled to Mississippi in anticipation of Allan’s release. The legal team presented extensive documentation, including letters of support from members of Congress, as well as evidence of Allan’s marriage and community ties.

Instead of releasing him, ICE exercised its authority to place a 10-day hold while considering an appeal. During that time, Matt remained in Mississippi, visiting Allan regularly.

“ICE decided to just ignore that and not release him. They used something called the ‘auto stay’ provision to keep him locked up anyway,” Rizio said. “It’s essentially them saying, ‘We don’t like the judge’s order, so we’re not going to follow it….That feels crazy—because it is crazy. There’s no real statutory basis for it. It’s a regulation that allows them to operate outside the bounds of what the law actually says.”

Before the hold period ended, a second immigration judge became involved. Without reviewing the full evidence or receiving a newly filed green card application, the judge issued a decision in advance.

“A completely different judge—who isn’t even an immigration specialist—stepped in and denied an application that wasn’t even before him,” Rizio explained. “I have never seen anything like that in 14 years of practice.”

She has argued that the decision was procedurally improper and legally flawed.

“He decided, based on rehab records showing recovery and sobriety, to label Allan a ‘habitual drunkard.’ He cherry-picked information and ignored the evidence that he had successfully completed treatment.”

When the 10-day hold expired, Allan’s legal team attempted to secure his release again, but ICE cited the new ruling to continue detaining him. By that point, Allan had been in detention for more than 100 days.

“He could have walked out of detention with a green card,” Rizio said. “Instead, he’s still sitting in detention because of actions that simply shouldn’t have happened.”

“None of what I just described reflects a system that cares about justice,” she said. “It feels like punishment. I feel very confident these actions are designed to make people give up… Allan has already lost over three months of his life. He’s never going to get that time back.”

“We did everything right,” Matt said. “We followed the law, built a life, got married, had a clear pathway to citizenship. And now my whole life is on pause. If someone wants to understand this, imagine someone coming in and kidnapping the person you love most—taking away all your control. That’s what this feels like.”

Allan remains in detention in Natchez while legal challenges move forward. Throughout his time in custody, detainees have reported being pressured to accept voluntary deportation, often being told they are burdens to their families. Despite the mounting legal and emotional toll, Allan continues to fight his case from inside detention, while his family and community advocate for his release on the outside.

The couple has set up a Go-Fund-Me to help with the financial costs of this ongoing situation.

The Blade contacted ICE and DHS for comment but did not receive a response.

Longtime Trump ally and openly gay “Special Presidential Envoy for Special Missions of the United States” Richard Grenell is stepping down from his leadership role at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

The story was first reported by Axios on March 13 before President Donald Trump made any official statements about the leadership change at the Kennedy Center, which has undergone a sweeping overhaul of rule changes and pro-Trump appointees to its board since Trump took office in 2025.

In addition to packing the Kennedy Center boardroom with loyalists and appointing himself chair of the board in February 2025, the Trump-Vance administration has placed the president’s name on the facade in an attempt to rename the center — despite the move being illegal without an act of Congress to officially change its name. The administration has also painted the building’s columns white and removed diverse programming.

Since these changes, multiple shows have pulled out of performing at the historic venue — including productions associated with the Washington National Opera.

Matt Floca, the former vice president of facilities operations at the national cultural center under Grenell, has been named the new head of the Kennedy Center, according to Trump.

The change is expected to be announced at a Kennedy Center board of directors meeting at the White House on Monday, which Trump is expected to attend.

“I am pleased to announce that Matt Floca, subject to the approval of the Board of Directors, will be named the Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director of THE TRUMP KENNEDY CENTER where, as Vice President of Operations, Matt has helped us achieve tremendous progress in bringing the Center to the highest level of Excellence!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. “A Complete Reconstruction of THE TRUMP KENNEDY CENTER will begin after the July 4th Celebration, with a scheduled Grand Re-Opening in approximately two years.”

“Ric Grenell has done an excellent job in helping to coordinate various elements of the Center during the transition period, and I want to thank him for the outstanding work he has done,” the post added. “THE TRUMP KENNEDY CENTER will be, at its completion, the finest facility of its kind anywhere in the World! — President DONALD J. TRUMP.”

Grenell previously served as U.S. ambassador to Germany and later as acting director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term. He led the Kennedy Center during a period in which its programming was reshaped and new board members aligned with Trump were appointed. Trump also named himself chair of the board.

Congress approved $257 million in reconstruction funding for the Kennedy Center in last year’s spending package, a project estimated to take roughly two years to complete. Kennedy Center officials have also said they implemented increased cost-cutting measures — including large-scale layoffs — and that staff salaries are no longer being paid using debt reserves.

Actor Harvey Fierstein, a longtime critic of Trump’s takeover of the cultural institution and an award-winning openly gay performer, posted on Instagram celebrating Grenell’s departure.

“Good old anti-LGBTQ+ self-loathing dick licker, #RichardGrenell, is moving on to ruin something new under the auspices of our demented war-mongering MAGA fool Prez,” Fierstein wrote. “Maybe #RicGrennell can open a little boutique selling red baseball hats. But first, after destroying the Kennedy Center for the Arts, he’s earned a vacation. Maybe he and Kristi Noem can go puppy hunting together. They can tell each other tales of when they were once called ‘the best people’ and other fairy tales.”