National
Trump rechaza número de muertes de María en Puerto Rico
Los comentarios provocan indignación entre activistas LGBTI


El presidente Trump el 13 de septiembre provocó indignación cuando rechazó el número de muertes del huracán María en Puerto Rico (Foto de Washington Blade por Michael Key)
“3,000 personas no murieron en los dos huracanes que golpearon Puerto Rico,” dijo Trump en uno de sus dos tweets, refiriéndose a María, que tocó tierra en la costa sureste de Puerto Rico el 20 de septiembre de 2017, y el huracán Irma, que rozó el estado libre asociado estadounidense menos de dos semanas antes. “Cuando salí de la isla, después de que la tormenta había golpeado, tenían entre seis y 18 muertos. No subió demasiado con el paso del tiempo. Luego, mucho tiempo después comenzaron a reportar números realmente grandes, como 3,000.”
3000 people did not die in the two hurricanes that hit Puerto Rico. When I left the Island, AFTER the storm had hit, they had anywhere from 6 to 18 deaths. As time went by it did not go up by much. Then, a long time later, they started to report really large numbers, like 3000…
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 13, 2018
Trump en otro tweet acusó a los demócratas de inflar el número de muertes “para hacer que mirase lo peor posible cuando estaba recaudando miles de millones de dólares para ayudar a reconstruir Puerto Rico.”
“Si una persona murió por cualquier motivo, como la vejez, simplemente agréguela a la lista,” dijo Trump. “Malas políticas. Amo a Puerto Rico.”
…..This was done by the Democrats in order to make me look as bad as possible when I was successfully raising Billions of Dollars to help rebuild Puerto Rico. If a person died for any reason, like old age, just add them onto the list. Bad politics. I love Puerto Rico!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 13, 2018
Trump hizo sus comentarios menos de tres semanas después del gobernador de Puerto Rico Ricardo Rosselló aceptó los hallazgos de un estudio de la Universidad George Washington que atribuyó 2,975 muertos a María. Trump estaba twitteando mientras el huracán Florence comenzaba a azotar la costa de Carolina del Norte.
“Las declaraciones del presidente que cuestionan el número de muertes de los huracanes Irma y María son deplorables,” Omar Gonzalez-Pagan, un abogado para Lambda Legal que es puertorriqueño, dijo al Washington Blade el jueves desde la capital puertorriqueña de San Juan. “Demuestran que el presidente no solo está divorciado de la realidad, sino también su absoluta indiferencia por el sufrimiento de la gente y, francamente, su crueldad.”
“Casi 3,000 puertorriqueños murieron como resultado de los huracanes María e Irma,” añadió. “Sus vidas cuentan.”
Wilfred Labiosa, cofundador de Waves Ahead, un grupo que ayuda a los puertorriqueños LGBTI y otros grupos vulnerables recuperarse de María, estuvo de acuerdo con Gonzalez-Pagan cuando habló al Blade el jueves desde Puerto Rico. Labiosa añadió que los tweets de Trump “reflectan la falta de aceptación de puertorriqueños como ciudadanos estadounidenses.”
“Refleja que Puerto Rico no es un estado libre asociado, sino una colonia de los EEUU que podemos ser prescindibles para los EEUU,” Labiosa dijo al Blade.
La alcaldesa de San Juan Carmen Yulín Cruz es entre aquellos que siguen ser críticas vocales de la respuesta de Trump a María, que incluyó tirando papel toallas en una multitud de personas en una iglesia en las afueras de San Juan menos de dos semanas después del huracán tocó tierra. Cruz el jueves en una larga declaración dijo que las declaraciones de Trump muestran “una falta de respeto por nuestra realidad y nuestro dolor.”
“El simplemente no puede comprender el sufrimiento humano que su negligencia y falta de sensibilidad nos han causado,” dijo Cruz. “3,000 personas murieron en su vigilancia y su incapacidad de captarlo (es lo que) lo vuelven peligroso.”
Rosselló, que han sido reacio a criticar a Trump, también rechazó los tweets.
“Ni la gente de Puerto Rico ni las víctimas merecen que su dolor sea cuestionado,” Rosselló dijo a CBS News.

Un poste dañado en un barrio de Vieques, Puerto Rico, el 31 de enero de 2018. (Foto de Washington Blade por Michael K. Lavers)
Trump ‘dándole la espalda a todos los que sufren’
María tuvo vientos de 155 mph cuando tocó tierra.
Cientos de miles de puertorriqueños no tenían electricidad o acceso a agua potable durante meses.
Labiosa y otros activistas en Puerto Rico han dicho al Blade que personas con VIH/SIDA no tenían acceso a medicamentos antiretrovirales durante los días y semanas después de María tocó tierra. También han dicho que los puertorriqueños confrontaron discriminación en albergues de emergencia por toda la isla.
Casas con toldos azules como techos temporales todavía eran comunes en la zona metropolitana de San Juan y en el sureste de Puerto Rico en mayo cuando este reportero estuvo en la isla.
David Begnaud, un reportero de CBS News, el jueves reportó FEMA dijo que se mudó millones de botellas de agua a una vieja pista en Ceiba, un municipio en la costa noreste de Puerto Rico, que fueron fotografiadas esta semana con toldos azules resistidos sobre ellas.
BREAKING: FEMA accepts blames, admits it DID move water onto a runway in Ceiba, Puerto Rico in order to save taxpayer money.
I was told @FEMA didn’t have available space on the island to store the millions of bottles of water, so it sat tarped in the sun.https://t.co/4gopvepV3Y— David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) September 13, 2018
BuzzFeed el martes reportó que FEMA solo aprovechó 75 de las 2,431 solicitudes de asistencia funeraria que recibió de puertorriqueños después de María. Trump en el mismo día defendió de nuevo la respuesta de su administración a María mientras hablaba sobre Florence con reporteros a la Casa Blanca.
“Mientras está ocupado tratando de ‘salvar la cara,’ continuará dándole la espalda a todos los que sufren,” dijo Cruz el jueves en su declaración. “En pocas palabras: Está completamente desquiciado de la realidad. Una cosa es segura, nuestras vidas importan y no necesitamos un tweet de Trump para recordarnos eso.”
Labiosa estaba de acuerdo, notando que su organización y otras todavía están ayudando a los puertorriqueños recuperarse de María e Irma. Labiosa también dijo al Blade que Waves Ahead, SAGE Puerto Rico y otros grupos que dan la asistencia a puertorriqueños LGBTI también están trabajando de responder a la creciente crisis de salud mental de la isla.
“La comunidad, la diáspora y las entidades no gubernamentales están haciendo la diferencia por trabajar duras para dar los servicios necesarios a aquellos devastados por los huracanes,” dijo al Blade.

Un poste y árboles dañados en Adjuntas, Puerto Rico, el 2 de febrero de 2018. (Foto de Washington Blade de Michael K. Lavers)
New York
Men convicted of murdering two men in NYC gay bar drugging scheme sentenced
One of the victims, John Umberger, was D.C. political consultant

A New York judge on Wednesday sentenced three men convicted of killing a D.C. political consultant and another man who they targeted at gay bars in Manhattan.
NBC New York notes a jury in February convicted Jayqwan Hamilton, Jacob Barroso, and Robert DeMaio of murder, robbery, and conspiracy in relation to druggings and robberies that targeted gay bars in Manhattan from March 2021 to June 2022.
John Umberger, a 33-year-old political consultant from D.C., and Julio Ramirez, a 25-year-old social worker, died. Prosecutors said Hamilton, Barroso, and DeMaio targeted three other men at gay bars.
The jury convicted Hamilton and DeMaio of murdering Umberger. State Supreme Court Judge Felicia Mennin sentenced Hamilton and DeMaio to 40 years to life in prison.
Barroso, who was convicted of killing Ramirez, received a 20 years to life sentence.
National
Medical groups file lawsuit over Trump deletion of health information
Crucial datasets included LGBTQ, HIV resources

Nine private medical and public health advocacy organizations, including two from D.C., filed a lawsuit on May 20 in federal court in Seattle challenging what it calls the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’s illegal deletion of dozens or more of its webpages containing health related information, including HIV information.
The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington, names as defendants Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and HHS itself, and several agencies operating under HHS and its directors, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and the Food and Drug Administration.
“This action challenges the widespread deletion of public health resources from federal agencies,” the lawsuit states. “Dozens (if not more) of taxpayer-funded webpages, databases, and other crucial resources have vanished since January 20, 2025, leaving doctors, nurses, researchers, and the public scrambling for information,” it says.
“These actions have undermined the longstanding, congressionally mandated regime; irreparably harmed Plaintiffs and others who rely on these federal resources; and put the nation’s public health infrastructure in unnecessary jeopardy,” the lawsuit continues.
It adds, “The removal of public health resources was apparently prompted by two recent executive orders – one focused on ‘gender ideology’ and the other targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion (‘DEI’) programs. Defendants implemented these executive orders in a haphazard manner that resulted in the deletion (inadvertent or otherwise) of health-related websites and databases, including information related to pregnancy risks, public health datasets, information about opioid-use disorder, and many other valuable resources.”
The lawsuit does not mention that it was President Donald Trump who issued the two executive orders in question.
A White House spokesperson couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on the lawsuit.
While not mentioning Trump by name, the lawsuit names as defendants in addition to HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., Matthew Buzzelli, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Jay Bhattacharya, director of the National Institutes of Health; Martin Makary, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration; Thomas Engels, administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration; and Charles Ezell, acting director of the Office of Personnel Management.
The 44-page lawsuit complaint includes an addendum with a chart showing the titles or descriptions of 49 “affected resource” website pages that it says were deleted because of the executive orders. The chart shows that just four of the sites were restored after initially being deleted.
Of the 49 sites, 15 addressed LGBTQ-related health issues and six others addressed HIV issues, according to the chart.
“The unannounced and unprecedented deletion of these federal webpages and datasets came as a shock to the medical and scientific communities, which had come to rely on them to monitor and respond to disease outbreaks, assist physicians and other clinicians in daily care, and inform the public about a wide range of healthcare issues,” the lawsuit states.
“Health professionals, nonprofit organizations, and state and local authorities used the websites and datasets daily in care for their patients, to provide resources to their communities, and promote public health,” it says.
Jose Zuniga, president and CEO of the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (IAPAC), one of the organizations that signed on as a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said in a statement that the deleted information from the HHS websites “includes essential information about LGBTQ+ health, gender and reproductive rights, clinical trial data, Mpox and other vaccine guidance and HIV prevention resources.”
Zuniga added, “IAPAC champions evidence-based, data-informed HIV responses and we reject ideologically driven efforts that undermine public health and erase marginalized communities.”
Lisa Amore, a spokesperson for Whitman-Walker Health, D.C.’s largest LGBTQ supportive health services provider, also expressed concern about the potential impact of the HHS website deletions.
“As the region’s leader in HIV care and prevention, Whitman-Walker Health relies on scientific data to help us drive our resources and measure our successes,” Amore said in response to a request for comment from the Washington Blade.
“The District of Columbia has made great strides in the fight against HIV,” Amore said. “But the removal of public facing information from the HHS website makes our collective work much harder and will set HIV care and prevention backward,” she said.
The lawsuit calls on the court to issue a declaratory judgement that the “deletion of public health webpages and resources is unlawful and invalid” and to issue a preliminary or permanent injunction ordering government officials named as defendants in the lawsuit “to restore the public health webpages and resources that have been deleted and to maintain their web domains in accordance with their statutory duties.”
It also calls on the court to require defendant government officials to “file a status report with the Court within twenty-four hours of entry of a preliminary injunction, and at regular intervals, thereafter, confirming compliance with these orders.”
The health organizations that joined the lawsuit as plaintiffs include the Washington State Medical Association, Washington State Nurses Association, Washington Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Academy Health, Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, Fast-Track Cities Institute, International Association of Providers of AIDS Care, National LGBT Cancer Network, and Vermont Medical Society.
The Fast-Track Cities Institute and International Association of Providers of AIDS Care are based in D.C.
U.S. Federal Courts
Federal judge scraps trans-inclusive workplace discrimination protections
Ruling appears to contradict US Supreme Court precedent

Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas has struck down guidelines by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission designed to protect against workplace harassment based on gender identity and sexual orientation.
The EEOC in April 2024 updated its guidelines to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), which determined that discrimination against transgender people constituted sex-based discrimination as proscribed under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
To ensure compliance with the law, the agency recommended that employers honor their employees’ preferred pronouns while granting them access to bathrooms and allowing them to wear dress code-compliant clothing that aligns with their gender identities.
While the the guidelines are not legally binding, Kacsmaryk ruled that their issuance created “mandatory standards” exceeding the EEOC’s statutory authority that were “inconsistent with the text, history, and tradition of Title VII and recent Supreme Court precedent.”
“Title VII does not require employers or courts to blind themselves to the biological differences between men and women,” he wrote in the opinion.
The case, which was brought by the conservative think tank behind Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation, presents the greatest setback for LGBTQ inclusive workplace protections since President Donald Trump’s issuance of an executive order on the first day of his second term directing U.S. federal agencies to recognize only two genders as determined by birth sex.
Last month, top Democrats from both chambers of Congress reintroduced the Equality Act, which would codify LGBTQ-inclusive protections against discrimination into federal law, covering employment as well as areas like housing and jury service.