News

Report ahead of Trans Day of Remembrance shows 331 trans murders in last year

Published

7 years ago

November 20, 2019

Last week, in advance of today’s International Trans Day of Remembrance, Transrespect versus Transphobia Worldwide released the annual results from its Trans Murder Monitoring research project, “to join the voices raising awareness of this day regarding hate crimes against trans and gender-diverse people, and to honour the lives of those who might otherwise be forgotten.”

The TMM project is devoted to the systematic collection, monitoring and analysis of reported killings of gender-diverse/trans people worldwide. It was established by TvT Worldwide in 2009, using data from 2008 onward.

This year’s update, which was published on the organization’s website November 11, reported 331 cases of reported killings of trans and gender-diverse people between October 1 2018 – September 30 2019.

The complete update is reproduced below:

“On the occasion of the International Trans Day of Remembrance (TDoR), which is held on 20th of November 2019, the Transrespect versus Transphobia Worldwide (TvT) team is publishing the Trans Murder Monitoring (TMM) research project update to join the voices raising awareness of this day regarding hate crimes against trans and gender-diverse people, and to honour the lives of those who might otherwise be forgotten.

The TDoR 2019 update has revealed a total of 331 cases of reported killings of trans and gender-diverse people between 1 October 2018 and 30 September 2019. The majority of the murders occurred in Brazil (130), Mexico (63), and the United States (30), adding up to a total of 3314 reported cases in 74 countries worldwide between 1st of January 2008 and 30th of September 2019.

Stigma and discrimination against trans and gender-diverse people is real and profound around the world, and are part of a structural and ongoing circle of oppression that keeps us deprived of our basic rights. Trans and gender-diverse people are victims of horrifying hate violence, including extortion, physical and sexual assaults, and murder. In most countries, data on murdered trans and gender-diverse people are not systematically produced and it is impossible to estimate the actual number of cases.

Violence against trans and gender-diverse people frequently overlaps with other axes of oppression prevalent in society, such as racism, sexism, xenophobia, and anti-sex worker sentiment and discrimination. TMM data shows that the victims whose occupations are known are mostly sex workers (61%). In the United States, the majority of the trans people reported murdered are trans women of colour and/or Native American trans women (85%), and in France, Italy, Portugal, and Spain, which are the countries to which most trans and gender-diverse people from Africa and Central and South America migrate, 65% of the reported murder victims were migrant trans women.

More about the project can be found on our TMM report 2016.”

Since beginning the TMM project, TvT has registered the murders of 3317 trans and gender-diverse people worldwide. The killings are merely catalogued as reports of murdered trans and gender-diverse persons, without further classification, because (according to the TvT website), “The classification of the murder of a trans/gender-diverse person as a hate crime is often difficult, due to a lack of information in the reports as well as the lack of national monitoring systems.”

TvT Worldwide, an ongoing, comparative qualitative-quantitative research project initiated by Transgender Europe (TGEU), serves gender-diverse/trans people’s movements and activism by seeking to provide an overview of the human-rights situation of trans and gender-diverse persons in different parts of the world and to develop useful data and advocacy tools for international institutions, human-rights organizations, the trans movement, and the general public. Besides the TMM, their work is divided into two additional sub-projects: one, dedicated to legal and social mapping, surveys existing laws, law proposals, and actual legal and health-care practices as well as diverse aspects of the social situation relevant to gender-diverse/trans people; another, a Survey on the Social Experiences of Trans and Gender-Diverse People, addresses experiences of both Transphobia and Transrespect in communities around the world.

You can read more about the TMM and TvT Worldwide’s other work here.

Up Next

Despite Harris deal, few surgeries granted to trans inmates in California

Don't Miss

Mary Washington to run for Baltimore mayor

FUND LGBTQ JOURNALISM

Ghana

Ghanaian lawmakers approve anti-LGBTQ bill

Measure that would criminalize allyship awaits president’s signature

Published

2 days ago

May 29, 2026

Michael K. Lavers

Ghanaian flag (Public domain photo from Pixabay)

Ghanaian lawmakers on Friday approved a bill that would, among other things, criminalize LGBTQ allyship.

Reuters reported MPs approved the Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Bill, 2025, in a voice vote after parliament’s Constitutional and Legal Affairs Committee backed it.

MPs in 2024 approved a similar bill, but it faced legal challenges and then-President Nana Akufo-Addo didn’t sign it. Lawmakers last year reintroduced the measure after President John Dramani Mahama took office.

The bill awaits his signature.

Rightify Ghana, a Ghanaian LGBTQ advocacy group, in a series of social media posts notes MPs passed the bill days before the 4th African Inter-Parliamentary Conference on Family Values and Sovereignty will take place in Accra, the country’s capital.

Russia

Nine Russian LGBTQ groups deemed ‘extremist’ banned

Human Rights Watch: authorities ‘intensifying their criminalization’ of queer people

Published

2 days ago

May 29, 2026

Michael K. Lavers

(Washington Blade photo by Ernesto Valle)

Nine LGBTQ groups in Russia have been banned so far this year after authorities deemed them as “extremist.”

Human Rights Watch on Thursday noted courts in seven regions between March and May banned Coming Out, the LGBT Resource Center, Parni Plus, the Moscow Community Center for LGBT+ Initiatives, Irida, the Russian LGBT Network, the Kallisto movement, T9 NSK, and Center T. Human Rights Watch also pointed out a lawsuit has been filed against the Alliance of Straights and LGBT for Equality.

Parni Plus is an LGBTQ media outlet.

“Russian authorities are intensifying their criminalization of those who provide critical support to the very LGBT people they have systematically persecuted,” said Human Rights Watch Europe and Central Asia Director Hugh Williamson in a press release. “Authorities should vacate all court decisions and criminal convictions based on these spurious ‘extremism’ charges.”

The Kremlin over the last decade has faced global criticism over its crackdown on LGBTQ rights.

The Russian Supreme Court in 2023 ruled the “international LGBT movement” is an extremist organization and banned it.

The country in January designated ILGA World, a global LGBTQ and intersex rights group, as an “undesirable” organization. ILGA World in response to the designation noted Russians who are found guilty of engaging with “undesirable” groups face up to six years in prison.

District of Columbia

D.C. Pride flag raising ceremony set for June 1

Mayor, council members to participate

Published

3 days ago

May 28, 2026

Lou Chibbaro Jr.

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser at the flag-raising of the Progress Pride flag at the Wilson Building in D.C. on June 1, 2023. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs is inviting the LGBTQ community and friends to attend the city’s annual Pride flag raising ceremony scheduled for 4 p.m. Monday, June 1, outside the John Wilson Building that serves as the D.C. City Hall.

Like in prior years, members of the D.C. Council and officials with the Office of LGBTQ Affairs were expected to join Bowser in delivering remarks on the front entrance steps at the Wilson Building before raising the Pride flag atop one of the tall flagpoles next to the building’s entrance.

Gaby Vincent, a spokesperson for the LGBTQ Affairs Office, said attendees of the flag raising ceremony will be invited to attend a reception immediately following the ceremony in the main lobby of the Wilson Building, which is located on Pennsylvania Avenue at 14th Street, N.W.

She said the reception will feature a DJ, dancing, and refreshments provided by the D.C. LGBTQ bar and café Spark Social House.

Vincent said the flag raising event will also mark the 20th anniversary of the opening of the D.C. Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs.

In its official announcement of the flag raising event the LGBTQ Affairs Office also announced it is hosting the 7th annual District of Pride Showcase event to be held Friday, June 17, at 7 p.m. at the Lincoln Theater.

The announcement says LGBTQ community members, families, and allies are also invited to walk with Bowser in the Capital Pride Parade scheduled for Saturday, June 20. It says the mayor’s parade contingent will assemble at 2 p.m. at the parade’s starting location at 14^th and U Streets, N.W.

“As we also celebrate the 20^th anniversary of the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, we invite residents, community members, families and allies to join us throughout June for moments of pride, connection, visibility, and joy,” the announcement says.