Local
D.C. Jail drops policy of placing trans women in men’s facility
But ACLU proceeds with lawsuit anyway
One month after it was hit by a lawsuit from the ACLU for placing a female transgender inmate in the men’s housing facility at the D.C. Jail, the D.C. Department of Corrections announced on June 17 it has dropped its policy of placing transgender inmates in the male or female section of the jail based on their “anatomy” rather than their gender identity.
But the ACLU has said it will continue its lawsuit on behalf of trans woman Sunday Hinton despite the DOC’s announced change in policy on grounds that the new policy requires trans inmates to be placed in isolation cells, which the ACLU says are equivalent to solitary confinement, during an inmate intake period.
“The intake period can last more than a week before the individuals receive their regular housing assignment,” the ACLU said in a statement. “As the original complaint notes, ‘Placing a transgender woman in solitary confinement puts her at grave risk for suicide,’” the statement says.
The ACLU has said that days after it filed its lawsuit against the DOC on Sunday Hinton’s behalf, D.C. Jail officials transferred her from the men’s housing unit to the women’s unit. A short time later, a D.C. Superior Court Judge ordered Hinton released from jail while awaiting trial for her arrest for an alleged unarmed burglary in which she attempted to take $20.
Despite her release, the ACLU says it still has legal grounds to continue the lawsuit, which originally charged the DOC with violating the D.C. Human Rights Act’s ban on transgender discrimination by placing Hinton in the men’s housing unit at the jail.
In a brief filed in court on July 16, the ACLU, and the DC Public Defender Service, which joined the ACLU in filing the lawsuit, the two groups argue that the DOC’s new policy is still discriminatory because it forces transgender inmates into solitary confinement “simply because they are transgender.”
The court brief also says that although the DOC’s new policy claims to provide transgender inmates with the choice of deciding which housing unit they prefer to be assigned, the two groups learned that at least three trans inmates were not reassigned to the housing unit of their choice.
“Because DOC has inaugurated a new type of discrimination against transgender individuals, we continue to litigate against its new policy and seek classwide relief,” the court brief states, referring to the original lawsuit’s classification as a class action lawsuit.
DOC spokesperson Dr. Keena Blackmon didn’t immediately respond to a request by the Washington Blade for comment on the lawsuit’s new allegations.
In a 12-page revised policy document, which the DOC says applies to housing for transgender, intersex, and gender nonconforming inmates, the DOC says the policy calls for placing those inmates “in a cell by themselves during the intake process for their safety and security and the safety, security, and order of the facility.”
The document says once the safety of placing a trans, intersex, or gender nonconforming inmate in the male or female housing unit of their choice is confirmed and the DOC’s Transgender Housing Committee has a chance to review the matter, the policy calls for granting the inmate’s request for being placed in the housing unit of their choice.
District of Columbia
Mayor Bowser signs bill requiring insurers to cover PrEP
‘This is a win in the fight against HIV/AIDS’
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser on March 20 signed a bill approved by the D.C. Council that requires health insurance companies to cover the costs of HIV prevention or PrEP drugs for D.C. residents at risk for HIV infection.
Like all legislation approved by the Council and signed by the mayor, the bill, called the PrEP D.C. Amendment Act, was sent to Capitol Hill for a required 30-day congressional review period before it takes effect as D.C. law.
Gay D.C. Council member Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5) last year introduced the bill.
Insurance coverage for PrEP drugs has been provided through coverage standards included in the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare. But AIDS advocacy organizations have called on states and D.C. to pass their own legislation requiring insurance coverage of PrEP as a safeguard in case federal policies are weakened or removed by the Trump administration, which has already reduced federal funding for HIV/AIDS-related programs.
Like legislation passed by other states, the PrEP D.C. Amendment Act requires insurers to cover all PrEP drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Studies have shown that PrEP drugs, which can be taken as pills or by injection just twice a year, are highly effective in preventing HIV infection.
“I think this is a win for our community,” Parker said after the D.C. Council voted unanimously to approve the bill on its first vote on the measure in February. “And this is a win in the fight against HIV/AIDS.”
District of Columbia
Blade editor to be inducted into D.C. Society of Professional Journalists Hall of Fame
Kevin Naff marks 24 years with publication this year
Longtime Washington Blade Editor Kevin Naff will be inducted into D.C.’s Society of Professional Journalists Hall of Fame in June, the group announced this week.
Hall of Fame honorees are chosen by the Society of Professional Journalists’ Washington, D.C., Pro Chapter. Naff and two other inductees — Seth Borenstein, a Washington-based national science writer for the AP and Cheryl W. Thompson, an award-winning correspondent for National Public Radio — will be celebrated at the chapter’s Dateline Awards dinner on Tuesday, June 9, at the National Press Club. The dinner’s emcee will be Kojo Nnamdi, host of WAMU radio’s weekly “Politics Hour.”
“I am tremendously honored by this recognition,” Naff said. “I have spent a lifetime in the D.C. area learning from so many talented journalists and am humbled to be considered in their company. Thank you to SPJ and to all the LGBTQ pioneers who came before me who made this possible.”
Naff joined the Blade in 2002 after years in print and digital journalism. He worked as a financial reporter for Reuters in New York before moving to Baltimore in 1996 to launch the Baltimore Sun’s website. He spent four years at the Sun before leaving for an internet startup and later joining the mobile data group at Verizon Wireless working on the first generation of mobile apps.
He then moved to the Blade and has served as the publication’s longest-tenured editor. In 2023, Naff published his first book, “How We Won the War for LGBTQ Equality — And How Our Enemies Could Take It All Away.”
Previous Hall of Fame inductees include luminaries in journalism like Wolf Blitzer, Benjamin Bradlee, Bob Woodward, Andrea Mitchell, and Edgar Allen Poe. The Blade’s senior news reporter Lou Chibbaro Jr. was inducted in 2015.
Maryland
Supreme Court ruling against conversion therapy bans could affect Md. law
Then-Gov. Larry Hogan signed statute in 2018
By PAMELA WOOD, JOHN-JOHN WILLIAMS IV, and MADELEINE O’NEILL | The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled against a law banning “conversion therapy” for LGBTQ kids in Colorado, a ruling that also could apply to Maryland’s ban on the discredited practice.
An 8-1 high court majority sided with a Christian counselor who argues the law banning talk therapy violates the First Amendment. The justices agreed that the law raises free speech concerns and sent it back to a lower court to decide whether it meets a legal standard that few laws pass.
Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the court’s majority, said the law “censors speech based on viewpoint.” The First Amendment, he wrote, “stands as a shield against any effort to enforce orthodoxy in thought or speech in this country.”
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
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