National
LGBTQ community shared nation’s grief after 9/11 attacks
Gay passenger may have helped stop hijackers from crashing into White House
Many in the LGBTQ community throughout the country were expected to join their friends, neighbors, and family members this week in commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the New York World Trade Center’s Twin Towers and on the Pentagon just outside Washington, D.C., as well as a hijacking that ended with a crash in Shanksville, Pa.
Activists involved with local and national LGBTQ advocacy organizations have said they recall a coming together of LGBTQ people and their co-workers, neighbors, and family members to support one another during a time of unimaginable horror and grief.
A total of 2,996 people died in the 9/11 attacks, including 19 terrorists who hijacked four jetliners whose passengers included Americans and citizens of 78 countries, according to history.com.
“The gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities and those living with HIV/AIDS have worked diligently to overcome other forms of evil, whether it be bigotry or violence,” said A. Cornelius Baker, who at the time was executive director of D.C.’s Whitman-Walker Clinic, in a statement during the week of the 9/11 attacks.
“And we will stand side by side with our fellow Americans and our fellow citizens of the world to do everything we can to overcome this new threat to humanity,” Baker said
For many LGBTQ residents of New York and the D.C. area, the suffering over the loss of loved ones, including same-sex partners, was heightened a short time later when they learned they were initially ineligible for local and federal programs aimed at providing financial assistance to survivors of the victims of the 9/11 attacks because same-sex partners were not legally recognized.
At the urging of LGBTQ rights organizations, state, and local officials in New York and the D.C. area took steps to address the initial denial of financial support for surviving same-sex partners in programs under their control. Officials with a massive, multi-million-dollar federal aid program for 9/11 survivors, however, said they did not have legal authority to authorize payments to same-sex partners.
The officials, in the administration of President George W. Bush, said the best they could do would be to leave it up to local authorities to determine whether state probate laws would recognize a same-sex partner as a family member for eligibility in the federal aid program for 9/11 survivors, many of whom lived in states outside New York and the D.C. area.
Among those who lost their lives in the 9/11 attacks was American Airlines co-pilot David Charlebois, an out gay man and member of the National Gay Pilots Association, who was on American Airlines Flight 77, which the terrorists crashed into the Pentagon.
Also among the terrorists’ victims in the 9/11 attacks was public relations executive and rugby enthusiast Mark Bingham of San Francisco, who contacted his mother by cell phone shortly before the United Airlines jet he was taking from Newark, N.J. to San Francisco crashed into the countryside in western Pennsylvania.
Surviving family members of other passengers on that flight have said they too were called by their loved ones who told them some of the passengers were planning an attempt to somehow regain control of the jet from the terrorists.
Bingham’s mother, Alice Hoagland, who at the time was a United Airlines flight attendant, said she believed her son joined other passengers to prevent the terrorists from carrying out what authorities said was their plan to crash the jet into the U.S. Capitol or possibly the White House. She said her son’s reputation as a fighter for civic justice, along with a past episode where he fought off muggers, led her to believe he was among those who foiled the terrorists’ plans to fly the jet to Washington.
An investigation into the 9/11 attacks by a federal 9/11 commission later found that flight data recordings from the cockpit of United Airlines Flight 93, where Bingham was among 44 people aboard, showed that one of the four hijackers who took control of the jetliner shortly after its takeoff responded to an attempt by passengers to storm the cockpit by deliberately steering the plane into a downward direction at about 500 miles per hour, causing it to crash into an empty field near the town of Shanksville in western Pennsylvania at 10:10 a.m. All 44 people were killed.
“The fact that he was so close to the action, it is likely that he was able to get at these guys,” Hoagland told the Associated Press. “It gives me a great deal of comfort to know my son may have been able to avert the killing of many, many innocent people,” she said.
Hoagland became an outspoken advocate for LGBTQ rights and for the gay rugby teams that Mark Bingham helped to create in the years after her son’s death. She died on Dec. 22, 2020, of natural causes at the age of 71 at her home in Los Gatos, Calif., according to the Associated Press.
Longtime LGBTQ rights advocate Jay Fisette, who at the time of the 9/11 attacks held the elected position of chair of the Arlington County Board, which serves as the county’s governing body, was among the Arlington officials that came to the Pentagon’s grounds to oversee efforts by Arlington firefighters to rescue Pentagon workers on the day of the attack.
Fisette noted that the Pentagon is in Arlington County, and it was largely the county’s firefighters and emergency medical teams that put out the fire caused by the jetliner crash and provided medical assistance to survivors of the crash.
At an Oct. 7, 2001, 9/11 Day of Remembrance and Appreciation ceremony held in Arlington, Fisette expressed the views of many in the community in response to the 9/11 attacks.
“Tonight, our community gathers as a family,” he told the gathering. “We gather in sorrow and in disbelief, in remembrance and appreciation,” he said. “But we come here, too, with resolve and pride. We come together as Arlingtonians who love our county, as Americans who love our country,” he said.
“Our enemies may hurt our bodies and destroy our buildings, but they will never defeat our determination to make this a world of peace and a community in which our children grow up safe and secure,” Fisette told participants at the gathering.
Although some of the same-sex partners of those killed in the 9/11 attacks faced obstacles in obtaining financial support through the federal 9/11 relief program, Tom Hay, the surviving partner of 14 years of American Airlines pilot David Charlebois was treated with respect and honor by American Airlines officials and colleagues at Charlebois’ funeral mass at D.C.’s St. Matthews Cathedral.
More than a dozen uniformed company pilots and flight attendants attended the mass. In a news release issued in June of this year, American Airlines mentions Charlebois’ relationship with Hay and tells how Hay stood with Charlebois when Charlebois pushed for equal rights for LGBTQ people in the airline industry through his involvement with the National Gay Pilots Association.
“David was an early member of the NGPA,” the American Airlines statement says. “His contribution helped ensure ongoing progress toward fairness and solidarity,” it says.
Activists in New York have said the 9/11 attacks drew attention to the need for legal protections for same-sex couples, including the need for legal recognition of same-sex marriage.
Ros Levi, who in 2001 served as executive director of the New York LGBTQ advocacy group Empire State Pride Agenda, or ESPA, said his group became aware that same-sex partner survivors were being treated differently when New York City and private relief agencies like the Red Cross set up an emergency station on a pier along the Hudson River. The station was intended to help people find a family member missing and as yet unaccounted for in the World Trade Center carnage.
“Literally, [gay] people had to go there, turn around, go back home, and get some paperwork that spouses didn’t have to get to prove a relationship existed,” Levi told the Washington Blade in 2011 when the Blade reported on the 10-year anniversary events related to the 9/11 attacks.
“You were nervous and scared and sad and then you had to go through that,” Levi said. “And worse, other people turned them away, even with the paperwork, saying sorry you’re not a family according to our guidelines.”
Activists said New York City and New York State officials quickly recognized the inequities faced by same-sex partner survivors and took steps to change policies and laws to correct the situation. Among other things, activists were pleased when New York’s then GOP Gov. George Pataki issued an executive order in October 2001 that included surviving partners of gay and lesbian victims of the World Trade Center attacks in receiving full spousal benefits from the state’s Crime Victims Board.
The New York State Legislature soon took its own action by approving three separate bills that included same-sex partner survivors in various state benefits to be allocated to 9/11 survivors and their families.
“The grief and loss were the same between heterosexual and same-sex couples, and a perception of this seemed to come through to much of the public,” said Jennifer Pizer, the then senior counsel for the LGBTQ litigation group Lambda Legal.
In a separate development, Lambda Legal, ESPA, the Human Rights Campaign and other LGBTQ advocacy groups created the September 11 Gay & Lesbian Family Fund to provide some support to surviving same-sex partners who were ineligible for help from the federal relief fund program.
“The Family Fund was established in December [2001] to help offset the discrimination gay and lesbian partners faced in obtaining benefits automatically afforded to surviving spouses, including Social Security and Workers Compensation survivor benefits and compensation under the Federal 9/11 Victims Compensation Fund,” ESPA said in a statement.
Among the other gay people known to have lost their lives in the 9/11 attacks was Father Mychal Judge, 68, a Franciscan priest who served as a Catholic chaplain for the New York City Fire Department. According to the National Catholic Reporter, Judge rushed to the scene of the World Trade Center to assist firefighters shortly before the Twin Towers collapsed. He was fatally struck by debris falling from the south tower while giving last rites to a fallen firefighter, the Catholic publication reported this week.
“He was a decent, wonderful human being,” said New York gay journalist Andy Humm, who had interviewed Judge for LGBT related stories prior to the 9/11 attacks. “When gays were kept out of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade, he gave me an interview on the street telling me how terrible it was for us to be discriminated against and for the church to be doing it,” Humm told the Blade.
“I saw him at many demonstrations for gay and AIDS causes, showing up in his Franciscan monk’s cassock,” said Humm. “And he was equally beloved by the Fire Department, there at every major fire tragedy in the city, lending moral support to firefighters.”
New Ways Ministries, the Maryland based LGBTQ Catholic group that advocates for LGBTQ supportive policies within the church, has announced it is reaching out to other faith-based organizations, asking them to form an association to call on the Catholic Church to officially recognize Fr. Judge as a saint by canonizing him.
Francis DeBernardo, New Ways Ministries’ executive director, has written a biography of Judge, which the group says will be published in March 2022 by Liturgical Press, one of the larger Catholic publishers.
A gay couple from California, Daniel Brandhorst and Ronald Gamboa, and their adopted son, David Brandhorst, were among those who died aboard the United Airlines flight that crashed in Pennsylvania. The Los Angeles Times reported that Brandhorst, a lawyer and Gamboa, the manager of a Santa Monica Gap store, had adopted 3-year-old David when he was an infant.
The White House
Trump’s shocking East Wing amputation—and the painful fallout Americans won’t ignore
Gay Social Secretary Jeremy Bernard talks about importance of civility
Since Jan. 20, 2025, life in Donald Trump’s divided America has been a series of jaw-dropping split-screen scenarios, flashing at an even faster pace since the resounding anti-Trump, pro-affordability Democratic electoral victories on Nov. 4. But while the weeks before Thanksgiving have injected hope that the No Kings marches, the rule of law, and the 2026 midterms will uphold democracy, Trump’s violently oriented MAGA and Christian National base and his committed Project 2025 backers continue remaking the federal government and fighting the culture wars.
Luxuriating in his own narcissism, Trump ordered the clandestine demolition of the East Wing on Oct. 23 to make way for his 90,000 square foot ballroom. He apparently didn’t care about the national shock at the brutal amputation of America’s beloved cultural arm that balanced the hard political arm of the People’s House.
“This isn’t a real estate deal. This is a living, breathing building. It actually hurts, as a citizen. It’s us. It’s our home. This doesn’t belong to anybody except the blood, the sweat and the tears of every president,” new D.C. resident Roseanne Siegel told NPR.
“For historians and for Americans who love their history, this is a big blow,” said ABC News presidential historian Mark Updegrove.
According to an Oct. 30 poll from the Washington Post, ABC News, and Ipsos, 56 percent of respondents disagreed with Trump’s move while 28 percent favored it. An earlier Yahoo/YouGov poll found 61 percent of respondents rejected Trump’s ballroom plan while 25 percent supported it.
Trump lied. “It won’t interfere with the current building,” Trump said last July about his ballroom plans. “It will be near it, but not touching it. And pays total respect to the existing building, which I’m the biggest fan of. It’s my favorite He was dishonest about his intent in terms of we’re not going to touch anything, like it’s going to be close, but not touching,” Kevin Wade, a 52-year-old tech tourist from Texas, told Reuters. “And then now we’re completely demolishing it.”
The East Wing emptiness is now a tourist attraction, a PTSD imprint that — with the rapid developments leading up to Thanksgiving — may inspire a turning point in Trump’s presidency.
On Tuesday, Nov. 18, after a 43-day government shutdown to avoid this moment, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 471-1 to compel the Justice Department to release all files on convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Meanwhile at the White House, Trump gleefully hosted Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who US intelligence believes approved the gruesome 2018 murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. The president scolded ABC News journalist Mary Bruce for embarrassing “guest” MBS with “a horrible, insubordinate” question about Khashoggi’s murder. “Whether you like [Khashoggi] or didn’t like him, things happen.”
In Bob Woodward’s 2020 book, “Rage,” Trump reportedly bragged about shielding MBS: “I saved his ass,” getting Congress “to leave him alone.”
Meanwhile, after the House vote, Epstein survivors huddled at a news conference, holding up photos of themselves as teenagers and young women, asking if Trump is innocent, what is he hiding? Why won’t he release the files now? Suddenly, thrilled survivors learned that the U.S. Senate had unanimously passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act and sent it to Trump for his signature.
Cut to Trump hosting a black-tie dinner for MBS with lots of rich men who do business with the Saudis. The next morning, he announced that he had signed the Epstein bill, with a 30-day deadline.
“It was a remarkable turn of events for what was once a far-fetched effort,” AP reported. “Trump did a sharp U-turn on the files once it became clear that congressional action was inevitable.”
Trump needed a distraction.
Early Tuesday morning, Nov. 18, U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) posted a 90-second video on her X account calling on U.S. servicemembers to not obey unlawful orders.
“The American people need you to stand up for our laws and our Constitution,” said Slotkin with five other fellow military veterans — U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), and U.S. Reps. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.), Maggie Goodlander (D-N.H.), and Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.). “Don’t give up the ship.”
The Uniform Code of Military Justice says troops who disobey a direct order will be punished. But servicemembers and officers also have an obligation to reject any order they deem is unlawful, a reference to the “I was only following orders” Nazi defense during the Nuremberg trials.
There is cause for concern. In his first term, Trump asked about shooting unarmed civilians protesting the murder of George Floyd. In his second term, Trump has threatened to use the Insurrection Act to deploy troops, “unleashed” police, federalized National Guard, and masked and violent ICE and Border Patrol agents in American cities.
“The president was enraged,” Trump’s 1st term Defense Secretary Mark Esper told NPR. “We reached that point in the conversation where he looked frankly at [Joint Chiefs of Staff] Gen. [Mark] Milley and said, ‘Can’t you just shoot them, just shoot them in the legs or something?’ … It was a suggestion and a formal question. And we were just all taken aback at that moment as this issue just hung very heavily in the air.”
Trump found his distraction on Thursday, Nov. 20, reposting a Washington Examiner story about the Democratic lawmakers’ video, adding that it was “really bad, and Dangerous to our Country. Their words cannot be allowed to stand. SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR FROM TRAITORS!!! LOCK THEM UP???” In another post he said it was “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH.”
Trump also reposted a @P78 comment: “HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD !!” Bomb and death threats against the Democratic vets “surged.” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said Trump was ‘lighting a match in a country soaked with political gasoline.’”
Cut to Friday. 34-year-old New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani met with Trump, who had vilified the Democratic Socialist. But inexplicably, the meeting turned into an Oval Office lovefest, with an almost giddy Trump, 79, saying it was “OK” that Mamdani had called him a fascist. He promised to help the city.
That night, longtime Trump and MAGA loyalist U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) announced she’s resigning from Congress, effective Jan. 5, 2026.
Greene criticized Trump over “America First” and health insurance policies but a major split occurred when she sided with Epstein survivors over him. Trump called her a “traitor” and vowed to back a primary challenger.
“Loyalty should be a two-way street,” Greene said in her 10-minute video. “I refuse to be a battered wife hoping it all goes away and gets better.”
No one knows what’s coming next.
But for the LGBTQ community, there are other important split screens amid Project 2025 erasure – such as U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.)’s key role as ranking member of the House Oversight Committee focused on transparency and justice for Epstein survivors.
And while Trump was threatening Democratic lawmakers with death on Thursday, Pete Williams, a former NBC News correspondent and press secretary for Vice President Dick Cheney, spoke at Cheney’s funeral at the National Cathedral. Williams told the mostly old-fashioned Republicans how he offered to resign in 1991 when the Advocate was about to out him as gay. Cheney — who loved his semi-out lesbian daughter Mary — said no and checked on him after the story was published. During the horrific AIDS crisis in the early 1990s, ANGLE (Access Now for Lesbian and Gay Equality) fundraised and worked to elect pro-gay politicians. In 1991, longtime gay politico David Mixner introduced ANGLE to his friend, Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, whom the group helped elect as president.
Gay people were not welcome at the White House until Clinton, other than one historic visit on March 26, 1977. Decades later, when ANGLE’s Jeremy Bernard was being interviewed by first lady Michelle Obama for the job of Social Secretary, he recalled how difficult it was to get through the East Wing visitors’ entrance during Clinton’s administration.
“I said to Mrs. Obama, ‘It takes a lot to get in these doors. And I think it’s very important for people to feel very welcomed,’” Jeremy says during a recent conversation.
The first lady agreed and “wanted to make sure as many people that never had been to the White House and never thought they would be, got the experience to do it.”
Bernard worked for Obama’s presidential campaign in 2008, then as White House Liaison to the National Endowment for the Humanities before serving as Senior Advisor to the US Ambassador to France. On Feb. 25, 2011, he became the first male and first openly gay person to serve as Social Secretary.
“Jeremy shares our vision for the White House as the People’s House, one that celebrates our history and culture in dynamic and inclusive ways. We look forward to Jeremy continuing to showcase America’s arts and culture to our nation and the world through the many events at the White House,” Obama said in a press release.
“My office was in the East Wing, and I had what I thought was the best office. I looked over toward the South Lawn, but I also had the roof of the East Colonnade below me. I had a window that actually would open like a door, and you could walk out onto the roof as if it was a patio,” Bernard recalls, noting that he was warned to call the Secret Service before going out to avoid getting shot.
“I was so shocked,” Bernard says about the East Wing being demolished. “When I first heard there were bulldozers, I was like, well, what is it they’re knocking down from it?” — finding out later, “the whole thing” was gone.
He felt “some self-sorrow” and “numb” remembering his office. “It really is a part of history, not just for those of us that worked there, but for virtually everyone – whether you were there for a state dinner, a holiday party, or a reception for St. Patrick’s Day, LGBT celebration — whatever it was, everyone came through the East Wing.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said it well, Bernard says. “Compared to what ICE is doing and all that, it may not rank up there, but it’s symbolic of what’s happened in our country.”
Michelle Obama said it well, too. “We always felt it was the people’s house,” she told CBS “The Late Show” host Stephen Colbert. “I am confused by what are our norms? What are our standards? What are our traditions? I just feel like, what is important to us as a nation anymore? Because I’m lost.”
And, Michelle Obama continued, “I hope that more Americans feel lost in a way that they want to be found again, because it’s up to us to find what we’re losing.”
“The West Wing was work — sometimes it was sadness, it was problems. It was the guts of the White House,” she said. “The East Wing was where you felt light.”
Bernard and Lea Berman, social secretary in the George W. Bush White House, have some suggestions in their book “Treating People Well,” subtitled “How to Master Social Skills and Thrive in Everything You Do.”
“It was important to us to see that despite our differences in how we viewed policy, Lea and I and Lea’s husband — who is an operative in the Republican Party — were very close,” Bernard says.
“I think about what this must be like for kids,” Bernard says. “We always looked at these presidents as a certain type of person.”
But now people hear Trump say, “’I hate my enemies. I want revenge.’ What is that teaching kids?” Bernard asks. “The president of the United States is saying that. I think it’s really frightening. We can’t let that stand.”
“I think we’ve got to go back to the way we were brought up about how you treat other people,” Bernard says. “It’s really important that we focus on the more positive characteristics of human beings … Most communities are very different and we celebrate that. But you can only celebrate it with civility.”
Karen Ocamb is a veteran LGBTQ journalist and former news editor for the Los Angeles Blade. This article was originally posted on her Substack LGBTQ+ Freedom Fighters. Her extended conversation with Jeremy Bernard, who talks more about the East Wing, ANGLE and the Obamas, is embedded in the post.
National
Study shows ‘pervasive mistreatment of LGBTQ people by law enforcement’
Findings claim nationwide police misconduct, including in D.C., Va., Md.
The LGBTQ supportive Williams Institute, an arm of the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law, released a report last month citing multiple research studies conducted over the past 25 years showing past and “ongoing” mistreatment of LGBTQ people by law enforcement throughout the United States.
“Findings show that LGBTQ communities – particularly LGBTQ people of color, youth, and transgender and gender nonconforming individuals – have faced profiling, entrapment, discrimination, harassment, and violence from law enforcement for decades, and this mistreatment continues to be widespread,” according to a Williams Institute statement.
“Experiences of police mistreatment may discourage LGBTQ people from reporting crimes or engaging with law enforcement,” Joshua Arrayales, the report’s lead author and Williams Institute Law Fellow said in the statement.
“Reporting crimes is essential for accurate crime statistics, proper allocation of crime prevention resources, and support services that address the unique needs of LGBTQ survivors,” he said.
The 59-page report cites the findings of two dozen or more studies and surveys of LGBTQ people’s interaction with police and law agencies for the past 25 years through 2024 conducted by various organizations, including the ACLU, the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs, the Williams Institute, and local government agencies.
But the report does not provide a breakdown of where police abuse against LGBTQ people occurred by specific police departments or locations. Instead it provides survey research findings of large groups of LGBTQ people who responded to a survey in different locations of the U.S.
Among other things, those surveys have found “LGBTQ people are more likely than non-LGBTQ people to report being stopped by police, searched by police, arrested, and falsely accused of an offense,” the Williams Institute statement accompanying the report says. “LGBTQ people also report substantial rates of verbal harassment, physical harassment, sexual harassment, and assault,” it says.
The report itself cites surveys of LGBTQ people’s interactions with police in D.C., Baltimore, and Virginia but does not give specific cases or identify specific police departments or agencies.
“A 2022 study based on interviews with 19 Black transgender women from Baltimore and Washington, D.C. identified a theme of re-victimization while seeking help from police,” the report says. “One participant noted that male officers asked what she did to cause her own abuse,” according to the report.
“Other participants expressed that when a knowledgeable officer was present, such as an LGBTQ+ liaison, they felt more inclined to reach out for help,” it says.
The report also states, “A 2024 study based on interviews with 44 transgender people in Virginia documented two instances of transgender women being pulled over for broken tail lights and then being mistreated once officers discovered they were transgender based on their IDs.” The report does not reveal the specific location in Virginia where this took place.
Other locations the report cites data on anti-LGBTQ conduct by police include New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, Palo Alto, Newark, N.J., and Austin and San Antonio in Texas.
The full report can be accessed at williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu.
The White House
SPJ calls for take down of Trump’s ‘media offenders’ website
White House launched online database on Monday
The Society for Professional Journalists has called out the White House for creating a website that targets individual journalists and news outlets that publish unfavorable coverage of the Trump-Vance administration.
In a letter to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Monday, the SPJ — the nation’s most broad-based journalism organization, which works to protect the free practice of journalism with high ethical standards — asked the White House to take down its website singling out journalists for negative coverage of the administration.
“Journalists have a constitutionally protected and societally encouraged duty to hold power to account. They are not political opponents to be tracked, cataloged or punished,” the letter signed by SPJ National President Chris Vaccaro and SPJ Ethics Committee Chair Dan Axelrod.
“By publishing reporters’ names, outlets and specific stories, the White House is naming and shaming members of the press in a highly charged political and social environment. SPJ regards this as a form of online harassment that exposes journalists to potential threats and even violence.”
The website currently lists 23 outlets as “Media Offenders of the Week,” singling out national organizations like CBS News, the Boston Globe, and the Independent. The website says these particular organizations “misrepresents and exaggerates President Trump.”
The letter goes on to explain that there are more civil ways to disagree with published stories without singling out people for doing the only constitutionally protected job in the country.
“There are well-established ways of resolving disagreements over the fairness or accuracy of stories. The White House web page attacking so-called ‘media offenders’ ignores these principles and instead denigrates and attacks reporters.”
It also highlights how Trump often attacks women journalists in particular, noting that two weeks ago he told White House correspondent Catherine Lucey from Bloomberg News to be “quiet piggy” after she asked questions related to Trump’s relationship with sex offender Jeffery Epstein on Air Force One.
“Journalists, particularly women, already face an enormous amount of online harassment, and this can convert into physical violence. As you know, women journalists have also been publicly insulted by the president in recent weeks.”
The letter also explains that attacks like this on the legitimate press can cause tensions between journalists who attempt to hold those in power responsible and the public who consumes the rhetoric.
“This page, which categorizes reporting as ‘lies,’ ‘left-wing lunacy,’ and ‘malpractice,’ has a chilling effect on coverage. It undermines the healthy democratic relationship in which journalists hold power to account.”
The letter also draws a connection to how the Russian authoritarian dictatorship references media it dislikes, saying, “The president’s new ‘media offenders’ list mirrors a 2017 initiative by the Kremlin that labeled independent journalism as ‘fake news.’ The United States should not follow that example.”
“SPJ believes civility must be restored between the media and the Administration. Removing this page would be a vital first step toward lowering the temperature and reinforcing America’s commitment to free expression.”
The SPJ’s code of ethics, widely regarded as the ethical standard for good journalism, has four main pillars: Seek Truth and Report It, Minimize Harm, Act Independently, and Be Accountable and Transparent. The code was adopted in 1926 from the American Society of Newspaper Editors and has been revised multiple times since then, including in 1984, 1987, 1996, and most recently in 2014.
NLGJA, the The Association of LGBTQ+ Journalists is the journalist-led association that works within the news media to advance fair and accurate coverage of LGBTQ+ communities and issues, provided a statement to the Blade on the website and supports the SPJ’s public call for removing the website to restore faith in journalistic freedom in the U.S.
“We stand with SPJ in urging the Trump administration to remove its website targeting so-called “media offenders.” While NLGJA believes that media organizations should be held to the highest standards of accuracy and ethical reporting, this website does nothing to support a healthy press environment,” National Board President Ken Miguel told the Blade via email. “Instead, it undermines public trust in the free press, enables the harassment and targeting of journalists, and hinders their ability to cover the news fairly and accurately. Journalists must be able to do their work without fear of government retaliation.”
The White House has not responded to the Washington Blade’s request for comment on the letter.
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