Opinions
Kamala Harris is not perfect, but far better than Donald Trump
Republican ticket has voiced support for Vladimir Putin
As a Ukrainian child, I’ve been obsessed with American politics.
I was 13 when I was following my first American presidential election, avidly reading Russian Newsweek and watching the discussion about the debates between Barack Obama and John McCain on Savik Shuster’s political talk show on Ukrainian television.
Obama and Zbigniew Brzezinski, former Jimmy Carter’s national security advisor, were the only Democrat politicians I liked in my “Republican” teenage years. And while I respected Brzezinski for his anti-Soviet views, my sympathy toward Barack Obama was personal.
At 13, I didn’t have words to describe myself as an autistic or trans* person, but I had a feeling that there is something deeply unusual about me. I was cruelly bullied among peers for being “weird.” I knew the history of the American Civil Rights Movement much better than any stories about Eastern European activism, and the idea that a Black man could become the president of the United States while millions of Americans still remember segregation gave me some hope about the possibility of social change.
Now with Kamala Harris and Donald Trump on the ballot this year, I have a particular feeling of deja vu.
If Kamala wins, she will definitely become a role model — not just for girls all around the world but also because she is a Black woman — for people from other minorities, including folks who are living on the intersection of discrimination. Moreover, because she is an outstanding supporter for LGBT+ rights, her victory could be crucial for the LGBT+ community globally, because of American cultural and financial influence.
It is not just her role as an inspirational model that is interesting to me in the context of the coming election, but also the way the election and its outcome is affecting the situation in Eastern Europe and beyond.
The role of American culture
It is not particularly unusual that a Ukrainian child like me was deeply into American politics.
My classmates were less politicized than me, but some of my peers in school liked politics, and teachers often commented on the news. As weird as it could sound for an ordinary American citizen, the 2008 U.S. presidential election was no less popular in Donetsk, Ukraine, than the Ukraine’s Orange Revolution of 2004-2005.
That’s right, ordinary Ukranians cared about the American situation no less than their own, maybe even more. American culture is extremely prominent globally — my Ukrainian and Russian peers who weren’t into politics were into American stuff like Kardashian shows and Hollywood blockbusters.
I think the average American should think a little bit more about the level of influence that American culture and political situation has in this world.
When I was an LGBT+ activist in Russia, I didn’t hear much about the Soviets who were put into prisons for being gay, or the Russian Empire’s history of queerness. On queer events we mostly spoke about the Stonewall riots, the HIV epidemic in the U.S., and San Francisco’s LGBT+ community during the Harvey Milk era.
When activists in St. Petersburg and Kyiv were talking about racism, they spoke about Dr. Martin Luther King and the Black Lives Matter movement, not about Russia’s persecutions of Chechens and Crimean Tatars. In “feminist schools,” the new generation of girls learned about intersectionality from Kimberly Krenshow’s speeches about PoC Americans.
Of course, it partly happened because post-Soviet activists lack the ability to think about their own political situation — Soviet people for years didn’t have any opportunity to participate in politics. Soviet dissidents looked to the West for inspiration, and Soviet officials for finding something that they could criticize to better fit in the party.
But this obsession with the U.S. is not limited to Eastern Europe.
In the Middle East, for example, terrorist groups like the so-called Islamic State even based a significant part of their propaganda on Western memes; making Hollywood-style videos, using American mass-culture references, and deliberately hiring Western supporters — “muhajirin” or immigrants — for media work.
American political and social culture is simply creating cultural trends.
This is why Kamala Harris could really change the perspective of a girl from a PoC background, and bring inspiration to marginalized people. Also, in the age when pro-Donald Trump’s QAnons conspiracy went global, a Trump victory would make far-right ideas much more mainstream.
Russian-Ukrainian war: Beyond the queer context
The situation is actually more complex than it may seem from the first glance.
If we are speaking about the Russian-Ukrainian war, we need to understand that right from the beginning of this war, Russia used anti-LGBT+ bigotry to justify its military aggression.
For example, the Russian Patriarch Kirill, the leader of the biggest and most prominent Christian church in Russia, was saying that the war in Ukraine happened because “people in Donbas do not want to have gay Pride.” We need to remember that at the same time Russia brutally bombed civilians in Donbas region, destroying schools and maternity wards.
The situation with schools is particularly “interesting.”
The governor of St. Petersburg’s region, Alexander Beglov, was saying that the Russian soldiers knew what they were fighting for after they saw gender-neutral toilets in Ukrainian schools.
So for the Kremlin, it is much better to kill children than to let them be queers, and Donald Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, is known not just for his outstanding homophobic and transphobic views, but also for his support of Vladimir Putin. Despite all the pompousness of this statement, Trump and his administration de facto support genocide of queer people.
Kamala Harris has had her own problems with Eastern Europe.
For example, in my opinion, her relationship with Russia is too-centered around the Russian opposition, some of whom are Russian-supremacist, and she lacks understanding of intersectionality and colonial history of Eastern Europe and Northern Caucasus. That was obvious during prisoner exchange this past summer when the U.S. and Germany released Russian killer Vadim Krasikov, who was serving a life sentence in a German prison for killing Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a Chechen refugee who fought against Russian aggression in his homeland. The family of the victim wasn’t informed and Zelimkhan’s wife didn’t have an opportunity to react to the situation or participate in negotiations. German authorities and the Biden administration during the exchange didn’t ask Russia to release any Chechen political prisoners from Russian prisons.
The Khangoshvili case was extremely prominent for the Chechen community and could be compared to the George Floyd murder for Black Americans. So Krasikov’s release made Chechen communities in the U.S. and Europe believe in Kamala’s xenophobic tendencies. It is especially true after the long history of ignoring of Russia kidnapping and torture of Chechen civilians, and the fact that prominent Democrats, including Joe Biden, spoke about Chechnya only or mostly in a context of persecution of LGBT+ people.
When I spoke with Chechen activists about it, some of them started to believe a kind of a “gay lobby” conspiracy because of this situation, while others like to point out that it was under Russian authorities when gay people began to disappear in Chechnya. Before Russia’s occupation of Chechnya in 2000, private sexual lives was just a taboo topic, and any idea of “spying” on someone because the person could be gay, or reading private messages was considered an abomination. Western officials at the same time mostly believed Russian activists who are quite xenophobic, and made it all look like a problem of Chechen culture, not a direct result of Russian politics in Chechnya where people could be kidnapped and tortured literally for anything, from listening to a prohibited music to making a political joke on social media. Chechen Americans became alienated from Republicans because of their Islamophobia and anti-immigrant sentiments, and they are also alienated from Democrats. And the situation has worsened because Russian authorities often kidnap Chechen refugee-activists’ relatives in Chechnya, forcing Chechen in the West, including American Chechens to be quiet, and nobody in American politics is addressing the problem.
This is not just a Chechen issue.
American Democrats for years were collaborating mostly with civil society activists from the Russian opposition, ignoring Crimea Tatars, Ukrainians, Belorussians, Georgians, and other people from post-Soviet states. They, while not deliberately, supported Russian propaganda that said the entire Eastern Bloc is one big “Mother Russia,” so they have a lot to work with.
Even though Democrats had their own issues, Republicans were making the same mistakes, and showing their open bigotry.
The stakes are now higher than before. Donald Trump is not just xenophobic and homophobic but also known for his collaborations with Vladimir Putin’s regime that committed horrendous war crimes in Chechnya, Syria, Libya, Mali, and, finally, Ukraine.
Americans could choose a convicted sex predator who had ties with a genocidal regime in Russia, or they could choose the imperfect, but ready-to-learn first female American president who would make the world more acceptable in the eyes of those who live overseas.
Ayman Eckford is a freelance journalist, and an autistic ADHDer transgender person who understands that they are trans* since they were 3-years-old.
Opinions
Let love and compassion guide our response to Joe Biden’s cancer diagnosis
Former president is diminished, but he and family deserve love and prayers
When I heard Joe Biden had serious prostate cancer, I felt immediate compassion for him and his family. I am a prostate cancer survivor myself. Then I heard how Trump, and some of his MAGA Republicans, responded and was amazed at how they are able to constantly sink to new lows. Trump’s son posted on X “What I want to know is how did Dr. Jill Biden miss stage five metastatic cancer or is this yet another cover-up???” Clearly, they will never give up on being vile human beings.
The equally disgusting Joe Scarborough had on a doctor who declared he positively knows Biden must have known about his cancer years ago, although he knows nothing about the case. The reality, coming from many specialists, is at this time only Biden’s doctors know when he was diagnosed, and whether he even had regular PSA tests done, and when. Based on the latest research, the American Urological Association (AUA) age guidelines are that they do not recommend routine PSA screening for men 70 or older. This is because prostate cancer is normally very slow growing, and if you were to be diagnosed after 70, you will likely die of something else. Then you had the felon in the White House talking about “stage nine” cancer. Is he really so dumb? Guess he is as he tries to prove it nearly every time he opens his mouth. Talk about diminished.
Now is Biden diminished from what he was years ago? It is clear he is. Should the people around him have tried to hide that in order to have him run again, no! But the-then president’s hiding health issues is nothing new. Wilson was severely impaired and it is said his wife Edith ran the country for his last year in office. The same was said about Nancy Reagan when they hid Reagan’s Alzheimer’s. Kennedy hid his Addison’s disease and other infirmities, and Trump hid how sick he was from COVID, when being helicoptered to the hospital. Is it wrong to hide these things from the American public, yes, but clearly not unusual. Actually, the media is often complicit in this, which many said they were in Biden’s case. Then you have a guy like Jake Tapper who is happy to be complicit, so he can now write a book about it and make loads of money. Very sad.
I think the time has come in the case of Joe Biden, for us to just offer him and his family some love and prayers, and the hope he will be able to manage his cancer and live a long life. Then turn the page and deal with the things that will matter more to the lives of the American people today.
Those are the things the felon in the White House, and his Nazi sympathizing co-president, along with the MAGA Congress, are trying to do to them. Things like taking away their healthcare, and thereby also causing the closure of some rural hospitals. Things like the mass firings of federal workers, including thousands of veterans. Things like making it harder for our veterans to access their healthcare by cutting services at the Veterans hospitals. Things like increasing costs for groceries, and other items, due to the felon’s ineffective use of tariffs. Things like seeing college costs go up, as foreign students who pay the full fare at most schools, are sent home or denied visas. Things like making it harder to file for social security by closing so many offices, and pretending to lower drug prices, but not really doing it. Things like cutting research looking for cures for cancer, Alzheimer’s, MS, HIV/AIDS, and a host of other diseases, which will hurt people for decades to come. Things like creating havoc in the world, and bowing down to dictators. Things like walking away from our allies and making the world a less safe place for all of us, including abandoning Ukraine, and cozying up to his friend Putin. I always believed Putin has some dirt on him. Trump said Zelenskyy would be responsible for WW III. But it’s Trump who will be, if it happens. Then we must put a focus on the idiot who is secretary of HHS, RFK Jr., and whether he will allow the flu and covid vaccines, being readied for the fall, to be available in a timely manner. Will he continue to disparage all vaccines, and by doing so, cause deaths here, and around the world. Things like abandoning the fight against climate change and thereby screwing the planet and future generations.
These are the things the American public really needs to know about, and care about. It may have been wrong to hide Biden’s being diminished, but he is no longer in office, and he no longer impacts people’s lives on a daily basis. The felon in the WH does, and that is where the focus must be.
A first generation American from Queens, N.Y., Kameny was a decorated WWII veteran. With a prodigious 148 I.Q., he earned a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard University. In 1957 he was recruited by the Army Map Service, a pioneering agency in space exploration.
In 1953 in the wake of McCarthyism, President Eisenhower issued Executive Order 10450 that prohibited homosexuals from military or civilian employment. Having nothing to do with workplace conduct, the Army learned that Kameny might be a homosexual. When confronted, he equivocated and was terminated. Unlike then thousands of other homosexuals terminated from government employment, Kameny fought back.
He took on the military and Civil Service Commission including being the first openly gay man to file an appeal about gay rights to the U.S. Supreme Court. He helped co-found and chair the Mattachine Society of Washington, the first gay rights organization in the nation’s capital.
He wrote letters to, among others, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. He founded and chaired the Eastern Conference of Homophile Organization, the nation’s first regional gay organization.
In the 1960s homosexuality, even with a consenting adult in the privacy of one’s bedroom was criminal. The police entrapped and extorted gay men. The American Psychiatric Association classified homosexuality as a mental illness. A bar could lose its license if there was more than one homosexual in their establishment. Homosexuals were considered dangerous, deviant and demented.
Kameny coined the phrase “Gay Is Good.” He organized picketing called Annual Reminders each July 4 from 1965 to 1969 at Independence Hall. The picketers were the first to call for gay equality. The 1965 Annual Reminder had 39 activists making it then the largest demonstration for gay rights. In the mid-1960s the country had an estimated 300 gay and lesbian activists.
He published a newsletter that became the Washington Blade, now the nation’s oldest LGBTQ weekly newspaper. Kameny and Barbara Gittings, the mother of the movement that demonstrated for the right to be heard at the 1971 American Psychiatric Association meeting. Their panel at the 1972 meeting with a masked psychiatrist using a pseudonym and voice modulator was so impactful that the APA created a panel to determine if homosexuality as a mental illness was based on science or discrimination. In 1973, that classification was removed.
He advised gays and lesbians who were the subject of discharge from federal government service. He identified test cases and referred them to the ACLU, Lambda Legal and other counsel. Slowly, but surely those cases began a process for LGBTQ equality.
His efforts led D.C. to be the first city to overturn its sodomy criminal laws. He helped found the first national LGBTQ organization, the North American Conference of Homophile Organizations. His efforts laid the groundwork for HRC and National LGBTQ Task Force.
After Stonewall in June 1969, he chaired a meeting of NY, Philadelphia and D.C. activists that authorized and helped organize to help remember Stonewall the first New York Pride Parade. He believed that Stonewall could be the movement’s Boston Tea Party. He marched in that 1970 parade holding a picket emblazoned with “Gay Is Good.”
He was the first out person to run for Congress as the D.C. delegate. Money left over from his campaign was used to fund the first gay rights television commercial. In July 1975, he was the first to be advised by the Civil Service Commission that it would eliminate homosexuality as a basis for not hiring or for firing a federal civilian employee. In 1977, he attended the White House’s first meeting with gays and lesbians.
Kameny died on Oct. 11, 2011, National Coming Out Day. He lived to see marriage equality approved in several states. He attended the signing by President Obama of the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” which enabled gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military. Kameny is buried in the Congressional Cemetery. On his tombstone is inscribed “Gay Is Good.” Over 70,000 of his documents are in the Library of Congress and picket signs from the pioneering demonstrations are housed in the Smithsonian Institution.
On May 21 LGBTQ national organizations gather in front of the Supreme Court. One hundred activists will each hold a candle for his 100th birthday. Fifteen national leaders will engage in picketing similar to the 1965 picketing at the White House and Independence Hall. They will honor Frank Kameny; celebrate the 10th anniversary of marriage equality (Obergefell v Hodges, 2015); and push back on those who would attempt to render us invisible, deny our history and undermine our equality. We will remember the nation’s loss when it fired a Harvard Ph.D. in astronomy because of his status as a homosexual. History repeats itself. This month the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the federal government to terminate transgender servicemembers solely because of their sexual orientation. How far we have come. How much farther we have to travel.
Malcolm Lazin is the national chair, Kameny 100. He is the executive director, LGBT History Month and executive producer of three LGBTQ documentaries including Gay Pioneers. He was an adjunct professor of LGBT History and Rights at New College of Florida. www.kameny100.org.
Opinions
Returning to Alcatraz: Memory through a queer lens
Trump would like to ‘rebuilt and reopen’ notorious island prison
When I arrived at Alcatraz Island, what I felt wasn’t curiosity — it was discomfort. Standing before such a photogenic landscape, something felt off. As if the place was trying to erase what it truly was: a mechanism of punishment, a machine built to control and define who should be excluded. I couldn’t walk those corridors without thinking about what this place represents for so many of us: a symbol of how the state has decided, time and again, that some lives matter less.
As a queer person, what struck me wasn’t just the past Alcatraz holds — but how that past is still alive in today’s policies. As I looked into the empty cells, I thought about the many LGBTQIA+ people who have been punished simply for existing. People like Frank Lucas Bolt, the first prisoner of Alcatraz — not convicted for violence, but for “sodomy,” a label the legal system used to persecute gay men.
He was not the only one. For decades, being gay or trans was enough to end up in a federal prison or a psychiatric hospital. Not for a crime, but for defying the norm. The legal and medical systems worked hand in hand to suppress any deviation from prescribed gender and sexuality. In prisons, queer people were subjected to physical punishment, solitary confinement, and even conversion therapy. Alcatraz was not an exception — it was one of the system’s most brutal epicenters.
But the queer memory of this place isn’t found in tourist brochures. To uncover it, you have to read between the lines, search through archives that are never taught in schools, and listen to those who still carry the scars. Walking among those walls, I realized that remembering isn’t enough — we have to contest the meaning of memory itself. What isn’t told, is repeated.
That’s why, when a few weeks ago President Trump said he’d like to “rebuild and reopen Alcatraz,” I didn’t take it as just another symbolic gesture. I took it as a warning. In times of crisis, punishment becomes an easy offer: lock them up, expel them, make them disappear. And in that narrative, queer, migrant, and racialized bodies are always the first to be targeted.
The danger isn’t just in the idea of a reopened prison, but in what it represents: The longing to return to a social order that was already deeply unjust. The nostalgia for “tough-on-crime” prisons is the same one that criminalizes unhoused people, persecutes migrants, and stigmatizes queer and trans youth in public spaces. Anyone who dreams of locking up more people isn’t thinking about justice — they’re thinking about control.
In 1969, a group of Native American activists occupied Alcatraz for over a year. They did it to denounce land theft and the government’s betrayal of treaties. During their occupation, they painted a message on the island’s water tower: “Peace and Freedom. Home of the Free Indian Land.” That gesture was a radical reclamation of space, a way of saying: this island can also be a place of resistance.
Alcatraz holds many layers. It was a high-security prison, yes, but it also became the stage for one of the most powerful acts of civil disobedience in the 20th century. That tension still lingers. The question is not just what happened at Alcatraz, but what we want it to represent today. A renewed model of punishment — or a site of memory that helps us prevent more harm?
As I walked its halls, I couldn’t stop thinking about the migrant detention centers that are still full today. About trans people held in inhumane conditions. About arbitrary detentions. About those of us who, like me, crossed borders just to survive. The distance between that Alcatraz and our present is not as wide as we’d like to believe. The walls may change, but punishment still operates on the same bodies.
Standing before the empty cells, I felt what many must have felt there: the weight of abandonment, the state’s mark upon their body, the feeling that their existence was a problem. But I also felt something else: conviction. The certainty that we will no longer walk into those spaces in silence. That we will not let ourselves be labeled as “mistakes” or “deviants.” That if they try to lock us up again, they will find us organized, with memory, with dignity.
Alcatraz does not need to be rebuilt. It needs to be understood. And we — queer, racialized, migrant communities — need to transform that understanding into action: to push back against hateful rhetoric, to protect those still living under threat, and to tell our full stories. Let no one be punished again for being who they are. Let history not become a locked cell once more.
The views expressed in this article are solely my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer, colleagues, or any affiliated organization. They are shared from a personal perspective shaped by lived experience and advocacy work.
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Frank Kameny’s legacy lives on
