Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares on Monday announced he will run for reelection.

Miyares, a Republican who was in the Virginia House of Delegates from 2016-2022, in 2021 defeated then-Attorney General Mark Herring.

Miyares in a 2023 letter to Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin said school districts must adhere to the state’s new guidelines for transgender and nonbinary students that activists say could potentially out them. Miyares also joined other state attorneys general who challenged the Biden-Harris administration’s Title IX rules that specifically protect LGBTQ students from discrimination based on their gender identity and sexual orientation.

Youngkin under the state constitution cannot run for a second consecutive term as governor.

Lieutenant Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, who also opposes LGBTQ rights, in September announced she is running to succeed Youngkin in 2025. Earle-Sears will likely face outgoing Democratic Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger in next year’s general election.

A Virginia teacher who was fired for refusing to use a transgender student’s preferred pronouns has reached a settlement with the West Point School Board, securing $575,000 in damages and legal fees. 

The school board agreed to settle Peter Vlaming’s wrongful termination lawsuit after the Virginia Supreme Court ruled last December it had violated Vlaming’s rights. 

In 2018, the school board fired the former French teacher for violating school board policies that prohibit discrimination and harassment based on gender identity.

Vlaming had refused to use male pronouns when referring to a trans student in his class. 

Following his dismissal, he sued the school board, claiming that the request to use the student’s preferred pronouns violated his conscience and went against his religious and philosophical convictions. 

The King William County Circuit Court first dismissed Vlaming’s case, but the Virginia Supreme Court later reinstated it and ruled in Vlaming’s favor.

“I’m very grateful for the work of my attorneys at Alliance Defending Freedom to bring my case to victory, and hope it helps protect every other teacher and professor’s fundamental First Amendment rights,” Vlaming said in a statement through Alliance Defending Freedom, the conservative, anti-LGBTQ Christian legal organization that represents him.

The West Point School Board has since revised its policies to comply with Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s overhaul of model policies for trans and nonbinary students.  

The new policies, which went into effect in July 2023, mandate that schools use students’ names and pronouns based on the sex listed in their official records. Staff are prohibited from using a different name or pronoun unless parents provide written consent, and students are required to use bathrooms that correspond with their sex assigned at birth. 

Arlington County’s newly formed LGBTQ+ Advisory Committee will hold its first meeting on Oct. 21. 

The committee will guide county leadership on LGBTQ issues and ensure representation of the community in local government.

Officially formed by Arlington County Manager Mark Schwartz, the committee was developed in collaboration with Equality Arlington, a nonprofit LGBTQ advocacy organization. 

“We’re excited to see what the committee can do to help improve the county’s understanding of and services for the LGBTQ+ community,” Kellen MacBeth, the president and founder of Equality Arlington, said. 

The committee was developed with Alexandria’s LGBTQ+ Task Force and the D.C. Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs as references. The County Manager will appoint 15 members who are active in the LBGTQ community to two year terms.

According to the committee’s charter, it will “keep county and community leadership apprised of issues and actions regarding the needs of LGBTQ+ residents, make recommendations to ensure LGBTQ+ residents can thrive in the county, and work to increase understanding and support for the LGBTQ+ community.”

The County Manager created the committee in response to a letter Equality Arlington sent to the Arlington County government in March that highlighted several areas where the county could improve its responsiveness to the needs of LGBTQ residents.

MacBeth said Equality Arlington had found that, while the county had an LGBTQ  liaison role, few people in the community and the county government knew about its existence. The role, he said, seemed to be more about securing points on the Human Rights Campaign’s Municipal Equality Index — a tool evaluating the inclusiveness of municipal laws, policies, and services for LGBTQ people — than about serving the community.

“And we said, ‘That’s not what people think of when they think of having a liaison to a particular group within the community,’” MacBeth explained.

Together with the County Manager, Equality Arlington drafted the committee’s charter and proposed community members who could fill its seats, such as Freddie Lutz, the owner of Freddie’s Beach Bar  in Arlington. 

MacBeth envisions the committee as a place for LGBTQ Arlingtonians to interact with county government and increase the collaboration and coordination of the different LGBTQ serving organizations in the county, particularly in preparation for WorldPride in 2025. 

The first meeting on Oct. 21 will begin at 6 p.m. and members of the public can engage with the committee both virtually and in person at the Bozman Government Center. 

An application for those who are interested in serving on the committee is still open on the Arlington County website as of Wednesday.