National
Bi-national couples in ‘surreal’ wait for DOMA decision
150 attorneys in training to assist when ruling comes
Heather (left) and Maria “Mar” del Mar have already filed their I-130 applications in anticipating of a ruling against DOMA. (Photo courtesy of Immigration Equality)
After being together for five years, Heather and Maria “Mar” del Mar are making their final preparations in anticipation of a ruling from the Supreme Court that could mean they can stay together in the United States.
Heather, a U.S. citizen, and Mar, a Spanish national, have already completed their I-130 marriage-based green card application and have sent it to the LGBT group Immigration Equality with the expectation that the high court will strike down the Defense of Marriage Act.
“We’re actually largely done with that,” Heather said. “Our intention on that front is, of course, to file that petition the first day it’s legally viable to do so.”
Although Mar has legal status because she’s living in the United States on a work visa, it expires in November. Section 3 of DOMA, which prohibits federal recognition of same-sex marriage, has blocked the New York City couple, who married in 2011, from a more permanent solution.
In March of last year, U.S. Customs & Immigration Enforcement denied Heather and Maria a marriage-based green card based on an earlier application, citing DOMA as the reason. They’re one of the estimated 28,500 bi-national same-sex couples in danger of separation.
That could change in the coming days. The Supreme Court is expected to deliver a ruling on the constitutionality of DOMA as a result of pending litigation along with ruling in a separate case challenging California’s Proposition 8.
If the court rules DOMA is unconstitutional, blocking the U.S. government from enforcing it, USCIS will have no legal reason to withhold the marriage-based green card from Heather and Mar.
Heather, a marketing director for a global non-profit organization in New York, said the wait for the decision has been “kind of surreal” and what’s been on the couple’s minds in the days heading to the ruling.
“We look at each other every night before we go to bed I would say for the last few weeks, where it’s been kind of like a month countdown, and we’ve said, “Oh my God, what is it going to really be like the day after?” she said. “How much is our life going to change when this issue isn’t a huge weight on our relationship and even on our everyday thought process.”
Mar, who works in marketing for a Spanish-language newspaper in New York, said a ruling against DOMA would lift a considerable burden because they are unable to plan for the future as they fear separation.
“We are really nervous because this would be a big change in our life,” Mar said. “We are very excited.”
As of today, the Supreme Court calendar designates only June 20 and June 24 as days on which opinions will be handed down; But with 14 cases yet to be decided, it is widely expected that they will add another day to the calendar, either June 26 or June 27 and the decisions for the marriage will be announced at that time.
And Heather and Mar, who are among the plaintiffs in Immigration Equality’s lawsuit against DOMA, already have plans. On the last Saturday of the month, they’re inviting friends and family to come to their home to celebrate the moment when the federal government will view their relationship as legally equal to others.
“We actually already have — I guess this is probably superstitious; I shouldn’t say this out loud — but we actually already have a celebration planned for family and friends — we have to be optimistic — for Saturday night on the 29th,” Heather said. “So, we’re celebrating at our place.”
And what if the Supreme Court rules in favor of DOMA? Heather said it’s not an outcome they like to consider, but in that event, they’d pursue additional litigation, find a way to renew Mar’s work visa and push for the inclusion of gay couples in comprehensive immigration reform legislation.
“To be honest, it will just be devastating; all of those things are just technically the things that we’ll do,” Heather said. “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do; we’re going to start a family anyway because we refuse to live at the effect of our circumstances. We’ve already postponed things in our life much more than is fair — and we’ll consider the option of moving to Spain where our marriage is recognized.”
But Heather and Mar are just one of many bi-national same-sex couples readying for a Supreme Court ruling that would ensure they can stay together in the United States.
Rachel Tiven, executive director of Immigration Equality, said she’s expecting thousands of green card applications from bi-national same-sex couples in the months following a court ruling against DOMA.
“We think that there will be over the first year many thousands,” Tiven said. “I think in the remaining five months of the year, we’ll see something between 2,000 and 10,000 applications, but that’s a guess.”
In the meantime, Tiven said her organization is already preparing some applications for same-sex bi-national couples and making plans for others to renew applications that were previously denied.
“We’re preparing some families who will file immediately if the Supreme Court will enable them to do so,” Tiven said. “Other families who filed a long time ago — either because they were plaintiffs, or because it was a step to seeking deferred action — we are asking the administration, for those who were denied, we’re asking the administration to reopen those applications so they don’t have to file all over again, and don’t have to pay the fee again.”
In order to facilitate the expected increase in couples filing marriage-based green card applications, Immigration Equality’s legal team has conducted two trainings last week for attorneys who have signed up to assist couples with their petitions following a court ruling striking down Section 3 of DOMA.
Steve Ralls, a spokesperson for Immigration Equality, said 150 lawyers from across the country to date have joined that network of attorneys and have taken part in one of those two trainings.
“As part of that training, our legal team discussed topics related to identifying issues that may arise for same-sex bi-national couples during implementation following the court’s ruling,” Ralls said. “A key goal is to ensure that attorneys working with LGBT families can also serve as watchdogs during that critical implementation period and report any issues they encounter with relevant government agencies in their processing of green card applications for affected families.”
Another couple making preparations in anticipation of a court ruling is Rachel Wilkins and Jennifer Blum, a New Jersey couple that married a year-and-a-half ago. Blum, a New Jersey native, is awaiting the opportunity to sponsor Wilkins, a British national, for residency in the United States.
The couple has never filed a marriage-based green card application before, but Blum, an attorney, said they’ve already hired an attorney to help them through the process in anticipation of a ruling against DOMA.
“We’ve hired an attorney to prepare our application for us,” Blum said. “So we’ve been really just trying to get all the paperwork together, and we’re excited for this decision to finally come to fruition, and we just want to move on with our lives.”
Wilkins, a curator who’s in the country on work visa, said she shares a sense of optimism that the Supreme Court will issue a decision that renders Section 3 of the the Defense of Marriage Act inoperable.
“I think we’re feeling optimistic,” Wilkins said. “We were watching the Supreme Court blog to see the orders handed down just waiting to see the right decision made.”
The couple came to D.C. when the oral arguments took place at the Supreme Court in March and had the opportunity to meet lesbian New Yorker Edith Windsor, who filed the lawsuit that’s currently before the court.
“We walked up on the steps and I lost it … because it’s just the culmination of so many people’s hard work, sweat, they’ve given so much to be able to get to this point where we could get this case in front of the Supreme Court, and for the Supreme Court to finally do the right thing, and for justice to be done,” Blum said.
Should the court strike down DOMA, Blum said they’ll celebrate by gathering at the Stonewall Inn in New York City, where riots began in 1969 that were considered the start of the modern gay rights movement.
“Legally, factually, I just can’t see the Supreme Court determining any other way,” Blum said. “Like I said, there’s no other option.”
Lavi Soloway, a gay immigration attorney at Masliah & Soloway and co-founder of The DOMA Project, said his firm worked for several months on preparing to file new marriage-based green card applications — some on the day the court issues a decision against DOMA — and has several filed in 2011 and 2012 that haven’t yet been denied.
“The couples have undertaken the preparation with the understanding that that the Supreme Court ruling on DOMA is not something that we can predict in advance, but it would be fair to say that their perspective, like mine, is cautiously optimistic,” Soloway said.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article misattributed quotes to Jennifer Blum and Rachel Wilkins. The Blade regrets the error.
New York
Pride flag raised at Stonewall after National Park Service took it down
‘Our flag represents dignity and human rights’
A Pride flag was raised at the site of the Stonewall National Monument days after a National Park Service directive banned flying the flag at the birthplace of the LGBTQ rights movement in the U.S.
The flag-raising was led by Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal and supported by other elected officials.
“The community should rejoice. We have prevailed,” Hoylman-Sigal said shortly after the flag was hoisted. “Our flag represents dignity and human rights.”
The flag now sits in Christopher Street Park, feet away from the Stonewall Inn, where in 1969 a police raid of the gay bar sparked outrage and led to a rising of LGBTQ people pushing back on NYPD brutality and unjust treatment.
Elected officials brought a new flagpole with them, using plastic zip ties to attach it to the existing pole.
In 2016, President Barack Obama declared the site a national monument.
One day before the planned re-raising of the Pride flag, the National Park Service installed only an American flag on the flagpole, which days prior had flown a rainbow flag bearing the NPS logo.
The directive removing the flag was put forward by Trump-appointed National Park Service Acting Director Jessica Bowron.
This comes one day after more than 20 LGBTQ organizations from across the country co-signed a letter to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and General Services Administrator Ed Forst, demanding the flag be restored to the monument.
“It is our understanding that the policy provides limited exceptions for non-agency flags that provide historical context or play a role in historic reenactments. Simply put, we urge you to grant this flag an exception and raise it once again, immediately,” the letter read. “It also serves as an important reminder to the 30+ million LGBTQ+ Americans, who continue to face disproportionate threats to our lives and our liberty, that the sites and symbols that tell our stories are worth honoring … However, given recent removals of the site’s references to transgender and bisexual people — people who irrefutably played a pivotal role in this history — it is clear that this is not about the preservation of the historical record.”
The letter finished with a message of resilience the LGBTQ community is known for: “The history and the legacy of Stonewall must live on. Our community cannot simply be erased with the removal of a flag. We will continue to stand up and fight to ensure that LGBTQ+ history should not only be protected — it should be celebrated as a milestone in American resilience and progress.”
When asked about the directive, the NPS responded with this statement:
“Current Department of the Interior policy provides that the National Park Service may only fly the U.S. flag, Department of the Interior flags, and the Prisoner of War/Missing in Action flag on flagpoles and public display points. The policy allows limited exceptions, permitting non-agency flags when they serve an official purpose. These include historical context or reenactments, current military branch flags, flags of federally recognized tribal nations affiliated with a park, flags at sites co-managed with other federal, state, or municipal partners, flags required for international park designations, and flags displayed under agreements with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services for Naturalization ceremonies.”
An Interior Department spokesperson on Thursday called the move to return the flag to the monument a “political stunt.”
“Today’s political pageantry shows how utterly incompetent and misaligned the New York City officials are with the problems their city is facing,” a department spokesperson said when reached for comment.
The clash comes amid broader efforts by the Trump-Vance administration to minimize LGBTQ history and political power. The White House has spent much of President Donald Trump’s second presidency restricting transgender rights — stopping gender-affirming care for transgender youth, issuing an executive order stating the federal government will recognize only two sexes, male and female, and blocking Medicaid and Medicare from being used for gender-affirming care.
State Department
FOIA lawsuit filed against State Department for PEPFAR records
Council for Global Equality, Physicians for Human Rights seeking data, documents
The Council for Global Equality and Physicians for Human Rights have filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the State Department for PEPFAR-related data and documents.
The groups, which Democracy Forward represents, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on Wednesday.
Then-President George W. Bush in 2003 signed legislation that created PEPFAR. UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima last March said PEPFAR has saved 26 million lives around the world.
The Trump-Vance administration in January 2025 froze nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending for at least 90 days. Secretary of State Marco Rubio later issued a waiver that allowed PEPFAR and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during the freeze.
The Washington Blade has previously reported PEPFAR-funded programs in Kenya and other African countries have been forced to suspend services and even shut down because of gaps in U.S. funding. HIV/AIDS activists have also sharply criticized the Trump-Vance administration over reported plans it will not fully fund PEPFAR in the current fiscal year.
The lawsuit notes the Council for Global Equality and Physicians for Human Rights have “filed several FOIA requests” with the State Department for PEPFAR-related data and documents. The groups filed their most recent request on Jan. 30.
“On Jan. 30, 2026, plaintiffs, through counsel, sent State a letter asking it to commit to prompt production of the requested records,” reads the lawsuit. “State responded that the request was being processed but did not commit to any timeline for production.”
“Plaintiffs have received no subsequent communication from State regarding this FOIA request,” it notes.
“Transparency and inclusion have been hallmarks of PEPFAR’s success in the last decade,” said Beirne Roose-Snyder, a senior policy fellow at the Council for Global Equality, in a press release that announced the lawsuit. “This unprecedented withholding of data, and concurrent ideological misdirection of foreign assistance to exclude LGBTQI+ people and others who need inclusive programming, has potentially devastating and asymmetrical impacts on already marginalized communities.”
“This data is vital to understanding who’s getting access to care and who’s being left behind,” added Roose-Snyder.
“We filed this lawsuit to seek transparency: the administration’s PEPFAR data blackout withholds information the public, health providers, and affected communities need to track the HIV epidemic and prevent avoidable illness and death, obscuring the true human cost of these policy decisions,” said Physicians for Human Rights Research, Legal, and Advocacy Director Payal Shah.
The State Department has yet to respond to the Blade’s request for comment on the lawsuit.
New York
N.Y. lawmaker vows ‘Pride flag will fly again’ at Stonewall Monument
After a Jan. 21 policy shift, Pride flags were banned at national parks, prompting backlash from Bottcher and LGBTQ advocates.
Hours after news broke that the National Park Service would no longer allow Pride flags to fly at the Stonewall National Monument — the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ rights movement in the United States — the Washington Blade spoke with New York State Sen. Erik Bottcher, who represents the area surrounding the Stonewall Inn and the national monument.
During the interview, Bottcher, who is gay, spoke about the policy change and outlined steps he plans to take in the coming days to push for its reversal.
“This is another act of erasure,” Bottcher told the Blade. “It’s a cowardly attempt to rewrite history and to intimidate our community. This is Stonewall — it’s where we fought back, where we ignited a global movement for equality — and we refuse to go back. We’re not going to accept these acts of erasure.”
The Stonewall Inn became a flashpoint in 1969 after NYPD officers raided the bar, part of a longstanding pattern of police harassment of LGBTQ spaces. The raid sparked days of protest and resistance along Christopher Street, now widely recognized as the catalyst for the modern LGBTQ rights movement.
While the events are often referred to as the “Stonewall Riots,” many activists and historians prefer the term “Stonewall Uprising,” emphasizing that the resistance was a response to systemic oppression rather than senseless violence. LGBTQ patrons and community members fought back — shouting “Gay Power!” and “Liberate Christopher Street!” — as crowds grew and frustration with police abuse boiled over.
Since the uprising, LGBTQ people and allies have gathered annually in June to commemorate Stonewall and to celebrate Pride, honoring the movement that placed LGBTQ voices at the center of the fight for equality.
In June 2016, then President Barack Obama officially designated the space as the Stonewall National Monument, making it the United States’s first national monument designated for an LGBTQ historic site.
Now, nearly 10 years later, President Trump’s appointed NPS acting director Jessica Bowron changed policy on Jan. 21 regarding which flags are allowed to be flown in national parks. Many, including Bottcher, say this is part of a larger targeted and deliberate attempt by the administration to erase LGBTQ history.
“It’s clear they’re making a conscious decision to erase the symbols of our community from a monument to our community’s struggle,” he said. “This is a calculated and premeditated decision, and it could be — and should be — reversed.”
“Let’s be clear,” Bottcher added, “they wish we didn’t exist … But we’re not going anywhere. We refuse to go back into the shadows.”
When asked why it is critical to challenge the policy, Bottcher emphasized the importance of visibility in preserving LGBTQ history.
“This is why it’s so important that we not let this stand,” he said. “Visibility is critical. When people see us, learn about us, and get to know us, that’s how we break down prejudice and stereotypes. We cannot allow them to push us back into the shadows.”
Other LGBTQ leaders and elected officials were quick to condemn the removal of the Pride flag, which had flown since the site’s official designation as a national monument.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani called the decision “outrageous.”
“I am outraged by the removal of the Rainbow Pride Flag from Stonewall National Monument,” Mamdani said in a statement. “New York is the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement, and no act of erasure will ever change or silence that history.”
“Our city has a duty not just to honor this legacy, but to live up to it,” he added. “I will always fight for a New York City that invests in our LGBTQ+ community, defends their dignity, and protects every one of our neighbors — without exception.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer also condemned the move.
“The removal of the Pride Rainbow Flag from the Stonewall National Monument is a deeply outrageous action that must be reversed immediately,” Schumer said in a statement to The Advocate. “Stonewall is a landmark because it is the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ rights movement, and symbols of that legacy belong there by both history and principle.”
Cathy Renna, communications director for the National LGBTQ Task Force, said the flag’s removal will not erase the movement it represents.
“They can take down a flag, but they can’t take down our history,” Renna said. “Stonewall is sacred ground rooted in resistance, liberation, and the legacy of trans and queer trailblazers who changed the course of history.”
Human Rights Campaign National Press Secretary Brandon Wolf echoed that sentiment.
“Bad news for the Trump administration: these colors don’t run,” Wolf said. “The Stonewall Inn and Visitors Center are privately owned, their flags are still flying high, and that community is just as queer today as it was yesterday.”
Tyler Hack, executive director of the Christopher Street Project, said the removal was aimed squarely at LGBTQ visibility.
“The Pride flag was removed from Stonewall for one reason: to further erase queer and trans people from public life,” Hack said. “Stonewall marks the moment when queer and trans people fought back and demanded dignity. Our history is not theirs to erase.”
Bottcher closed with a promise to his constituents — and to the broader LGBTQ community — that the Pride flag’s removal would not be permanent.
“We will not be erased. We will not be silenced,” he said. “And the Pride flag will fly again at the birthplace of our movement.”
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