News
10 years later, Goodridge decision still seen as milestone
Advocates see path for nationwide marriage equality in another decade
Mary Bonauto litigated the case that brought marriage equality to Massachusetts 10 years ago. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Ten years have passed since marriage equality came to the first state in the nation following a historic decision by the Massachusetts Supreme Court, helping to usher in swift change in attitudes and law around gay and lesbian couples.
On Nov. 18, 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Court handed down a 4-3 ruling in the case of Goodridge v. Department of Public Health, bringing marriage equality to the Bay State.
“The question before us is whether, consistent with the Massachusetts Constitution, the Commonwealth may deny the protections, benefits, and obligations conferred by civil marriage to two individuals of the same sex who wish to marry,” the decision states. “We conclude that it may not. The Massachusetts Constitution affirms the dignity and equality of all individuals.”
Despite efforts from then-Gov. Mitt Romney to limit the ruling to civil unions and enact a constitutional amendment to rescind the decision, supporters of the ruling won the day and marriage equality has remained the law of the land in Massachusetts.
Mary Bonauto, who litigated the Goodridge case on behalf of Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders and now serves as civil rights director there, said on the 10th anniversary of the decision the ruling “broke a historic barrier that we have never been able to overcome.”
“And it did so in the shared values of our constitution that we all believe in equality and we don’t have second-class citizens in this nation under the law,” Bonauto said.
The magnitude of the decision was bolstered, Bonauto said, six months later by the same-sex couples who went to the altar to marry.
“Now you had principle and you had reality working together, and all this freedom and equality from the court, and the you saw the joy in couples who finally were able to marry,” Bonauto said. “I think actually having couples marry was profound. It had to happen somewhere, somebody had to be first.”
Evan Wolfson, an early proponent of marriage equality and current president of Freedom to Marry, said having same-sex marriage legal someplace in the country was transformational for the movement.
“The breakthrough we were always working for in those early years was to make it real somewhere because we knew that once people had a chance to see with their own eyes families helped, and no one hurt, the opposition and resistance and fears would begin to subside, and we could build on that win to the rest of the wins still needed,” Wolfson said.
But the victory in Massachusetts, followed by then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s decision to distribute marriage licenses to gay couples, was met by a significant roadblock in the 2004 election when 11 states adopted constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage. President George W. Bush won re-election after making support for a U.S. constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage a prominent part of his campaign.
Pointing to political analysis debunking the notion that the marriage issue drove voters to the polls to re-elect Bush, Bonauto expressed skepticism that the ruling led to the win for Republicans in the 2004 election.
“The way this all got started, I think, people were putting two-and-two together about moral values, and the 22 percent of voters had stated that their most important consideration was ‘moral values,’ and the 11 amendments,” Bonauto said. “In the exit polling and so on about what this moral values means, for a great many people it meant the Iraq war. So it wasn’t even clear that the moral values voters were Bush voters.”
Bonauto said when she filed the case in 2001, 36 states already had statutory bans on same-sex marriage in response to advancing efforts to legalize same-sex marriage in Hawaii in the 1990s.
“From my perspective, it wasn’t really so much a backlash as a continued lashing,” Bonauto said. “People who had already taken steps to be very explicit about marriage bans, the only place they could go, continue to hone their political credentials, was to be even more draconian, and so that’s what happened by and large.”
Referencing a speech he delivered prior to Election Day of that year, Wolfson said the win in Massachusetts still trumped the losses at the ballot box in 2004 because it was still progress from the status quo.
“Even in 2004, I was on record before the election as saying that any year in which we endured some anti-gay attacks, but won marriage was a winning year because wins trump losses,” Wolfson said. “We would use the power of the win to overcome the temporary barriers erected in our losses, and that’s precisely what we are doing.”
It wasn’t until 2008 when other states would follow suit after courts in Connecticut and California ruled in favor of marriage equality, although the victory in California was (until recently) abrogated several months later by the passage of Proposition 8.
Now 16 states and D.C. are poised to have marriage equality on the books in the same year that the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibited federal recognition of these unions.
The ruling against DOMA at the Supreme Court was coupled by a decision from justices that restored marriage equality to California. In the months that followed, the New Jersey Supreme Court has instituted marriage equality in the Garden State and state legislatures in Illinois and Hawaii have extended marriage to gay couples. At any time, the New Mexico Supreme Court could hand down a ruling in favor of marriage equality as a result of pending litigation.
M.V. Lee Badgett, research director at the Williams Institute, estimated about 100,000 gay couples have married since the Goodridge decision 10 years ago, but the effect of having marriage equality in Massachusetts and other places goes far beyond numbers.
“It will take a while for researchers to analyze and publish more detailed findings on the effects of the ability to marry and of actual marriage,” Badgett said. “One early study showed that same-sex couples in Massachusetts feel more social inclusion, and one sample of gay men showed lower health care costs and health care utilization. In California we’ve seen that psychological health is better for same-sex couples who marry or had domestic partnerships.”
Wolfson said the growth of marriage equality in the country is noteworthy in many respects, including in terms of percentages.
“As we celebrate the end of this big year, we now have 38 percent of the American people living in a freedom to marry state, up from zero a decade ago,” Wolfson said. “Gay people can share in the freedom to marry in 18 countries, in five continents, up from zero virtually a decade ago. That, by any standard, is enormous progress and real momentum, but we have to finish the job.”
Reflecting back on the decision 10 years ago, Bonauto said she hoped at the time this much change would happen a decade later, but confessed “there were times that I certainly wasn’t sure.”
“I had always hoped that the arc for us would be what it was in some ways for interracial marriage, where courts rebuff and rebuff and rebuff, and then in 1948 the California Supreme Court struck down the interracial marriage ban,” Bonauto said. “More states repealed those after the California ruling, so that 19 years later when the Supreme Court decided Loving v. Virginia, Virginia was only one of 16 states that had such bans.”
During a news conference held on the same day as the 10th anniversary of the Goodridge decision, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney also noted progress made in the past decade in response to a more general question on LGBT rights.
“I think that anybody who looks at LGBT rights and the road travelled in this country just in the past decade would rightly be pleased by the significant progress that’s been made, even as we acknowledge that more work needs to be done, more progress need to be done,” Carney said.
Carney later told the Blade via email he wasn’t making a direct reference to the Goodridge decision, but his comments were meant “just as a broad reference to the progress made over the last decade.”
And hopes continue for a brighter future as advocates anticipate one of the pending federal lawsuits in 20 states across the country will make its way to the Supreme Court, delivering a ruling in favor of same-sex marriage nationwide in less than 10 years. Following the Supreme Court rulings in June, Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said marriage equality will reach the entire nation within five years.
Bonauto said she hopes the Supreme Court will settle the marriage issue once and for all, but isn’t completely sure which way the justices would rule and emphasized hard work is necessary for a favorable outcome.
“I think we have to work with the same intensity that we have up to this point and hopefully the Supreme Court will settle the issue, and then if for some reason it does not, which I think would be extremely unfortunate, I just think we have to continue doing what we’ve been doing state by state,” she said.
Freedom to Marry has prepared a “Roadmap to Victory” in anticipation of a Supreme Court decision that entails winning more states and building support for same-sex marriage in nationwide polls. Eyes will be on Oregon in 2014 to see whether it will reverse a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage at the ballot.
Wolfson said he “absolutely” believes that supporters of same-sex marriage will be able to finish the job.
“The good news for us is the same winning strategy that brought us to this point of momentum is the strategy that is going to bring it all home,” Wolfson said.
The White House
Hundreds protest ICE killing of Renee Nicole Good in D.C.
Married queer woman shot in Minneapolis on Wednesday
Hundreds of people took to the streets of D. C. on Thursday night to protest the killing of a U.S. citizen by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.
Protests began at the busy — and increasingly queer — intersection of 14th and U Streets, N.W. There, hundreds of people held signs, shouted, and made their way to the White House to voice their dissent over the Trump-Vance administration’s choice to increase law enforcement presence across the country.
The protest, which also occurred simultaneously in cities large and small across the country, comes in the wake of the death of Minneapolis resident Renne Nicole Good at the hands of ICE Agent Jonathan Ross. Good left behind two children and a wife, Rebecca Good.
Records obtained by the Associated Press found that Ross was an Iraq War veteran and nearly two decades into his career with U.S. Border Patrol and ICE.
Good was gunned down just blocks away from where George Floyd was killed by police in 2020, sparking weeks of national protests. Minnesota officials say the FBI has blocked their access to an investigation into the fatal shooting, according to a BBC story published on Friday.
In the nation’s capital, protesters marched from the intersection of 14th and U Street to Lafayette Square, right outside the White House. Multiple D.C. organizations led the protest, most notably Free DC, a nonprofit that works to ensure the right of “self-determination” for District residents, as many local laws can be reviewed, modified, or overturned by Congress. Free DC had organized multiple protests since the Trump-Vance administration was elected.
The Washington Blade spoke to multiple protesters towards the tail end of the protest about why they came out.
Franco Molinari, from Woodbridge, Va., crossed the Potomac to partake in his first-ever protest.
“I don’t appreciate ICE and the use of federal agents being pretty much militarized against America,” Molinari said while holding a “Justice for Renee” sign. “The video of Renee being executed cartel style in her car was enough for me to want to come out, to at least do something.”
Molinari, like many others the Blade spoke with, found out about the protest on Instagram.
“It was my friend there, Sarah … had sent a link regarding the protest to a group chat. I saw it in the morning, and I thought, ‘You know what, after work, I’m head out.’”
He also shared why protesting at the White House was important.
“I already saw the response that the president gave towards the murder of Renee, and it was largely very antagonizing,” Molinari said.
President Donald Trump, along with federal leaders under him, claimed that Good “violently, willfully and viciously ran over the ICE officer.” The president’s claims have been widely discredited through multiple videos of the incident, which show Good was attempting to leave the scene rather than attacking the officer.
“I hope that anybody would be able to see that and see the response and see for themselves that it just is not correct,” Molinari said.
The Blade also spoke with leftist influencer Dave the Viking, who has more than 52,000 followers on TikTok, where he posts anti-fascist and anti-Trump videos.
“We’re out here to make sure that this regime can’t rewrite history in real time, because we all know what we saw … we’re not going to allow them to run with this narrative that they [ICE agents] were stuck in the snow and that that poor woman tried to weaponize her car, because we all saw video footage that proves otherwise,” he told the Blade. “We’re not going to let this regime, the media, or right-wing influencers try to rewrite history in real time and try to convince us we didn’t all see what we know we saw.”
Dave the Viking continued, saying he believes the perceived power of ICE and other law enforcement to act — oftentimes in deadly and unjustifiable ways — is a product of the Trump-Vance administration.
“There’s a line between fascism and anti-fascism. These motherfuckers have been pushing that envelope, trying to label an idea a terrorist organization, to the point of yesterday, crossing that line hardcore. You face the point of looking at history and saying there was this 1989, 2003 America, where we’re just going in, raiding resources. Where is this fucking 1930s Germany, where we’re going in and we’re about to just start clearing shit and pulling knots? Yeah, nope. We proved that shit yesterday.”
Two people were injured in another shooting involving federal agents, this time Border Patrol in Portland, Ore., on Thursday afternoon.
KC Lynch, who lives near American University, also spoke about her choice to protest with a group.
“I came out today because everything that ICE has done is absolutely unacceptable, not only killing this one woman, but also the fact that they’ve been imprisoning people in places that are literally, that have been literally on record by international organizations shown to be human rights violating. It’s unbelievably evil.”
Lynch also echoed Dave’s opinion about parallels between the Trump-Vance administration and the rise of Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany.
“It’s literally what happened before the Holocaust. We should all be scared. We should all be angry. I’m so angry about it … even talking about it — I’m sorry,” she said before getting choked up.
Lynch emphasized that despite the circumstances in which people were protesting together, the sense of community was strong and powerful.
“I feel like it’s important for people to know that we’re angry, even if no policy changes come out of it, and it’s just nice to yell and be angry about it, because I feel like we’ve probably all been feeling this way, and it’s nice to be around people that are like minded and to like have a sense of community.”
Venezuela
AHF client in Venezuela welcomes Maduro’s ouster
‘This is truly something we’ve been waiting for’ for decades
An AIDS Healthcare Foundation client who lives in Venezuela told the Washington Blade he welcomes the ouster of his country’s former president.
The client, who asked the Blade to remain anonymous, on Thursday said he felt “joy” when he heard the news that American forces seized Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, at their home in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, during an overnight operation on Jan. 3.
“This is truly something we’ve been waiting for for 26 or 27 years,” the AHF client told the Blade.
Hugo Chávez became Venezuela’s president in 1999. Maduro succeeded him in 2013 after he died.
“I’ve always been in opposition,” said the AHF client, who stressed he was speaking to the Blade in his personal capacity and not as an AHF representative. “I’ve never agreed with the government. When I heard the news, well, you can imagine.”
He added he has “high hopes that this country will truly change, which is what it needed.”
“This means getting rid of this regime, so that American and foreign companies can invest here and Venezuela can become what it used to be, the Venezuela of the past,” he said.
The AHF client lives near the Colombia-Venezuela border. He is among the hundreds of Venezuelans who receive care at AHF’s clinic in Cúcuta, a Colombian city near the Táchira River that marks the border between the two countries.
The Simón Bolívar Bridge on the Colombia-Venezuela border on May 14, 2019. (Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
The AHF client praised U.S. President Donald Trump and reiterated his support for the Jan. 3 operation.
“It was the only way that they could go,” he said.
The Venezuelan National Assembly on Jan. 4 swore in Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president, as the country’s acting president. The AHF client with whom the Blade spoke said he is “very optimistic” about Venezuela’s future, even though the regime remains in power.
“With Maduro leaving, the regime has a certain air about it,” he said. “I think this will be a huge improvement for everyone.”
“We’re watching,” he added. “The actions that the United States government is going to implement regarding Venezuela give us hope that things will change.”
Minnesota
Reports say woman killed by ICE was part of LGBTQ community
Renee Nicole Good shot in Minneapolis on Wednesday
A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis as she attempted to drive away from law enforcement during a protest on Wednesday.
The Star Tribune newspaper identified the victim as Renee Nicole Good, 37, a Minneapolis resident who lived blocks from where she was shot in the Central neighborhood, according to reports. Donna Ganger, Good’s mother, told the Star Tribune that her daughter lived in the Twin Cities with her wife.
Multiple videos of the shooting have gone viral on social media, showing various angles of the fatal incident — including footage that shows Good getting into her car and attempting to drive away from law enforcement officers, who had their weapons drawn.
In the videos, ICE agents can be heard telling Good to “get out of the fucking car” as they attempted to arrest her. Good, who press reports say was married to a woman, ended up crashing her car into an electric pole and other vehicles. She was later transported from the scene of the shooting and died at the hospital.
President Donald Trump defended the ICE agent on Truth Social, saying the officer was “viciously” run over — a claim that coincides with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s assessment of the situation. Noem, a South Dakota Republican, insisted the officer “fired defensive shots” at Good after she attempted to run over law enforcement agents “in an attempt to kill them — an act of domestic terrorism.”
Multiple state and local officials disputed claims that the shooting was carried out in self-defense at the same time Noem was making those assertions.
An Instagram account that appears to belong to Good describes her as a “poet and writer and wife and mom and shitty guitar strummer from Colorado; experiencing Minneapolis, MN,” accompanied by a rainbow flag emoji.
A video posted to X after the shooting shows a woman, reportedly her wife, sitting on the ground, crying and saying, “They killed my wife. I don’t know what to do.”
“We’ve dreaded this moment since the early stages of this ICE presence in Minneapolis,” Mayor Jacob Frey said during a Wednesday press conference. “Having seen the video myself, I want to tell everybody directly that [the DHS’s claim of self-defense] is bullshit. This was an agent recklessly using power that resulted in somebody dying, getting killed.”
“I have a message for ICE. To ICE, get the fuck out of Minneapolis,” Frey continued. “We do not want you here. Your stated reason for being in this city is to create some kind of safety, and you are doing exactly the opposite. People are being hurt. Families are being ripped apart. Long-term Minneapolis residents that have contributed so greatly to our city, to our culture, to our economy are being terrorized, and now somebody is dead. That’s on you, and it’s also on you to leave.”
Across the Capitol, members of the House and the Senate condemned the actions of the officer.
“There’s no indication she’s a protester, there’s nothing that at least you can see on the video, and therefore nothing that the officers on the ground could see that identify her as someone who’s set out to try to do harm to an ICE officer,” U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said Wednesday night on MS NOW’s “The Weeknight.”
“There is no evidence that has been presented to justify this killing,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said in a statement on his website. “The masked ICE agent who pulled the trigger should be criminally investigated to the full extent of the law for acting with depraved indifference to human life.”
“ICE just killed someone in Minneapolis,” U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) the highest-ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, posted on X. “This administration’s violence against communities across our country is horrific and dangerous. Oversight Democrats are demanding answers on what happened today. We need an investigation immediately.”
In a statement to the Advocate, Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson wrote, “Today, a woman was senselessly killed in Minneapolis during an ICE action — a brutal reminder that this agency and the Trump regime put every community at risk, spreading fear instead of safety. Reports that she may have been part of the LGBTQ+ community underscore how often the most vulnerable pay the highest price.”
National LGBTQ Task Force President Kierra Johnson also responded to Good’s death.
“We recognize and mourn the loss of Renee Nicole Good and extend our condolences to her family, loved ones, and community,” said Johnson in a statement. “This loss of life was preventable and reprehensible, particularly coming at the hands of federal agents.”
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