The White House
Blade speaks exclusively to U.S. envoy for global LGBTQ rights
Jessica Stern named to position in June 2021
The special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ rights abroad in an exclusive interview with the Washington Blade ahead of Pride month highlighted the White House’s efforts in support of LGBTQ rights around the world.
Jessica Stern pointed out to the Blade the State Department’s decision to offer passports with an “X” gender marker “is an important example of how we’re expanding resources to people who are targeted because of gender identity and expression.” She also noted U.S. embassies and consulates over the last year have publicly condemned violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Andrea González, a transgender activist in Guatemala who was shot to death on June 11, 2021, near her Guatemala City home, participated in the State Department’s International Visitors Leadership Program.
Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols is among the U.S. officials who condemned González’s murder. William Popp, the U.S. ambassador to Guatemala, and U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator Samantha Power visited the headquarters of González’s group, Reinas de la Noche, to express their condolences over her death.
The U.S. Consulate General in Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, condemned the so-called honor killing of Doski Azad, a trans woman whose brother reportedly shot her in the head and chest in January after she returned to the region. The State Department in May 2021 in a statement to the Blade described the so-called honor killing of Ali Fazeli Monfared, an Iranian man whose relatives murdered him after they learned he was gay, as “appalling.”
Stern noted the Biden administration’s continued support of LGBTQ rights abroad also includes marriage equality in countries where activists say such a thing is possible through legislation or the judicial process.
“The administration acknowledges that married or not, LGBTQI+ people, couples and their families deserve full equality, access to legal protections and should have their families legally recognized,” she said. “All of this is consistent with President Biden’s commitment to LGBTQI+ equality and marriage equality specifically.”
President Biden in February 2021 signed a memo that committed the U.S. to promoting LGBTQ rights abroad as part of his administration’s overall foreign policy. The White House four months later named Stern, who was previously the executive director of OutRight Action International, as the next special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ rights abroad.
Biden, who is Catholic, was vice president in 2012 when he publicly backed marriage equality during on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” He spoke in favor of the issue before then-President Obama did.
A law that allows same-sex couples to marry and adopt children took effect in Chile in March.
Same-sex couples in Switzerland will be able to legally on July 1 after voters last November overwhelmingly approved a “Marriage for All” law.
Lawmakers in Cuba continue to consider a new family code that could pave the way for marriage equality on the island. Honduran President Xiomara Castro, who took office in January, has publicly backed marriage equality in her country.
The Privy Council’s Judicial Committee in London in March upheld a Bermuda law that rescinded marriage rights for same-sex couples. The same judicial body, which is an appellate court for British territories, also ruled same-sex couples don’t have a constitutional right to marry in the Cayman Islands.
Stern last month spoke at the 2022 ILGA World Conference that took place in Long Beach, Calif.
She spoke with the Blade before she traveled to Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam. Stern will also visit Lithuania, Sweden and the Netherlands before she returns to the U.S. on June 8.
Malaysia is one of the upwards of 70 countries in which consensual same-sex sexual relations remain criminalized. Iran, Saudi Arabia and Mauritania are three of the handful of nations in which homosexuality remains punished by death.
State Department spokesperson Ned Price, who is openly gay, during a May 2021 interview with the Blade said the decriminalization of consensual same-sex sexual relations is one of the Biden administration’s five priorities in its efforts to promote LGBTQ rights abroad. Stern noted that “among a wider set of priorities, marriage equality is one element of our longstanding and ongoing commitment to advance the rights of LGBTQI+ persons.”
“All human beings should be treated with respect and dignity and should be able to live without fear, regardless of who they love,” she said.
Stern acknowledged potential critics of the White House’s efforts to champion marriage equality and other LGBTQ-specific issues around the world. Stern stressed, however, the “only thing that holds us back is hatred and intolerance.”
“We see autocracy is on the rise globally. We see that democratic institutions and democracies themselves are being undermined and we see LGBTQI+ people are often the canary in the coal mine,” she said. “We need to fight back against these homophobic and transphobic trends.”
The State Department on April 28 released a report on the implementation of Biden’s memo.
USAID and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief a few weeks earlier announced they delivered more than 18 million doses of antiretroviral drugs for Ukrainians with HIV/AIDS. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last August after he met with Biden at the White House pledged his country will continue to fight anti-LGBTQ discrimination.
Stern noted Canada and Germany are among the other countries that have pledged to support LGBTQ rights abroad as part of their respective foreign policies.
“Every administration sets its own priorities. We know what a positive impact President Biden’s staunch support of LGBTQI+ rights has had on this community domestically and on our support for LGBTQI+ people internationally,” she said. “Thankfully, governments around the world are increasingly normalizing the idea that LGBTQI+ people are entitled to recognition under the law and affirming that their rights need to be an explicit part of a human rights agenda.”
The White House
EXCLUSIVE: Garcia, Markey reintroduce bill to require US promotes LGBTQ rights abroad
International Human Rights Defense Act also calls for permanent special envoy
Two lawmakers on Monday have reintroduced a bill that would require the State Department to promote LGBTQ rights abroad.
A press release notes the International Human Rights Defense Act that U.S. Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) introduced would “direct” the State Department “to monitor and respond to violence against LGBTQ+ people worldwide, while creating a comprehensive plan to combat discrimination, criminalization, and hate-motivated attacks against LGBTQ+ communities” and “formally establish a special envoy to coordinate LGBTQ+ policies across the State Department.”
“LGBTQ+ people here at home and around the world continue to face escalating violence, discrimination, and rollbacks of their rights, and we must act now,” said Garcia in the press release. “This bill will stand up for LGBTQ+ communities at home and abroad, and show the world that our nation can be a leader when it comes to protecting dignity and human rights once again.”
Markey, Garcia, and U.S. Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.) in 2023 introduced the International Human Rights Defense Act. Markey and former California Congressman Alan Lowenthal in 2019 sponsored the same bill.
The promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights was a cornerstone of the Biden-Harris administration’s overall foreign policy.
The global LGBTQ and intersex rights movement since the Trump-Vance administration froze nearly all U.S. foreign aid has lost more than an estimated $50 million in funding.
The U.S. Agency for International Development, which funded dozens of advocacy groups around the world, officially shut down on July 1. Secretary of State Marco Rubio earlier this year said the State Department would administer the remaining 17 percent of USAID contracts that had not been cancelled.
Then-President Joe Biden in 2021 named Jessica Stern — the former executive director of Outright International — as his administration’s special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights.
The Trump-Vance White House has not named anyone to the position.
Stern, who co-founded the Alliance for Diplomacy and Justice after she left the government, is among those who sharply criticized the removal of LGBTQ- and intersex-specific references from the State Department’s 2024 human rights report.
“It is deliberate erasure,” said Stern in August after the State Department released the report.
The Congressional Equality Caucus in a Sept. 9 letter to Rubio urged the State Department to once again include LGBTQ and intersex people in their annual human rights reports. Garcia, U.S. Reps. Julie Johnson (D-Texas), and Sarah McBride (D-Del.), who chair the group’s International LGBTQI+ Rights Task Force, spearheaded the letter.
“We must recommit the United States to the defense of human rights and the promotion of equality and justice around the world,” said Markey in response to the International Human Rights Defense Act that he and Garcia introduced. “It is as important as ever that we stand up and protect LGBTQ+ individuals from the Trump administration’s cruel attempts to further marginalize this community. I will continue to fight alongside LGBTQ+ individuals for a world that recognizes that LGBTQ+ rights are human rights.”
The White House
Trump targets LGBTQ workers in new loan forgiveness restrictions
A new Trump policy attempts to limit loan forgiveness for federal workers working with LGBTQ issues.
The Trump-Vance administration is moving forward with plans to restrict federal workers from using the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program if their work involves issues related to LGBTQ individuals, immigrants, or transgender children.
Lawsuits were filed last week in more than 20 cities — including Albuquerque, N.M., Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco — challenging the administration’s efforts to withhold loan forgiveness from organizations that oppose the president and his party’s political agenda.
Created by Congress in 2007 and signed into law by then-President George W. Bush, PSLF cancels the federal student loan debts of borrowers who spend a decade or more working in public service. The program covers teachers, nurses, law enforcement officers (including members of the military), and employees of tax-exempt organizations under Section 501(c)(3). Many of those who work to support LGBTQ rights are employed by such organizations — meaning they stand to lose eligibility under the new policy.
As of 2024, more than 1 million Americans have benefited from PSLF, helping erase an estimated $74 billion in student loan debt, according to a Biden-era estimate.
Under the new rule, which takes effect July 1, 2026, the Department of Education will be able to deny loan forgiveness to workers whose government or nonprofit employers engage in activities deemed to have a “substantial illegal purpose.” The power to define that term will rest not with the courts, but with the education secretary.
The rule grants the secretary authority to exclude groups from the program if they participate in activities such as trafficking, illegal immigration, or what it calls the “chemical castration” of children — defined as the use of hormone therapy or puberty-blocking drugs, a form of gender-affirming care sometimes provided to transgender children and teens.
Under Secretary of Education Nicholas Kent defended the change, arguing that the new rule would better serve the American people, despite every major American physician organization research showing gender-affirming care helps more than it harms.
“It is unconscionable that the plaintiffs are standing up for criminal activity,” Kent said in a statement to NPR. “This is a commonsense reform that will stop taxpayer dollars from subsidizing organizations involved in terrorism, child trafficking, and transgender procedures that are doing irreversible harm to children.”
The Williams Institute, a leading research center on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy, warned that this — along with other restrictions on federal loan forgiveness — would disproportionately harm LGBTQ Americans. The institute found that more than one-third (35%) of LGBTQ adults aged 18 to 40 — an estimated 2.9 million people — hold over $93.2 billion in federal student loans. About half (51%) of transgender adults, 36% of cisgender LBQ women, and 28% of cisgender GBQ men have federal student loans.
“The proposed restrictions on student loans will particularly affect the nearly one-quarter of LGBTQ adults employed in the public or nonprofit sectors, which qualify for the Public Student Loan Forgiveness program,” said Brad Sears, Distinguished Senior Scholar of Law and Policy at the Williams Institute, who authored a brief on how the proposed changes could impact LGBTQ borrowers. “A recent executive order could potentially disqualify anyone working for an organization involved in gender-affirming care, or possibly those serving transgender individuals more broadly, from the PSLF program.”
The White House
Political leaders, activists reflect on Dick Cheney’s passing
Former VP died on Monday at 84
Dick Cheney, the 46th vice president of the United States who served under President George W. Bush, passed away on Monday at the age of 84. His family announced Tuesday morning that the cause was complications from pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease.
Cheney, one of the most powerful and influential figures in American politics over the past century, held a long and consequential career in public service. He previously served as White House chief of staff for President Gerald Ford, as the U.S. representative for Wyoming’s at-large congressional district from 1979-1989, and briefly as House minority whip in 1989.
He later served as secretary of defense under President George H.W. Bush before becoming vice president during the George W. Bush administration, where he played a leading behind-the-scenes role in the response to the Sept. 11 attacks and in coordinating the Global War on Terrorism. Cheney was also an early proponent of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, falsely alleging that Saddam Hussein’s regime possessed weapons of mass destruction and had ties to al-Qaeda.
Cheney’s personal life was not without controversy.
In 2006, he accidentally shot Harry Whittington, a then-78-year-old Texas attorney, during a quail hunt at Armstrong Ranch in Kenedy County, Texas — an incident that became the subject of national attention.
Following his death, tributes and reflections poured in from across the political spectrum.
“I am saddened to learn of the passing of former Vice President Dick Cheney,” former Vice President Kamala Harris posted on X. “Vice President Cheney was a devoted public servant, from the halls of Congress to many positions of leadership in multiple presidential administrations,” she added. “His passing marks the loss of a figure who, with a strong sense of dedication, gave so much of his life to the country he loved.”
Harris was one of the Democrats that the Republican had supported in recent years following Trump’s ascent to the White House.
Former President Joe Biden, who served as former President Obama’s vice president, said on X that “Dick Cheney devoted his life to public service — from representing Wyoming in Congress, to serving as Secretary of Defense, and later as vice president of the United States.”
“While we didn’t agree on much, he believed, as I do, that family is the beginning, middle, and end. Jill and I send our love to his wife Lynne, their daughters Liz and Mary, and all of their grandchildren,” he added.
Human Rights Campaign Senior Vice President of Federal and State Affairs JoDee Winterhof reflected on Cheney’s complicated legacy within the LGBTQ community.
“That someone like Dick Cheney, whose career was rife with anti-LGBTQ+ animus and stained by cruelty, could have publicly changed his mind on marriage equality because of his love for his daughter is a testament to the power and necessity of our stories.”
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