Former President Jimmy Carter, who died Sunday at the age of 100, is being remembered by both admirers and political observers as a progressive southern Democrat and former Georgia governor who pushed for an end to racial injustice in the U.S., and as a beloved humanitarian who worked hard as president and during his post-presidential years to improve the lives of people in need throughout the world.

Carter’s death comes over a year after the passing on Nov. 19, 2023, of former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, his wife and devoted partner of 77 years. Carter also had the distinction of becoming the oldest living former U.S. president after the death at the age of 94 of former President George H.W. Bush on Nov. 30, 2018.

The former president’s passing also follows his decision in February 2023 to receive hospice care at his family home in Plains, Ga., at the age of 98 after declining additional medical intervention to continue treatment of several ailments that required hospitalization over the previous several months.

Modest beginnings

Jimmy Carter was born Oct. 1, 1924, at a hospital in his hometown of Plains, Ga., where he was raised on his parents’ peanut farm. His decades of public service took place after he graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1946 and he began his service as a submariner.

He left the Navy after the death of his father in 1953, taking over the Carter family business in what was then a segregated Georgia with strong lines between Blacks and Whites. He was an early supporter of the nascent civil rights movement and became an activist within the Democratic Party and a leading voice for the change needed to end racial segregation.

Carter was first elected to public office in 1963 as a state senator, for which he served until 1967. He successfully ran for governor in 1970 and served as Georgia governor until 1975, when he turned his attention to a possible run for U.S. president as a progressive southern Democrat.

Many political observers have said although he was relatively unknown outside of Georgia and within the leadership of the Democratic Party, Carter was able to parlay voter fatigue and the public’s response to the Nixon Watergate scandal and the growing opposition to the Vietnam War to establish himself as an outsider candidate removed from scandal and bad policies.

Appearing to answer the nation’s needs at that time, Carter’s slogan at the start of his presidential campaign was, “A Leader, For A Change.” He came out ahead of nine other Democrats, most of them better known than him, to win the 1976 Democratic nomination for president.

The thirty-ninth President of the United States, Carter served from 1977 to 1981 at a time when support for LGBTQ people was in its early stages, with many elected officials remaining cautious about the potential political risk for outwardly embracing “gay rights.”

Yet during his 1976 presidential campaign, Carter surprised some political observers when he stated at a press conference during a campaign trip to San Francisco in May of that year that he would sign the Equality Act, the gay civil rights bill introduced by then U.S. Rep. Bella Abzug (D-N.Y.) if it reached his desk as president.

“I will certainly sign it, because I don’t think it’s right to single out homosexuals for abuse or special harassment,” he said.

While Carter did not back away from that statement, gay activists were disappointed at the time of the Democratic National Convention in New York City in July 1976, when they said convention officials at the request of the Carter campaign refused to include a gay rights plank as part of the Democratic Party’s platform approved at the convention.

Some LGBT Democratic activists attending the convention said they agreed with the contention of Carter supporters that Carter should not be hampered by a controversial issue that could hurt his chances of defeating Republican President Gerald Ford in the November 1976 presidential election.  

Carter narrowly defeated Ford in the election. Some political observers said Ford might have won except for the negative fallout from his decision to pardon former President Richard Nixon, who resigned from office in the midst of the Watergate scandal and allegations that Nixon engaged in illegal activity by playing some role in the break-in at the Democratic Party headquarters in D.C.’s Watergate office building that triggered the scandal.

In March of 1977, just over two months after Carter was inaugurated as president, the White House hosted an historic, first-of-its-kind meeting with fourteen prominent gay rights leaders from throughout the country. Carter did not attend the meeting and was staying at the presidential retreat at Camp David, Md., at the time of the meeting, which was organized by presidential assistant for public liaison Margaret “Midge” Costanza. But White House officials said Carter was aware of the meeting and supported efforts by Costanza and other White House staffers to interact with the gay leaders.

“The meeting was a happy milestone on the road to full equality under the law for gay women and men, and we are highly optimistic that it will soon lead to complete fulfilment of President Carter’s pledge to end all forms of Federal discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation,” said Jean O’Leary, then co-executive director of the National Gay Task Force, which helped select the gay activists who attended the meeting. Among those attending was D.C. pioneer gay rights advocate Frank Kameny.

But about one year later in 1978, some LGBT leaders joined famed gay San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk in criticizing Carter for being slow to speak out against California’s Proposition 6, also known as the Briggs Initiative, a ballot measure asking voters to approve a law to ban gay and lesbian individuals from working in California public schools as teachers or staff members. 

In a June 28, 1978, letter to Carter, Milk called on the president to take a stand against Proposition 6 and speak out more forcefully in support of LGBT rights. “As the President of a nation which includes 15-20 million lesbians and gay men, your leadership is vital and necessary,” Milk wrote.

About four months later,  in a Nov. 4, 1978, campaign speech in support of California Democratic candidates in Sacramento, three days before the Nov. 7 election, Carter spoke out against Proposition 6 and urged voters to defeat it. Others who spoke out against it earlier were former President Ford and then former California GOP Governor Ronald Reagan as well as California’s then Democratic Governor Edmund Jerry Brown.

Voters defeated the proposition by a margin of 58.4 percent to 41.5 percent, with opponents of the anti-gay measure thanking Carter for speaking out against it.

During his presidency Carter helped put in place two new federal cabinet-level agencies – the Department of Energy and the Department of Education. One of the highlights of his presidential years was his role in bringing about the historic Camp David Accords, the peace agreements between Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.

The initial agreement, signed in September 1978, which led to the first-ever peace treaty between Israel and Egypt one year later in 1979, came about after Carter invited the two Middle East leaders to meet together with him and to begin negotiations at the U.S. presidential retreat at Camp David, Md. Sadat and Begin were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1978 for their contributions to the historic agreements that were brokered by President Carter.

Despite this and other important achievements, Carter faced multiple setbacks the following year in 1979 related to international developments that political observers say Carter and his advisors failed to address properly. Among them was the revolution in Iran that toppled the reign of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and installed the fundamentalist Islamic regime headed by Ayatollah Khomeini that led to a dramatic drop in Iran’s production and sale of oil. That quickly led to a dramatic rise in the cost of  gasoline for American consumers along with a shortage of gas at fuel pumps leading to long lines as filling stations.

If that were not enough, Carter was hit with the take-over of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, by militant Iranian youths supported and encouraged by Khomeini who held as hostages 52 U.S. diplomats and American citizens with no sign that they would be released any time soon. As Carter’s poll ratings declined, then U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) announced his candidacy for the 1980 Democratic presidential nomination in a rare challenge to an incumbent president.

With all that as a backdrop, gay Democratic activists launched a campaign to elect far more openly gay and lesbian delegates to the 1980 Democratic National Convention than they had in 1976. A record number of just over 100 gay and lesbian delegates emerged from this effort, with many of them pledged to Kennedy. And this time around, the Democratic Party leaders backing Carter at the convention, as well as Carter himself, according to some reports,  expressed support for including a “gay” plank in the party’s platform, which the convention adopted in an historic first.

But when it became clear that Kennedy and California Governor Jerry Brown, who also challenged Carter for the 1980 Democratic nomination, did not have enough delegates to wrest the nomination from Carter, gay activists expressed concern that the Carter campaign was backing away from taking a stronger position in support of gay rights.

Their main concern was that the response by the Carter campaign to a “gay” questionnaire the National Gay Task Force sent to all the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates seeking their party’s nomination in 1980 was significantly less specific than the response by Kennedy and Brown.

Among other things, the activists said the Carter campaign’s response, which was prepared by Carter Campaign Chairperson Robert Strauss, did not make a commitment for Carter to sign an executive order ending the longstanding discrimination against gays and lesbians in federal government agencies, including the military.  The Carter campaign response also did not express support for the national gay rights bill, even though Carter had expressed support for it back in 1976.

Carter supporters, including many in the then gay and lesbian community, pointed out that Straus’s response to the questionnaire expressed overall support for the rights of the gay and lesbian community and a commitment to follow up on that support over the next four years.  Gay Carter supporters also pointed out that Carter would be far more supportive than Ronald Regan, who had captured the 1980 Republican presidential nomination.

Some historians have said that the final straw in dooming Carter’s chances for a second term, in addition to his seeming inability to gain the release of the American hostages held in Iran, was the final televised debate between Carter and Reagan. With most political observers saying Reagan was an infinitely superior television candidate, those observations appeared to be confirmed when Carter’s poll numbers dropped significantly following the final debate.

Although Reagan captured 51.8 percent of the popular vote, with Carter receiving 41.0 percent and independent candidate John Anderson receiving 6.6 percent, Reagan won an Electoral College landslide, with 489 electoral votes compared to 49 for Carter. Reagon won in 44 states, with Carter winning in just 6 states and the District of Columbia.

Carter Center and post-presidential career

Both Carter supporters as well as critics and independent political observers agree that Jimmy Carter’s years after leaving the White House have been filled with years of work dedicated to his passion for the advancement of human rights, peace negotiations, advancing worldwide democracy, and advancing disease prevention and eradication in developing nations.

Most of that work was accomplished through The Carter Center, an Atlanta based nonprofit organization that Carter and wife Rosalynn founded in 1982. Twenty years after its founding, Jimmy Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. The Nobel Committee, among other things, stated it selected Carter for the Nobel Peace Prize “for his decades of untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development.”

In the years following his presidency Carter also continued to lend support as an ally to the LGBTQ community. During a book tour promoting his book, “A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety,” Carter stated in a July 2018 interview with Huff Post Live, that he supported same-sex marriage.

As a long-time self-described born-again Christian, Carter said in the interview, “I think Jesus would approve gay marriage,” adding, “I  think Jesus would encourage any love affair if it was honest and sincere and was not damaging to anyone else, and I don’t see that gay marriage damages anyone else.”

His expression of support for same-sex marriage came four years after he responded to a question about his thoughts about LGBTQ rights and religion during an appearance at Michigan’s Grand Rapids Community College in 2014.

“I never knew of any word or action of Jesus Christ that discriminated against anyone,” he said. “Discrimination against anyone and depriving them of actual equal rights in the United States is a violation of the basic principles of the Constitution that all of us revere in this country,” Carter stated at the event.

President-elect Donald Trump has nominated the president of an anti-LGBTQ+ Catholic group to become the next U.S. ambassador to the Vatican.

The incoming president on Dec. 20 announced he had nominated Brian Burch, president and co-founder of CatholicVote, for the ambassadorship.

“Brian loves the church and the United States,” said Trump on Truth Social. “He will make us all proud.”

Burch on X said he is “deeply honored and humbled to have been nominated by President Trump to serve as the United States Ambassador to the Holy See.”

“The role of ambassador is to represent the government of the United States in its relations with the Holy See,” said Burch. “The Catholic Church is the largest and most important religious institution in the world, and its relationship to the United States is of vital importance.”

“I am committed to working with leaders inside the Vatican and the new administration to promote the dignity of all people and the common good,” he added. “I look forward to the confirmation process and the opportunity to continue to serve my country and the church. To God be the glory.”

Burch in his post also thanked his wife, Sara, and their nine children for their support.

I am deeply honored and humbled to have been nominated by President Trump to serve as the United States Ambassador to the Holy See. Words cannot express my gratitude to all those that have helped me achieve this nomination, most especially my wife Sara…

— Brian Burch (@BrianBurchCV) December 20, 2024

The National Catholic Reporter reported Burch last year sharply criticized Pope Francis’s decision to allow priests to bless same-sex couples.  

CatholicVote’s website repeatedly refers to transgender people in quotes.

A Dec. 5 post on the U.S. v. Skrmetti case notes the justices heard oral arguments on “whether Tennessee can protect children from puberty blockers, which chemically sterilize, and sexual surgeries that mutilate and castrate.” A second CatholicVotes post notes the justices grilled the Justice Department “on challenge to Tennessee protections for children against ‘transgender’ mutilations and sterilizations.”

The Vatican’s tone towards LGBTQ+ and intersex issues has softened since Pope Francis assumed the papacy in 2013.

Francis, among other things, has described laws that criminalize homosexuality as “unjust.” 

He met with two African LGBTQ+ activists — Clare Byarugaba of Chapter Four Uganda and Rightify Ghana Director Ebenezer Peegah — at the Vatican on Aug. 14. Sister Jeannine Gramick, one of the co-founders of New Ways Ministry, a Maryland-based LGBTQ+ Catholic organization, organized a meeting between Francis and a group of trans and intersex Catholics and LGBTQ+ allies that took place at the pontiff’s official residence on Oct. 12.

Francis during a 2023 interview with an Argentine newspaper described gender ideology as “one of the most dangerous ideological colonizations” in the world because “it blurs differences and the value of men and women.” A declaration the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith released in March with Francis’s approval condemned gender-affirming surgeries and “gender theory.”

Particularly since Republicans took the U.S. House of Representatives in 2023, legislative attacks against the LGBTQ+ community, at least at the federal level, have been blunted by U.S. Senate Democrats exercising their narrow majority in the upper chamber, along with President Joe Biden’s promise to veto any discriminatory bill that should reach his desk.

Next month, however, Republicans will take control of both chambers of Congress as President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House, marking the first time since 2018 that the GOP has governed with a trifecta in Washington. 

“We expect the Trump administration and House and Senate Republicans to continue their anti-LGBTQ+ attacks on all aspects of life, especially against trans kids,” Josh Sorbe, a spokesperson for Senate Majority Whip and Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), told the Washington Blade.

Durbin is among the Democratic senators who spoke out this week against a policy rider added to the National Defense Authorization Act by Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson (La.), which would prohibit the military’s health provider Tricare from covering transgender medical treatments for the children of U.S. service members.

“In his first term, Donald Trump enabled LGBTQ+ workplace discrimination, banned trans service members, and vilified trans kids,” Sorbe said, while “The Biden-Harris administration and Democrats codified same-sex marriage, declared mpox a national emergency, and built up the LGBTQ+ movement.”

He added, “Democrats will continue to hold the line against misguided, anti-freedom legislation that we anticipate will be introduced.”

The Senate Judiciary Committee, one of the most powerful in Congress, exercises broad legislative jurisdiction and is responsible for oversight of the Executive Branch as well as the initial stages of confirming the president’s nominees for vacancies on the federal bench, including those picked to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

In the 117th Congress, control of the Senate was a 50-50 split, with Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris casting tie-breaking votes. Democrats won another Senate seat in the 2022 midterms and for the past two years Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has led a 51-49 majority.

Despite the party’s narrow margin of control and starting with less than half the number of vacancies than were available for Trump to fill when he took office in 2017, Sorbe noted Senate Democrats are expected to confirm Biden’s 234th and 235th judicial nominees — surpassing, by one, the number of confirmations under the previous administration and also, by one, the record setting number of LGBTQ+ jurists appointed by President Obama over two terms. 

These “highly qualified, diverse candidates” will “help ensure the fair and impartial administration of the American justice system,” Sorbe said. Many will decide legal questions with broad implications for LGBTQ+ communities, including challenges brought against anti-LGBTQ+ legislation at the local, state, and federal level, or anti-LGBTQ+ policies enacted by the Trump-Vance administration. 

Sorbe highlighted some of the other work Durbin has done to “protect civil rights for all Americans” over the past four years in the majority, pointing to the Judiciary Committee’s 2021 hearing on the Equality Act, legislation that would codify LGBTQ+-inclusive nondiscrimination protections; a 2023 hearing that celebrated “the historic progress made in protecting the right of LGBTQ+ Americans”; the first hearing since 1984 about the Equal Rights Amendment that would “enshrine gender equality into the Constitution”; floor speeches in which the majority whip denounced “the harmful anti-LGBTQ+ legislation being introduced across the country”; and the senator’s co-sponsorship of the Respect for Marriage Act, which solidified the legal rights of interracial and same-sex married couples. 

President Joe Biden on Monday signed a proclamation to establish a national monument in Newcastle, Maine, that will honor Frances Perkins, who became the first woman named to a Cabinet-level position when she was chosen by FDR to serve as secretary for the U.S. Department of Labor.

The move highlights the Biden-Harris administration’s record of advancing women’s rights and strengthening the labor movement while also commemorating Perkins’s achievements, including the establishment of pensions, unemployment, and workers’ compensation, the minimum wage and overtime pay, the 40-hour workweek, and child labor laws.

Perkins is also credited with helping to lay the blueprint for legislation like the Social Security Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, and the National Labor Relations Act.

Research suggests she may have been a lesbian, perhaps even the first LGBTQ+ Cabinet secretary.

According to the National Park Service, “Perkins’ relationship with one roommate, Mary Harriman Rumsey,” who was a close friend of Eleanor Roosevelt, “was very intimate,” though an entry for the late labor secretary on the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project quotes her biographer Kirsten Downey’s assertion that “it is probably impossible to know whether Frances’s relationship with Mary was also sexual or romantic.”

President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday named former U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell to his administration.

Grenell will serve as special missions envoy.

“Ric will work in some of the hottest spots around the world, including Venezuela and North Korea,” Trump said on Truth Social, according to the Associated Press.

Grenell, 58, was U.S. ambassador to Germany from 2018-2020.

The Trump-Pence administration later named him acting director of national intelligence, which at the time made him the highest-ranking openly gay presidential appointee in American history. Grenell was also the previous White House’s special presidential envoy for Serbia and Kosovo peace negotiations.

The Trump-Pence administration in 2019 tapped Grenell to lead an initiative that encouraged countries to decriminalize consensual same-sex sexual relations. Grenell and then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Kelly Knight Craft later that year organized an event on the sidelines of a U.N. Security Council meeting that focused on decriminalization efforts.

Many activists around the world with whom the Washington Blade has previously spoken questioned whether this effort had any tangible results. Grenell also faced sharp criticism when he told Breitbart News shortly after he arrived in Berlin that he wanted to “empower” the European right.

Grenell was among those who the president-elect reportedly considered to nominate to become the next secretary of state. Trump instead tapped U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).

“Working on behalf of the American people for (Trump) is an honor of a lifetime,” said Grenell on X on Saturday. “President Trump is a problem solver who keeps Americans safe and prosperous.”

Working on behalf of the American people for @realDonaldTrump is an honor of a lifetime.

President Trump is a problem solver who keeps Americans safe and prosperous.

We have so much to do.
Let’s get to work. https://t.co/xGpTLr1QHy

— Richard Grenell (@RichardGrenell) December 15, 2024

Log Cabin Republicans President Charles Moran and Amir Ohana, the openly gay speaker of the Israeli Knesset, are among those who congratulated Grenell.

Troy Masters, publisher of the Los Angeles Blade, died on Wednesday Dec. 11, according to a family member. He was 63. The LA County Coroner said the cause of death was suicide.

Masters was a well-respected and award-winning journalist and publisher with decades of experience, mostly in LGBTQ media. In 2017, he became the founding publisher of the Los Angeles Blade, a sister publication of the Washington Blade.

Praise for Masters’s work and dedication to LGBTQ equality and journalism poured in throughout the day.

Equality California released the following statement from Executive Director Tony Hoang: “We at Equality California are heartbroken by the unexpected passing of Troy Masters, a trailblazing journalist, publisher, and tireless advocate for the LGBTQ+ community. Troy’s remarkable career spanned decades, during which he used his voice and platform to amplify the stories of our community and champion the fight for equality.

“His passion for storytelling and relentless pursuit of social justice left an indelible mark on the fight for LGBTQ+ rights. Over many years, Equality California and the Los Angeles Blade have worked hand in hand to ensure LGBTQ+ stories are accurately represented and shared within the Los Angeles community and throughout California. 

“Our thoughts are with his family, friends, and the Los Angeles Blade and Washington Blade teams during this difficult time. We stand in solidarity with them as we honor Troy’s life, legacy, and unwavering dedication to our community. His passing is a profound loss, and he will be deeply missed.

“Rest in power, Troy. Your work will forever live on in the hearts and lives of those you fought so fiercely for.”

California state Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur, (D-Los Angeles) said in a statement: “I am terribly saddened to hear of the passing of Troy Masters, a pillar in the LGBTQ+ community. In his many roles, he has covered life in our community and the challenges of our fight for civil rights and social justice.”

L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, in a statement on X, said she would miss Masters’s humor, wit and huge heart and praised his journalistic pursuits and dedication to uplifting the LGBTQ+ community.

Journalist and Blade contributor Jasmyne Cannick also praised Masters, describing him as a mentor.

“Through the years, he was supportive of my work, giving me space and a voice as a columnist and reporter for the Blade newspapers when it mattered most,” she said in on X. “Troy understood the importance of covering the Black LGBTQ+ community and made it a point to ask me what stories they needed to be telling.”

Michael Yamashita, publisher of the Bay Area Reporter, in a statement said, “I have known Troy as a fellow publisher and friend for over 20 years. He was smart and accomplished. More than a few times, he started gay publications — in New York City and Los Angeles. I will miss working with him.”

Dana Piccoli, managing director of News Is Out, a queer media collaborative, wrote: “Troy was a fierce advocate for the LGBTQ+ community and pioneer in queer media. We were lucky to work with him as a member of News Is Out and will forever be grateful for the barriers he broke down for the queer community. Our hearts are with our colleagues at the Los Angeles Blade and the Washington Blade.”

“It has been a tough day for all of us at the Blade,” said Washington Blade editor Kevin Naff. “Troy’s love of queer media and the city of Los Angeles is well known and he will be missed by so many. In his spirit, we will carry on with our mission and we are planning a celebration of his life in the coming months.”

The Montana Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled that SB 99, a 2023 Montana law that bans life-saving gender-affirming care for transgender youth, is unconstitutional under the Montana Constitution’s privacy clause, which prohibits government intrusion into private medical decisions. This ruling will allow Montana communities and families to continue accessing medical treatments for transgender minors with gender dysphoria, the ACLU announced in a statement.

 “I will never understand why my representatives are working to strip me of my rights and the rights of other transgender kids,” Phoebe Cross, a 17-year-old transgender boy told the ACLU. “Just living as a trans teenager is difficult enough, the last thing me and my peers need is to have our rights taken away.”

“Fortunately, the Montana Supreme Court understands the danger of the state interfering with critical healthcare,” said Lambda Legal Counsel Kell Olson. “Because Montana’s constitutional protections are even stronger than their federal counterparts, transgender youth in Montana can sleep easier tonight knowing that they can continue to thrive for now, without this looming threat hanging over their heads.”

“We are so thankful for this opportunity to protect trans youth, their families, and their medical providers from this baseless and dangerous law,” said Malita Picasso, Staff Attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Project. “Every day that transgender Montanans are able to access this care is a critical and life-saving victory. We will never stop fighting until every transgender person has the care and support they need to thrive.”

“Today’s ruling permits our clients to breathe a sigh of relief,” said Akilah Deernose, Executive Director of the ACLU of Montana. “But the fight for trans rights is far from over. We will continue to push for the right of all Montanans, including those who are transgender, to be themselves and live their lives free of intrusive government interference.”

The Court found that the Plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the merits of their privacy claim, holding: “The Legislature did not make gender-affirming care unlawful. Nor did it make the treatments unlawful for all minors. Instead, it restricted a broad swath of medical treatments only when sought for a particular purpose. The record indicates that Provider Plaintiffs, or other medical professionals providing gender-affirming care, are recognized as competent in the medical community to provide that care.[T]he law puts governmental regulation in the mix of an individual’s fundamental right ‘to make medical judgments affecting her or his bodily integrity and health in partnership with a chosen health care provider.’

Two justices filed a concurrence arguing that the Court should also clarify that discrimination on the basis of transgender status is a form of sex discrimination prohibited by Montana’s Equal Protection Clause, the ACLU reported.

About 15 protestors affiliated with the Gender Liberation Movement were arrested on Thursday for protesting the anti-trans bathroom policy that was introduced by U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) and enacted last month by U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).

Whistleblower Chelsea Manning and social justice advocates Raquel Willis and Renee Bracey Sherman were among those who were arrested in the women’s bathroom and the hallway outside Johnson’s office in the Cannon House Office Building.

Demonstrators held banners reading “FLUSH BATHROOM BIGOTRY” and “CONGRESS: STOP PISSING ON OUR RIGHTS!” They chanted, “SPEAKER JOHNSON, NANCY MACE, OUR GENDERS ARE NO DEBATE!” and “WHEN TRANS FOLKS ARE UNDER ATTACK WHAT DO WE DO? ACT UP, FIGHT BACK!”

Protests began around 12:10 p.m. ET. Within 30 minutes, Capitol Police arrived on the scene, began making arrests, and cleared the area. A spokesperson told Axios the demonstration was an illegal violation of the D.C. code against crowding, obstructing or incommoding.

Mace and her flame-throwing House GOP allies have said the bathroom policy was meant to target Sarah McBride, the Delaware state senator who will become the first transgender member of Congress after she is seated in January.

LGBTQ groups, elected Democrats, and others have denounced the move as a bigoted effort to bully and intimidate a new colleague, with many asking how the policy’s proponents would enforce the measure.

Outside her office in the Longworth House Office Building, the Washington Blade requested comment from Mace about the protests and arrests.

“Yeah, I went to the Capitol Police station where they were being processed, so I’ll be posting what I said shortly,” the congresswoman said.

U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) (Washington Blade photo by Christopher Kane)

Using an anti-trans slur, Mace posted a video to her X account in which she says, “alright, so some tranny protestors showed up at the Capitol today to protest my bathroom bill, but they got arrested — poor things.”

“So I have a message for the protestors who got arrested,” the congresswoman continued, and then spoke into a megaphone as she read the Miranda warning. “If you cannot afford an attorney — I doubt many of you can — one will be provided to you at the government’s expense,” she said.

“Everyone deserves to use the restroom without fear of discrimination or violence. Trans folks are no different. We deserve dignity and respect and we will fight until we get it,” Gender Liberation Movement co-founder Raquel Willis said in a press release.

“In the 2024 election, trans folks were left to fend for ourselves after nearly $200 million of attack ads were disseminated across the United States,” she said. “Now, as Republican politicians, try to remove us from public life, Democratic leaders are silent as hell.”

Willis continued, “But we can’t transform bigotry and hate with inaction. We must confront it head on. Democrats must rise up, filibuster, and block this bill.”

The State Department on Tuesday honored a Ghanaian LGBTQ+ activist and seven other human rights advocates from around the world.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken presented Rightify Ghana Executive Director Ebenezer Peegah with the Secretary of State’s Human Rights Defender Award during a ceremony at the State Department.

“He’s been a prominent figure advocating for equality and justice,” Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Enrique Roig told the Washington Blade on Tuesday during an interview.

The other human rights activists who received the award include:

• Mary Ann Abunda, a migrant workers advocate in Kuwait

• Permanent Human Rights Assembly of Bolivia President Amparo Carvajal

• Aida Dzhumanazarova, country director for the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law in Kyrgyzstan

• Mang Hre Lian, founder of the Chin Media Network in Myanmar

• Juana Ruiz of Asociación Asvidas, an organization that advocates for survivors of gender-based violence in Colombia

• Rufat Sararov, a former prosecutor who runs Defense Line in Azerbaijan

The State Department posthumously honored Thulani Maseko, a prominent human rights activist from Eswatini who was killed in 2023. His wife, Tanele Maseko, accepted the award on his behalf.

The ceremony took place on International Human Rights Day, which commemorates the U.N. General Assembly’s ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on Dec. 10, 1948. Sararov did not attend because Azeri authorities arrested him before he could obtain a visa that would have allowed him to travel to the U.S.

Ghanaian Supreme Court to rule on anti-LGBTQ+ law on Dec. 18

Ghanaian lawmakers on Feb. 28 approved the Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill that would, among other things, criminalize allyship. President Nana Akufo-Addo has said he will not sign the bill until the Supreme Court rules on whether it is constitutional or not. 

The Supreme Court is expected to rule on the law on Dec. 18. John Dramani Mahama, the country’s president-elect, will take office on Jan. 7.

Ruig applauded Peegah’s efforts to highlight the Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill.

“For us in the U.S. government, the work that he’s done on this issue has also been instrumental in our own discussions with the current government as well as the incoming administration around the concerns that we’ve expressed with regards to this legislation,” Roig told the Washington Blade “He’s been an important partner in all this as well.”

Peegah on Aug. 14 met with Pope Francis at the Vatican.

At least 1,000 people rallied outside the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday as the justices considered whether a Tennessee law banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender youth is unconstitutional.

Dueling rallies began early in the morning, with protesters supporting trans rights and protesters supporting Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care each stationed with podiums on opposite sides.

Trans rights protesters, who significantly outnumbered the other group, held signs reading “Keep hate out of healthcare,” and “Respect family medical decisions.” On the other side, protesters carried signs with messages like “Sex change is fantasy,” and “Stop transing gay kids.”

Ari, a trans person who grew up in Nashville and now lives in D.C., spoke to the Washington Blade about the negative effects of the Tennessee law on the well-being of trans youth. 

“I grew up with kids who died because of a lack of trans healthcare, and I am scared of that getting worse,” they said. “All that this bill brings is more dead kids.”

The Tennessee law that is being challenged in U.S. v Skrmetti took effect in 2023 and bans medical providers from prescribing medical treatments such as puberty blockers and hormone therapies to trans youth. 

A number of Democratic lawmakers, including U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), co-chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, and U.S. Sens. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) addressed the crowd in support of trans rights. 

In his speech, Merkley said Americans deserved freedom in accessing gender affirming care and criticized the law as political intervention in private medical decisions. 

“Americans should have the freedom to make medical decisions in the privacy of their doctor’s office without politicians trying to dictate to them,” he said. 

Robert Garofalo, a chief doctor in the division of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine at a Chicago children’s hospital, emphasized the importance of trans youth having access to gender affirming care. 

“We [providers] are seeing patients and families every day, present with crippling fears, added stress and anxiety as they desperately try to locate care where it remains legal to do so,” Garofalo, who is also a professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University, told the crowd. “Transgender children and adolescents deserve health care that is grounded in compassion, science and principles of public health and human rights. They must not be denied life saving medical care — their lives depend on it.”

Major U.S. medical associations, including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, support gender affirming care. 

Research has found gender affirming care improves the mental health and overall well-being of gender diverse children and adolescents. Those who are denied access to gender affirming care are at increased risk for significant mental health challenges.  

An unlikely coalition came out to support Tennessee’s ban on gender affirming care. Far-right figures, such as U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Matt Walsh — both of whom have a history of making homophobic statements — were joined by groups such as the LGBT Courage Coalition and Gays Against Groomers. 

The groups questioned the quality of the research finding gender-affirming care to have a positive effect on the well-being of trans and gender nonconforming youth and argued that minors cannot consent to medical treatment. Ben Appel, a co-founder of the LGBT Courage Coalition, which he notes was “co-founded by gay, lesbian, bisexual, and trans adults who oppose pediatric gender medicine, which we know to be non-evidence-based and harmful to young gay people,” said gender nonconformity is often part of the lesbian, gay, and bisexual experience and should not be “medicalized.” 

“I care about the adult gay detransitioners who have been harmed … by these homophobic practice,” he said “They should have just been told they’re gay.” 

Claire, a Maryland resident who attended the rally in favor of the Tennessee law and claims to have detransitioned, described being prescribed testosterone and having a mastectomy at 14, medical treatments she says she was unable to consent to at that age. She doesn’t oppose gender affirming care for adults but is opposed to “medical experimentation on children.”

“I think that adults should be allowed to do whatever they want with their bodies. I think that it is if someone is happy with the decision that they made that’s great,” she said. “I was not able to make that decision. I was a child.” 

But trans activists fear that a ruling in favor of Tennessee could pave the way for states to restrict access to gender-affirming care for adults.

“There’s also broader implications for civil rights and trans rights, more broadly, for adults in the future. There are some states that have tried to ban some healthcare for adults — they haven’t yet — but I think that’s something we might also see if the Supreme Court rules that way,” Ethan Rice, a senior attorney at Lambda Legal, one of the legal organizations representing the plaintiffs in U.S. v Skrmetti, said.

In the case, three Tennessee families and a physician are challenging the Tennessee law on the grounds that it violates the Equal Protection Clause in the 14th Amendment by drawing lines based on sex and discriminating against trans people. The statute bans medications for trans children while allowing the same medications to be used when treating minors suffering from other conditions, such as early-onset puberty. 

A 2020 Supreme Court decision determined sex-based discrimination includes discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation. The key question in U.S. v. Skrmetti is whether this interpretation applies under the Equal Protection Clause.

“We really hope that the Supreme Court recognizes their own precedent on sex discrimination cases and comes out the right way, saying this is sex discrimination by the state of Tennessee and thus is unconstitutional,” Rice said. 

Twenty-six states currently have laws or policies restricting minors’ access to gender-affirming care. If the court rules against Tennessee, similar bans in other states would also be unconstitutional, granting trans youth greater access to gender affirming care nationwide. 

Edith Guffey, the board chair at PFLAG, expressed doubt the court will strike down the law, citing its sharp ideological turn to the right in recent years. But she said she remains hopeful. 

“I hope that the court will … step outside agendas and look at the needs of people and who has the right to say what’s good for their children,” she said.

Chase Strangio, an ACLU attorney representing the families, on Wednesday became the first openly trans lawyer to argue before the Supreme Court. He addressed the trans rights protesters after the hearing. 

“Whatever happens, we are the defiance,” Strangio said. “We are collectively a refutation of everything they say about us. And our fight for justice did not begin today, it will not end in June — whatever the court decides.”