CHICAGO — Closing out the Democratic National Convention on Thursday night, Vice President Kamala Harris delivered a rousing acceptance speech in which she laid out the case against Donald Trump and touched on a number of high-priority policy issues.

Harris began by describing her immigrant parents and their family’s middle class life in the Bay Area, detailing how a formative experience in her girlhood — helping a friend who was being sexually abused — had shaped her decision to become a prosecutor.

From the courtroom to the San Francisco district attorney’s office to the California attorney general’s office to the Senate and vice presidency, Harris detailed her journey to become her party’s presidential nominee — explaining how she was serving the people every step of the way.

“Kamala Harris for the people,” she would tell the judge each day in the courtroom, while Trump, by contrast, has only ever looked out for himself, she said.

In keeping with the theme of many speeches during the convention this week in Chicago, Harris explained how she would chart a new, brighter way forward as commander-in-chief, working to uplift Americans regardless of their differences.

“With this election, our nation has a precious, fleeting opportunity to move past the bitterness, cynicism, and divisive battles of the past,” she said. “A chance to chart a new way forward. Not as members of any one party or faction, but as Americans.”

She repeatedly made the case against Trump, detailing how he is not only “unserious” but also dangerous — a threat to world peace, America’s democratic institutions, the rule of law, women’s rights, and more.

The vice president presented another argument that had been a throughline in remarks by other primetime speakers, the “fundamental freedoms” at stake in this election, and how she would protect them while Trump has vowed to take them away.

She ticked off “the freedom to live safe from gun violence — in our schools, communities, and places of worship” as well as “the freedom to love who you love openly and with pride” and “the freedom to breathe clean air, drink clean water, and live free from the pollution that fuels the climate crisis.”

Harris noted that the “freedom to vote” is “the freedom that unlocks all the others,” retreading some of her earlier remarks about Trump’s efforts to undermine American elections.

The vice president’s second reference to LGBTQ rights came with her proclamation that “America cannot truly be prosperous unless Americans are fully able to make their own decisions about their own lives, especially on matters of heart and home.”

CHICAGO — During a powerful speech at the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday, U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg drew a stark contrast between the Republican and Democratic presidential tickets to illustrate the choice voters will face in November.

The openly gay former mayor of South Bend, Ind., has emerged as among the most high profile surrogates for the Harris-Walz campaign.

Buttigieg said Donald Trump’s decision to choose, as his vice presidential candidate “a guy like JD Vance,” the U.S. senator from Ohio, sends the message “that they are doubling down on negativity and grievance, committing to a concept of campaigning best summed up in one word: darkness.”

“The other side is appealing to what is smallest within you,” he said. “They’re telling you that greatness comes from going back to the past. They’re telling you that anyone different from you is a threat. They’re telling you that your neighbor or nephew or daughter who disagrees with you politically isn’t just wrong, but is now the enemy.”

By contrast, he said, “I believe in a better politics, one that finds us at our most decent and open and brave, the kind of politics that [Vice President] Kamala Harris and [Minnesota Gov.] Tim Walz are offering.”

Buttigieg explained that when he and his husband Chasten are struggling to get their young children seated and ready for dinner, “It’s the part of our day when politics seems the most distant — and yet, the makeup of our kitchen table, the existence of my family is just one example of something that was literally impossible as recently as 25 years ago, when an anxious teenager growing up in Indiana wondered if he would ever find belonging in this world.”

“This kind of life went from impossible to possible, from possible to real, from real to almost ordinary in less than half a lifetime,” he said — adding that it was, at least to some extent, thanks to politics.

“So this November, we get to choose,” Buttigieg said. “We get to choose our president. We get to choose our policies, but most of all, we will choose a better politics, a politics that calls us to our better selves and offers us a better everyday.”

He continued, “That is what Kamala Harris and Tim Walz represents. That is what Democrats represent. That is what awaits us when America decides to end Trump’s politics of darkness once and for all.”

The transportation secretary concluded his remarks by urging Americans to “embrace the leaders who are out there building bridges and reject the ones who are out there banning books.”

CHICAGO — U.S. Rep. Becca Balint (D), Vermont’s first woman and first LGBTQ member of Congress, spoke exclusively with the Washington Blade shortly after her remarks before the second LGBTQ Caucus meeting on Wednesday at the Democratic National Convention.

“There’s so much energy and light,” this week, “and I think people understand that we are starved for connection,” she said. “We’re starved for connection — And it’s not just in our community.”

“It is across the country that people don’t want to live in a hateful, cynical place. They just don’t. And we have a special part in helping people to not just see the joy, but channel the joy. And I think that’s a huge part of our community.”

It was “super fun,” the congresswoman said, when she got a shout-out for her teaching background during the ceremonial roll-call vote on Tuesday, which officially made Vice President Kamala Harris the Democratic presidential nominee.

Asked to share her thoughts on her experience as an LGBTQ educator at a time when schools have become the nexus of Republican-led attacks against the community, particularly targeting queer and transgender young people, Balint said “our students across this country need us, and I mean all of us adults, to show up for them.”

“Educators are under attack” too, she said. “Librarians are under attack. And they believe — by them, I mean the MAGA, the folks who are supporting Project 2025 — they believe that somehow they can stifle who we are by going after teachers and educators and [it’s] not going to work.”

Balint continued, “We are who we are. We’re going to keep being who we are. But we, we need to show up for those teachers. We need to show up for those librarians, because they are the ones day in and day out who are standing up for our kids.”

Harris is “tremendous,” she said. “The day that [Joe] Biden endorsed [her], I endorsed [her]. I believe that she is the exact right leader we need at this moment. She has been very, very good for our community for a very long time.”

“And, you know, she’s the real deal,” Balint said. “She’s the real deal. She she shows up, she does the work, and that’s what we need.”

During the LGBTQ Caucus meeting, writer and LGBTQ activist Charlotte Clymer had noted the absence of trans Democrats in the convention’s primetime lineup featured at the United Center, arguing that congressional candidate and Delaware state Sen. Sarah McBride, who would be the first trans member of Congress, should have been invited to speak.

“We have to continue to work within the Democratic Caucus and the Democratic National Committee to make sure that the face that we’re putting forward to Americans truly represents all of us,” Balint said.

“There are other groups, too, that I know feel like they wish that they were more represented as well,” she said. “And this is a work in progress.”

Balint added that “it’s one of the reasons why I am extremely excited that Sarah McBride is going to be my colleague. She’s going to win in Delaware. She’s going to do it. She’s a star, and I can’t wait to welcome her.”

CHICAGO — Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson addressed the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday, beginning with a stirring account of her family’s journey from enslavement in antebellum Mississippi to freedom in Muscatine, Iowa.

“Progress is happening,” HRC’s first Black woman leader said, noting that the country is “preparing to elect President Kamala Harris.”

“My friends, the 20+ million LGBTQ+ Americans are living proof,” Robinson said. “We are your friends and your neighbors, your classmates and your family — like Daniel, a trans kid in Tucson who’s going to his very first prom, like Eric from San Antonio, who sacrificed in combat and then came home to battle ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ like Sandy and Kris, the first same-sex couple to get legally married in California 11 years ago, in a ceremony officiated by Kamala Harris.”

By contrast, “Donald Trump wants to erase us,” she said. “He would ban our healthcare, belittle our marriages, bury our stories. But we are not going anywhere. We are not going back.”

“Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, they are champions for LGBTQ+ freedom, y’all,” Robinson said. “So tonight, we’re fighting for lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer and trans freedom without exception. We’re fighting for equality for all without exception. We’re fighting for joy. Somebody say joy? Somebody say joy. Somebody say joy, without exception.”

CHICAGO — Addressing the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday, gay Colorado Gov. Jared Polis warned of the dangers presented by Project 2025, the conservative Heritage Foundation’s governing blueprint for a second Donald Trump administration.

He began by outlining the extreme restrictions on reproductive freedom that would be effectuated under the plan, which would go far beyond an abortion ban.

“It says that Donald Trump could use an obscure law from the 1800s to single handedly ban abortion in all 50 states, even putting doctors in jail,” he said, while “page 486 puts limits on contraception” and “page 450 threatens access to IVF.”

“On page 455,” Polis continued, “Project 2025 says that states have to report miscarriages to the Trump administration” and “page 451 says the only legitimate family is a married mother and father, where only the father works.”

The governor spoke while holding a large “Project 2025” book. Tearing out a page, he said, “You know what? I’m going to take that one out. I’m going to put that in my pocket so I can share it with undecided voters, so they better understand what’s at stake this election.”

Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic Party’s presidential and vice presidential nominees, have focused much of their messaging on issues of reproductive freedom. The Walz family had their children through IVF.

“Project 2025 would turn the entire federal government and bureaucracy into a massive machine,” Polis said. “It would weaponize it to control our reproductive and personal choices.”

“Look, as a Redditor, gamer, entrepreneur and Swifty from the Free State of Colorado, I’m excited by Kamala Harris’s vision for protecting and expanding our personal freedom, internet freedom and economic freedom,” he said.

“Democrats welcome weird, but we’re not weirdos telling families who can and can’t have kids, who to marry, or how to live our lives,” the governor said, setting up a contrast with the Republican ticket.

“These Project 2025 people” like Trump and U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, the Republican vice presidential nominee, “are not just weird — they’re dangerous,” Polis said.

“They want to take us backwards, but we aren’t going back — like ever, ever, ever,” he said, a reference to Taylor Swift’s single, “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.”

“Let’s stop project 2025 and elect Kamala Harris president this November.”

CHICAGO — A coalition of LGBTQ leaders addressed the second meeting of the LGBTQ Caucus at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago’s McCormick Place Convention Center on Wednesday.

In order of appearance, speakers included Democratic National Committee LGBTQ Caucus Chair Earl Fowlkes, Harris-Walz National LGBTQ+ Engagement Director Sam Alleman, congressional candidate and Delaware state Sen. Sarah McBride (D), senior advisor to Vice President Kamala Harris Sergio Gonzales, LGBTQ Victory Fund and Institute President Annise Parker, Chasten Buttigieg, Texas state Rep. Julie Johnson (D), Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison, actor and LGBTQ activist Wilson Cruz, writer and LGBTQ activist Charlotte Clymer, Virginia state Sen. Danica Roem (D), National LGBTQ Task Force President Kierra Johnson, Stonewall veteran and transgender rights activist Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, and U.S. Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.).

Fowlkes celebrated the record-breaking number of LGBTQ delegates in Chicago this year — more than 800, up from 635 in 2020 — and invited those who were in the room to gather near the stage for photos. He also noted his formation of a trans advisory commission, an ad-hoc committee to the LGBTQ caucus.

“I don’t think I have to tell anyone how clear as day the difference between our ticket is and their ticket is when it comes to issues for our community,” Alleman said. Outlining the Out for Harris national LGBTQ organizing program, he noted the events and investments in earned and paid media, along with metrics.

Up next, Alleman said, will be continued onboarding of sub-groups and state programs with a focus on Broadway, drag performers, queer women, Black LGBTQ people, and “mama bears and allies.” He said Out for Harris will also scale national direct voter contact and organizing efforts through an organizing call on Aug. 29, weekly direct voter contact trainings and activations, which will become daily on Oct. 12, and get out the vote (GOTV) efforts.

McBride, the Democratic Party’s endorsed candidate for Delaware’s open congressional seat, said that while to she hopes to “join you in four years not just as Delaware’s next member of Congress, but as the first openly trans member of Congress in American history,” she is “running to make historic change on all of the issues that matter.”

“Right now, there is a cruel and concerted effort,” McBride said, to “roll back the clock on our progress” and “target some of the most vulnerable but badass members of the LGBTQ community for hate and discrimination — trans young people.”

“We also know what is possible when it comes to all of the issues that we face, because at the end of the day, as Audre Lorde reminds us, there is no such thing as a single issue cause, because no one lives single issue lives,” she said.

“As someone who has worked up close with the vice president now for a number of years,” said Gonzales, who has been a senior advisor to Harris from the time she began serving in the U.S. Senate in 2017, “the only thing I really want to focus on today for his remarks is just to make sure that you know we are on the cusp of electing a leader and a champion who has been in the LGBTQ community for years.”

But while “we know that Kamala Harris has showed up for our community time and again,” Gonzales said, now “Kamala Harris needs you” because “this is going to be a really tight election” and “we know the ugliness of the other side, the kind of hate that they’re spewing towards our community in particular.”

After outlining the services provided by the Victory Fund, which works to elect LGBTQ people to public office, and the Victory Institute, which provides training, professional development, and networking services, Parker discussed the stakes of November’s elections.

“Kamala Harris is going to have coattails,” she said, “but she’s going to need us at the grassroots pushing up. And people are going to show up for the trans school board candidate in their community. People are going to show up for a state rep who is non binary in their community. People going to show up for a lesbian or gay man who is running for city council. Even if they’re not excited about the top of the ticket, as we are, they will show up in their community for people they know.”

“Politics has always pushed me to try to do the right thing, and I don’t think me becoming a parent has changed my political convictions, but it sure has scared the daylight out of me,” said Buttigieg, who is raising a son and daughter with husband Pete Buttigieg, secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation.

“I hope that we can remind one another that, yes, some dreams have come true because of politics and because of progress, because of the people linking arms in this room saying ‘we demand more, we demand better,'” he said, but there are kids out there who are afraid to be who they are or unable to be open about who they are for fear for their safety. “So let’s go out there and show them that there can be a better way, and I know we can do that by electing Kamala Harris and Tim Walz this November.”

Noting that she formed the first-ever LGBTQ caucus in the Texas legislature, Johnson said the message from her opponents during her primary campaign was “that the gay community, that the trans community, were terrible, were going to destroy our society and ruin the American family.”

“I was the only Democrat on TV, and my message was, I am gay all day, I am gay, gay, gay, gay, gay,” she said. “My message to you is this, don’t hide from your truth. Own it. Campaign on it. People value it. They will vote for you, and you will win, just like I did in the state of Texas.”

“I describe this convention as a big and probably the hardest family reunion in the world,” Harrison said, “because, in family reunions, people are laughing, they’re hugging, they’re dancing, and they’re crying sometimes, but those reunions are filled with love and happiness, joy” while “the other party is a party that’s built around fear; they want to make you afraid of everything.”

“When they come for one of us, they come for all of us,” he said. “I want every LGBTQ+ person who is growing up in this country to understand you matter, you are enough, and we are going to fight for you.”

Cruz defined the two tickets in stark and diametrically opposite terms. “We can have a White House that believes in equality for all of us,” he said, “or we can have a dictatorship hellbent on ending American democracy itself.”

“And that’s why I’m showing up,” said the actor, who is board chair of SMYAL, the LGBTQ youth-serving organization in D.C. “A brighter future is worth fighting for. For our young people, our freedoms are worth fighting for. We have made incredible progress, and we are not going back.”

Clymer thanked the DNC for “a fantastic convention this week,” adding that, “very respectfully, I also want to say something that I think needs to be heard.” At a time when “trans people are being viciously, directly attacked on a daily basis, and in a year when we are about to elect the first trans member of Congress, it is absolutely ridiculous that Sarah McBride is not on the speaking program” in the evening primetime sessions at the United Center.

When Terry McAuliffe lost the Virginia gubernatorial race to Republican Glenn Youngkin in 2021 “there was a lot of talk about CRT (critical race theory) and LGBTQ rights and all the hateful speech that is usually brought up in the analysis of why Democrats lose,” Clymer said. “What was missing in that post-election analysis is that a progressive trans woman was elected to the state Senate and outperformed the top of the ticket in her district.”

She was referring to Roem, the next speaker to take the stage. “Throughout this week, I’ve gotten the chance to hear people describe Vice President Harris as being fearless,” the Virginia state senator said, “and we heard even earlier about how she was that kid standing up to the playground bully as a child,” referring to an anecdote that was repeated by Harrison.

Roem explained how she learned to be fearless, too, as she gradually came out as trans, beginning around the time when Harris, then the newly elected district attorney of San Francisco, “started officiating [same-sex] weddings, and she did it with the same joy that’s the cornerstone of her campaign today.”

She “supported us before it was popular, even in the Democratic Party, not because it was easy, but because it was right,” Roem said.

“I met President Carter at the convention in Denver in 2008,” Johnson said. “You may not know that his administration was the first administration to entertain a queer delegation, and the Task Force led that delegation — yes, my president, President Carter, was the only president that the National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund ever endorsed until just this year, when we endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris.”

She added, “It is only fitting, given that together, she and Tim [Walz] have a nearly unmatched record for being champions of LGBTQ+ people, and with you, with us, with our peoples, we can secure the presidency, the Senate and the House, and ensure the Equality Act is finally, finally passed — an Equality Act that was first introduced by President Carter, and we’re gonna finish that business with this next administration.”

After she was introduced by Johnson, members of the audience approached the stage to hear Miss Major draw the contrast between Harris, the first presidential candidate she has ever endorsed, and Trump, who she feels is beneath contempt.

The activist spoke with the Washington Blade last week for a profile focused on her decades of work as an activist, her involvement in this election, her work with the Task Force, and her take on the Harris campaign’s commitment to not go back.

Vermont’s first woman and first LGBTQ member of Congress took the stage to share how she “learned recently that there is this incredible thing that happens when we experience a sense of awe.”

“And when you experience that, something changes inside of you,” Balint said. “We know this intuitively, but the data also bears it out — you are more open to the world; you have more humility; you have more curiosity, which is why we seek it.”

“I want you to remember you have a part in this. You do not need to be in elected office to transform your community, to transform the people around you. Lean hard into your humility and your curiosity and your generosity. Others will be drawn to you.”

CHICAGO — For the second consecutive night, the Democratic National Convention in Chicago’s United Center made reference to LGBTQ rights, including in the context of the 2024 nominee’s record of expanding freedoms and protections for the community.

Vice President Kamala Harris “has always done the right thing, a champion for voting rights, civil rights, LGBTQ rights, the rights for women and girls,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom said during the ceremonial roll call Tuesday night, whereupon she was officially made the nominee.

Leading the roll call was openly gay Democratic National Committee Secretary Jason Rae, who in 2006 interned at the LGBTQ Victory Fund (which at the time was called the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund.)

When Vermont pledged 24 votes for Harris, the state’s first LGBTQ representative in Congress, Becca Balint, was highlighted as an exemplar of its commitment to public education, as she previously served as a middle school history and social studies teacher.

Speeches were kicked off Tuesday by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).

The night was headlined by former President Barack Obama, who said, “We believe that true freedom gives each of us the right to make decisions about our own life, how we worship, what our family looks like, how many kids we have, who we marry, and we believe that freedom requires us to recognize that other people have the freedom to make choices that are different than ours.”

“Shutting down the Department of Education, banning our books, none of that will prepare our kids for the future,” former First Lady Michelle Obama said. “Demonizing our children for being who they are and loving who they love — look, that doesn’t make anybody’s life better.”

“Americans with LGBTQ kids don’t want them facing discrimination at school because the state sanctioned it,” Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) said.

Monday night saw two LGBTQ speakers, U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia and U.S. Sen. Laphonza Butler, Democrats of California.

Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, who is widely considered a rising star in Democratic politics, stepped on stage with a printout of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 right-wing and socially conservative governing agenda.

Then, when President Joe Biden took the stage to close out the evening with a rousing and emotional address to his party, he discussed “the freedom to love who you love” among the liberties that are at stake in November.

CHICAGO — Vice President Kamala Harris, the 2024 Democratic nominee for president, is “more than ready for this job,” Gloria Allred told the Washington Blade on the sidelines of an LGBTQ caucus meeting during the Democratic National Convention on Monday.

“I met [Harris] when she was running for District Attorney of San Francisco, and she came to my office to seek my support, which, of course, I gave her,” Allred said. “I was extremely impressed with her at the time.”

“Usually I don’t make time to meet with political figures, frankly, because I’m so busy with the cases,” she said. “And I just, you know, can’t. But for some reason, I said, ‘Okay, I’ll meet her in my office,’ and I did, and I just had a feeling about her. And I’m so happy.”

Allred stressed that “we have to work to make it happen because it’s not going to happen just if we hope for it, we wish for it, we pray for it. We have to work for it.”

She also pointed out the dangers of Donald Trump’s candidacy for a second term in the White House, warning, “The Trump administration was just a disaster and a catastrophe for the country. And what they are doing now, Project 2025 in terms of pro-choice, in terms of gay and lesbian and transgender rights, is just a disaster.”

The former president, Allred said, “wants to distance himself from it” but “he can’t because so many of his employees, or former employees, I should say, from the administration, were involved in writing it — and also, of course, he’s on video talking about how great it was and is.”

An attorney whose career has spanned five decades, Allred has argued some of the most high profile civil rights cases in America, with a particular focus on LGBTQ and women’s rights, often representing some of the most famous public figures, from politicians to entertainers.

“I just want to say, my law firm and I have been involved in advocating and litigating for gay, lesbian, and transgender rights since the late 1970s,” Allred said. “I know what going back means when they we say ‘we won’t go back,’ because I’ve been saying that at pro-choice marches and gay and lesbian protests since that time.”

“No one has ever given women our rights. We’ve always had to fight for women. And this is the same for gay, lesbian, transgender, you know, bisexual, the whole community — no one’s giving us anything. No one ever gave us anything. We always have to fight to win it.”

At the DNC, “that’s what we’re doing here, is organizing, and I’m just really proud of the community that they’re here, educating people and helping to mobilize them,” Allred said. “Because we have to mobilize, we have to organize, and we have to help raise money to win.”

Trump, she said, has “billionaires supporting him,” and while Harris and the Democrats can win, Allred cautioned “we have to be really committed. There are not many days left to do it.”

“We have a real commitment, and we know how much more this election can make in terms of a difference for the community and equal rights for all,” Allred added.

Allred’s precedent-setting LGBTQ rights cases

Allred told the Blade about several landmark cases that she litigated on behalf of LGBTQ clients, going back several decades, including one involving two gay men who attended their high school reunion in the 1980s and were told their photo would not be published in the book because “the publisher felt it was against his religion to publish a photo of two gay men together.”

“We sued them, and after 16 years of litigating it all the way up to the California Court of Appeals, we won,” Allred said. The matter earned media attention, as the publisher “took out advertisements in the newspapers” arguing that “he had a right of free speech and religious expression to not publish” the photo.

“Well, we won the case in California decades ago,” she said.

Allred noted that apart from the role of the California Unruh Civil Rights Act in her case, analogous legal disputes were at issue in the U.S. Supreme Court’s Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (2018).

California was, and is, at the vanguard of LGBTQ civil rights movements. So was, and is, Allred and her firm, Allred, Maroko & Goldberg. “We did the right to marry case,” she said, “I did AIDS discrimination cases that we also won up in the California Court of Appeals” which ruled that “you can’t discriminate against someone” because of their HIV/AIDS status.

“We represented Robin Tyler and Diane Olson and Reverend Troy Perry and Phillip Ray De Blieck, his partner, the four of them in our right to marry case in California,” Allred said. “And we were the first in the state to challenge the family code law that essentially said that two people of the same sex could not marry. We challenged that. We went all the way to the California Supreme Court and we won.”

Here, too, Allred’s work crossed paths with Harris’s efforts in the public sector, aided by other allies like California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) who was, during this time, mayor of San Francisco.

“Because we were the first, Robin and Diane were the first, to be allowed to marry in LA County, a day before everyone else, we know that Newsom — actually, the same day that we announced we’re challenging the constitutionality of the law [he] started marrying gay and lesbian couples.”

The attorney — who in 2022 was awarded the highest honor of the LGBTQ+ Lawyers Association of Los Angeles — noted her and her firm’s ongoing work on behalf of transgender clients, which she considers “part of what we think should be always a teaching moment for what happens so that if people see the injustice and the unfairness, then they will join with us in wanting to right the wrongs.”

Allred highlighted another landmark case in the 1980s in which she represented “two lesbian life partners, wonderful women, businesswomen, very articulate” who were “not going to be in the closet” about their relationship when they celebrated Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday at Papa Choux, a fine dining establishment in Los Angeles.

“One was Latina, the other one was African American,” she said. “They were a couple, and they made a reservation for the romantic booths, which were like a few steps up from the main restaurant” with “sheer curtains, and violinists [who] came in to play” by the tables.

The couple was told that they were welcome to sit elsewhere but “two people of the same sex can’t sit in this romantic section” as a matter of restaurant policy and also per a city ordinance. “They weren’t kissing, they weren’t hugging, they weren’t even holding hands,” Allred said, and they did not want to move. As they would later say publicly, “‘we thought to ourselves, what would Martin Luther King Jr. want us to do? And we decided he would want us to call Gloria Allred.'”

“They came to us,” she said, and “we took the case. We had to decide, is this sexual orientation? Is it sex discrimination? Is it important? Or is it not important? Is it ridiculous? And then we decided, if you think that Rosa Parks sitting in the back of the bus was important, even though the bus would still get there, but she was treated in a way that was not respectful of her right to be treated in a dignified, respectful way, so this is the same thing.”

“So we fought at the lower court,” Allred said. “The trial court said, the judge said, ‘I want to go see the restaurant,’ which was not necessary. It’s a legal issue. But he did, and then he ruled against us, and we went up to the Court of Appeals, and we won, and they reversed, and we set a legal precedent that we’re able to cite in other cases and other attorneys were able to cite that you can’t discriminate against people because they’re lesbian or gay or of the same sex.”

That was 1984. “It’s still a legal precedent in California,” Allred added.

Former U.S. Rep. George Santos of Long Island, N.Y., who was the first out gay non-incumbent Republican to win election to Congress in 2022 and whose congressional colleagues voted to expel him last year, pleaded guilty on Aug. 19 to felony charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft as part of a plea deal with federal prosecutors.

His guilty plea came a little over a year after a federal grand jury indicted him in May 2023 on 13 counts of defrauding campaign donors and falsely claiming unemployment benefits. Last October prosecutors obtained another indictment that included the charge of aggravated identity theft on grounds that he falsified campaign donation information with the Federal Election Commission. He initially pleaded not guilty to the charges.

CBS News reports that a judge at the U.S. District Court in Central Islip, N.Y., which is on Long Island, set a sentencing date for Feb. 7, 2025, and said Santos faces an estimated sentencing range of between six and eight years in prison. Under the plea agreement, Santos will be required to repay at least $373,000, according to CBS News.

Had he not accepted the plea deal he was expected to go on trial in September.

“I understand  that my actions betrayed my supporters and constituents,” the Washington Post quoted Santos as saying during the court hearing in which he pleaded guilty to the two charges. “I am committed to making amends and learning from this experience,” the Post quoted him as saying.

Santos, 36, who was expelled from Congress last December, is one of only five members of Congress who have been expelled in U.S. history. The Washington Post reports that three were expelled in 1861 for supporting the Confederacy during the U.S. Civil War, and two others, one in 1980 and the other in 2002, were expelled after being convicted of bribery.

In his 2022 race for New York’s Third Congressional District seat, which includes part of Nassau County on Long Island and part of the New York City Borough of Queens, Santos defeated another gay candidate, Democratic businessman Robert Zimmerman. Political observers have said the two appeared to be the first two openly gay U.S. House candidates to run against each other in a general election.

Santos won the election in what is considered a swing district by a margin of 53.7 percent to 46.3 percent. Following Santos’s expulsion, Long Island Democrat Tom Suozzi emerged as the winner in a special election on Feb. 13 of this year. 

The Washington Post reports that from among the total of 23 felony charges that Santos faced before his guilty plea he was alleged to have defrauded campaign donors and used their money for personal expenses, including the purchase of designer clothing; he allegedly stole his donors’ identities and made thousands of dollars of purchases on their credit cards; received unemployment benefits when he was employed; lied to Congress about his finances; and falsified campaign finance reports.

The Washington Blade will be reporting live from Chicago at the Democratic National Convention next week.

With 81 percent of delegates responding, this year has seen a record number — 17 percent — who identify as LGBTQ, up from 11.5 percent in 2020, convention officials told the Blade. They will be joined by LGBTQ lawmakers, including the chair and most co-chairs of the Congressional Equality Caucus, and representatives from several major LGBTQ advocacy organizations.

This year’s DNC will be the last in which Annise Parker will participate as president and CEO of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund and LGBTQ+ Victory Institute. Under the leadership of the former Houston mayor, the political action campaign and training organization for LGBTQ elected leaders have become powerhouses.

The Human Rights Campaign will also be on the ground with President Kelley Robinson leading events throughout the week. Less than a week after Vice President Kamala Harris’s emergence as the presumptive Democratic 2024 nominee, HRC raised more than $300,000 during an Out for Harris LGBTQ+ Unity Call.

For the first time in more than 40 years, the National LGBTQ+ Task Force Action Fund endorsed a presidential candidate, Harris, following President Joe Biden’s announcement on July 21 that he would step off the presidential ticket. Task Force President Kierra Johnson will be in Chicago alongside senior staff for the organization.

GLAAD will be at the DNC to help inform media about LGBTQ issues and amplify queer and trans voices, while Advocates 4 Trans Equality (f.k.a. the National Center for Transgender Equality and the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund) will have a presence at the convention, too.

Events for next week will include:

• Sunday Aug. 18 | 6 p.m. CT: HRC and Victory Fund will host a delegate meet-up and mixer/bar crawl at various LGBTQ establishments in Chicago
• Location: LGBTQ venues including Sidetrack, Roscoe’s, Progress, Lark, Kit Kat, and Hydrate
• Monday Aug. 19 | 3 p.m. CT: HRC will host a “DNC LGBTQ+ Kickoff — The Power of Equality Votes,” which will feature top leaders and strategists from the LGBTQ movement and the Democratic Party, along with influencers and others
• Location: McCormick Place
• Tuesday, Aug. 20 | 10 a.m. CT: GLAAD will host a “Media Institute Culture Briefing” to review the organization’s 2024 Accelerating Acceptance report
• Location: The Drake Hotel
• Tuesday Aug. 20 | 4 p.m. CT: The Victory Fund will host a “Victory at the DNC” event, which is expected to draw delegates and executive officers
• Location: The Wit
• Tuesday Aug. 20 | 9 p.m. CT: HRC and Planned Parenthood Action Fund will host a “We Show Up — We Decide” party (by invitation only)
• Location: downtown Chicago
• Wednesday Aug. 21 | 11:45 a.m. CT: The Task Force will address a meeting of the LGBTQ+ Caucus
• Location: McCormick Place
• Thursday Aug. 21: HRC will host 50+ watch parties across the country. Harris is expected to take the stage at the United Center between 6 and 10 p.m. CT
• All week: HRC will host a “Creator Studio and Activation Center” where attendees can learn how best to make an impact in the 2024 elections and mobilize volunteers
• Location: McCormick Center

Register for HRC events at HRC.im/DNC.