Take Action
Summer isn’t over but the chance to Tell HHS to keep LGBTQ+ nondiscrimination in the ACA nearly is: DEADLINE for you to submit public comments is Monday, August 13th (this Monday)
We need your PFLAG family voice to weigh in with the Administration because nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people and families in current law is at risk. As reported previously in Policy Matters, the Trump Administration on June 14th published a proposed rule to roll back existing nondiscrimination protections now included in the Health Care Rights Law of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), called Section 1557.
Please submit your comment without delay; LGBTQ+ lives, healthcare and health insurance access depend on you:
- Visit ProtectTransHealth.org
- Follow the simple instructions there: begin with your personal story of why retaining nondiscrimination in health care for LGBTQ+ people matters to you and your family
- Email [email protected] (or call directly at (202) 657-6997) if you want help
Background
The proposed rule by HHS seeks to revoke existing protections for LGBTQ+ people and other communities currently protected by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services regulations.
This rule would severely threaten transgender people’s access to all forms of health care, undermine access to care for women and other people with reproductive health needs, make it harder for people with Limited English Proficiency (LEP) to access health care, and curtail nondiscrimination protections for everyone by attempting to severely limit their scope, people’s access to information about their rights, and ability to enforce them.
As part of this rollback, the administration has opened a mandated 60 day period for comments on the proposed rule. This comment period closes on August 13, 2019. The administration is required to respond to the comments it received and may not implement this new rule until 60 days after the comment period has closed. At this time, anti-discrimination protections under the Health Care Rights Law are still the law of the land.
Visit ProtectTransHealth.org to share your story and tell the Trump administration that the new proposal will make it harder for LGBTQ people to access life-saving care.
Federal Matters
Twenty-nine transgender women who are in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody at a privately-run detention center in rural New Mexico have signed a letter in which they complain about living conditions. The transgender women who are detained at the Cibola County Correctional Center signed the handwritten letter written in Spanish dated June 26th. The letter says there is not “adequate” medical attention to “treat people with disabilities, people with HIV, skin infections,” and there is “a lack of medications for many” transgender women. The letter also states Cibola County Correctional Center staffers “psychologically and verbally” mistreat them.
Students who said they were discriminated against because of their sexual orientation or gender identity were significantly less likely to get any relief from the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights under the current administration than they were under the past administration, according to a report released Monday. The report, released by the Center for American Progress and based on the Department of Education’s own data, provided the first analysis of how students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer have fared in the first half of the Trump administration.
Nearly three dozen members of Congress sent a letter to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Thursday morning expressing their concern over the agency’s treatment of transgender detainees and demanding the agency take transgender migrants’ asylum claims more seriously. The letter stressed ICE should especially consider asylum claims coming from the “Northern Triangle” countries of El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala, where “violence against the transgender community occurs at alarming rates.” In one study conducted by the UN Refugee Agency, 88 percent of LGBTQ asylum seekers fleeing the Northern Triangle reported experiencing sexual and gender-based violence in their countries of origin.
State Matters
California - Los Angeles now largest U.S. city to include LGBTQ businesses in contracts. The City of Los Angeles is now formally including businesses owned by members of the LGBTQ community in the contract process. The policy not only gives LGBTQ businesses opportunities in contracting and procurement but also for capacity building and educational programs from small businesses.
Florida - Kiki Fantroy is 13th Black transgender woman reportedly murdered in 2019. According to the Miami Herald, Fantroy was killed during an argument and found near an abandoned home.
A teenager was arrested Monday in connection with the fatal shooting of a transgender woman in Miami-Dade County's Goulds neighborhood.
Kansas - Kansas' child welfare agency has drafted guidelines urging foster parents to allow LGBTQ kids in their care to "express themselves as they see themselves," riling conservatives a little more than a year after the state granted legal protections to faith-based adoption agencies that do not place children in LGBTQ homes. The Department for Children and Families issued draft "guidance" for "prudent parenting" in mid-July, six months after Gov. Laura Kelly took office. It said foster homes should recognize LGBTQ children "by their preferred identity if it differs from their sex assigned at birth."
Michigan - More than a month after Gov. Gretchen Whitmer ordered multi-colored rainbow flags to fly over the Romney office building in Lansing to commemorate Pride Month, a Republican lawmaker said enough is enough. Whitmer was quick to respond, retweeting a post from a Detroit Free Press reporter with the addition: "My veto pen is ready."
North Carolina - Governor ends funding of conversion therapy on minors. Roy Cooper issued an executive order directing the state's Department of Health and Human Services to cease the use of federal and state funds for the harmful and discredited practice of conversion therapy.
Ohio - Jordan Cofer, a 22-year-old transgender man, was among the nine victims killed in a mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, on Sunday. Cofer, who is remembered by friends as “extremely bright” and “well-liked,” appears to have been out to a handful of close friends, including one who said in a message to Splinter News: “He identified with he/him pronouns to people he trusted and knew would support him. Jordan was probably one of the sweetest people you would ever meet, a true saint ... He tried to give the best to everyone.”
Oregon - Oregon transgender woman sues insurance companies to pay for facial surgery. Christina Ketcham, a 59-year-old transgender woman, has filed a $375,000 lawsuit against her insurance companies and employer, saying they’ve discriminated against her by refusing to pay for facial surgery that would make it more likely that strangers would recognize her as female.
South Carolina - The murder of a transgender woman is under investigation. It’s the second one in South Carolina in recent weeks. Family members of the 24-year-old are trying to make sense of it all after learning of the death died.
Texas - Students and recent graduates of Baylor University, one of the country’s most prominent Baptist colleges, want the National Collegiate Athletic Association to examine the institution’s treatment of gay, transgender and queer students who say they have long faced discrimination on campus and in university policies. The students assert in their letter that Baylor is the only member institution of the Big 12 Conference that “prohibits LGBTQ+ students from being officially recognized as part of the campus community.”
Utah - Utah Supreme Court says law banning same-sex couples from gestational agreements is unconstitutional. Chief Justice Matthew Durrant said “same-sex couples must be afforded all of the benefits the State has linked to marriage and freely grants to opposite sex-couples.”
Washington / Pennsylvania - Washington state and Pennsylvania will offer a third gender option on driver's licenses, so people who don't identify as female or male can choose X instead. The changes will bring the number of states that offer a third option to at least 14. Washington, DC, and New York City do, as well.
Washington - Laurie Jinkins historically becomes State Speaker of the House – First Woman, First Lesbian. Representative Laurie Jinkins was elected by her peers as the new House Speaker, making her the first openly LGBTQ+ person and the first woman in that role.
Wisconsin - After a painful battle over whether to allow LGBT police officers to march in last year’s Pride Parade in Madison, organizers have ditched the parade this year in favor of a picnic and festival on the North Side. OutReach LGBT Community Center, which is hosting the event in mid-August at Warner Park, hopes the festival will help foster community healing after the anger and uproar surrounding last year’s controversy.
Global Matters
India - Amid protests, Lok Sabha Passes Transgender Persons Bill. The Lok Sabha (lower house of India's bicameral Parliament) passed a Bill that will provide a mechanism for social, economic, and educational empowerment of transgender persons.
An Indian transgender couple who both underwent sex re-assignment have tied the knot in a traditional Bengali ceremony, in what is believed to be the state’s first “rainbow wedding”. Surrounded by family and friends, the bride, Tista Das, 38, and groom, Dipan Chakravarthy, 40, took part in rituals in Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal state.
Israel - Teen seriously injured in stabbing at Tel Aviv LGBT youth hostel; brother suspected. A 16-year-old boy was stabbed and seriously wounded outside an LGBT youth hostel in Tel Aviv, in what has been alleged as a hate crime.
Pakistan - Two transgender women tortured, killed in Pakistan. Police in Pakistan say they have found the bodies of two transgender women who were tortured and beaten to death.
Poland - Scores of Poles are identifying themselves as gay, bisexual, trans, or queer on social media, following violent attacks on a pride parade in eastern Poland. They talk about how they are regular people, teachers, doctors, high school students or just neighbors you might pass on the street or in the grocery store. Others are joining in as allies of the community, all under the hashtag #jestemLGBT or “#IamLGBT.” It became the top trending hashtag on Twitter in the country, with many thousands of entries.
Russia - Russian police said on Thursday they had detained a man over the fatal stabbing of an LGBTQ activist near her home in St Petersburg and were not treating the murder as a hate crime. The victim, Elena Grigoryeva, 41, campaigned for gay rights and also took part in anti-war protests and rallies on other issues. The murder prompted a fellow campaigner to say Grigoryeva had regularly received death threats in the past and reported them to police, but that they had not acted upon those threats.
In support of Russia's LGBTQ community, two male members of the German heavy metal group Rammstein kissed in front of a massive crowd in Moscow. Under a so-called gay propaganda law, the kiss could be considered illegal.
Russia rips children from their dads under ‘gay propaganda’ law. After a trip to a Moscow hospital, Russia has used its 2013 federal law prohibiting “propaganda of nontraditional sexual relationships” to split a male same-sex couple from their legally adopted 12- and 14-year-old sons.
The European Court of Human Rights has ordered the Russian government to pay approximately $41,000 in damages to three LGBTQ groups that it refused to allow to register as associations, citing the country’s anti-gay “propaganda” law. The three nonprofits have spent the better part of the last decade trying to register their organizations. But the Russian government rejected all three organizations’ requests, finding that they ran afoul of the country’s 2013 law banning “propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations,” which effectively prevents any advocacy for the rights of sexual minorities — and even the facially-neutral acknowledgement of the existence of LGBTQ people.
United Kingdom - Four teens have been charged in connection with a violent attack on a lesbian couple on a London bus, police announced Thursday. The couple, Melania Geymonat and her girlfriend, Chris, were assaulted on May 29 after refusing demands to kiss. A photo of the women, who were left bloodied and bruised, shared by Geymonat on her Facebook page sparked public outrage over the attack.
Pro-Brexit Boris Johnson's premiership may be a mixed bag for the United Kingdom’s LGBTQ community, advocates say. The former British foreign secretary and London mayor became prime minister Wednesday, following the resignation of Theresa May.
Uruguay - Effort to roll back transgender rights fails in Uruguay. An effort to roll back transgender rights in Uruguay failed to draw enough voters to the polls to trigger a national referendum, prompting LGBT+ rights supporters to declare victory over the conservative-backed initiative.
Media Matters
Victoria’s Secret has cast an openly transgender woman for the first time, hiring the Brazilian model Valentina Sampaio for a catalog photo shoot, her agent said. Her agent, Erio Zanon, said on Monday that Ms. Sampaio, 22, had been hired for catalog work for VS Pink, the company’s athletic line.
BBC soap opera series "East Enders" announces its first Muslim lesbian character. Introduced in February and to be disclosed in August, actress Priya Davdra plays Iqra Ahmed.
Wilson Cruz, a co-star in the new Hulu animated children’s series “The Bravest Knight,” describes the show’s dad couple this way: “We’re not explaining homosexuality, or same-gender sexuality. We’re talking about the love of a family.” His words and those of his fellow Hulu father, T.R. Knight, speak loudly about the state of LGBTQ representation in TV fare for kids, a segment of media that has been broadening storylines over the last several years to include a range of non-binary characters.
Tinder will start to warn its LGBTQ users when they're in a country where it could be risky to swipe. The dating app announced a new safety feature called Traveler Alert that will inform LGBTQ users when they've entered a part of the world that criminalizes same-sex consensual activity and hide their profiles by default.
Netflix's award-winning "Orange is the New Black" freeze frames ICE detention as distinct from Litchfield.
Netflix's "Queer Eye" Jonathan Van Ness meets with his high school alma mater’s GSA and discusses being bullied there. Quincy, Mass. had no GSA when he attended, and Van Ness said that he came out in his 6th grade talent show in a “lyrical interpretive dance” to a song by Jewel. He said that queer students then were their own support system and family, because the school provided no support for LGBTQ+ students or against bullying.
Mattachine Society creates website that captures achievements and narrative of lesbian pioneer Lilli Vincenz and invites all to visit it. Thanks to the dedication of legendary LGBTQ+ champions Charles Francis and Pate Felts, this important piece of the community's history is preserved and available. Lilli’s archival papers and films are preserved at the Library of Congress. We learned about this from PFLAG friend and LGBTQ+ hero Bob Witeck.
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