Self-care note: While some of the following stories celebrate and affirm LGBTQ+ people, many cover legislation targeting the LGBTQ+ community, particularly trans and nonbinary youth. Please be kind to yourself and use your discretion while reading this section. Advisory: State news is representative but not exhaustive due to space constraints; feel free to forward news about your state to [email protected] to consider for inclusion. Alabama - Legislature adjourns without passing anti-LGBTQ+ bills. HB111, a sex redefinition bill which would have banned trans people from many public sex-segregated spaces, HB130, a “Don’t Say Gay” bill, and other bills targeting the LGBTQ+ community all failed to pass out of the legislature before it adjourned for the year. Arkansas - Trans community center vandalized for the fifth time in one year. InTRANSitive, the only trans community center in the state, has seen repeated acts of vandalism since it opened in December 2021. Starting last year, someone has damaged the pipes outside of the building at least four times, until someone ripped them up and stole them. Cameras have also disappeared and plants have been damaged. Louisiana - Senate committee passes anti-trans facilities ban. HB608 cleared the Senate Committee on Judiciary C. The bill would segregate all bathrooms, changing rooms and sleeping quarters by sex assigned at birth in public schools, domestic violence shelters and correctional facilities. The bill now heads to the Senate floor, its final stop before reaching the governor’s desk. Call your Senator TODAY and tell them to vote NO on HB608! Mississippi - Legislature passes anti-trans facilities ban. The House and Senate both voted to suspend the rules of the Legislature and pass SB2753. The bill, which goes into effect July 1, restricts access to bathrooms and other public facilities based on sex assigned at birth and people who violate the new law can be sued for damages by those who feel their privacy within the gender-specific facility was violated. Tennessee - Gov. Lee signs forced outing bill into law. The new law requires schools to tell parents if their child asks to go by a different name or set of pronouns than what is on their official school forms. Gay former employee of Memphis restaurant to receive $60,000 in back pay and damages following harassment. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued the restaurant in 2023 on the employee’s behalf, claiming he had been subjected to a hostile work environment and forced to endure on-the-job harassment due to his sexual orientation, including repeatedly being called homophobic slurs by a fellow waiter. In addition to paying damages to the harassed ex-employee, the restaurant will also revise its anti-harassment policies as part of the settlement. Utah - Online complaint form to report trans people in bathrooms flooded with fake complaints. The State Auditor released the so-called hotline complaint form on May 1st, allowing people to report alleged violations of HB257, which requires individuals to use restrooms and changing rooms in government buildings that correspond with their sex assigned at birth. By May 3rd, the state auditor’s office had received nearly 4,000 complaints, all of which appear to be fake. Virginia - Donald Davenport, pioneering LGBTQ+ activist, dies. Davenport was a teenager when he participated in the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City and was a longtime member of the LGBT Democrats of Virginia. His long-time partner, Chuck Unger, announced Davenport’s death after a lengthy illness. | 
