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A spate of teen suicides linked to anti-gay harassment is prompting school officials nationwide to rethink their efforts against bullying -- and in the process, risk entanglement in a bitter ideological debate.The conflict: Gay-rights supporters insist that any effective anti-bullying program must include specific components addressing harassment of gay youth. But religious conservatives condemn that approach as an unnecessary and manipulative tactic to sway young people's views of homosexuality.It's a highly emotional topic. Witness the hate mail -- from the left and right -- directed at Minnesota's Anoka-Hennepin School District while it reviews its anti-bullying strategies in the aftermath of a gay student's suicide.The invective is "some of the worst I've ever seen," Superintendent Dennis Carlson said. "We may invite the Department of Justice to come in and help us mediate this disc
by Kathy DraskyThe story in this video was first brought to our attention last week on Facebook. It is a story not unlike so many of ours. Josh, an American, married Henry, who is from Venezuela, in a state that recognizes gay marriages (Connecticut) last year. We all know the drill - if Josh was "Jane", he would have been able to petition the federal government to sponsor his husband for a green card. While there may be a waiting period and even an "investigation", the couple would not be looking down the barrel of being forced apart, and would most likely end up living happily ever after in the US.But Josh is a man and so is Henry, and as another Congressional session comes to a close with more co-sponsors of the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA) than ever before, but still no debate, much less a floor vote and our secure inclusion in Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) as "iffy
By Matt Hennie | Oct 26, 2010 | 7:00 PMVIEW PHOTOS | Georgia Democratic Party LGBT Caucus Candidate MixerTop Democrats – including former Gov. Roy Barnes—mingled with LGBT politicos during a reception Monday, urging them to donate money and support them in the closing days of the campaign, but they did so without talking much about gay issues.Barnes (top photo) was joined by state Labor Commissioner Michael Thurmond, who is running for U.S. Senate; Carol Porter, who is campaigning for lieutenan
“I don’t want to be an activist,” Josh Vandiver, a 29-year-old gay man explained.A Harvard graduate completing his Ph.D. at Princeton, with a focus on comparative ancient Greek and Renaissance political theory, Vandiver said, “I want to finish up my dissertation and become a professor… I’m a reclusive scholar. I like to be in the library all day.”Cristina Ojeda, a 24-year-old lesbian who came to the US from Mexico when she was 11 and became a citizen at the same time her father did, has more experience with LGBT causes. As an undergraduate at the University of California at Santa Cruz, she found herself amidst a politically charged student body. “It was natural to be involved,” she said.Still, when Ojeda, who grew up in California, moved to Buffalo to get a master’s in social work at SUNY, she found an apartment off campus in a low-income neighborhood where she felt uneasy leading a vis
Starting in April groups will submit reports on human rights within the U.S. as part of the United Nations’ Universal Periodic Review of the country this year. Dittrich intends to ask pointed questions about the lack of marriage rights for same-sex couples, anti-gay immigration policies and the restriction against gays serving openly in the military.

The United States has also felt Dittrich’s influence. Through his involvement with the U.S. Council for Global Equality, he pushed the State Department to require all American ambassadors to include reports on LGBT issues in the countries where they are stationed.
A resolution supporting the federal bill that would allow gay U.S. citizens to sponsor their partners for a visa passed the California Senate Judiciary Committee Thursday and now heads to the Senate floor for a vote.

Our cover story this week, "Worlds Apart," tells the story of three Bay Area couples whose lives would be changed by the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA), a federal bill that allows "permanent partners" to be treated the same as straight spouses in immigration matters. Currently, gay couples have no legal pathway to sponsor their foreign partners to stay in the country.


While the federal UAFA bill is on hold while lawmakers decide whether to include it in the comprehensive immigration reform, California legislators such as Assemblyman Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco) introduced a resolution last year urging the U.S. Congress to pass the s
California Democratic representative Maxine Waters, a member of the House Judiciary Committee's subcommittee on immigration, has cosponsored legislation that would provide immigration rights to binational gay couples and their families.

Waters’s support comes at a crucial time for LGBT immigration reform. Last week 60 Congress members issued a letter to President Barack Obama and congressional leaders urging passage of the legislation, originally introduced in the House by New York representative Jerrold Nadler and in the Senate by Vermont’s Patrick Leahy.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is tired of her "vulnerable" (read: freshman, or up for re-election) Democratic friends being targeted by the right-wing for their controversial views and votes, particularly on health care. Which is why she's reportedly told her Congressional colleagues that the House will not take up any "controversial" bills in 2010 unless the Senate acts first. And you can bet that Don't Ask Don't Tell — or ENDA, or UAFA (or any immigration reform), or repealing DOMA — falls into that category.
As a presidential candidate, Barack Obama did not support marriage equality, but he did support the repeal of the so-called "Defense of Marriage" Act (DOMA), a 1996 law that bans any federal recognition of gay and lesbian families and allows states to deny marriage rights even to same-sex couples who have been legally wed in their home states. Obama also spoke of supporting some sort of legal provision to allow same-sex families access to civil unions on a national level.

Pro-family parity lawmakers have a bill that would strike down DOMA. They call it the Respect for Marriage Act; if passed into law, the bill would protect marriage--all marriages, that is--by granting federal-level recognition to families, gay or straight, who had been married in any jurisdiction.

Some family equality advocates do not support the bill because it applies only to married couple
Immigration Equality, a non-profit advocacy and legal aid organization serving lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) and HIV-positive immigrants and their families, announced today that it has established a “501(c)4” entity, the Immigration Equality Action Fund, to significantly increase its federal advocacy and grassroots organizing work. The Action Fund’s launch also includes an expanded office in Washington, D.C., where a new policy staffer and an online grassroots organizer will soon join the organization.

“The launch of the Immigration Equality Action Fund comes at a critical moment in our work to advocate on behalf of LGBT immigrant families,” said Rachel B. Tiven, the organization’s executive director. “As Congress turns its attention to comprehensive immigration reform, and as a record number of lawmakers signal their support for the Uniting American Families A
No action on DADT. No action on DOMA. No action on ENDA. No action on immigration equality for separated families. No action on adoption rights.

Rahm Emanuel and Barack Obama draw the wrong lessons about where progressives LBGTs will go in 2010. It’s not that we’ll vote for the talibangelical GOP. After all, we’re not total idiots. We know those people would just as soon Ugandize our asses as look at us.

The danger is that we will stay at home. And we’ll stay at home not just on Election Day, but on every phone-banking, neighborhood-walking, vote-by-mailing, voter-IDing, precinct-organizing, campaign-blogging day before that. That’s a lot of wo/manpower to run a mid-term campaign without.

Moreover: We are the opinion leaders in our small communities. We are the folks our less engaged friends look to for guidance. Most people don’t pay attention
U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter made headlines earlier this year when he announced that he was switching the "R" after his name to a "D," and he was again in the headlines late last month when he declared that he had also shifted his position on an LGBT issue that has beleaguered the community for more than a decade.
There are many people throughout the United States who seem more and more unhappy with the current state of gay rights issues. This unhappiness seems particularly acute when discussing the issue of DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act). Under current United States Federal law same sex marriages are not recognized by the Federal Government. Therefore, United States Immigration benefits based upon marriage cannot be extended to the same-sex partners of US citizens as same sex marriage is not recognized as a “marriage” for purposes of US Immigration.
Many have advocated either the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act or the enactment of some federal legislation which would allow for same sex immigration benefits notwithstanding DOMA. A recent example of the latter is the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA) which would provide US Immigration benefits to “permanent partners” of US Citiz
Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA), member of the Senate Judiciary Committee (and formerly that committee’s Republican Chairman), has signed on as a cosponsor of the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA).

At last June’s Senate Judiciary Committee UAFA hearing, Specter expressed strong support for ending discrimination against gay and lesbian Americans and their families in immigration law. Immigration Equality applauds Senator Specter for his support for LGBT binational families.

Eight of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s twelve Democrats are now cosponsors of UAFA. A ninth, Senator Ted Kaufman of Delaware, recently publicly stated his support for equal immigration rights for LGBT families
Two days after signing the historic Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act--the first federal law to extend protections to GLBT Americans--President Barack Obama addressed two other issues seen by gay Americans as crucial to the cause of equality.

The president signed into law legislation that re-authorizes the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Treatment Extension Act. The law provides funds for another four years to programs that provide medicine and care for needy people living with HIV/AIDS. An estimated 500,000 individuals rely on the program to maintain their treatment regimens...

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Promoting public awareness of the need for fairness in immigration policy particularly as it relates to the rights of same-sex bi-national couples in the United States who seek equal immigration rights; Providing information regarding political issues relating to gay immigration equality issues, rights and policy.