National
Obama, Kennedy and a year of change
From President Obama’s inauguration to the National Equality March, the last 12 months brought a variety of real and symbolic change for LGBT Americans. Marriage was the top story of the year, but here are the 10 other biggest stories of 2009.
ten
Barack Obama becomes 44th president: Telling a massive National Mall crowd that, “all are equal, all are free,” Barack Obama became the nation’s 44th president Jan. 20. Gays from across the country joined the estimated 1.8 million people on Capitol Hill who watched Obama take the oath of office. Seconds after Obama took the oath, a detailed narrative describing Obama’s support for gay rights legislation was published to the White House web site. The page noted Obama’s support for a gay and transgender inclusive hate crimes bill, an employment non-discrimination bill covering gays and transgender people, and overturning “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” among other issues. The section also mentioned Obama’s call to repeal the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act and his support for new legislation that would provide full marriage-related rights and benefits for same-sex couples joined in civil unions or domestic partnerships.
nine
Nation mourns Kennedy: Sen. Edward Kennedy was remembered as the LGBT community’s “strongest advocate in the United States Senate” when he died in August at age 77. Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese noted that Kennedy championed LGBT issues in Congress before doing so was politically acceptable and offered a strong voice of support in the 1980s when the HIV/AIDS epidemic began taking the lives of gay men. Kennedy went on to become a staunch supporter of same-sex marriage and in 1996 was among 14 senators to vote on the Senate floor against the Defense of Marriage Act. He also spoke on the Senate floor against the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment in 2004. “Make no mistake,” he said, “a vote for the federal marriage constitutional amendment is a vote against civil unions, domestic partnerships and other efforts by states to treat gays and lesbians fairly under the law.”
eight
Gay federal workers get limited benefits: President Obama took what activists described as his “first step” on gay civil rights in June when he signed a presidential memorandum granting a limited number of federal employee benefits to the same-sex partners of federal workers. Among the new benefits were long-term care insurance and the use of sick time to care for a domestic partner and non-biological, non-adopted child. Additionally, the same-sex partners of U.S. Foreign Service workers were granted access to the use of medical facilities at overseas posts, medical evacuation privileges from such posts and inclusion of same-sex families in overseas housing allocations. Notably absent from the list was health insurance and retirement benefits. White House officials said the administration is prohibited from providing the perks to the same-sex partners of federal workers without a change in the civil service personnel statute and the Defense of Marriage Act.
seven
Gay man leads U.S. Office of Personnel Management: John Berry became the Obama administration’s highest-ranking openly gay official in May when he was sworn in as director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. The ceremony notably occurred at OPM headquarters in Northwest Washington — the same building where officials once carried out a policy that allowed them to deny employment to gays seeking federal jobs. On hand for the event was longtime gay civil rights activist Frank Kameny, who was fired by the federal government in 1957 because of his sexual orientation. Berry lauded Kameny, noting that Kameny’s work made Berry’s appointment possible. “For that, Frank, I personally thank you for your leadership, your passion, and your persistence and express our nation’s appreciation for your courage in teaching America to live up to our promise and our potential,” Berry said.
six
Obama cheered at Pride event: President Obama and his wife won cheers and shouts of “I love you!” from lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender activists during a White House celebration in June commemorating Pride and marking the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion. The gathering came as many activists urged the president to take greater action on LGBT issues, including the repeal of the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act and “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Obama told the crowd that the nation “cannot — and will not — put aside issues of basic equality” and that he seeks “an America in which no one feels the pain of discrimination based on who you are or who you love.”
five
Lesbian elected mayor of Houston: Gay rights advocates heralded the victory of lesbian Annise Parker in her bid to become Houston’s next mayor as a triumph for LGBT Americans. Parker, a Democrat and city controller for Houston, won the December election after taking 53 percent of the vote. Her win marked the seventh time she’d won a citywide election in Houston and made the city the most populous in the country to elect an openly LGBT mayor. Paul Scott, executive director for Equality Texas, said Parker’s victory was significant on many levels. “I think in some ways, we’ve seen the ceiling being broken, not only within the Houston area and Texas, but also nationally in terms of an open lesbian being elected into the highest-level office in the metropolitan area for the fourth largest city in the country,” he said.
four
Justice Department criticized for DOMA defense: Gay activists were outraged in June when the U.S. Justice Department defended the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act by citing child rearing and procreation as reasons why a court should dismiss a legal challenge of it. Some gay Democratic activists who supported Obama in the 2008 presidential election said administration insiders told them the president was not directly consulted on the brief’s wording, but he nonetheless drew significant criticism. When the Justice Department acted again in August to defend DOMA against a separate challenge, the language was toned down and included a note that “this administration does not support DOMA as a matter of policy, believes that it is discriminatory, and supports its repeal.”
three
Washington Blade ends 40-year run: After chronicling the LGBT community for 40 years, the Washington Blade published its final issue Friday, Nov. 13. Abruptly forced to close as its parent company, Window Media, went into Chapter 7 bankruptcy, the Blade was widely acknowledged as the LGBT community’s newspaper of record. It covered a range of issues — from the outbreak of the HIV/AIDS epidemic to the advent of same-sex marriage — with a depth unmatched by mainstream media outlets. But coverage of local and national LGBT issues did not end when the Blade locked its doors. Strongly supported by Blade advertisers and readers, the newspaper’s staff quickly founded a new publication and distributed the first issue Nov. 20. The DC Agenda, a local, employee-owned business, is now in its seventh week.
two
Obama signs hate crimes bill: Despite several efforts to derail the bill, President Obama signed the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act into law in October as part of the Fiscal Year 2010 Defense Authorization Act. The act allows the Justice Department to assist in the prosecution of hate crimes based on actual or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity, among other categories. “After more than a decade of opposition and delay, we passed inclusive hate crimes legislation to help protect our citizens form violence based on what they look like, who they love, how they pray or who they are,” Obama said. Opponents had argued the law was tantamount to creating thought crimes and could limit free speech rights.
one
National Equality March hits Washington: Tens of thousands of protesters descended on the nation’s capital in October to urge Congress and President Obama to extend full legal equality to LGBT people. Featuring a mix of veteran speakers and young faces, the weekend event included a march past the White House that ended outside the U.S. Capitol. Participants carried rainbow-colored flags and held signs calling for immediate action to enact equality. The bright, nearly cloudless sky and unseasonably warm weather welcomed crowds as several high-profile speakers called the participants to action. “If you believe we are equal, then it is time to act like it,” said Cleve Jones, a longtime gay activist and one of the chief organizers of the march. “A free and equal people do not tolerate prioritization of their rights. They do not accept compromises. They do not accept delays.”
Hungary
Vance speaks at Orbán rally in Hungary
Anti-LGBTQ prime minister trailing ahead of April 12 vote
Vice President JD Vance on Tuesday urged Hungarians to support Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in the country’s April 12 elections.
“We have got to get Viktor Orbán re-elected as prime minister of Hungary,” Vance told Orbán supporters who gathered at Budapest’s MTK Sportpark.
Vance and Orbán on Tuesday met before they held a press conference in Budapest. Orbán also spoke at the rally.
The U.S. vice president after he took to the stage called President Donald Trump, who told the crowd he is “a big fan of Viktor” and is “with him all the way.” Vance, as he did during Tuesday’s press conference with Orbán, criticized the European Union.
“We want you to make a decision about your future with no outside forces pressuring you or telling you what to do. I’m not telling you exactly who to vote for, but what I am telling you is that the bureaucrats in Brussels, those people should not be listened to,” said Vance. “Listen to your hearts, listen to your souls, and listen to the sovereignty of the Hungarian people.”
Vance in his speech noted “across the West, we’ve got a small band of radicals” who, among other things, “condemn children to mutilization and sterilization in the name of gender care.” Vance also criticized a “far-left ideology given quarter in university circles, in the media, and in our entertainment industry, and increasingly among bureaucrats on both sides of the Atlantic.”
Vice President JD Vance speaks at MTK Sportpark in Budapest, Hungary, on April 7, 2026
Orbán has been in office since 2010. He and his Fidesz-KDNP coalition government have faced widespread criticism over its anti-LGBTQ crackdown.
A Hungarian activist with whom the Washington Blade previously spoke said it is “impossible to change your gender legally in Hungary” because of a 2020 law that “banned legal gender recognition of transgender and intersex people.” Hungarian MPs the same year effectively prohibited same-sex couples from adopting children and defined marriage in the country’s constitution as between a man and a woman.
The European Commission in 2022 sued Hungary, which is a member of the EU, over the country’s anti-LGBTQ propaganda law.
Hungarian lawmakers in March 2025 passed a bill that banned Pride events and allowed authorities to use facial recognition technology to identify those who participate in them. MPs later amended the Hungarian constitution to ban public LGBTQ events.
Upwards of 100,000 people last June defied the ban and marched in Budapest’s annual Pride parade.
Polls indicate Orbán is trailing Péter Magyar and his center-right Tisza party ahead of the April 12 election. Vance at Tuesday’s rally told Orbán supporters that he and Trump “want you to make a decision about your future with no outside forces pressuring you or telling you what to do.”
“I’m not telling you exactly who to vote for, but what I am telling you is that the bureaucrats in Brussels, those people should not be listened to,” said Vance. “Listen to your hearts, listen to your souls, and listen to the sovereignty of the Hungarian people.”
“Unlike some of the leadership of Brussels, I’m not threatening you or telling you that we’re going to withhold funds to which you’re legally entitled,” he added. “You will make the decision about Hungary’s future.”
The White House
White House ends protections for trans students in multiple school districts
Cape Henlopen School District in Delaware among administration’s targets
The Department of Education has terminated agreements with five school districts and a college aimed at protecting the rights of transgender students, backtracking requirements made in prior administrations, according to the Associated Press.
Allowing the reversal of these federal obligations removes formerly mandatory measures, including faculty training on responding to a student’s preferred name and pronouns, and policies allowing trans children to use bathrooms that align with their gender identity.
This policy change is a major shift from past democratic-led administrations, and will impact Delaware Valley School District in Pennsylvania, Sacramento City Unified School District in California, Cape Henlopen School District in Delaware, Fife School District in Washington, and La Mesa-Spring Valley School District, as well as Taft College in California.
Delaware Valley School District received notice from the Trump-Vance administration in February and has since voted to roll back anti-discrimination protections. Other schools, like Sacramento City Unified School District, said the change in minimum protections a district must offer will not affect their policies because it “remains committed to the support of our LGBTQ+ students and staff.”
This is part of a wider wave of anti-trans actions taken by the Trump-Vance administration. This White House has penalized schools attempting to accommodate students’ gender identity, filed lawsuits in California and Minnesota over state policies allowing trans students to participate in interscholastic sports, and opened civil rights investigations into multiple schools and universities over their policies on trans students.
Kimberly Richey, the Department of Education’s Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, said the action underscored the administration’s efforts to prevent trans students from participating in girls’ and women’s sports teams and accessing shared locker rooms.
“Today, the Trump administration is removing the unnecessary and unlawful burdens that prior administrations imposed on schools in its relentless pursuit of a radical transgender agenda,” she said in a written statement.
According to the AP, this is just one instance of the administration rescinding civil rights protections in education. Last year, the Department of Education terminated two agreements: one involving the removal of books from a school library in Georgia, and another addressing harsh discipline and unequal education opportunities for Native students in the Rapid City Area School District in South Dakota.
Shiwali Patel, the senior director of education justice at the National Women’s Law Center, issued a statement in response to the removal of protections for trans students, saying the rollback will negatively impact all students — not just trans ones.
“There is absolutely no basis for what the Department of Education is doing, and it is unimaginably cruel. Title IX exists to ensure that students are protected from discrimination and treated with dignity so that they can learn and thrive in our schools,” Patel said. “It’s what students, families, lawmakers, and advocates fought for when Title IX was passed decades ago. But the Trump administration’s Department of Education has spent its limited resources to strip Title IX of that very purpose.”
She continued, highlighting the issues that will arise from the agreement removals in schools.
“Real complaints of discrimination and sexual assault are going unanswered by the Department of Education while conservative lawmakers continue to escalate their attacks on a small minority of students,” the nationally recognized Title IX expert and advocacy leader for gender-based harassment added. “Parents, teachers, and students need the Department to focus on addressing real harms on campuses instead of rolling back policies that keep all students safe.”
The schools that had their agreements terminated vary, but stem from the same issue: treating trans students with the same protections from harassment as their cisgender peers.
In 2023, Taft College, a community college in California’s Central Valley, became one of the few schools to settle a case with the Department of Education’s Civil Rights Office after a student accused faculty of discrimination, including refusing to use the student’s preferred pronouns. The college agreed to faculty training on Title IX protections and revised its policies to clarify that refusing to use a person’s preferred name and pronoun can constitute harassment.
The now-canceled agreement with Sacramento City Unified School District stemmed from a 2022 complaint brought by a student after a teacher refused to use the student’s preferred pronouns and/or refused to allow the male-identifying student to work in a boys’ group for a class activity. The 2024 resolution agreement had mandated training for employees on civil rights law, sexual harassment, and how to handle formal complaints.
Under a settlement the Delaware Valley School District reached with the Obama-Biden administration, the district was required to permit students to use bathrooms aligned with their gender identity. In February, the Trump-Vance administration sent the district a letter rescinding the settlement and requiring the rollback of antidiscrimination protections for trans students. The school board voted in late March to change its policies accordingly.
This move is part of a broader pattern of anti-trans actions from the White House since Trump returned to office.
In addition to restricting protections in federally funded education spaces, the administration has attempted to end trans girls’ and women’s participation in sports competitions and has sued states that have not complied. It has also blocked trans and nonbinary people from choosing sex markers on passports and attempted to stop those under 19 from receiving gender-affirming medical care.
South Carolina
Man faces first S.C. ‘hate intimidation’ charge
Timothy Truett allegedly shot at gay club in Myrtle Beach on April 1
A South Carolina man remains in custody on a more than $300,000 bond after he allegedly opened fire at a Myrtle Beach nightclub on April 1, according to WMBF.
Reports say 37-year-old Timothy James Truett Jr., of Clover, S.C., was detained by the Myrtle Beach Police Department after the April 1 incident outside Pulse Ultra Club. He was later arrested and charged with possession of a weapon during a violent crime, discharging a firearm into a dwelling, discharging a firearm within city limits, malicious injury to real property valued over $5,000, and assault or intimidation due to political opinions or the exercise of civil rights.
At 10:57 a.m. on April 1, officers responded to a call about a possible shooting at Pulse Ultra Club, located in the 2700 block of South Kings Highway.
In an affidavit released later, the club’s owner, Ken Phillips, said he was doing paperwork that morning when he heard “five or six” gunshots. He went outside and found a window and the windshield of his SUV shattered by bullets. An SUV with blue plastic covering one window was left at the scene.
Police later reviewed footage that showed a silver vehicle stopping in the middle of the road. The video appeared to capture muzzle flashes coming from the passenger-side window.
According to the affidavit, an officer later pulled over a vehicle driven by Truett and found spent shell casings in the back seat, along with a gun.
Documents do not detail why Truett was ultimately charged under the state law covering assault or intimidation tied to political opinions or the exercise of civil rights.
As of April 1, records show Truett is being held in Horry County on a combined bond of more than $312,000.
WMBF spoke with Phillips after the incident and asked whether there was any prior conflict that might have led to the shooting.
“I don’t know if it’s personal, I don’t know if it’s related to being gay, I don’t know if it’s related to the bar issues,” Phillips told WMBF. “Anybody with a mindset of pulling out a weapon in broad daylight is not right.”
“My primary concern has and always will be the safety of my community and my customers,” he added. “It’s given me great concern … as to how far people will go.”
WMBF also spoke with Adam Hayes, vice chair of Myrtle Beach’s Human Rights Coalition, who was involved in pushing for the ordinance. He said that while the incident itself is troubling, it shows the policy is being put to use.
The ordinance is intended to deter “crimes that are motivated by bias or hate towards any person or persons, in whole or in part, because of the actual or perceived” identity, in the absence of a statewide hate crime law.
“It’s nice to see that something we put into policy is not just a piece of paper, that it’s actually being used,” said Hayes.
He said the shooting underscores the need for a statewide hate crime law in South Carolina and added that the incident has left the local LGBTQ community shaken.
South Carolina and Wyoming are the only two states in the U.S. without a comprehensive statewide hate crime law.
Truett remains in jail as of publication.
Vance speaks at Orbán rally in Hungary
White House ends protections for trans students in multiple school districts
Amendments to India’s transgender rights law criticized
Cuba under pressure and without answers
Police mental health struggles gain growing attention
Belarusian lawmakers approve bill to crackdown on LGBTQ rights
How new barriers to health care coverage are hitting D.C.
Kenyan advocacy groups launch LGBTQ voter mobilization campaign
Calendar: April 3-9
