National
Gay Obama officials, HRC named in ‘racketeering’ lawsuit
Former Bush official Scott Bloch sues 25 people and groups
Two gay Obama administration officials and the Human Rights Campaign were lumped in as defendants with former Bush administration operative Karl Rove and more than a dozen others in a federal racketeering lawsuit filed by anti-gay Bush official Scott Bloch.
John Berry, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (Blade photo by Michael Key)
The 64-page lawsuit, filed last week in Fairfax County Circuit Court, charges the defendants – including former GOP Congressman Tom Davis of Virginia – with conspiring to force Bloch out of his job as head of the U.S. Office of Special Counsel through a trumped up criminal investigation.
News of the lawsuit, which was first reported by Courthouse News Services, hasn’t been widely reported in major news media outlets.
Bloch and his wife, who is a party to the suit, are seeking $102 million in compensatory damages and $100 million in punitive damages.
Bloch, who served as director of the Office of Special Counsel from 2004 to October 2008, pleaded guilty in April 2010 to a charge of contempt of Congress. The guilty plea followed a lengthy investigation that included an FBI raid on his office and home in May 2008.
The investigation stemmed from allegations that Bloch improperly sought to purge employees in his office who disagreed with him and later sought to cover up possible wrong-doing by hiring a computer services company to “scrub” files from his government office computer.
A federal judge in Washington sentenced him on March 30 to one month in jail in connection with his guilty plea but agreed to stay the sentence while Bloch appeals it on grounds that he didn’t know the contempt of Congress law carries a mandatory minimum jail term of 30 days.
The gay Obama administration officials named in Bloch’s suit are John Berry, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, and Elaine Kaplan, OPM’s general counsel. Kaplan preceded Bloch as head of the Office of Special Counsel during the Clinton administration.
While working as an attorney in private practice after her term ended as U.S. Special Counsel, Kaplan joined others who criticized Bloch for dismantling LGBT-supportive policies at the Special Counsel’s office that Kaplan established there.
Kaplan and others argued that an existing U.S. civil service law protected federal workers from discrimination based solely on their sexual orientation through a provision that barred bias for non-work related factors. Bloch, upon taking office after being appointed by President George W. Bush, reversed Kaplan’s policies, saying he disputed the assumption that the civil service law could be interpreted to bar discrimination based on sexual orientation.
In his lawsuit, Bloch alleges that the Bush White House demanded that he back off from reversing Kaplan’s polices at the Office of Special Counsel, saying White House aides threatened to arrange for his dismissal if he failed to comply with their request.
Bloch and his wife, who are representing themselves in the case, filed their suit under a federal statute called the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO. The statute allows both criminal and civil charges to be brought in cases where the government or a private party alleges that others conspired to commit an illegal act or to damage a person or a business through a “criminal enterprise.”
Other parties named as defendants in the lawsuit include the Executive Office of the President, the Office of Special Counsel, the National Treasury Employees Union, and several government watchdog groups, including the Government Accountability Project.
Elaine Kaplan, OPM's general counsel (Blade photo by Michael Key)
In his lawsuit, Bloch names Berry as a defendant only in his capacity as director of the Office of Personnel Management, making no allegations that Berry played a role in Bloch’s forced resignation as head of the Office of Special Council during the Bush administration.
However, Bloch repeatedly alleges in the lawsuit that OPM as a government agency “conspired” with others in the Bush administration to force his ouster because, among other things, he was investigating possible breaches of government ethics rules by Bush White House staffers, including Karl Rove, and officials with other government agencies.
The lawsuit alleges that Kaplan was a party to the alleged effort to oust him from his post as head of the Office of Special Counsel in her role as general counsel to the National Treasury Employees Union, which opposed Bloch’s policies and practices at the OSC. Kaplan became general counsel to NTEU shortly after her five-year term as head of the Office of Special Counsel ended.
The lawsuit alleges that Kaplan joined other organizations and individuals who disagreed with Bloch’s policies and sought his removal.
It says the Human Rights Campaign was among several outside groups that Kaplan and others worked with to discredit Bloch and “conspire” to oust him from office. During his tenure as head of the Office of Special Counsel, HRC criticized Bloch for rolling back his office’s protections for gay federal workers.
“We don’t believe this case has any merit,” said HRC spokesperson Fred Sainz.
“[F]rom 2005 to the present, both as counsel for National Treasury Employees Union, and plaintiffs are informed and believe and thereon allege, that in her current role as general counsel of OPM, [Kaplan] is conspiring with or has conspired with third parties to damage plaintiffs as hereinafter alleged, improperly, illegally, and against the Ethics in Government Act, both as to her involvement in previous issues as Special Counsel of the OSC, and as general counsel of OPM with conflicts of interest, personal and official, and to conspire to harm plaintiffs…,” Bloch says in his lawsuit.
The lawsuit charges that Kaplan and those she allegedly conspired with sought to “disrupt official investigations, undermine official functions in the Office of Special Counsel, divert loyalty of employees away from Scott Bloch, and otherwise seek to undermine and harm plaintiffs in their reputation and family life.”
Berry and Kaplan or a spokesperson for the Office of Personnel Management couldn’t be immediately reached for comment on the lawsuit.
The lawsuit can be read in its entirety on the Courthouse News Service website: http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/04/29/Bloch.pdf
U.S. Federal Courts
Federal judge blocks Trump passport executive order
State Department can no longer issue travel documents with ‘X’ gender markers
A federal judge on Friday ruled in favor of a group of transgender and nonbinary people who have filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s executive order that bans the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers.
The Associated Press notes U.S. District Judge Julia Kobick in Boston issued a preliminary injunction against the directive. The American Civil Liberties Union, which represents the plaintiffs, in a press release notes Kobick concluded Trump’s executive order “is likely unconstitutional and in violation of the law.”
“The preliminary injunction requires the State Department to allow six transgender and nonbinary people to obtain passports with sex designations consistent with their gender identity while the lawsuit proceeds,” notes the ACLU. “Though today’s court order applies only to six of the plaintiffs in the case, the plaintiffs plan to quickly file a motion asking the court to certify a class of people affected by the State Department policy and to extend the preliminary injunction to that entire class.”
Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken in June 2021 announced the State Department would begin to issue gender-neutral passports and documents for American citizens who were born overseas.
Dana Zzyym, an intersex U.S. Navy veteran who identifies as nonbinary, in 2015 filed a federal lawsuit against the State Department after it denied their application for a passport with an “X” gender marker. Zzyym in October 2021 received the first gender-neutral American passport.
The State Department policy took effect on April 11, 2022. Trump signed his executive order shortly after he took office in January.
Germany, Denmark, Finland, and the Netherlands are among the countries that have issued travel advisories for trans and nonbinary people who plan to visit the U.S.
“This ruling affirms the inherent dignity of our clients, acknowledging the immediate and profound negative impact that the Trump administration’s passport policy would have on their ability to travel for work, school, and family,” said ACLU of Massachusetts Legal Director Jessie Rossman after Kobick issued her ruling.
“By forcing people to carry documents that directly contradict their identities, the Trump administration is attacking the very foundations of our right to privacy and the freedom to be ourselves,” added Rossman. “We will continue to fight to rescind this unlawful policy for everyone so that no one is placed in this untenable and unsafe position.”
State Department
HIV/AIDS activists protest at State Department, demand full PEPFAR funding restoration
Black coffins placed in front of Harry S. Truman Building
Dozens of HIV/AIDS activists on Thursday gathered in front of the State Department and demanded the Trump-Vance administration fully restore President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief funding.
Housing Works CEO Charles King, Health GAP Executive Director Asia Russell, Human Rights Campaign Senior Public Policy Advocate Matthew Rose, and others placed 206 black Styrofoam coffins in front of the State Department before the protest began.
King said more than an estimated 100,000 people with HIV/AIDS will die this year if PEPFAR funding is not fully restored.
“If we continue to not provide the PEPFAR funding to people living in low-income countries who are living with HIV or at risk, we are going to see millions and millions of deaths as well as millions of new infections,” added King.
Then-President George W. Bush in 2003 signed legislation that created PEPFAR.
The Trump-Vance administration in January froze nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending for at least 90 days. Secretary of State Marco Rubio later issued a waiver that allows the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS relief and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate during the freeze.
The Washington Blade has previously reported PEPFAR-funded programs in Kenya and other African countries have been forced to suspend services and even shut down because of a lack of U.S. funding. Two South African organizations — OUT LGBT Well-being and Access Chapter 2 — that received PEPFAR funding through the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in recent weeks closed down HIV-prevention programs and other services to men who have sex with men.
Rubio last month said 83 percent of USAID contracts have been cancelled. He noted the State Department will administer those that remain in place “more effectively.”
“PEPFAR represents the best of us, the dignity of our country, of our people, of our shared humanity,” said Rose.
Russell described Rubio as “ignorant and incompetent” and said “he should be fired.”
“What secretary of state in 90 days could dismantle what the brilliance of AIDS activism created side-by-side with George W. Bush? What kind of fool could do that? I’ll tell you who, the boss who sits in the Harry S. Truman Building, Marco Rubio,” said Russell.
U.S. Military/Pentagon
Pentagon urged to reverse Naval Academy book ban
Hundreds of titles discussing race, gender, and sexuality pulled from library shelves
Lambda Legal and the Legal Defense Fund issued a letter on Tuesday urging U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to reverse course on a policy that led to the removal of 381 books from the Nimitz Library of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.
Pursuant to President Donald Trump’s executive order 14190, “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling,” the institution screened 900 titles to identify works promoting “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” removing those that concerned or touched upon “topics pertaining to the experiences of people of color, especially Black people, and/or LGBTQ people,” according to a press release from the civil rights organizations.
These included “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou, “Stone Fruit” by Lee Lai, “The Hate U Give” by Angie Thomas, “Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong” by James W. Loewen, “Gender Queer: A Memoir” by Maia Kobabe, and “Democracy in Black: How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul” by Eddie S. Glaude, Jr.
The groups further noted that “the collection retained other books with messages and themes that privilege certain races and religions over others, including ‘The Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan’ by Thomas Dixon, Jr., ‘Mein Kampf’ by Adolf Hitler, and ‘Heart of Darkness’ by Joseph Conrad.
In their letter, Lambda Legal and LDF argued the books must be returned to circulation to preserve the “constitutional rights” of cadets at the institution, warning of the “danger” that comes with “censoring materials based on viewpoints disfavored by the current administration.”
“Such censorship is especially dangerous in an educational setting, where critical inquiry, intellectual diversity, and exposure to a wide array of perspectives are necessary to educate future citizen-leaders,” Lambda Legal Chief Legal Officer Jennifer C. Pizer and LDF Director of Strategic Initiatives Jin Hee Lee said in the press release.
‘Pronoun Trouble’ reminds us that punctuation matters
Federal judge blocks Trump passport executive order
Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington to celebrate Spring Affair honorees
Goodlander endorses Pappas’s Senate bid
Local attorney, LGBTQ rights advocate Dale Sanders dies at 75
Gay Venezuelan makeup artist remains in El Salvador mega prison
HIV/AIDS activists protest at State Department, demand full PEPFAR funding restoration
Science must not be a weapon against trans people
Md. schools plan to comply with federal DEI demands
US lists transgender Brazilian congresswoman’s gender as ‘male’ on visa
-
El Salvador4 days agoGay Venezuelan makeup artist remains in El Salvador mega prison
-
State Department3 days agoHIV/AIDS activists protest at State Department, demand full PEPFAR funding restoration
-
Opinions5 days agoScience must not be a weapon against trans people
-
Maryland5 days agoMd. schools plan to comply with federal DEI demands