News
Will the 6th Circuit allow Michigan marriages to continue?
Weddings halted until at least Wednesday, but no decision on stay pending appeal
The Sixth Circuit will consider whether to stay marriages in Michigan this week. (Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons)
Marriage equality advocates are watching the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals this week as it decides whether to stay same-sex weddings in Michigan or allow them to continue as the court considers marriage equality litigation.
Experts say the Sixth Circuit — and the Supreme Court if the stay request is appealed — have room to allow the Michigan same-sex weddings to continue because the Supreme Court’s stay on weddings following a similar ruling in Utah isn’t controlling and many district courts have now ruled in favor of marriage equality.
Shannon Minter, legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, was among those saying he doesn’t believe a stay is warranted in the case, known as DeBoer v. Snyder.
“The Supreme Court did not explain the reasons for its stay in the Utah case, so it provides little guidance and certainly should not be construed as requiring stays in other cases,” Minter said. “Utah was the first federal court in the country to strike down a state marriage ban post-Windsor, but many others have since followed suit, so the legal landscape is already quite different than when the Supreme Court issued a stay in that case.”
U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman, a Reagan appointee, issued the ruling striking down Michigan’s 2004 constitutional ban on same-sex marriages on Friday, but unlike similar rulings against laws in Texas, Virginia and Oklahoma, Friedman didn’t include a stay in his ruling.
Vickie Henry, a senior staff attorney at Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders who helped plaintiffs for the Michigan trial, said the lack of a stay from the judge came as no surprise given the concern he stated in his ruling for children raised by same-sex couples.
“At this point, all the recent decisions have all come out the same way,” Henry said. “So at some point I think you recognize there’s a high human cost, a high people cost, in the denial of these rights. I can’t speculate what he was thinking, but that seems like a great reason to not enter a stay.”
But Attorney General Bill Schuette filed a stay request before the Sixth Circuit to halt the same-sex marriages in Michigan as he and Gov. Rick Snyder filed notice they would file an appeal to the court.
After allowing plaintiffs the opportunity to respond to the stay request by Tuesday, the Sixth Circuit issued a temporary stay on the same-sex weddings until at least Wednesday — but only after an estimated 315 gay couples received marriage licenses on Saturday.
A similar situation has happened before just recently. After U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby struck down Utah’s marriage ban in the case of Kitchen v. Herbert, Gov. Gary Herbert sought a stay request from the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. The appeals court denied the stay, but the Supreme Court later instituted it after U.S. Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor referred the matter to the entire bench.
Henry said she thinks the same outcome won’t necessarily befall Michigan despite the stay from the Supreme Court in the Utah case.
“It’s not directly controlling,” Henry said. “In other words, the Sixth Circuit’s not bound by it, but it’s certainly suggestive to the court of what at least one member of the Supreme Court would want them to do.”
Equality Michigan is circulating a petition calling on Snyder and Schuette to drop their appeal of the ruling. As of Monday afternoon, the petition had more than 10,000 signatures.
“We must end the second-class treatment of LGBT families in Michigan,” the petition states. “Rather than siding with the people of Michigan, Schuette and Snyder are wasting taxpayer dollars defending a ban on marriage equality that harms Michigan families — and that the people of Michigan no longer even want.”
But now that the Michigan case has been appealed, all four states in the Sixth Circuit — Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee and Kentucky — have marriage equality cases before the appeals court.
The Sixth Circuit has ruled on an LGBT-relevant case before, but the outcome and the precedent it set wasn’t favorable to LGBT people.
In the case of Equality Federation v. Cincinnati, the court in 1996 upheld an anti-gay ordinance in Cincinnati forbidding the city from enforcing civil rights ordinances based on sexual orientation. The judges issued this decision despite the Supreme Court ruling in 1992 in Romer v. Evans, which found that a similar measure, Colorado’s Amendment 2, was unconstitutional.
But the Cincinnati ordinance has since been repealed in 2004, and that ruling was delivered years ago before the Supreme Court issued precedent protecting gay people in Lawrence and Windsor.
If the Sixth Circuit denies a stay, state officials could appeal the stay request to the Supreme Court justice responsible for stays in the Sixth Circuit: U.S. Associate Justice Elena Kagan. In that event, Kagan could refer the request to the entire court. If she declines a stay on her own, the state could ask any justice on the court for a stay, including anti-gay U.S. Associate Justice Antonin Scalia.
Jon Davidson, legal director for Lambda Legal, expressed uncertainty about whether the Supreme Court would take similar action as it did with the Utah same-sex marriages.
“The Supreme Court did not explain why they issued the stay in Kitchen previously, however, so there is no way of knowing for sure what motivated them to do that or whether a majority of them would do the same thing in the face of the tidal wave of decisions in favor of marriage equality that we are seeing in the lower courts,” Davidson said.
Not all legal experts foresee a possibility in which neither the Sixth Circuit nor the Supreme Court would refuse to grant a stay on same-sex weddings.
Nan Hunter, a lesbian law professor at Georgetown University, predicted the Supreme Court would continue to issue stays on same-sex marriages throughout the country until it delivers it final determination on same-sex marriage.
“My view is that the Supreme Court will continue to grant stays until they resolve a case on the merits,” Hunter said. “Earliest that is likely to happen is June 2015.”
In the event a stay is granted by either the Sixth Circuit or the Supreme Court, another question would emerge similar to the situation in Utah: Would the federal government and state of Michigan recognize the same-sex marriages already conducted in the state?
In Utah, the decision was split. Herbert announced that his state wouldn’t recognize the estimated 1,300 same-sex marriages conducted in Utah pending the final outcome of the litigation. But U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced the Obama administration would consider those marriages valid for the purposes of federal benefits. Several state attorneys general, including Maryland’s Doug Gansler, announced their states would also recognize the marriages.
According to the Associated Press, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder is holding off on the determination on whether his state will recognize the unions. His spokesperson is quoted as saying the governor will wait for a stay decision to be reached before deciding whether Michigan will recognize the marriages.
Ingham County Clerk Barb Byrum and East Lansing Mayor Nathan Triplett, who performed same-sex marriages in Michigan over the weekend, sent a letter Monday to Holder insisting the federal government should recognize those unions.
“Many of the couples that were married on March 22 waited decades for that opportunity,” Byrum and Triplett write. “Their marriages complied with Judge Friedman’s order and all relevant provisions of Michigan law and should be recognized as such by state and federal authorities without delay.”
The Justice Department didn’t yet have a definitive answer in response to the Washington Blade’s request to comment on whether the federal government will recognize same-sex marriages performed in Michigan.
“We are closely monitoring the situation,” said Allison Price, a Justice Department spokesperson.
State Department
Democracy Forward files FOIA request for State Department bathroom policy records
April 20 memo outlined anti-transgender rule
Democracy Forward on Tuesday filed a Freedom of Information Act request for records on the State Department’s new bathroom policy.
A memo titled “Updates Regarding Biological Sex and Intimate Spaces, Including Restrooms” that the State Department issued on April 20 notes employees can no longer use bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity.
“The administration affirms that there are two sexes — male and female — and that federal facilities should operate on this objective and longstanding basis to ensure consistency, privacy, and safety in shared spaces,” State Department spokesperson Tommy Piggot told the Daily Signal, a conservative news website that first reported on the memo. “In line with President Trump’s executive order this provides clear, uniform guidance to the department by grounding policy in biological sex as determined at birth.”
President Donald Trump shortly after he took office in January 2025 issued an executive order that directed the federal government to only recognize two genders: male and female. The sweeping directive also ordered federal government agencies to “effectuate this policy by taking appropriate action to ensure that intimate spaces designated for women, girls, or females (or for men, boys, or males) are designated by sex and not identity.”
Democracy Forward’s FOIA request that the Washington Blade exclusively obtained on Tuesday is specifically seeking a copy of the memo that details the State Department’s new bathroom policy. Democracy Forward has also requested “all” memo-specific communications between the State Department’s Bureau of Global Public Affairs and the Daily Signal from April 1-21.
Federal Government
House Republicans push nationwide ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill
Measures would restrict federal funding for LGBTQ-affirming schools
Republicans have been gaining ground in reshaping education policy to be less inclusive toward LGBTQ students at the state level, and now they are turning their focus to Capitol Hill.
Some GOP lawmakers are pushing for a nationwide “Don’t Say Gay” bill, doubling down on their commitment to being the party of “traditional family values” by excluding anyone who does not identify with their sex at birth.
The largest anti-LGBTQ education legislation to reach the House chamber is House Bill 2616 — the Parental Rights Over the Education and Care of Their Kids Act, or the PROTECT Kids Act. The PROTECT Kids Act, proposed by U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.), and co-sponsored by U.S. Reps. Burgess Owens (R-Utah), Mary Miller (R-Ill.), Robert Onder (R-Mo.), and Kevin Kiley (R-Calif.), would require any public elementary and middle schools that receive federal funding to require parental consent to change a child’s gender expression in school.
The bill, which was discussed during Tuesday’s House Rules Committee hearing, would specifically require any schools that get federal money from the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 — which was created to minimize financial discrepancies in education for low-income students — to get parental approval before identifying any child’s gender identity as anything other than what was provided to the school initially. This includes getting approval before allowing children to use their preferred locker room or bathroom.
It reads that any school receiving this funding “shall obtain parental consent before changing a covered student’s (1) gender markers, pronouns, or preferred name on any school form; or (2) sex-based accommodations, including locker rooms or bathrooms.”
LGBTQ rights advocates have criticized both national and state efforts to require parental permission to use a child’s preferred gender identity, as it raises issues of at-home safety — especially if the home is not LGBTQ-affirming — and could lead to the outing of transgender or gender-curious students.
A follow-up bill, HB 2617, proposed by Owens, one of the bill’s co-sponsors, prevents the use of federal funding to “advance concepts related to gender ideology,” using the definition from President Donald Trump’s 2025 Executive Order 14168, making that an enshrined definition in law of sex rather than just by executive order. There is also a bill making its way through the senate with the same text— Senate Bill 2251.
Advocates have also criticized this follow-up legislation, as it would restrict school staff — including teachers and counselors — from acknowledging trans students’ identities or providing any support. They have said that this kind of isolation can worsen mental health outcomes for LGBTQ youth and allows for education to be politicized rather than being based in reality.
David Stacy, the Human Rights Campaign’s vice president of government affairs, called this legislation out for using LGBTQ children as political pawns in an ideology fight — one that could greatly harm the safety of these children if passed.
“Trans kids are not a political agenda — they are students who deserve safety and affirmation at school like anyone else,” Stacy said in a statement. “Despite the many pressing issues facing our nation, House Republicans continue their bizarre obsession with trans people. H.R. 2616 does not protect children. It targets them. This bill is cruel, and we’re prepared to fight it.”
This is similar to Florida House Bills 1557 and 1069, referred to as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill and “Don’t Say They” bill, respectively, restricting classroom discussions on sexual orientation and gender identity, prohibiting the use of pronouns consistent with one’s gender identity, expanding book banning procedures, and censoring health curriculum.
The American Civil Liberties Union is tracking 233 bills related to restricting student and educator rights in the U.S.
Botswana’s government has repealed a provision of its colonial-era penal code that criminalized consensual same-sex sexual relations.
The country’s High Court in 2019 struck down the provision. The Batswana government in 2022 said it would abide by the ruling after country’s Court of Appeals upheld it.
The government on March 26 announced the repeal of the penal code’s “unnatural offenses” section that specifically referenced any person who “has carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature” and “permits any other person to have carnal knowledge of him or her against the order of nature.”
Lesbians, Gays and Bisexuals of Botswana, a Batswana advocacy group known by the acronym LEGABIBO, challenged the criminalization law with the support of the Southern Africa Litigation Center. LEGABIBO in a statement it posted to its Facebook on April 25 welcomed the repeal.
“For many, these provisions were not just words on paper — they were lived realities,” said LEGABIBO. “They affected access to healthcare, safety, employment, and the freedom to love and exist openly.”
“LEGABIBO believes that the deletion of these sections is a necessary and long-overdue step toward restoring dignity and aligning our legal framework with constitutional values of equality and human rights,” it added. “It is a clear message that LGBTIQ+ persons are not criminals, and that their lives and relationships deserve protection, not punishment.”
LEGABIBO further stressed that “while this does not erase the harm of the past, it creates space for healing, inclusion, and continued progress toward full equality.”
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Botswana repeals colonial-era sodomy law
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