National
Obama speechwriter reflects on marriage ruling, Charleston shooting in new book
Cody Keenan revisits 10 critical days from unique vantage point

Cody Keenan, director of speechwriting for President Obama, had a prominent vantage point in the White House during an eventful 10 days that included recovery from a violent memory underscoring lingering issues with racism.
Those 10 days, which saw the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in favor of same-sex marriage and upholding Obamacare as well as Obama’s speech in the aftermath of a racist shooting at a Black church in Charleston, are now encapsulated in his new book, “Grace: Barack Obama and Ten Days in the Battle for America.”
The Washington Blade spoke with Keenan about his book in an interview on Tuesday that includes an exchange the author and this reporter shared from different perspectives during Obama’s speech in the Rose Garden after the Supreme Court’s ruling for same-sex marriage.
Read the full interview below:
Blade: Why was the time now for this book?
Cody Keenan: There’s a couple of reasons for that. No. 1 is sort of technical. I was still working for President Obama up until the beginning of 2021. And so I didn’t feel appropriate to start writing a book that’s largely about him as long as he was paying me. So that’s the technical answer.
The other is I’d just been rolling these 10 days around in my head for a while. You know, it doesn’t coalesce all at once. You don’t wake up in the morning after marriage equality and Charleston and say, “OK, I’m going to write a book.” It really took the Trump years to actually crystallize it in my head because suddenly we were living through the opposite. We come through this kind of amazing 10-day burst of progress. That, of course, is not limited to 10 days. It was a result of decades of effort, and then the backlash to it. It makes it seem all that more sharp.
Blade: I think our viewers are going to be very interested in the discussion on the marriage ruling and the potential outcomes that you depict in the book. Looks like there was a lot of anxiety behind closed doors about the decision as well as the possible decision on the Affordable Care Act. Do you think that anxiety was shared by President Obama?
Cody Keenan: I’ll never know for certain. He didn’t show his hand like that. He never looked at the drafts we wrote the kind of ‘in case of emergency break glass’ drafts. He just he never did. Not on election nights, not on Supreme Court rulings. It’s not that he’s cocky, he was confident. I think it was more confident in the ACA decision because he knew that it shouldn’t have been there in the first place. So, I don’t so I don’t know how he felt about the marriage equality ruling coming in. I know how he felt about it after the fact. You can watch his remarks on YouTube, which are pretty extraordinary.
They were fairly short as written and then he decided to keep going, which is always interesting as a speech writer, knowing that the remarks are over. I love watching him ad lib, but when the remarks are over, and he just keeps going and there’s no runway to land that plane and that’s always a little interesting. On the page, it’s not a lot but he was really thinking as he was saying the words, as he was tying it to the countless small acts of courage with people who came out and parents who love their kids in return, people who just who made this happen through decades of efforts. And then, he tied this into Bobby Kennedy, which is really exciting. So that was kind of fascinating to watch.
I’ve always thought that he was genuinely moved by the fact that America had come so far and, relatively speaking, so fast on the equal rights issue like that. … I asked him later why he ad-libbed all that and why he was talking so slowly. He just he said he was up too late, reworking my speech, which isn’t true, because he gave it back to me like 11 p.m. But no, I think he was genuinely proud of the country, and then a whole lot of people at that point.
Blade: Yeah, I remember that day very well because I was actually right in front of Obama as he was giving those remarks. I’m a White House reporter, so I wanted to be able to see these remarks firsthand. I was at the Supreme Court and I rushed back to the White House. I actually missed the call time just by ever so slightly but a when the White House staffer saw me there, she escorted me to the Rose Garden. And I was seated there, then press saw me there and they knew how important it was to me so they allowed me to take the seat in the front row where normally the major news stations sit. I was a few feet away from Obama, as he was saying those words.
Keenan: Oh wow. Well, this isn’t a two-way interview, obviously, but I’d be very curious afterwards as to how you were feeling that morning before and then.
Blade: For me, it was a very surreal and very powerful experience to have this issue that has been a really important issue for so many people, and really animated my work for so long, to more or less reach its conclusion. And one thing that really stood out to me was it just seems to me like when I was writing about marriage equality, it was really of interest to a certain group of people and other people really weren’t that interested. But on that day, it was a reminder that that wasn’t the case. Because remember, President Obama gave his remarks and then the entire White House staff circled around the perimeter of the Rose Garden and gave applause and it was just it was very touching, very moving. I don’t think they did that for the ACA speech. It struck me just how powerful it was because people wanted to embrace that decision with that reaction.
Keenan: The difference there is that we had ā this is who people are, we had so many colleagues that ā I just dreaded the idea of having to look a colleague in the eye or a friend had it gone the other way. There was anxiety and we were also relieved and excited that it went the right way. There was anxiety that morning. I guess I can always speak for myself, but as a Democrat and as a Chicago sports fan, I am never satisfied until it’s overā¦I’m always hopeful we’re gonna win, but I don’t ever expect. So until that really came down, I was pretty anxious for sure.
Blade: Was there anything during that speech that surprised you. I think you said Obama said a few things you didn’t think he was going to say but just anything that otherwise happened that just really opened your eyes on that either after the ruling or in his remarks?
Kennan: The remarks didn’t surprise meā¦I just thought it was so interesting that he kept going. He always gave long speeches, but for a speech to be over on paper and for him to not want to stop. You know, he didn’t want to stop and just wanted to say more, and I thought that was so fascinating and awesome and exciting, and then obviously five minutes after that we need to head down to Charleston.
Blade: I do want to ask you about Charleston, but one thing I want to ask you about was that was the night that the White House was lit up in rainbow colors. And I’m just wondering if you were part of the discussion, if you aware of that, if you remember your reaction to that?
Keenan: I was not a part of the discussion. I didn’t know what was going to happen until that morning or the morning after, I can’t remember. We were on the Rose Garden for the remarks, and Denis McDonough came up and told me, “God, that’s cool.” It’s one of those things where you wish you thought of it because it seems so obvious. I’ve talked to a lot of people for this book. I talked to Jeff Tiller and Tina Tchen. [Jeff Tiller was an Obama White House LGBTQ media liaison.] And one of the coolest things Jeff told me was he was the one that kind of spearheaded this whole thing and found funding for it, found quotes from contractors and was out there kind of tearing his hair out when the lights weren’t necessarily working.
But the coolest thing he said is they were talking about what to do if the Supreme Court ruled the other way. Do they light it up? And Jeff said, “Yeah, it’s even more important then.”
Blade: That’s definitely something that was planned for. I was really surprised at how they were able to keep it under wraps for so long. It was a surprise to everyone I think.
Keenan: The only bummer is that Obama was gonna fly around the front of the White House on Maine One to look at it. But I don’t think anybody remembered this was like the longest week of the year daylight-wise. So we’ve been back for maybe two hours before it actually started, before colors actually started getting visible.
Blade: So on the Charleston speech, a much more somber moment, do you think having the nation’s first Black president at the time offered us something unique in that moment?
Keenan: Sure. I talk a lot about how difficult it was to write about race just because we haven’t all lived the same experiences. It may have actually been more difficult to write that speech had it been for a white president to deliver. The fact that a Black president gave that eulogy was pretty remarkable. It’s not just that he is a walking sign of progress and change, and a lot of people didn’t like that, hence some of the backlash we’re living in now.
ā¦.He can speak to race and the possibilities of reconciliation and change, I think, more so than a white president could have in that moment. It’d be easy for a white president to just condemn it, but for a Black president to go up and find the words is easier symbolically. It might have been more difficult on the page. I really don’t know. But it was a quintessential hit, what he did to the text, using the lyrics to Amazing Grace to kind of create the space for people to change their minds, the space for people to ā the whole song was written by a slave owner who changed his ways, to repent. And it’s sort of the same thing, if anything’s ever going to wake us up to the long legacy of racism and to what gun violence is doing, that’s what the Confederate flag means to some people. It has to be this. So in some ways, I don’t know the answer as to whether it be easier or harder, but he did bring something unique to it just by virtue of his experience.
Blade: Did you think the Charleston shooting represented the last dying breath of racism in the United States, or that it was a prelude of things to come?
Keenan: I don’t think either. I could see the argument for each but I don’t think either. We’ve obviously endured racial violence for centuries. A Black church was set on fire in Massachusetts the day Obama was elected. He had more threats against him than any other president. It’s what we live with. So it definitely wasn’t the start, and it’s not the end. I mean, in a lot of ways, the fact that Donald Trump announced his candidacy the day before the shooting, it’s just kind of an awful reminder that a president’s words can unleash a lot of bad things, and at their best they can inspire the best in people, at their worst they can turn people against each other and kind of let loose the country’s worst demons and create permission structure for people to act out their political violence.
What kind of linked those things that week, and even Obamacare to a lesser extent, is who are we? Do we stand up to white supremacy and bigotry? Or do we allow this to continue, do we allow state legislators to fly the Confederate flag over where Black people live and work and worship? Do we allow the Supreme Court to basically codify bigotry by saying, “No, you can’t get married”? Do we allow them to say sorry to millions of poor people and working people you don’t get to have health insurance unless you’re wealthy? And like all those things just came to a head in the same week.
Blade: So my final question for you is what kind of impact would you like for your book to have?
Keenan: There’s kind of three buckets here. One is first I really do think it’s an important story to tell for history. I want people to read about this some day as this kind of amazing spasm of progress that is not due to one president, but to two generations of people who marched and fought and bled for this. I also teach speech writing at Northwestern, I want young people who are in college now and look at politics and think, “Why would I want to do that?” and change their minds. I want them to think this is a place that’s worth my time and effort. It can actually be fulfilling and collegial and fun.
And anyone else myself included who’s started to feel really cynical in recent years, and there’s plenty of reasons for it, I wanted to throw that up. I’ve gotten some of the greatest feedback so far from a couple strangers who reached out to say they sign up to knock on doors and one of my former colleagues texted this morning to say just reminded me in politics in the first place, and that’s what I want. I want people to read it and say, “You know what, for all the awfulness out there and for the act of undermining of our democracy and the heinous cruelty, we’re still in charge.”
{Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited for length.]
The White House
USCIS announces it now only recognizes ‘two biological sexes’
Immigration agency announced it has implemented Trump executive order

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on Wednesday announced it now only “recognizes two biological sexes, male and female.”
A press release notes this change to its policies is “consistent with” the “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” executive order that President Donald Trump signed shortly after he took office for the second time on Jan. 20.
āThere are only two sexes ā male and female,ā said DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin in a statement. “President Trump promised the American people a revolution of common sense, and that includes making sure that the policy of the U.S. government agrees with simple biological reality.”
“Proper management of our immigration system is a matter of national security, not a place to promote and coddle an ideology that permanently harms children and robs real women of their dignity, safety, and well-being,ā she added.
The press release notes USCIS “considers a personās sex as that which is generally evidenced on the birth certificate issued at or nearest to the time of birth.”
“If the birth certificate issued at or nearest to the time of birth indicates a sex other than male or female, USCIS will base the determination of sex on secondary evidence,” it reads.
The USCIS Policy Manuel defines “secondary evidence” as “evidence that may demonstrate a fact is more likely than not true, but the evidence does not derive from a primary, authoritative source.”
“Records maintained by religious or faith-based organizations showing that a person was divorced at a certain time are an example of secondary evidence of the divorce,” it says.
USCIS in its press release notes it “will not deny benefits solely because the benefit requestor did not properly indicate his or her sex.”
āThis is a cruel and unnecessary policy that puts transgender, nonbinary, and intersex immigrants in danger,” said Immigration Equality Law and Policy Director Bridget Crawford on Wednesday. “The U.S. government is now forcing people to carry identity documents that do not reflect who they are, opening them up to increased discrimination, harassment, and violence. This policy does not just impact individuals ā it affects their ability to travel, work, access healthcare, and live their lives authentically.” Ā
“By denying trans people the right to self-select their gender, the government is making it harder for them to exist safely and with dignity,” added Crawford. “This is not about ācommon senseāāit is about erasing an entire community from the legal landscape. Transgender, nonbinary, and intersex people have always existed, and they deserve to have their identities fully recognized and respected. We will continue to fight for the rights of our clients and for the reversal of this discriminatory policy.āĀ
Federal Government
Mass HHS layoffs include HIV/AIDS prevention, policy teams
Democratic states sue over cuts

Tuesday began a series of mass layoffs targeting staff, departments, and whole agencies within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who reportedly plans to cut a total of 10,000 jobs.
On the chopping block, according to reports this week, is the Office of Infectious Disease and HIV/AIDS Policy. A fact sheet explaining on the restructuring says “a new Administration for a Healthy America (AHA) will consolidate the OASH, HRSA, SAMHSA, ATSDR, and NIOSH, so as to more efficiently coordinate chronic care and disease prevention programs and harmonize health resources to low-income Americans.”
The document indicates that “Divisions of AHA include Primary Care, Maternal and Child Health, Mental Health, Environmental Health, HIV/AIDS, and Workforce, with support of the U.S. Surgeon General and Policy team.”
“Today, the Trump administration eliminated the staff of several CDC HIV prevention offices, including entire offices conducting public health communication campaigns, modeling and behavioral surveillance, capacity building, and non-lab research,” said a press release Tuesday by the HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute.
The organization also noted the “reassignments” of Jonathan Mermin, director of the National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, and Jeanne Marrazzo, director of the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Both were moved to the Indian Health Service.
āIn a matter of just a couple days, we are losing our nationās ability to prevent HIV,” said HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute Executive Director Carl Schmid. “The expertise of the staff, along with their decades of leadership, has now been destroyed and cannot be replaced. We will feel the impacts of these decisions for years to come and it will certainly, sadly, translate into an increase in new HIV infections and higher medical costs.”
The group added, “We are still learning the full extent of the staff cuts and do not know how the administrationās announced reorganization of HHS will impact all HIV treatment, prevention, and research programs, including President Trumpās Ending the HIV Epidemic initiative,” but “At the moment, it seems that we are in the middle of a hurricane and just waiting for the next shoe to drop.”
A group of 500 HIV advocates announced a rally planned for Wednesday morning at 8 a.m., at the U.S. Capitol lawn across from the Cannon House Office Building, which aims to urge Congress to help stop the cuts at HHS.
“Over 500 advocates will rally on Capitol Hill and meet with members of Congress and Hill staff to advocate for maintaining a strong HIV response and detail the potential impact of cuts to and reorganization of HIV prevention and treatment programs,” the groups wrote.
The press release continued, “HHS has stated that it is seeking to cut 10,000 employees, among them 2,400 CDC employees, many doing critical HIV work. It also seeks to merge HIV treatment programming into a new agency raising concerns about maintaining resources for and achieving the outstanding outcomes of the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program.”
On Tuesday a group of Democratic governors and attorneys general from 23 states and D.C. filed a lawsuit against HHS and Kennedy seeking a temporary restraining order and injunctive relief to halt the funding cuts.
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention withdrew approximately $11.4 billion in funding for state and community health departments during the COVID-19 pandemic response, along with $1 billion to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
āSlashing this funding now will reverse our progress on the opioid crisis, throw our mental health systems into chaos, and leave hospitals struggling to care for patients,ā New York Attorney General Letitia James said.
State Department
Former US envoy for global LGBTQ, intersex rights slams Trump
Former President Joe Biden appointed Jessica Stern in 2021

Jessica Stern, the former special U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights, says the work that she and her colleagues did under the Biden-Harris administration is “being systematically dismantled.”
“As the person who was responsible for leading U.S. foreign policy on LGBTQI+ issues, it’s been very difficult for the past two months to see that work being systematically dismantled,” she told the Washington Blade on March 19 during a telephone interview.
Stern was the executive director of Outright International, a global LGBTQ and intersex advocacy group, when then-President Joe Biden appointed her in June 2021.
The promotion of LGBTQ and intersex rights was a cornerstone of the Biden-Harris administration’s overall foreign policy. These efforts specifically included the decriminalization of consensual same-sex sexual relations and marriage equality efforts in countries where activists said they were possible through the legislative or judicial processes.
The Trump-Vance administration’s decision to freeze most U.S. foreign aid spending for at least 90 days has had a devastating impact on the global LGBTQ and intersex rights movement. President Donald Trump’s executive order that bans the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers has prompted Germany and several other European countries to issue travel advisories for transgender and nonbinary people who are planning to visit the U.S.
Stern said the Trump-Vance administration “has studied the anti-LGBTQI strategies of other countries and basically imported the worst ideas from around the world: The most violent, the most dehumanizing, the most targeting strategies.” Stern added these policies have emboldened Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor OrbĆ”n, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Argentine President Javier Milei and other anti-LGBTQ heads of state.
“It’s one thing when a small country that has limited global reach implements anti-LGBTQI laws and policies. It’s another thing when one of the world’s superpowers does so,” Stern told the Blade. “There’s no question that the U.S.’s regression on LGBTQI rights is actually going to accelerate backlash against LGBTQI people around the world.”
“We provide political legitimacy to those ideas, but also we’re forging new alliances and coalitions, and we’re pushing these ideas on other countries,” she added. “So, it’s not a passive action. The U.S. government currently is actively funding and disseminating anti-LGBTQI hatred around the world.”
Former State Department colleagues ‘afraid every day’
The Trump-Vance administration in a Feb. 3 statement that defended its efforts to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development noted examples of the organization’s “waste and abuse” included $2 million for “sex changes and ‘LGBT activism'” in Guatemala and $1.5 million to “advance diversity, equity and inclusion in Serbia’s workplaces and business communities.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio last month said 83 percent of USAID contracts have been cancelled, and the remaining will “now be administered more effectively under the State Department.”
Rubio after the Trump-Vance administration froze nearly all U.S. foreign aid spending issued a waiver that allowed the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and other “life-saving humanitarian assistance” programs to continue to operate.
The Blade has previouslyĀ reportedĀ PEPFAR-funded programs in Kenya, South Africa, and elsewhere have suspended services and even shut down because of a lack of U.S. funding. UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima on March 24 said 6.3 million more people around the world will die of AIDS-related complications over the next four years if the U.S. does not fully restore its foreign assistance.
Stern said her former State Department colleagues are “afraid every day.”
“They never know, ‘Am I going to be fired today?’ “Am I going to be put on administrative leave?’,” she said. “I cannot even imagine what it’s like to go to work every day.”
Stern told the Blade her former colleagues tell her that “there’s not a lot of foreign policy work happening because there’s so much disruption being caused by DOGE (the Department of Government Efficiency).”
“Entire departments have been decimated,” she said, noting one of them has lost 60 people. “It’s almost inconceivable to figure out how to restructure your work when your resources have been decimated.”

Stern described herself as “an eternal optimist” when the Blade asked whether she thinks the U.S. can ever stand for LGBTQ and intersex rights abroad.
“You have to believe in human rights,” she said.
Stern said former Secretary of State Antony Blinken as “an ally on LGBTQI issues.” Stern also said many of her now former State Department colleagues thanked her and her team for their work before they left government.
“There’s so much compassion from straight and cisgendered allies, from career officials, people that are not human rights experts or specialists, people that don’t focus on the well-being of LGBTQI people, but people that care very much about the United States standing for its values, the rule of law, equality for all, and this notion that it is in our national interest to ensure that there is safety, prosperity, and well-being for people around the world,” she said.
“The situation we find ourselves in will not last forever,” added Stern. “What we have to do is figure out how to hold the line right now, and how to organize for the future.”
She stressed ways to “hold the line” include litigation, protests, letters-to-the-editor, demanding accountability from lawmakers.
“There’s so much to do,” said Stern.

Stern is currently teaching at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, and is writing about her experience as the “first-ever human rights expert to be the special U.S. envoy for LGBTQI rights.” Stern also told the Blade that she is working to launch a new organization.
“I love being an activist again,” she said. “If there was ever a time when activists are needed, it’s now.”
“I am really proud to have rejoined the resistance,” added Stern.
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