News
LGBT group joins call to ‘honor with action’ victims of gun violence
Family of victims tell stories day after House passes concealed carry bill
Rep. John Larson is joined y gun control advocates at a news conference (Washington Blade photo by Chris Johnson)
One day after the U.S. House approved legislation allowing concealed carry of firearms across state lines, gun control advocates — including an LGBT group — took to Capitol Hill to decry the move and to “honor with action” the lives of Americans lost to ongoing gun violence.
Representing an LGBT voice at the news conference Thursday was Taylor Houston, communications director for the Pride Fund to End Gun Violence.
Houston recalled the massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Fla., was once the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history, but things have changed with the mass shooting in Las Vegas, which this year surpassed the death toll in Orlando, as well as other incidents.
“America is the only developed country in this entire world that faces this public health crisis,” Houston said. “We’re supposed to be leading the world when it comes to the quality of life that we ensure our citizens.”
Houston said the United States has experienced 1,500 mass shootings since the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012 and 142 of them have been school shootings.
“So we’re fighting here with Pride Fund, we’re fighting with gun safety measures everyday with everything that we have,” Houston said. “We’re doing it for the 20 children that were gunned down an six staffers in the room of Sandy Hook, we’re doing it for the Pulse victims and 58 Las Vegas and the other 33,000 Americans who will lose their lives this year.”
During a somber portion of the news conference, family and friends of the victims of gun violence stood up to the podium one by one to name the victim they knew and called on Congress to “honor with action” their memory.
Among them were parents who lost their daughter at the 2012 theater shooting in Aurora, Colo., individuals who lost loved to suicide by gun death, a parent whose daughter was shot in the heart in a mass shooting, parents whose daughter who shot several times during a 2010 home invasion in Portland, Maine, a pastor whose mother was shot and killed in front her other daughters and whose niece was lost to gun violence, and a mother who lost her son to gun violence while he out celebrating graduation from paramedic school.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), who has made gun safety a signature issue, the stories were an “impossible act to follow,” but took the opportunity to lament legislative inaction and accused Congress of letting the violence happen.
“Congress has unfortunately become complicit in these murders because our silence has started to look like an endorsement,” Murphy said. “People notice when the leaders of this country do nothing in the face of slaughter, after slaughter, after slaughter.”
But Murphy cited a number of factors which he said indicate things are changing, such as Democratic victories on Election Day 2017 in Virginia after voters cited gun violence as their No. 2 reason for going to the polls.
On Tuesday, the House passed legislation, 231-198, that would allow people with permits for carrying concealed handguns to do so in other states that allow concealed weapons. The interstate concealed carry would require an individual to carry a valid government-issued photo ID and be lawfully licensed to possess a concealed handgun.
The package also contained a measure that would ensure authorities report criminal history records to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, penalizing agencies that don’t report them to the FBI.
Rep. Elizabeth Esty (D-Conn.) spoke angrily about the passage of the House bill, saying it amounts lawmakers having “dishonored with action” the victims of gun violence.
“The House leadership chose to bring up a bill which we might as well rename ‘The Guns Anywhere, Anytime by Anyone,'” Esty said. “It is wrong, and the American people need to stand up.”
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) asserted the House-passed legislation “will not pass the United States Senate” and anticipated separation of the bill into parts — one expanding checks, one for concealed carry — because that was the “good faith” agreement with Senate leadership and Republican.
“That’s sort of the bare minimum,” Blumenthal said. “It’s barely progress. What we need to extend those background checks to all purchases, to make sure we ban assault weapons, to ban high capacity magazines.”
Blumenthal added “we will prevail” because of gun control advocates “are breaking the vice-like grip of the NRA and the gun lobby.”
Other lawmakers who spoke were Reps. John Larson (D-Conn.), Jim Himes (D-Conn.), Brent Thompson (D-Calif.). Joining them were from Po Murray, chair of Newtown Action Alliance; Avery Gardiner, co-president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence; Victoria Coy, national director of States United to Prevent Gun Violence; and Robin Lloyd, director of government affairs for Giffords.
The news conference took place hours before another shooting in Aztec High School in New Mexico that left two students and the suspect dead.
Congress
Top Democrats re-introduce trans bill of rights
Lawmakers spoke outside US Capitol on Wednesday
U.S. Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and U.S. Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), and Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.) announced the reintroduction of a “Trans Bill of Rights” on Wednesday.
Despite chilling winds and snow on the ground, transgender activists, LGBTQ rights advocates, and trans-supporting lawmakers gathered outside the U.S. Capitol to announce the reintroduction of the “Transgender Bill of Rights” resolution to protect trans Americans, as the Trump-Vance administration continues to target LGBTQ Americans.
About 30 people gathered outside to hear from legislators and individuals impacted by recent White House policies.
“Today we say loud and clear that trans rights are human rights, and they must be protected every single day of every single year,” Markey told the crowd. “We stand together in solidarity with the trans community and with those who have too often been left behind by a system that refuses to recognize their humanity. We are here to ensure that every trans and gender-diverse person in America can live freely and safely and authentically. That’s what the Trans Bill of Rights is all about.”
Markey is leading the resolution on the Senate side, while Jayapal is pushing it forward in the House.
“With the Trans Bill of Rights, we are laying out a comprehensive vision to provide protections for transgender and nonbinary people — a vision that ensures every single person has a chance to thrive,” Jayapal said. “A vision that says: you are us, you belong, and you are worthy of the same rights as everyone else. This bill supports amending the Civil Rights Act to ensure that trans people have the same rights and protections as all other Americans. It creates a level playing field where trans people no longer have to fight tooth and nail to get the same treatment as their cisgender friends.”
The resolution for House and the Senate reads:
“Recognizing that it is the duty of the federal government to develop and implement a Transgender Bill of Rights to protect and codify the rights of transgender and nonbinary people under the law and ensure their access to medical care, shelter, safety, and economic security.”
Trans Legislation Tracker, an independent research organization that collects data on anti-trans legislation from the hyper-local level to the floor of the U.S. Senate, found that in 2025, 1,022 measures were proposed across the country to restrict the rights of trans Americans — from health care removals to bathroom bans.
Markey directly called out those lawmakers for what he described as discriminatory actions taken against trans Americans who, as he pointed out, are fighting for rights that everyone else is inherently given.
“Trump and MAGA Republicans have used the power of government to spread fear and hate across our country. They have tried to ban lifesaving and medically necessary health care, strip anti-discrimination protections, and turn trans lives into political talking points for their benefit. Well, we have a message for them: we are louder, we are stronger, and we are not going anywhere. We’re in this fight for the long term,” the Massachusetts senator said.
Jacobs, a co-chair of the Transgender Equality Task Force within the Congressional Equality Caucus, also spoke at the event.
“Trans Americans are being targeted just for being who they are — by laws and court decisions that try to erase them from classrooms, from courts and fields, from health care and public life. These attacks aren’t about safety or fairness,” Jacobs said. “They’re about hatred and instilling fear. And we know how quickly fear can warp into suspicion and violence with deadly consequences.”
In addition to lawmakers, trans Americans and supporters spoke.
Olivia Hunt from Advocates for Trans Equality, LaLa Zannell from the American Civil Liberties Union, as well as three additional people who have been actively harmed by the ongoing wave of anti-trans legislation, shared their stories.
Hunt emphasized the staggeringly high number of anti-trans bills being introduced in statehouses across the country — despite trans adults making up less than 1 percent of the population, according to the Williams Institute’s 2025 data.
“Since 2020, thousands of anti-LGBTQIA+ bills have been introduced in statehouses across the country,” Hunt said. “It’s a veritable tidal wave of political bullying disguised as legislation, and most of these bills specifically target transgender and nonbinary people — especially trans youth and their families. This is a moment that demands action.”
Hunt, who is trans, helps trans people in D.C. obtain legal documents that match their gender identity — something the Trump-Vance administration has stopped.
“Trans youth deserve to be protected by their government. They shouldn’t have to be protected from their government,” she said. “It’s long past time that our federal laws reflect and protect the reality and dignity of all people. Trans people have always existed — we are your neighbors, your family members, your community — and we belong.”
Zannell, who spoke proudly about her trans identity, explained why the bill is necessary and how it would protect trans people in all facets of their lives.
“I stand here as an unapologetic Black trans woman who has led this movement for over a decade to get us to moments like this. The reintroduction of the Trans Bill of Rights will aim to protect access to gender-affirming care, prevent discrimination in housing and public spaces, and preserve legal recognition,” Zannell said. “My hope is that this affirms our government’s duty to protect all trans and nonbinary people.”
The Transgender Bill of Rights is cosponsored in the Senate by U.S. Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Peter Welch (D-Vt.).
In the U.S. House of Representatives, the resolution is led by Jayapal, co-led by Jacobs and U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), with nearly 100 other representatives signing on as co-sponsors.
“To all trans people across the United States: you are seen, you are valued, and you are loved,” said Markey. “And I want you to know there are people who will fight for you every single day on the floor of the House and Senate to win those rights for you.”
Senegal
A dozen Senegalese men arrested for ‘unnatural acts’
Popular journalist and musician among those taken into custody
Senegalese police have charged a dozen men with committing “unnatural acts.”
The New York Times reported Pape Cheikh Diallo, a popular television reporter, and Djiby Dramé, a musician, are among the men who authorities arrested. They appeared in court in Dakar, the Senegalese capital, on Monday.
Le Soleil, a Senegalese newspaper, reported authorities arrested the men on Feb. 6 “for intentional transmission of HIV, unnatural acts, criminal conspiracy, and endangering others.” The newspaper further notes the men have been placed in “pre-trial detention.”
Senegal is among the countries in which consensual same-sex sexual relations remain criminalized.
Police in Kaolack, a town that is roughly 135 miles southeast of Dakar, in 2015 arrested 11 people who allegedly engaged in same-sex sexual acts during “a celebration of a gay marriage.” The National Assembly in 2021 rejected a bill that would have further criminalized homosexuality in the country.
Local
Local LGBTQ groups, activists to commemorate Black History Month
Rayceen Pendarvis to moderate Dupont Underground panel on Sunday
LGBTQ groups in D.C. and elsewhere plan to use Black History Month as an opportunity to commemorate and celebrate Black lives and experiences.
Team Rayceen Productions has no specific events planned, but co-founder Rayceen Pendarvis will attend many functions around D.C. this month.
Pendarvis, a longtime voice in the LGBTQ community in D.C. will be moderating a panel at Dupont Underground on Sunday. The event, “Every (Body) Wants to Be a Showgirl,” will feature art from Black burlesque artists from around the country. Pendarvis on Feb. 23 will attend the showing of multimedia play at the Lincoln Theatre that commemorates the life of James Baldwin.
Equality Virginia plans to prioritize Black voices through a weekly online series, and community-based story telling. The online digital series will center Black LGBTQ voices, specifically trailblazers and activists, and contemporary Black queer and transgender people.
Narissa Rahaman, Equality Virginia’s executive director, stressed the importance of the Black queer community to the overall Pride movement, and said “Equality Virginia is proud to center those voices in our work this month and beyond.”
The Capital Pride Alliance, which hosts Pride events in D.C., has an alliance with the Center for Black Equity, which brings Black Pride to D.C. over Memorial Day weekend. The National LGBTQ Task Force has no specific Black History Month events planned, but plans to participate in online collaborations.
Cathy Renna, the Task Force’s director of communications, told the Washington Blade the organization remains committed to uplifting Black voices. “Our priority is keeping this at the forefront everyday,” she said.
The D.C. LGBTQ+ Community Center is also hosting a series of Black History Month events.
The D.C. Public Library earlier this year launched “Freedom and Resistance,” an exhibition that celebrates Black History Month and Martin Luther King Jr. It will remain on display until the middle of March at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library at 901 G St., N.W.
Top Democrats re-introduce trans bill of rights
A dozen Senegalese men arrested for ‘unnatural acts’
Meet D.C.’s Most Eligible Queer Singles
Local LGBTQ groups, activists to commemorate Black History Month
