Harris' VP pick Walz a longtime LGBTQ ally
Indian Supreme Court to hear challenge to gay blood donor ban
Over at the Los Angeles Blade, my Out in the World column has a deeper dive on news from the UK, Malaysia, Nepal, and Thailand.
🇮🇳 India: The Supreme Court is hearing a case challenging the government’s ban on blood donations from transgender people, men who have sex with men, and sex workers.
🇳🇱 Netherlands: A new poll shows majority support for banning conversion therapy, including among supporters of the current governing coalition.
🇰🇿 Kazakhstan: A petition calling on the government to institute an anti-LGBT “propaganda” law (as inspired by similar laws in Russia and Kyrgyzstan) has drawn criticism from the United Nations, which is urging the government not to consider it. The group pushing the propaganda law is also an anti-vax conspiracy group whose efforts to discourage people from vaccinating their children have probably contributed to the deaths of at least two Kazakh children from whooping cough, so, no, they’re not just concerned about children’s welfare, despite what they say.
🇺🇸 Meanwhile, in the States
🧱🧱Democratic Presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris has announced her running mate will be Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. Walz is a longtime ally of the LGBTQ community from a rural part of the country where that wasn’t always easy, and we should be very pleased with this pick.
As Governor, Walz pushed several executive actions to protect the LGBTQ community and expand rights, including banning conversion therapy and making the state a sanctuary for trans youth. For the last two years, he’s also been able to govern with a narrow majority in the state legislature, which is the most hopeful situation Democrats can look forward to in 2025, and state Democrats have been among the most productive in advancing progressive legislation and expanding LGBTQ rights.
Among Minnesota Dems’ successful LGBTQ initiatives this term, they decriminalized sodomy, banned conversion therapy, updated discrimination law to remove loopholes for housing and nonprofits, updated family law, banned the gay panic defense, codified the trans refuge order, implemented a state council for LGBTQ Minnesotans, and banned anti-LGBTQ book bans.
And that’s not even counting the raft of other legislation to protect voting rights, help the needy, protect abortion access, justice reform, etc.
Among priorities that failed to pass in that time was a bill to codify surrogacy arrangements (which are legal under court precedent) and a bill to add protections against anti-LGBTQ discrimination and protection for abortion to the state constitution.
Should Harris-Walz be elected in November, Lt-Gov. Peggy Flanagan will become the first Native American woman to hold the office of Governor in the United States, and the first female governor of Minnesota.
🗽New York: Groups supporting the equal rights amendment that’s going before voters are suing because the proposed language on the ballot is allegedly unclear. They want the ballot to clearly state that a yes vote “protects LGBTQ and pregnant people” and “protects abortion,” but the Board of Elections has opted for the language from the text of the amendment itself, which is more legalistic. The court will hear arguments on Aug 14.
🌉 California: The mayor of Huntington Beach is proposing a local ordinance called “Parents’ Right to Know” that she says would override a recently passed state law that bars school districts from requiring staff to out trans students to their parents.
I don’t believe local laws are allowed to just contradict state law in California, so this looks like a big expensive stunt.
Also, to be clear, the state law doesn’t require schools to keep secrets from parents, it just bars them from requiring staff to break students’ confidence, which allows staff to use discretion on case-by-case bases, which makes sense when you think about it.