Wednesday’s Indian Supreme Court decision reversing a lower court and recriminalizing same-sex sexual intimacy marks a dreadful new judicial low for international LGBTQ human rights Even as we in the U.S. enjoy ever increasing visibility and protections for our community, life for many of our brothers and sisters in other countries is going from bad to intolerable. It is repellent that extremist religious opposition worldwide is such a corrosive impediment to basic human rights. The...
Our Voices
And Sam Ames, Esq. NCLR Staff Attorney For the past 5 days, we have eaten nothing. We continue to work, drinking only water. We continue to prepare food for our families, and we watch our colleagues eat at lunch. Sometimes it’s hard, but we are committed to fasting because we are committed to Fast for Families. We are committed to raising awareness about the need for commonsense immigration reform. We are fasting to show Speaker John Boehner and other House leadership the urgency of voting on...
Listening to President Obama speak yesterday on the need for comprehensive immigration reform in San Francisco’s Chinatown made me realize how my own relationship as an immigrant in this country has come full circle. I grew up in the small border town of McAllen, Texas, located in the lower Rio Grande Valley of South Texas. Only eight miles from the Mexican border, it is a predominantly Mexican, Spanish-speaking, rural, farm worker community. I was born in Mexico, but lived in McAllen since...
November is National Adoption Month, and there are currently more LGBTQ parents waiting to adopt than there are children in the foster system. Unfortunately, some LGBTQ couples are denied the right to parent—and children are denied a home—because of discriminatory state policies governing same-sex adoption, and policies that allow adoption agencies to give preference to different-sex couples. Anti-LGBTQ bias and discrimination in the courts further leads to LGBTQ parents being denied custody...
A new report released today shows that LGBTQ workers of color are among the most disadvantaged in the country, facing high rates of unemployment and poverty due to workplace discrimination, unequal job benefits and taxation, and unsafe and under-resourced U.S. schools. The report—A Broken Bargain for LGBTQ Workers of Color—examines how LGBTQ workers of color face unique types of discrimination based both on their race and sexual orientation/gender identity. The report is co-authored by the...
After a long battle with a rare form of brain cancer, Jennifer Neuman-Roper, a client of NCLR and bold advocate for marriage equality, passed away on November 8. Jen and Angelique Neuman-Roper joined Griego v. Oliver—a lawsuit brought by the ACLU of New Mexico and the National Center for Lesbian Rights—in August, and played a pivotal role in the struggle to win the freedom to marry for same-sex couples in New Mexico. Because Jen suffered from Stage 4 brain cancer, the couple of more than 20...
Yesterday, President Obama brought together a coalition of immigration reform advocates—including NCLR—and gave his first address on immigration reform since Congress finally ended the government shutdownand cleared the way to reengage with the rest of its legislative agenda. His message to Congress on this crucial issue was simple and clear: “It’s time,” he declared to a roaring crowd, “Let’s go get it done.” Earlier this year, the Senate passed legislation that would overhaul and repair our...
Want to hear something really scary? This Halloween, there is one treat that is actually a dangerous trick that could harm young people everywhere: Jelly Belly candies. And the trick isn’t the few seconds of horror that may result from biting into the dreaded canned dog food, vomit or even the baby wipe flavored jelly beans (yes those are real flavors). Jelly Belly Chair Herman Rowland Sr. is using some of his fortune to fund an effort to overturn California’s new School Success and...
Today, California Governor Jerry Brown signed Assembly Bill 460, which clarifies that insurance coverage of fertility treatments must be offered and provided equally to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender prospective parents, who continue to face discrimination in receiving equal coverage for these services. Even though California law prohibits discrimination in insurance generally, same-sex couples, transgender prospective parents, and single prospective parents in California continue to...
I never thought that in my lifetime I would live to see the incredible progress the LGBTQ movement has experienced in just the last few months. So many have been working for decades to reach this moment, but even for those of us doing this work, the gains of the past year have been breathtaking. Gains such as the striking down of a key part of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and seeing the demise of Proposition 8 are tremendous victories for the LGBTQ community and for a nation that prides...
