Pope Leo XIV announced recently that he will continue supporting the Catholic Church’s current stance on LGBTQ+ issues and support for informal blessings of same-sex marriages. The announcement was made at a news conference following a nearly two week-long visit in Africa according to reports from PinkNews. However, the new pope also said the church would not move forward to offer formal recognition for same-sex couples. Leo claimed the church would continue to respect the policies and sentiments expressed by his predecessor, the late Pope Francis. The late Pope began expressing support, or at least tolerance for LGBTQ+ people in…
Author: Lauren Mulvey
The Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum, which is currently in the development and fundraising phase, may face obstacles as House Republicans move to exclude transgender women from the museum’s display plans. LGBTQ Nation reports that just last week the Democratic Women’s Caucus and House Democratic Caucus sent a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson urging him not to bring to a vote an amended version of the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum Act (H.R. 1329). The amended version of the bill, rewritten in March by Republican lawmakers, proposes that only “biological women” be included in the museum’s plans for exhibitions…
Pride season will soon be taking place in many destinations around the world. If you are looking forward to attending LGBTQ+ events, here’s where you can celebrate Pride in May. U.S. Rochester, Minnesota: May 16. For one day only in Rochester, at Soldier’s Field Park, enjoy five hours of live entertainment, family-friendly activities and more, including drag performances, live music and over 100 local vendors, artists and community resources. Plus, peruse food trucks, bring the kids to the Youth Tent, beat your friends in yard games and wear your best rainbow colors. rochmnpride.org/ Springfield, IL – May 16. Not too…
Public libraries throughout the U.K. have begun stocking books meant to “help” parents of transgender children, encouraging methods for detransition and conversion therapy. QueerAF, an LGBTQ news outlet, investigated the availability of books discussing conversion practices, detransitioning and ‘desistance’ in early 2026. “When Kids Say They’re Trans: A Guide for Thoughtful Parents,” authored by therapists Lisa Marchiano, Stella O’Malley, and Sasha Ayad, is currently being stocked at 58 public libraries across nearly every county in the U.K. This includes cities like London, Manchester, Bristol, Edinburgh, and Swansea, according to PinkNews. The authors of the book are known anti-trans advocates, with…
The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), an organization researching and advocating at the intersections of religion and public life, published new data recently about American opinions of LGBTQ+ rights across all 50 states and D.C. The results are based on over 22,000 interviews with adults throughout 2025, and they evaluate public opinion on LGBTQ+ non-discrimination protections, religiously based service refusals, and same-sex marriage. The findings show that around 72% of respondents supported non-discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people and around 65% support same-sex marriage. Despite this, these figures have dropped from recent years. Approximately, 60% of Americans said they were opposed…
Hungary has officially ousted anti-LGBTQ Viktor Orban, electing a new prime minister Peter Magyar. Orban served as PM for 16 years, and in that time, he brought forth a number of authoritarian policies. Orban’s party, Fidesz, lost by a landslide to Magyar’s Tisza party, according to reports from PinkNews. Orban was an ally of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, but Magyar hopes to draw Hungary away from relations with Russia and strengthen bonds with the European Union and Ukraine. Just last year, Orban banned Pride in Hungary via a bill which prohibited assemblies in “violation” of child protection laws, which…
Georgia has succeeded in blocking every new anti-LGBTQ+ bill on the docket for the state’s 2026 legislative session. Georgia Equality reports nearly 15 pieces of anti-queer legislation were shot down. The organization which pushed for the dissolution of these bills is Georgia’s largest LGBTQ+ rights advocacy organization. “This session we stopped every bill targeting LGBTQ Georgians, even in spite of underhanded political manoeuvres deployed over the last few weeks. Thousands of Georgians from over 60 counties came together to successfully defeat every last one,” said Georgia Equality executive director Jeff Graham. Bills nixed from the session included HB 54, a…
The Pride flag that hung outside the famous LGBTQ+ historical monument in Greenwich Village was removed in early February, a move that saw ample backlash from local leaders, advocates and allies. In protest, New York lawmakers and leaders came together with LGBTQ+ activists and allies to raise a flag again outside the monument, the week following its removal. Those in support of the move included Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal, Congressman Jerry Nadler and more. Mayor Zohran Mamdani also voiced support for the re-establishment of the flag at the monument. “We won’t let Trump erase LGBTQ+ history,” Nadler wrote in a…
The highest administrative court in Greece has ruled that same-sex marriage and adoption rights remain a constitutional right in a landmark decision affirming the country’s 2024 equality law. In the ruling, Greece’s Council of State dismissed a legal challenge that claimed rights for same-sex couples undermined “traditional family structures or the rights of opposite-sex couples.” The case challenged Greece’s official law legalizing same-sex marriage which was passed in 2024 in Hellenic Parliament. PinkNews reports, judges in the court also rejected concerns about same-sex couples being able to adopt, ruling that the practice does not violate constitutional protections for children. With the…
A court in Poland ruled recently that a local civil registry was required to record the marriage of a gay couple married outside of the country. The Polish couple who brought the case to the Polish Supreme Administrative Court were married in Berlin, Germany in 2018, and sought to have their union recognized in their country of origin. The court ruled that though Poland had to recognize the union, they were not technically required to change their policies on same-sex marriage domestically. Poland has historically pushed back against LGBTQ+ rights unlike its more friendly European neighbors. According to Equaldex, the…
Residents of Munich, Germany have elected the city’s first openly gay mayor, Dominik Krause. At just 35, Krause won 56.4% of the vote, overcoming Social Democrat incumbent Dieter Reiter. His campaign platform centered around climate action initiatives, sustainable urban development, digitalization, and social policy, PinkNews reports. He is also the first mayor from the Green Party. Krause promised 50,000 new apartments to support Munich’s housing crisis during his campaign. The city is considered one of Germany’s most expensive and sees consistently high rents for residents. After hearing the news, Krause thanked his fiance, Sebastian Muller, calling him “the love of…
Nepal has elected Bhumika Shrestha as its first ever Trans lawmaker into office. The Nepal Election Commission recently confirmed Shrestha as a new member of Parliament. LGBTQ Nation reports she will take one of 182 seats in the country’s House of Representatives secured by centrist party Rastriya Swatantra. “Our constitution has provisions for our community, but they have not translated to laws and policies. Our community expects me to raise our issues,” Shrestha said. Shrestha is a 37-year-old activist and actress who has been leading Nepal’s LGBTQ+ rights movement in recent years, working with local rights groups including Blue Diamond Society…
The European Union’s highest court is requiring that member states allow transgender citizens to update their names and gender markers on official identification documents. The court challenged a 2023 Bulgarian Supreme Court decision which ruled against “change of the data regarding the sex, name, and uniform civil status in the acts of civil status of an applicant who claims to be transgender.” ILGA-Europe, Trans Europe, and Central Asia brought the case forward on behalf of a Bulgarian trans woman who is currently receiving hormone therapy in Italy. When she requested to update her Bulgarian ID documents she was continuously denied…
India has elected LGBTQ+ politician Menaka Guruswamy to its upper house of Parliament. DW.com reports Guruswamy was instrumental in the decriminalization of same-sex relations in India and is the first out member of the Indian Parliament. As a senior advocate in the Supreme Court of India, Guruswamy has ample experience in litigation. In 2018, she argued for India’s historical case decriminalizing same-sex relations. In the case, the court struck down Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code prohibiting “carnal intercourse against the order of nature.” After winning the case, she revealed her relationship with another court advocate – Arundhati Katuju, according…
A professor from the University of California is working with students to preserve LGBTQ+ history on Wikipedia. Professor Juana María Rodriguez has partnered with Wiki Education to have students produce historical entries for the site on LGBTQ+ subjects. According to LGBTQ Nation, contributions for these topics have “fallen through the cracks due to contributor bias.” Since Trump took office last year, the current administration has made concerted efforts to erase LGBTQ+ history across the web. This has included the removal of LGBTQ+ info and history from National Park Service sites. In 2025, the NPS scrubbed the word “trans” from the Stonewall Historic…
American skier Jake Adicoff has become the first out gay athlete to become a winter Paralympic champion, winning four gold medals at this year’s Paralympics in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. Adicoff competes in the vision-impaired category, and according to PinkNews, he vowed to bring home the four medals he eventually won. The 30-year-old won gold in the sprint visually impaired, 10km visually impaired, 20km freestyle visually impaired, and the 4 x 2.5km mixed relay. When speaking to Outsports about his wins, Adicoff expressed how important it was for him to represent the LGBTQ+ community at the elite level. Adicoff says…
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has appointed a trans woman to run the city’s first ever Office of LGBTQIA+ Affairs. Taylor Brown, a nationally recognized civil rights attorney, has become the first trans person to lead a New York City office or agency according to the Office of the Mayor’s official release. In her new role, Brown will oversee and implement LGBTQIA+ initiatives, developing legal resources to uphold sanctuary protections for LGBTQIA+ individuals. Mamdani signed an executive order on March 13 at the Brooklyn Community Pride Center in Crown Heights that officially established the new office. The designation of…
Democrats are pushing back against the Trump Administration’s continued attacks on the trans community with a Transgender Bill of Rights which calls on the federal government to codify trans rights. The bill — H. Res 1058 , which was introduced by Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), urges the Trump admin to codify the rights of “transgender and nonbinary people under the law and ensure their access to medical care, shelter, safety and economic safety.” Jayapal, who is the parent of a transgender child, spoke about the bill during a press conference announcing the bill’s reintroduction. This…
The state of California has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education and the Trump Administration over a threat of withholding $4.9 billion in education funding. The federal government has threatened to withhold funding for California’s public schools due to a state law that prohibits schools from forcibly outing transgender students. California state Attorney General Rob Bonta filed the suit claiming the government has misapplied the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), according to PinkNews. FERPA which was passed into law in 1974, is meant to protect the confidentiality of students. According to EPIC, it applies to any…
The Netherlands’ first gay prime minister has been officially sworn into office, making LGBTQ+ history for the country and Europe. Rob Jetten is the first out LGBTQ+ person to hold this position in the Netherlands and at the age of 38 he also becomes the nation’s youngest ever PM. He was sworn in at the end of February by Dutch King Willem-Alexander. According to Equaldex, LGBTQ+ rights in the Netherlands are mostly protected with codified protections against censorship and discrimination, and laws allowing for gender affirming care access, non-binary gender recognition, LGBTQ+ adoption and more. However, the country still maintains…
Florida House bills bluntly entitled “Anti-Diversity in Local Government” continue to advance through the state’s legislative bodies to potentially reach a floor vote next week. The new bills – HB 1001 / SB 1134 — would restrict Florida counties and municipalities from funding, promoting, or taking official action related to programming that references sexual orientation or identity, according to Miami Living. If passed, these changes would affect public-sector grants, municipal promotions, Tourism Development Council funding, and other forms of government support that include LGBTQ+ cultural programming. The bills define DEI efforts as “training, programming, or activities” that reference or center…
A federal appeals court recently ruled that a Maryland school district’s policy on using students’ preferred pronouns does not violate a Christian substitute teacher’s rights. The case was brought forward by substitute teacher Kimberly Polk, who began working at Maryland’s Montgomery County Public Schools in 2021. Polk refused to follow the school’s pronoun policy citing religious purposes and “her understanding of her Christian religion and the Holy Bible.” For this reason, Polk requested a religious accommodation from the school to misgender students, which was then denied. She sued the school district in 2024, under claims that the denial violated her First Amendment…
House Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA) has introduced a resolution to officially recognize National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day. The resolution, H.Res. 1039 was announced on Feb. 6, just one day prior to National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, and has been co-sponsored by nearly 30 other House Reps. It has also seen backing from various organizations including AIDS Foundation Chicago, AIDS United, AMAAD Institute, LA pride, NAESM Inc., NMAC, and PFLAG National. “National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day is a day set aside to increase HIV awareness and enhance prevention, testing, and treatment among African Americans,” Waters stated. “It is a day to…
Grindr is testing a new ultra-premium subscription plan that utilizes AI and will charge users $500 per month. Grindr’s new premium plan entitled EDGE is now going through a trial period in the U.S. Canada, Australia and New Zealand, with subscription prices ranging from $349.99 to $499.99, according to PinkNews. The new subscription plan will be a tier up from Grindr’s established subscription plan, which includes Grindr XTRA and Grindr Unlimited. Grindr EXTRA offers extra app features like a special Incognito Mode, ability to unsend messages and to see who has viewed your profile, plus unlimited profile filtering. Grindr Unlimited offers…
The Pride flag proudly flies again in its rightful position at The Stonewall National Monument in New York City following its recent removal by the Trump Administration. Those in attendance at the re-raising of the flag included Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal, Congressman Jerry Nadler and more. “We won’t let Trump erase LGBTQ+ history,” Nadler wrote in a statement online. “Stonewall was a rebellion. Stonewall was a beginning. Today, Stonewall is a call to action once again.” NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani also made statements on the removal of the flag writing about Stonewall’s legacy last week: “New York is the…
Billionaire MacKenzie Scott has donated more than $45 million to LGBTQ+ nonprofit The Trevor Project. Scott, Jeff Bezos ex-wife, continues to up her philanthropic portfolio with a donation to the organization which was established in 1998. Scott is reported to have received close to $40 billion in her divorce from Bezos. Since then, she has donated millions to various organizations and efforts via her philanthropic organization Yield Giving. Yield Giving has donated more than $26 billion in financial aid to non-profits like The Trevor Project, Planned Parenthood, Lambda Legal, Movement Advancement Project, Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund and more.…
A new study from The Journal of Pediatrics has found that trans youth who have access to hormone replacement therapies are less likely to be suicidal. The survey, published in advance of the journal’s February 2026 release, concluded that hormone therapy could be “associated with clinically meaningful reductions in suicidality over time, extending prior findings with a larger sample and longer follow-up.” The study was conducted at a multidisciplinary gender health clinic in an urban Midwestern academic medical center, evaluating 432 patients with an average follow-up time of 679 days. The effectiveness of hormone therapies and other forms of gender-affirming care…
Anti-LGBTQ+ riders have been removed from a new spending bill for the U.S. Departments of Education, Labor, Health and Human Services, marking a win for Congressional Democrats and the nation’s LGBTQ+ community. If the bill had been passed with the riders, they would have threatened various aspects of LGBTQ+ life, including preventing federal funding from supporting gender-affirming care at any age, banning higher education institutions from allowing trans participation in sports and clubs, and banning K-12 schools from implementing measures to protect and support trans youth (allowing for bathroom use and preventing pronoun responsibilities). These riders were just one part…
The Trump Administration has removed the Pride flag displayed outside the Stonewall National Monument, a move that has seen backlash from local leaders, advocates, and allies. The Stonewall National Monument located in Greenwich Village, Manhattan is a historical landmark for the LGBTQ+ community. The removal of the flag follows a National Park Service (NPS) directive banning certain types of flags at park sites including “non-agency flags and pennants” that are not the U.S. flag or the Interior Department flag. However, the directive also makes exceptions for military and historical flags. Ahead of this change, the NPS also made changes to Stonewall’s…
Popular gay dating app Grindr has announced that it would implement new safeguards and restrictions in-app to protect competitors at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics.The protections are meant to safeguard athletes who aren’t out or are coming from countries where LGBTQ+ activity is illegal or restricted. “Grindr shows users who’s nearby and how far away they are. In most contexts, that’s useful,” Grindr’s team writes on their blog. “In the Olympic Village where thousands of athletes are packed into a small area, those same features may become a liability.” “Someone outside the Village could browse profiles inside it. Distance data…