News

St. Louis Police are investigating an attack early Saturday outside a nightclub, and while police say it’s too soon to tell whether this will be categorized as a hate crime, the victims believe they were targeted because they’re gay, reports KSDK-TV. Jacob Piwowarczyk says, “I have a soft tissue bruise on my elbow. I have […]

The D.C. City Council drew national attention this week as it made final preparations for the first of two votes on a same-sex marriage bill Tuesday that observers say was expected to pass by a margin as wide as 11 to 2, reports DC Agenda. Council insiders said there was no surge in phone calls […]

Puerto Rican authorities have agreed to investigate Jorge Steven López Mercado’s murder as a hate crime after they met with local representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Catholic bishops in the state are instructing priests to read or distribute a letter this weekend asking Catholics to pray that lawmakers in New Jersey not allow same-sex marriage in New Jersey, reports the New Jersey Star-Ledger. The bishops’ letter restates Catholic teachings that marriage should be allowed only between a man and a woman. […]

Out Word Bound, Indianapolis’ only gay and lesbian bookstore, will close its doors after Christmas, reports the Indianapolis Star. “It has been a good run,” owners Mary Byrne and Tammara Tracy wrote in an e-mail to customers Wednesday. For more than a decade, the downtown store has served as a center of gay and lesbian […]

VALLEJO, CA – Vallejo’s Mayor Osby Davis is coming under fire for comments he recently made about gays and lesbians. Davis (pictured, left) finds himself in the middle of a controversy after an interview published this weekend in the New York Times. The article, titled “Faith and Tolerance Collide in Vallejo,” quotes Davis talking about […]

New Jersey voters now oppose gay-marriage legislation by a slim margin, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released this week, reports the New Jersey Star-Ledger. The poll, conducted between Nov. 17 and Nov. 22, found 49 percent of adult residents are opposed to giving gay couples the right to marry while 46 percent are in […]

Footage from the funeral of Jorge Steven López Mercado in Toa Alta, Puerto Rico, on Monday shows his grief-stricken mother remembering the moment she accepted her son as gay. According to a translation provided by the blogger Blabbeando, Myriam Mercado recalls the moment an emotionally upset Steven told her he was gay. “Aw, son … […]

A national gay rights group has filed a lawsuit against the Atlanta Police Department on behalf of 19 people who say they were forcibly searched and detained during a raid on an Atlanta gay bar. Lambda Legal filed the lawsuit against the city of Atlanta, the Chief of Police and forty-eight individual officers of the […]

Hundreds of gay marriage supporters took to the Statehouse in Trenton today as lawmakers began their first day of a lame-duck session, reports the New Jersey Star-Ledger. Steven Goldstein, chairman of Garden State Equality, rallied several hundred protesters on West State Street, directing them to take advantage of legislative committee meetings and speak with their […]

A Republican political hopeful interested in serving as governor of Massachusetts announced Monday he has chosen Richard R. Tisei, an openly gay state legislator, to be his running mate in the 2010 gubernatorial election, reports CBS News. “Want you to be the first to know: I’ve chosen State Senator Richard Tisei as my running mate,” […]

BANGOR, Maine — Who can marry and who can’t comes down to who has a Y chromosome and who doesn’t, a Bangor High School student told a crowd of more than 60 people gathered Sunday in Pickering Square in support of same-sex marriage in Maine, reports the Bangor Daily News. “What is the difference between […]

A planned November hearing by the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee to consider ending a ban on gays serving openly in the U.S. military will be postponed, a spokeswoman indicated Friday. “We do not have a date” for the hearing, said the aide, Tara Andringa. Committee staff have been working on Afghanistan issues ahead of […]

Another day, another horrifying report of violence against a gay teenager, reports the Dallas Voice. Jayron Martin, a 16-year-old high school freshman from Houston, tells KHOU-TV that he was chased down after school and beaten with a metal pipe last week while eight classmates stood around and watched. “All they kept saying was, ‘We going […]

Today marks the 11th annual Transgender Day of Remembrance around the world, a day when the LGBTQ and allied community honor those who were killed due to anti-transgender hatred or prejudice. The day of memorial was created in response to the murder of Rita Hester, a popular and outgoing transwoman, who was brutally stabbed at […]

Just days after the Washington Blade ceased publication, several former employees of the 40-year-old gay and lesbian newspaper launched a new, more modest version of the paper on Friday. Following the Blade’s surprise closure earlier this week, some former employees decided to rally around their craft and put together a new paper and Web site […]

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — The man charged with first-degree murder in the killing of a gay teenager in Puerto Rico will likely use “gay panic” as a defense, reports UPI. Juan A. Martinez Matos, 26, a married father of four (pictured), confessed he was cruising the “red light” district of Caguas, a city south […]

State Sen. Loretta Weinberg (D-Bergen) is angry Thursday about what she sees as a broken promise by Senate Majority Leader Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester) to move legislation in the upper house during the lameduck session that would legalize same-sex marriage, reports newjerseynewsroom.com. Sweeney told reporters that while gay marriage is an important issue, the Legislature should […]

Supporters of gay marriage may find New Jersey more hospitable than many other states, according to a Rutgers-Eagleton Poll released Thursday. By a 46 percent to 42 percent margin, adults in New Jerseyans favor legalizing same-sex nuptials, with 12 percent unsure. The survey also shows that if the state Legislature passes a bill legalizing gay […]

The decision by the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics to block a ballot initiative to ban same-sex marriage reverberated on Capitol Hill and in the courts Wednesday as the battle continued over whether voters should have a say in the debate, reports the Washington Post. Bishop Harry Jackson (pictured), represented by lawyers from a […]