TRUMP-PENCE COZIES UP WITH ANTI-LGBTQ EXTREMISTS AT HATE GROUP EVENT: Today, Donald Trump will become the first sitting U.S. president to speak at the Values Voters Summit, an annual gathering in Washington, D.C., of the nation’s most extreme anti-LGBTQ politicians, candidates and activists.  Trump, who last year addressed the group as a candidate, will again be keeping company with extremists who have made their careers seeding anti-LGBTQ hate in the U.S. and around the world -- from Vice President Mike Pence and former presidential advisor Steve Bannon, to the racist, bigoted Roy Moore, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Alabama. The 12th annual event is sponsored by the Family Research Council, an organization that has been designated a hate group for its anti-LGBTQ agenda by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Past summits have featured cavalcades of radical speakers who have attacked marriage equality and transgender people, advocated criminal sanctions against LGBTQ people, compared LGBTQ people to pedophiles, and promoted the dangerous, debunked practice of “conversion therapy.” Read more at HRC.

.@RealDonaldTrump will become the first sitting U.S. president to speak at the Values Voters Summit. #VVS17 https://t.co/U6op9evYxF

— HumanRightsCampaign (@HRC) October 13, 2017

TRUMP’S HEALTH CARE EXECUTIVE ORDER PUTS LIVES AT RISK: Trump’s latest gambit to sabotage the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will lead to substandard health plans, putting countless LGBTQ Americans at risk. The ACA provides lifesaving coverage for millions of Americans -- including transgender people and those with pre-existing conditions, including cancer and HIV. The executive order Trump signed yesterday opens the door to undermining those protections, increasing premiums and  jeopardizing the health of LGBTQ people and tens of millions of others. More from Washington Blade.

• And late yesterday, news reports indicated Trump is planning to scrap essential subsidies to health care companies that give life-saving access to millions of low-income people who can’t afford coverage. More from the New York Times.

HRC ENDORSES DOUG JONES FOR ALABAMA SEAT IN U.S. SENATE:  “Doug Jones has pledged to serve all Alabamians, including LGBTQ people,” said Eva Kendrick, HRC Alabama state director. “In this election, the choice between Roy Moore and Doug Jones could not be more stark. Moore has never passed up an opportunity to promote bigotry, division and extremism,  while Doug Jones has staked his career on fairness, equality and a positive vision for Alabama’s future. HRC is proud to endorse Doug Jones and work to help him become the next U.S. Senator from the state of Alabama.” Jones is running against the notoriously anti-LGBTQ Roy Moore in a December 12 special election to replace now-Attorney General Jeff Sessions. More from HRC and HuffPost.

FEEL GOOD FRIDAY -- CASA RUBY EXPANDS IN D.C., ADDS MARYLAND OFFICE: Casa Ruby is the capital area’s only bilingual, multicultural LGBTQ community center, providing live-saving and -affirming services and support to many of the most vulnerable in D.C.’s LGBTQ community. Earlier this year, Casa Ruby Executive Director Ruby Corado received the Upstander Award at HRC’s Time to THRIVE conference. More from The Washington Blade.

DESPICABLE -- TRUMP FAILING THE NEARLY 4 MIL U.S. CITIZENS IN PUERTO RICO: The morally bankrupt president tweeted yesterday that he “cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!” Only 10 percent of Puerto Rico has electricity, people in some villages are starving, there is a dire lack of potable water, and at least 45 people have died due to Hurricane Maria, at at least 113 remain unaccounted for. “The misery in Puerto Rico is completely unacceptable,” writes the Washington Post editorial board. More from The Hill.

FATHER OF TRANS SON SLAMS DOJ’S POSITION THAT TITLE VII DOES NOT PROTECT TRANS PEOPLE FROM DISCRIMINATION: “My son is transgender. He just graduated college... He had three job offers and took a position at a well-known Twin Cities nonprofit, where he will be working with kids with autism, which was his goal,” writes Doug Jones in a powerful oped for The Minneapolis Star Tribune. “But now the Trump administration is saying to him and thousands of other transgender people that… [i]n a land in which the Declaration of Independence declares that all men are created equal, you can be discriminated against.” At the direction of  Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the Department of Justice rescinded a memo issued by the Obama Administration advising that Title VII nondiscrimination provisions apply to transgender people. More from The Minneapolis Star Tribune.

REP. RICK NOLAN (D-MINN.) JOINS THE LGBT EQUALITY CAUCUS: Nolan has a 100 percent score on HRC’s Congressional Scorecard for the 114th Congress. More from FOX 9.

AUTHOR TO VISIT WICHITA AFTER SCHOOL DISTRICT REFUSES TO PURCHASE TRANS-INCLUSIVE CHILDREN’S BOOK: George, written by transgender author Alex Gino (@lxgino), is for students in late elementary school, and describes a transgender student coming out navigating her school. After the library media supervisor refused to put the book on library shelves, Gino donated a copy to every Wichita elementary and K-8 school library. Gino will speak at  Wichita State University  on Nov. 2. More from The Wichita Eagle.

AMERICAN MUSIC AWARDS NOMINATE LADY GAGA FOR ‘BEST FEMALE ARTIST - POP/ROCK’: The bisexual popstar has long been an outspoken advocate for LGBTQ equality. More from ABC.

MASSACHUSETTS MOTHER OF TRANS SON -- “I JUST WANT HIM TO FEEL SAFE”: Boston Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham (@GlobeAbraham) follows a mother of a transgender son as she works to defeat a 2018 Massachusetts ballot measure that would strip the state of protections for transgender people in places of public accommodation. “I just want him to have the same rights as my 9-year-old son,” the mom, Jessica, said. “If transgender people can’t use the restroom, they can’t go out in public.” In 2016, soon after the state extended non-discrimination protections in places of public accommodation to transgender residents, opponents of the law confirmed they had gathered enough signatures needed to bring it to the November 2018 ballot for repeal. If successful, this would officially position Massachusetts to become the first and only statewide voter initiative to repeal transgender protections in the country. More from The Boston Globe.

GEORGIA STATE REPRESENTATIVE COMES OUT AS BI: Georgia State Rep. Renitta Shannon came out as bisexual in honor of National Coming Out Day this week. “I am not only a consistent advocate for LGBTQ issues, I am a member of the LGBTQ community. I am a bisexual black woman,” Shannon said via a Facebook post. “[U]nder the #Trump administration proactive visibility seems more important than ever.” More from The Georgia Voice.

MORGAN FREEMAN MEETS WITH TRANS AFGHANI WOMAN IN THE STORY OF US: In the series premiere last night on Nat Geo, Freeman sat down with Victoria Khan, a transgender woman who came to the U.S. to escape violence and discrimination. More from Advocate.

LGBTQ INDONESIANS LIVING IN FEAR AMID GROWING POLICE VIOLENCE: The police crackdown on LGBTQ people continued this past weekend, when 58 people were arrested at an establishment popular with gay men. Earlier this year, almost 150 men were arrested during a raid in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta and two gay men were caned in the Indonesian province of Aceh. More from The Washington Post.

READING RAINBOW

Las Vegas Sun shares the unique challenges faced by LGBTQ DACA recipients; Hello Giggles discusses the power of transgender literature; U.S. News & World Report reports on the Out & Equal Summit;
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