Hundreds of veterans who were dismissed from the U.S. military under the now-repealed “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy have been given honorable discharges following a yearlong review, the Pentagon announced Tuesday.
“Even though the majority of service members discharged for their sexual orientation … were honorably separated, nearly 2,000 were separated with less than fully honorable characterizations,” Christa A. Specht, a legal policy director at the Defense Department, said in a news release Tuesday.
After the repeal, those who were dismissed due to the policy could appeal for an upgrade to an honorable discharge, which would make them eligible for full military benefits. However, Specht noted, many people affected by the policy were unaware they could do so. The “proactive review” sought to address this.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said 851 cases were proactively reviewed over the past year, and 96.8% of them, more than 800, qualified for “relief.”
“Brave LGBTQ+ Americans have long volunteered to serve the country that they love,” Austin said in a statement Tuesday. “Under President Biden’s leadership, the Department of Defense has taken extraordinary steps to redress the harms done by ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ and other policies on these former Service members.”
The announcement comes just over a year after the department announced it would conduct a “proactive review” of service members who were dismissed under the policy, which prohibited gay and lesbian members of the military from being open about their sexual orientation. “Don’t ask, don’t tell” was in effect from February 1994 to September 2011 and resulted in the discharge of more than 13,000 service members.
“What this means is that of the nearly 13,500 individuals who were administratively separated under Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, and served long enough to receive a merit-based characterization of service, 96% now have an honorable discharge,” Austin said in the statement.
Gays and lesbians dismissed from the military during the “don’t ask, don’t tell” era are part of a legacy that started well before 1994. Historians estimate at least 100,000 service members were forced out of the military due to their actual or perceived sexuality between World War II and 2011.
Hundreds of veterans who were dismissed from the U.S. military under the now-repealed “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy have been given honorable discharges following a yearlong review, the Pentagon announced Tuesday.
“Even though the majority of service members discharged for their sexual orientation … were honorably separated, nearly 2,000 were separated with less than fully honorable characterizations,” Christa A. Specht, a legal policy director at the Defense Department, said in a news release Tuesday.
After the repeal, those who were dismissed due to the policy could appeal for an upgrade to an honorable discharge, which would make them eligible for full military benefits. However, Specht noted, many people affected by the policy were unaware they could do so. The “proactive review” sought to address this.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said 851 cases were proactively reviewed over the past year, and 96.8% of them, more than 800, qualified for “relief.”
“Brave LGBTQ+ Americans have long volunteered to serve the country that they love,” Austin said in a statement Tuesday. “Under President Biden’s leadership, the Department of Defense has taken extraordinary steps to redress the harms done by ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ and other policies on these former Service members.”
The announcement comes just over a year after the department announced it would conduct a “proactive review” of service members who were dismissed under the policy, which prohibited gay and lesbian members of the military from being open about their sexual orientation. “Don’t ask, don’t tell” was in effect from February 1994 to September 2011 and resulted in the discharge of more than 13,000 service members.
“What this means is that of the nearly 13,500 individuals who were administratively separated under Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, and served long enough to receive a merit-based characterization of service, 96% now have an honorable discharge,” Austin said in the statement.
Gays and lesbians dismissed from the military during the “don’t ask, don’t tell” era are part of a legacy that started well before 1994. Historians estimate at least 100,000 service members were forced out of the military due to their actual or perceived sexuality between World War II and 2011.
A Roman Catholic high school in Charlotte, North Carolina, did not violate federal civil rights law by firing a gay teacher after he announced that he would marry his same-sex partner, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday, overturning a lower court ruling.
Lonnie Billard, a longtime teacher at Charlotte Catholic High School, shared a post on Facebook in 2014, shortly after the state legalized same-sex marriage, saying that he and his partner were engaged. He was fired several weeks later. Billard then sued the school for sex discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and a district court judge ruled in his favor in 2021.
Wednesday’s decision by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, however, reversed that ruling, finding that the religious high school’s termination of Billard “falls under the ministerial exception to Title VII.”
“We conclude that the school entrusted Billard with ‘vital religious duties,’ making him a ‘messenger’ of its faith and placing him within the ministerial exception,” the ruling, written by Judge Pamela Harris, states.
Title VII prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin, and in the 2020 landmark Supreme Court case Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, the high court ruled that workplace sex discrimination includes discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. However, the Supreme Court has upheld that nondiscrimination laws are subject to a carve out, known as a “ministerial exception,” which permits religious organizations from being subjected to government interference in the hiring and firing of people in religious roles.
The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which represented the school and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charlotte, applauded the ruling.
“The Supreme Court has been crystal clear on this issue: Catholic schools have the freedom to choose teachers who fully support Catholic teaching,” Luke Goodrich, Becket’s vice president and senior counsel, said in a statement. “This is a victory for people of all faiths who cherish the freedom to pass on their faith to the next generation.”
The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of North Carolina and Tin Fulton Walker & Owen, which represented the plaintiff, issued a statement that referenced the Bostock decision and its protection for LGBTQ workers.
“This is a heartbreaking decision for our client who wanted nothing more than the freedom to perform his duties as an educator without hiding who he is or who he loves,” the statement said. “While today’s decision is narrowly tailored to Mr. Billard and the facts of his employment, it nonetheless threatens to encroach on that principle by widening the loopholes employers may use to fire people like Mr. Billard for openly discriminatory reasons.”
Billard and his lawyers have 14 days to request a rehearing by the 4th Circuit or 90 days to appeal to the Supreme Court. The ACLU declined to comment on whether they would make a rehearing request or appeal.
Best Buy offered to screen donations from its employee resource groups going to LGBTQ causes following pressure from a conservative think tank that holds shares in the company, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing made public this week.
The SEC filing contains a monthslong email exchange between the National Center for Public Policy Research, which describes itself as a “nonpartisan, free-market conservative think tank,” and Best Buy. The dialogue, which hasn’t been previously reported, shows how the center said it would make “a splash” unless the consumer electronics giant moved in favor of its demands.
In some of the last correspondence in the filing, Best Buy noted that it allows its employee resource groups “some discretion to directly support organizations of their choosing” but added that “any such contributions would be screened to ensure they do not advocate or support the causes or agendas you have identified as concerning.” One of the causes the NCPPR cited was transgender care for minors, which the group falsely described as an attempt to “mutilate the reproductive organs of children.”
When asked for a request for comment regarding the filing, Carly Charlson, a spokesperson for Best Buy, stated in an email: “At Best Buy, we strongly believe in an inclusive work environment with a culture of belonging where everyone feels valued and has the opportunity to thrive. This commitment is evident through our longstanding and continuing support of organizations like HRC, which has recognized us as one of the best places to work for the LGBTQIA+ community for the past 18 years.”
She then sent a followup email adding, “Nothing has changed in the ways we give to LGBTQIA+ organizations.”
In HRC, Charlson was referring to the Human Rights Campaign, the country’s largest LGBTQ-rights group.
“The news of this SEC filing is very concerning, and we are working in partnership with Best Buy to understand more,” Eric Bloem, HRC’s vice president of programs and corporate advocacy, said in a statement Friday afternoon. “Any company that uses their Corporate Equality Index distinction as cover while working with fringe groups and bad actors does not reflect true LGBTQ+ allyship in the corporate space.”
The communication in the SEC filing began on Dec. 11, when the NCPPR sent Best Buy a shareholder proposal asking the retailer to produce by June — and distribute at Best Buy’s annual shareholder meeting that month — a report for investors analyzing how its partnerships with LGBTQ nonprofits are benefitting the company’s business.
“Best Buy has partnerships with and contributes to organizations and activists that promote the practice of gender transition surgeries on minors and evangelize gender theory to minors. Why are Best Buy shareholders funding the proliferation of an ideology seeking to mutilate the reproductive organs of children before they finish puberty?” the proposal, signed by Ethan Peck, an associate at the NCPPR’s Free Enterprise Institute, states. “This contentious and vast disagreement between radical gender theory activists and the general public has nothing to do with Best Buy selling electronics.”
In an email dated Jan. 17, Peck told Best Buy’s attorneys that his organization “will withdraw its proposal if Best Buy were to end its partnerships with and contributions to” eight different LGBTQ nonprofits and initiatives, which he refers to as “predatory butchers” in his email. These groups include The Trevor Project, an LGBTQ youth suicide prevention and crisis intervention organization; SAGE, which advocates on behalf of LGBTQ elders; and GLAAD, an LGBTQ media advocacy group.
Peck did, however, leave the Human Rights Campaign off this list, stating in his email that “we understand that it’s unrealistic for Best Buy to leave HRC in the near future because of their political clout.”
“We hope you take this off-ramp for the sake of shareholders,” Peck wrote in the Jan. 17 email. “Were Best Buy to agree to such a compromise with us, we will not make a splash about it.”
In a Feb. 5 email, Marina Rizzo, a Best Buy attorney, told Peck that the company had reviewed his organization’s concerns and informed him that the company hadn’t donated in several years to two of the LGBTQ causes mentioned in the Jan. 17 email — the Trevor Project and Our Gay History in 50 States — and has never donated to the other six. She then says the company would screen certain donations the NCPPR may find concerning.
“As discussed during our call, we do allow our individual employee organizations, including our Military ERG, Conservative employee interest group, and our PRIDE group, among many other groups, some discretion to directly support organizations of their choosing,” Rizzo wrote. “That said, any such contributions would be screened to ensure they do not advocate or support the causes or agendas you have identified as concerning. We hope this addresses the concerns.”(In a letter included in the SEC filing, Best Buy notes that its employee resource groups “are provided with their own funding and have the capability to identify sponsorships to receive that funding, subject to internal guidelines and Company oversight.”)
Later that day, Peck thanked Rizzo in an email “for looking into this” and added, “we’re definitely delighted to hear all that.” He then raised several follow-up questions, including why a page on the Best Buy website still indicates the company supports the Trevor Project and a book titled “Our Gay History in 50 States.”
“We’re going to need some kind of proof that that funding has ended,” Peck wrote.
In an email on Feb. 9, Rizzo informed Peck that Best Buy would submit a letter to the SEC that afternoon asking that the regulator not take any action against the company for omitting NCPPR’s proposal from shareholder materials. She also told him that the letter is a “standard part of the proposal process, and we intend to continue our dialogue.” She ended the email by writing, “We remain ready to reach an understanding in conjunction with the withdrawal agreement you initially outlined.”
No additional email correspondence is included in the SEC filing after Feb. 9, and it’s unclear whether an agreement between Best Buy and NCPPR was ever reached. On March 22, NCPPR withdrew its Dec. 11 shareholder proposal. Then, on Tuesday of this week, Best Buy pulled its Feb. 9 “no action” requestfrom the SEC, and the agency sent a letter on Wednesday confirming the matter was moot. This, in turn, ensures NCPPR’s shareholder proposal regarding LGBTQ donations will not be presented at Best Buy’s annual shareholder meeting in June.
In response to NBC News’ request for comment, Peck declined to share any specifics regarding his communication with Best Buy, stating, “We don’t discuss confidential discussions.” He did, however, confirm that his organization has sent similar proposals to other public companies, though he did not name them.
When asked why he chose the eight LGBTQ causes mentioned in the Best Buy SEC filing, he wrote, “We used those groups as examples of groups that have adopted radical and divisive positions on LGBTQ issues, but we recognize that many more such groups exist.”
The exchange between Best Buy and the NCPPR comes as many large companies face renewed pressure from conservatives to curb their public support for the LGBTQ community.
Major consumer brands, includingBud Light and Target, have faced heated criticism from conservative activists, prompting a rollback of LGBTQ-focused marketing campaigns and products as well as calls for boycotts. In Bud Light’s case, sales declined and shares of its parent company, Anheuser-Busch Inbev, tumbled in the months following the beer brand’s partnership with transgender influencerDylan Mulvaney on April 1 of last year, though the stock has since rebounded.
In an email on Friday, GLAAD, one of the LGBTQ nonprofits mentioned in the SEC filing, expressed its displeasure with Best Buy.
“Executives at Best Buy ought to be ashamed of how they turned their backs on their LGBTQ and ally employees and consumers,” GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis said. “They know what they did was wrong, or they would not have tried to hide this cowardly, toxic corporate takeover inside an ordinary SEC filing.”
The owner of Houston’s only lesbian bar says her business is in jeopardy after it was denied insurance coverage, and she’s putting the blame, in part, on an anti-drag bill moving through the Texas Legislature.
“They outright denied us, the underwriters, because we host drag shows,” Julie Mabry, the owner of Pearl Bar, said in an interview with NBC affiliate KPRC of Houston.
Pearl Bar owner Julie Mabry.KPRC
Mabry has insurance through December, but she decided to switch agents a few months ago and shop around for a new policy, she told KPRC. It was during that process that her agent received the denial email, which the agent then sent to Mabry.
“This is the first time I’ve ever gotten an email like that. I cried about this for about a week,” said Mabry, who told KPRC that drag shows were the first thing mentioned in the email, which outlined why the underwriter did not want to take on the risk of insuring her bar.
Mabry did not share additional details about the underwriter or the email, and she did not immediately respond to NBC News’ request for comment.
Mabry, who opened Pearl Bar in 2013, said the current political climate fueled the situation she’s in, and she encouraged followers of the Pearl Bar Instagram account to contact their legislators about anti-LGBTQ bills in the state, including one that would restrict drag shows on public property, on the premises of a commercial enterprise or in the presence of a child.
The bill, Senate Bill 12, passed in the Texas Senate last month by a vote of 20-11, and it was set to be considered by a House committee Thursday. If the measure is signed into law, violators could be subjected to civil penalties of up to $10,000.
“Pearl needs everyone to speak up for us so that we can stay open and HOST DRAG SHOWS! It’s THAT serious,” a post on the Pearl Bar Instagram account said. “We are in the final stretch of session and every voice counts in pushing back on this and the other anti-LGBTQ legislation. We need you to step up, be loud, and tell your legislators NO to any anti-LGBTQ+ bills. Our state should be open to all, period.”
State Sen. Bryan Hughes, the bill’s author, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Brad Pritchett, a Houston resident and the field director for LGBTQ advocacy group Equality Texas, noted that drag shows are still legal in Texas and said Pearl Bar’s situation is a result of the “fear and panic that lawmakers have stirred up” around the centuries-old art form.
“This situation highlights one of the most insidious consequences of all the anti-LGBTQ+ bills in the legislature this session—most people don’t know what’s going on,” he said in an email. “It’s ludicrous to think that lawmakers can shut down an entire industry without even changing the law. Texans, we need you to show up to the capitol, to email your legislators, and to make a lot of noise about what is happening in Texas.”
Texas is one of at least 16 states where legislators have proposed bills this year seeking to restrict the audiences for drag performances and where they can take place. Tennessee is the only state to have enacted such a law, which a federal judge temporarily blocked from taking effect.
Bills seeking to restrict drag shows are part of a larger trend of Republican-led bills targeting LGBTQ people in the U.S. So far this year, more than 470 such bills have been proposed in legislatures across the U.S., according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
Pearl Bar is one of about two dozen lesbian bars left in the U.S. and one of only two in Texas, the other being Sue Ellen’s in Dallas. Mabry hopes Texas will not be left with just a lone lesbian bar.
“This situation is real,” she wrote on Instagram. “I’ve tried to be as careful as I can to keep my patrons, performers, and staff safe, but if we stay quiet, we aren’t helping.”
The state’s governor, Brad Little, a Republican, signed the “Vulnerable Child Protective Act” into law Tuesday evening. The measure prohibits transgender people under 18 from accessing puberty blockers and hormones. It also prevents them from undergoing transition-related surgery, though there is no evidence to suggest minors are getting this type of surgery in Idaho, according to KTVB-TV, an NBC affiliate in Boise.
“In signing this bill, I recognize our society plays a role in protecting minors from surgeries or treatments that can irreversibly damage their healthy bodies,” Little wrote in a letter to Idaho’s House speaker. “However, as policymakers we should take great caution whenever we consider allowing the government to interfere with loving parents and their decisions about what is best for their children.”
Medical practitioners who violate the law, which takes effect Jan. 1, could be charged with a felony and spend up to 10 years in prison if convicted.
Critics of the law say it amounts to government overreach and will end up harming, not helping, the state’s transgender youths.
“We are heartbroken for the families of Idaho today. We are watching parental rights being dismantled in the name of stigmatizing and harming our most vulnerable youth,” Chelsea Gaona-Lincoln, executive director of the LGBTQ advocacy group Add the Words, Idaho, said in a statement.
Idaho’s Vulnerable Child Protective Act is part of a broader effort among conservative lawmakers throughout the country to restrict the rights of LGBTQ Americans, especially transgender people. So far this year, more than 400 such proposals have been filed in state legislatures, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
From an-depth look at transgender men’s experiences in prison to Olympic diver Tom Daley’s viral knitting, here are 21 of our most clicked on LGBTQ news stories of the year.
Meet the queer teacher behind Bernie Sanders’ viral mittens
Jen Ellis, creator of the famous Sen. Bernie Sanders mittens, lives in Vermont with her 5-year-old daughter and her wife, Liz, and teaches second grade.Courtesy Jen Ellis
Vermont educator Jen Ellis uses her mittens to raise money for LGBTQ youth and show people the power of generosity. (Jan. 30)
Americans identifying as LGBTQ more than ever, poll finds
Pride flag fon July 10, 2021, in San Diego, Calif.Daniel Knighton / Getty Images file
Nearly 16 percent of Generation Z, those 18 to 23 in 2020, consider themselves something other than heterosexual, according to a Gallup poll. (Feb. 24)
Bisexual women with straight male partners least likely to be out
Evgeniy Fedorcov / Getty Images/iStockphoto
Bisexual women’s health and well-being may be affected by the gender and sexual orientation of their partner, according to a study published in the Journal of Bisexuality. (March 6)
America’s remaining lesbian bars are barely hanging on
Cubbyhole in the West Village, in New York City. Jamie McCarthy / Getty Images
“They provide a safe space, a place for camaraderie, a place for community and, of course, a place to get laid,” actor Lea DeLaria said of queer women’s bars. (April 4)
Cherry Grove: How a beach town became a gay ‘safe haven’
Maggie McCorkle and Audrey Hartmann in Cherry Grove, Calif., 1963.Cherry Grove Archives Collection
An exhibit at the New-York Historical Society features rarely seen photos of the LGBTQ community enjoying the freedom offered by Fire Island’s Cherry Grove, one of America’s first gay beach towns. (May 14)
Mark Wahlberg with Reid Miller in “Joe Bell.”Quantrell D. Colbert / Roadside Attractions
The movie, starring Mark Wahlberg, tells the complicated story of a father who wanted to memorialize his gay son while also spreading a message of acceptance. (July 22)
Remembering the ‘Saint of 9/11’ and the ‘Hero of Flight 93’
Father Mychal Judge, Mark Bingham.Getty Images/Courtesy Amanda MarK
Mark Bingham, a rugby player, reportedly confronted hijackers on United Flight 93, and the Rev. Mychal Judge died tending to victims at the World Trade Center. (Sept. 11)
Dr. Rachel Levine becomes nation’s first trans four-star officer
Rachel Levine appears during her confirmation hearing on Feb. 25, 2021. Caroline Brehman / Pool via Reuters
Levine was appointed to lead the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, making her the nation’s first openly transgender four-star officer. (Oct. 19)
Kavanaugh cites landmark gay rights cases in abortion argument
Brett Kavanaugh on Capitol Hill on Sept. 27, 2018.Tom Williams / Pool via Getty Images file
Lawyers who argued for LGBTQ rights in those landmark cases — Obergefell v. Hodges and Lawrence v. Texas — were conflicted on the validity of Justice Kavanaugh’s argument about abortion restrictions. (Dec. 3)
The Food and Drug Administration has approved the first long-acting injectable medication for use as pre-exposure prevention, or PrEP, against HIV, the agency announced Monday.
Apretude, the new drug, is an injectable given every two months as an alternative to HIV prevention pills, like Truvada and Descovy, which have been shown to reduce the risk of HIV by 99 percent when taken daily.
Two FDA trials analyzing the safety and efficacy of the novel drug found that Apretude was more likely to reduce HIV than the daily oral medications — by 69 percent for cisgender men and transgender women who have sex with men and by 90 percent for cisgender women. Apretude’s superior efficacy was apparently driven by the greater ease with which study participants adhered to the every-other-month regimen compared with taking a pill every day.
“Today’s approval adds an important tool in the effort to end the HIV epidemic by providing the first option to prevent HIV that does not involve taking a daily pill,” Dr. Debra Birnkrant, the director of antivirals division at the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a statement. “This injection, given every two months, will be critical to addressing the HIV epidemic in the U.S., including helping high-risk individuals and certain groups where adherence to daily medication has been a major challenge or not a realistic option.”
While gains have been made in PrEP use over the past several years, only 25 percent of the 1.2 million people for whom PrEP is recommended were prescribed the treatment last year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC estimates that as of 2019, there were approximately 285,000 people using PrEP, the vast majority of them gay and bisexual men.
The hope is that the newly approved, long-acting injectable — made by ViiV Healthcare, which is majority owned by GlaxoSmithKline — will make adherence easier, help increase PrEP usage and drive down the national HIV rate.
“People who are vulnerable to acquiring HIV, especially those in Black and Latinx communities who are disproportionately impacted in the US, may want options beyond daily oral pills,” Deborah Waterhouse, ViiV Healthcare’s CEO, said in a statement, adding that “Apretude was studied in one of the most diverse and comprehensive HIV prevention trial programs to date, which also included some of the largest numbers of transgender women and Black men who have sex with men ever enrolled in an HIV prevention trial.”
Men who have sex with men accounted for 66 percent of all new HIV diagnoses in the U.S. in 2019, according to the CDC. When the numbers are broken down by race, Black Americans accounted for the highest percentage, representing 42 percent of all new diagnoses that year.
In July, the federal government announced that almost all insurers must cover the two approved forms of PrEP pills, Truvada and Descovy, as well as the lab tests and clinic visits required to maintain such prescriptions — and to do so with no cost sharing. As it stands, insurers will not be required to cover all costs for the new injectable version of PrEP, which has a list price of $3,700 per dose and is slated to begin shipping to wholesalers and specialty distributors in the U.S. in early 2022.
Kenyon Farrow, the managing director of PrEP4All, an advocacy group that fights to increase access to HIV prevention and treatment, said his organization is “definitely happy to see the FDA approval of another option for people who want to use PrEP.”
However, he said he fears that the “implementation of this option will likely take years to make it real for most people.”
“Due to COVID, public health systems are already overburdened and much of the workforce needed to implement this large scale are leaving the field due to burnout,” he said in an email. “Because it will need to be administered in clinical settings, it won’t be treated as a pharmacy benefit by payers, but instead as a clinical benefit, which will take time to implement the proper coding for billing, as well as education and training for nurses who will likely bear the brunt of the work to implement.”
Ohio will soon join nearly every other state in the country in allowing transgender people born in the state to change the gender markers on their birth certificates. Tennessee will soon be the lone holdout.
The Ohio Department of Health will not appeal a federal court rulingissued in December that found the state’s ban on birth certificate gender changes is unconstitutional. The department is instead working on a process for people to request the change and expects to have it in place by June 1, The Cincinnati Enquirer reported Monday, citing a court filing made Thursday.
The December ruling by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio came in response to a lawsuit brought by four transgender people born in Ohio. The plaintiffs, according to court documents, were subjected to professional humiliation, verbal harassment and threats to their safety as a result of not having a birth certificate that aligned with their gender identity.
The ruling cited a 2015 survey by the National Center for Transgender Equality that found 36 percent of respondents in Ohio who showed an ID with a name or gender that did not match their gender presentation were “verbally harassed, denied benefits or service, asked to leave, or assaulted.”
Judge Michael Watson called the state’s argument that permitting changes to birth certificate gender markers would “undermine the accuracy of vital statistics or fraud prevention” a “red herring.”
“The Court finds that Defendants’ proffered justifications are nothing more than thinly veiled post-hoc rationales to deflect from the discriminatory impact of the Policy,” Watson wrote.
While nearly every state now permits transgender people to change the gender marker on their birth certificate, the process for doing so varies from state to state. Fourteen states, for example, require proof of gender-affirming surgery in order to make such a change, according to Movement Advancement Project, an LGBTQ think tank.
A number of organizations, schools and businesses with either a history of anti-LGBTQ advocacy or policies that explicitly discriminate against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer individuals have received millions in pandemic relief funding, according to an NBC News analysis of data released last week by the Small Business Administration.
The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) — which was intended to help small businesses amid the Covid-19 crisis — gave nearly $5.3 billion in the potentially forgivable loans to 5,160,000 recipients, with the average loan being $101,409.
The lion’s share of that money went to the American Family Association, which received nearly $1.4 million in Paycheck Protection Program funds. The Mississippi-based organization uses its resources, in part, to combat what it calls the “homosexual agenda.” Through its One Million Moms initiative, the organization rallies its supporters to boycott brands and media outlets that promote “homosexuality and transgenderism.”
Cassie Miller, a senior research analyst at the SPLC, criticized the Trump administration for “letting millions of Americans and small businesses suffer” while providing “financial support to groups that tear at the fabric of our democracy.”
“Extremist movements thrive in climates of political uncertainty,” she said. “Now, the government is doing even more to help hate groups by handing them millions of dollars in forgivable loans.”
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The American Family Association, Ruth Institute and Pacific Justice Institute did not respond to NBC News’ requests for comment on the SPLC’s “hate group” designation and how they used their Paycheck Protection Program funds. The other four groups all disputed being labeled a “hate group,” and two of them shed light on how they used their relief loans.
The American College of Pediatricians said it used the loan to “fund the covered payroll period as designated.” It called the SPLC’s hate group designation a “mischaracterization” of its organization and pointed to its detailed response to the criticism. Liberty Counsel, which said it used its funds to avoid laying off any of its 35 employees, accused the SPLC of wanting to “destroy those with whom they disagree.”
Dr. James Dobson, who founded Focus on the Family, offers a prayer before an appearance by President Donald Trump at a campaign rally on Feb. 20, 2020, in Colorado Springs, Colo.David Zalubowski / AP file
At least four other organizations that received Paycheck Protection Program funding — Concerned Women for America, Dr. James Dobson Family Institute, Family Leader and First Liberty Institute — have a demonstrated track record of anti-LGBTQ advocacy or espousing an anti-LGBTQ ideology, though they have not been designated “hate groups” by the SPLC. These organizations received nearly $2 million in pandemic relief money combined.
The Dr. James Dobson Family Institute, Concerned Women for America and Family Leader did not respond to NBC News’ requests for comment on how they used the aid and their response to assertions that their organizations have a track record of anti-LGBTQ advocacy. First Liberty Institute’s general counsel, Mike Berry, sent a brief response saying his organization “advocates for the religious liberty of people of all faiths” and said “First Liberty repaid, with interest, all PPP funds by June 30.”
Two private schools that made national news over the past two years due to their anti-LGBTQ policies — and their high-profile conservative backers — were also on the Paycheck Protection Program recipient list.
Immanuel Christian School, a private K-10 in northern Virginia where Vice President Mike Pence’s wife, Karen Pence, teaches, received $724,900 in aid funding. As NBC News reported last year, the school explicitly bars its employees from engaging in or condoning “homosexual or lesbian sexual activity” and “transgender identity.” And in its parent agreement, the school states that it may “refuse admission” or “discontinue enrollment” of a student whose household condones “sexual immorality,” such as “homosexual activity or bi-sexual activity.”
Trinity Schools, a group of private Christian schools where newly confirmed Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett was once a trustee, received over $1 million. As The Associated Press reported in October, the schools effectively bar admission to children of gay parents and make it clear that openly LGBTQ teachers are not welcome in the classrooms.
Immanuel Christian School did not respond to NBC News’ request for comment. Trinity Schools President Jon Balsbaugh sent an email saying his institution used the funds to “ensure that economic disruption of our employees and staff due to the pandemic would be lessened” and said Trinity Schools does not “unlawfully discriminate with respect to race, color, gender, national origin, age, disability, or other legally protected classifications under applicable law.”
Several companies and organizations that have been at the center of high-profile lawsuits regarding their policies of excluding LGBTQ people have also received Paycheck Protection Program funding.
Catholic Social Services, which received over $2 million, is at the center of a case currently before the Supreme Court. Fulton v. City of Philadelphia stems from the faith-based child welfare agency’s policy of not considering same-sex couples as potential parents for foster children.
R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, which received more than $150,000, was part of a landmark Supreme Court case that resulted in the justices ruling that workplace discrimination based on a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity violates federal civil rights law. The Michigan funeral home’s involvement in the case stemmed from its termination of an employee after she came out as transgender. In November, the business agreed to pay $250,000 to the estate of the terminated employee, who died earlier this year, to settle the lawsuit.
Roncalli High School, which received nearly $1.8 million, was sued by two lesbian guidance counselors last year who said they were terminated when the school discovered they were married to women. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indiana, which oversees the school and was also named in the women’s suits, received over $2.4 in pandemic relief funds. In response to the lawsuits, which are still active, the Indiana archdiocese told NBC News last year that it has “a constitutional right to hire leaders who support the school’s religious mission.”
Catholic Social Services, R.G. & G.R Harris Funeral Homes, Roncalli High School and Arlene’s Flowers did not respond to requests for comment.
‘Warped priorities’
Kyle Herrig, president of government watchdog Accountable.US, said it’s “shameful” that the Trump administration provided pandemic relief funds to “organizations promoting bigotry, intolerance, and hate” with “so many small businesses forced to shutter since the start of the pandemic.”
“It is hard to find a clearer example of the Trump administration’s warped priorities than allowing countless mom-and-pop shops to go under without proper relief while bailing out wealthy and well-connected anti-LGBTQ enterprises on Americans’ dime,” he said in an email.
Justin Nelson, co-founder and president of the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce, shared a similar view.
“I think it’s ridiculous,” he said, “that the Small Business Administration led by the Trump administration would put the needs of avowed anti-LGBT organizations before hardworking small-business owners.”
Nelson said he’s seen first hand how LGBTQ-owned small businesses have struggled during the pandemic and how many have been unable to receive government relief.
“These folks are worried about keeping the lights on,” he said. “We had a number of businesses that applied, and only a small number that received funding.”
Nelson, whose organization works with thousands of LGBTQ-owned businesses around the country, said it’s frustrating to see large, well-funded organizations with anti-LGBTQ track records collect large sums of relief funding while thousands of small businesses have had to close their doors permanently. He noted that his chamber did not apply for a Paycheck Protection Program loan so as not to take away resources from the businesses most in need.
The Small Business Administration said in a statement that it does not comment on individual borrowers or loans. An agency spokesperson said the agency designed a “robust loan review process to ensure that only eligible borrowers received loans that fully complied with the program requirements” but added that just because a loan was issued, doesn’t mean the recipient was eligible or that the loan will ultimately be forgiven.
