A group of North Carolina drag queens have issued cease-and-desist orders to the funders of a political ad for Republican Jennifer Balkcom after being depicted as deepfaked versions of themselves dancing with Democratic opponent Jamie Ager.The ad in question, which was approved by Balkcom, features
Story not found
Back to all storiesrights
Barack Obama brutally mocked the Trump administration for its dramatic response to his joke about the president's design aesthetic while ignoring the former president's criticisms of its actual policies affecting Americans. While campaigning for Democrats in Cleveland last week, ...
rights
This story is based on LGBTQ Nation interviews with John Kyper in October and in 2025, and includes recollections from a history of his deportation that he shared with Left History in 2008. John Kyper was just a hippie hitchhiker traveling to Canada. But a backpack filled with co...
rights
Nine months ago, in January of 2026, I penned a column that advocated for gender affirming care among trans youth. Providing gender affirming care to trans youth is an issue that I care deeply about, mainly because I understand and know the suffering that young trans people can f...
rights
A female student who was banned from playing the male lead role in her high school musical filed a lawsuit against the school district on Monday, alleging she was discriminated against based on Title IX. Ana Mota, a 17-year-old senior at South Grand Prairie High School, was initi...
rights
A Virginia pastor is suing to invalidate a state ballot measure asking voters to remove the state’s 2006 constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and to add a right to marry regardless of a partner’s sex, gender, or race. Filed by the Founding Freedoms Law Center on behalf of Past...
rights
How’s this for a game of Gay Mad Libs? RuPaul’s Drag Race contestant Briar Blush has been engaged in a bitter, weeklong back-and-forth with rapper Azealia Banks on X. The Twitter drama began with season 18 contestant Briar commenting on another female rapper, namely the MAGA-fied...
rights
Here's a real headline that ran on Advocate yesterday: "Democrats haven’t yet won control of Congress, but their retreat on trans rights is already underway." A retreat? Considering how strong Democrats have stood on trans issues at the federal level since the wave of anti-trans ...
rights
A court in New York rejected a claim last week from a religious clothing retailer that her constitutional rights were violated when she was fined for refusing to sell a wedding jumpsuit to a lesbian woman. She'll now have to pay $5,000 in damages and a $20,000 fine. It all starte...
community
Several thousand people turned out on Oct. 27 for the 39th annual 17th Street High Heel Race, considered one of the city’s largest LGBTQ events that welcomes all city residents to celebrate Halloween. Started in 1986 by customers and staff at the 17th Street gay bar JR’s as a rac...
rights
This story originally appeared on The Advocate.Dolores Huerta, the labor rights activist, civil rights leader, and United Farm Workers co-founder, died Wednesday surrounded by family at her home in Bakersfield, California. She was 96.Family spokesperson Erik Olvera told The Assoc...
rights
This year, the Human Rights Campaign found that a record-breaking 12% of U.S. adults identify as LGBTQ, representing about 25.6 million people, according to a study of U.S. Census data. This record-high figure, combined with declining approval ratings for President Donald Trump, ...
rights
When New York Times reporter Jeffrey Schmalz collapsed at his desk in the paper's newsroom, just days before Christmas in 1990, few of his colleagues knew for certain that he was gay – he'd only shared that fact with a close circle of friends and family – and none were aware he h...
