- Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen told a Senate committee he is in favor of repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates said they have appointed a high-level working group to report, by the end of the year, on how the military can implement such a change if Congress repeals the law.
- President Barack Obama used his speech at the National Prayer Breakfast, run by fundamentalist group The Fellowship, to denounce the proposed “Anti-Homosexuality Bill” being considered in Uganda.
- The U.S. Tax Court ruled in favor of GLAD client Rhiannon O’Donnabhain, stating for the first time that treatment for gender identity disorder qualifies as medical care under the Internal Revenue Code, and is therefore deductible.
- After the Hawaii House voted last Friday to postpone a vote on civil unions indefinitely, Lambda Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii said they will file a lawsuit alleging that the state is violating the equal protection rights of same-sex couples by not enacting civil unions.
- The Kansas Senate Federal and State Affairs Committee endorsed a bill to prohibit discrimination in Kansas based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
- Maryland lawmakers rejected an effort to prohibit the state from recognizing legal marriages of same-sex couples from other jurisdictions. That doesn’t mean the state will recognize such marriages, only that there will not be a law explicitly stating that they won’t. Sigh.
- In a tit-for-tat in Utah, lawmakers said they will not consider a law to ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. They will instead spend the next year studying the issue. In exchange, opponents of such legislation will drop efforts to prevent local governments from passing similar laws this legislative session.
- The Washington, D.C. Board of Elections & Ethics ruled that the city cannot have a ballot measure to ban same-sex marriage because it would violate the city’s Human Rights Act.
Around the world:
- Albania passed a law to outlaw homophobic discrimination but failed to include a measure to allow marriage for same-sex couples.
- A candidate for Brazil’s top military court caused an uproar among gay and human rights groups when he said that gay people should not be given command positions because they would not be obeyed by their soldiers in combat.