The Senate Armed Services Committee passed its version of the National Defense Authorization Act without any of the anti-LGBT amendments that the House passed in its version—including one that would have delayed repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. The Senate bill would also repeal the military’s long-standing anti-sodomy regulation.- The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children and Families announced the creation of a resource center to support the resettlement of LGBT refugees.
- A federal judge ruled that Judge Vaughn Walker’s decision to overturn California’s Prop 8 ban on marriage for same-sex couples must stand. Proponents of the ban sought to overturn Walker’s ruling on the grounds that Walker himself is gay.
- The Maine legislature voted down legislation that LGBT advocates said would have restricted transgender people from using restrooms of their identified gender.
- The New York Assembly passed a bill to legalize marriage for same-sex couples. Looks like they’re within one stated vote in the Senate, but the Republican Senate Majority Conference is still deciding whether to allow the bill to go to the floor. They cite concerns over religious exemptions.
Around the world:
- The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) passed a resolution calling for a study on “discriminatory laws and practices and acts of violence against individuals based on their sexual orientation and gender identity, in all regions of the world, and how international human rights law can be used to end violence and related human rights violations based on sexual orientation and gender identity,” and requires a future session of the U.N. Human Rights to discuss the findings and “appropriate follow-up to the recommendations of the study.”
- France’s lower house of parliament rejected a bill that would have legalized marriage for same-sex couples. Two women have defied the ban and wed, however, because one is transgender and legally still a man.
