Civil Rights

The Charlotte Observer reports: The race for North Carolina governor appeared headed into overtime with Democrat Roy Cooper clinging to a paper-thin lead over Republican Gov. Pat McCrory early Wednesday morning. Cooper was leading by around 3,000 votes out of 4.7 million cast. The race could hinge on so-called provisional ballots expected to be counted by the time of a …

IMPORTANT CORRECTION: I had the numbers flipped in my first wrong, wrong, wrong draft of this post. Raleigh’s ABC affiliate reports: Hours before Election Day, a new Quinnipiac University poll shows races couldn’t be closer in North Carolina. Hillary Clinton leads Donald Trump 47 percent to 45 percent – well within the margin of error. In North Carolina’s Senate race, …

Reuters reports: African states launched a bid at the United Nations on Friday to halt the work of the first U.N. independent investigator appointed to help protect gay and transgender people worldwide from violence and discrimination. The 47-member U.N. Human Rights Council, based in Geneva, created the position in June and in September appointed Vitit Muntarbhorn of Thailand, who has …

Some of you might remember back in 2004 when Mike Rogers outed then-RNC National Field Director Dan Gurley for seeking “bareback sex with multiple partners” in a Gay.com chat room while reportedly overseeing George W. Bush’s abstinence and anti-gay marriage crusades. Gurley later appeared in Kirby Dick’s award-winning 2009 documentary on outing, Outrage. These days Gurley sits on the North …

Yesterday nine states, led by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, filed a federal appeals court brief in support of an on-hold Mississippi law that would legalize anti-LGBT business discrimination. This morning hate group leader Tony Perkins lavishes praise on Gov. Phil Bryant’s appeal. Via press release: Governor Phil Bryant (R-Miss.) has enough on his plate. He shouldn’t have to do …

The Austin Statesman reports: Joined Thursday by Republican officials from eight other states, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton urged a federal appeals court to reinstate a Mississippi law that had been struck down as discriminatory against gay and transgender people. The Mississippi law, Paxton told the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a legal brief, was intended to protect …

A French court has ruled it a criminal offense to call somebody a homophobe. Laure Pora, the former head of Paris ACT UP, has been fined $2500 for using the word on a poster of La Manif Pour Tous president Ludovine Rochere, seen above marching in NOM’s 2014 hate parade in Washington DC. Gay Star News reports: In 2013, ACT …

The Charlotte Observer reports: The North Carolina Republican Party has filed an elections board complaint against the Charlotte Observer and others who are planning a public forum about House Bill 2, alleging that the event will serve as an “infomercial” for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Roy Cooper. On Wednesday night, the Observer plans to host a forum on HB2, the controversial …

Via press release from hate group leader Tony Perkins: A presidential term doesn’t last a lifetime — but their Supreme Court picks do! So when voters head to the polls next Tuesday (or before), they’re not just voting for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton — they’re voting for at least one, and maybe as many as three or four, high …

From the editorial board of the Roanoke Times: Which candidate would do the most to help our local economy? That’s easy. It’s Pat McCrory, the Republican governor of North Carolina, who’s seeking his second four-year term in the November election. We can point to specific and multiple ways he has helped the economy — our economy. North Carolina panicked and …

USA Today reports: The Supreme Court agreed Friday to take up the controversial issue of transgender rights, instantly transforming what had loomed as a holding-pattern term with only eight justices into one featuring another major social policy issue. The justices will consider a Virginia school district’s challenge to Obama administration regulations requiring that schools allow transgender students to use restrooms …

The Buffalo News reports: The Buffalo Public Schools have a new gender identity policy to dictate how transgender students are treated. The polarizing policy allows a transgender student to use the restroom and locker room that corresponds to the student’s consistently expressed gender identity at school. Students can access the alternate restrooms as soon as their parent or legal guardian …

LGBTQ Nation reports: Leave it to a deodorant company to get what so many elected officials in this country can’t quite wrap their heads around — that there is no “one way” to express gender. And while right wing politicians and talking heads spend no shortage of time obsessing over how they, and most importantly their pure and innocent daughters, …

The BBC reports: The Scottish government is to move to pardon men who were convicted of same-sex offences before laws against homosexuality were scrapped. The UK government has announced plans for posthumous pardons for men who were convicted under laws now abolished. There was controversy after an SNP members’ bill on the topic was “talked out” at Westminster, with Theresa …

The Charlotte Observer reports: Over the last year, when companies announced plans to grow their footprints in North Carolina, state leaders have presented them with an unusual gift: An oak bowl carved from wood from the state capitol grounds. So when PayPal unceremoniously canceled its plans for an expansion in Charlotte over opposition to House Bill 2, state officials did …

The couple had been together for more than 50 years but never married. The New York Times reports: Bill Cornwell and Tom Doyle lived in a brownstone in the West Village for over five decades. They were artists, neighborhood fixtures and committed partners. Their enduring love never seemed to them to need codification — not to mention that for most …

The Raleigh News & Observer reports: North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory has closed a significant gap between himself and Democratic challenger Roy Cooper in a Monmouth University Poll released Monday. While the latest polling from Monmouth shows McCrory with a mere 1-point lead, two months ago the incumbent Republican governor was 9 points behind in that poll. In that time, …

The BBC reports: The Christian owners of a Northern Ireland bakery have lost their appeal against a ruling that their refusal to make a “gay cake” was discriminatory. Appeal court judges said that, under law, the bakers were not allowed to provide a service only to people who agreed with their religious beliefs. Two years ago, the family-run firm refused …

The Sun reports: There was widespread anger in the House of Commons as the Government talked out the Turing bill, which would automatically pardon gay men convicted of now abolished sexual offences. MPs shouted ‘shame’ and ‘shameful’ as Justice Minister Sam Gyimah killed off SNP MP John Nicolson’s private members bill. The Government has announced plans for thousands of gay …

The Charlotte Observer reports: Three days after Gov. Pat McCrory signed House Bill 2, his general counsel told a former legal colleague that the governor battled the legislature over the bill that limited protections for LGBT individuals, according to emails obtained by the Observer. “Bob, here are the facts: We fought against this bill,” Bob Stephens said in a March …