Joe.My.God. LGBT News

Toronto City News reports: “God says it best. Homosexuality is a sin.” Those are the first few lines of a homophobic letter sent to Toronto City Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam’s office on Wednesday morning. The letter is riddled with derogatory language describing gay people, with one line reading, “Now with the police not at your f*g parade, it makes it easy …

The Miami Herald reports: Just days before the state visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to Mar-a-Lago, President Donald Trump’s Palm Beach private club, Florida restaurant inspectors found potentially dangerous raw fish and cited the club for storing food in two broken down coolers. Inspectors found 13 violations at the fancy club’s kitchen, according to recently published reports — …

The New York Daily News reports: Sheila Abdus-Salaam, the first-ever female Muslim judge in U.S. history and the first African-American woman to serve on New York’s highest court, was found dead Wednesday on the bank of the Hudson River, police said. Abdus-Salaam, 65, was discovered floating fully clothed on the Manhattan side of the river, by the Henry Hudson Parkway …

Last night Bloomberg published speculation that Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy may be planning to retire at the end of the term. From the article: Kennedy, 80, has been the court’s primary pivot point since 2006, generally aligning with the four conservatives on campaign finance and voting rights and with the four liberals on gay rights. By selecting Kennedy’s successor, …

Via press release: The Congressional LGBT Equality Caucus denounced reports of hundreds gay men being arrested, detained, and tortured in Chechnya, an autonomous, predominantly Muslim subject of Russia. Additional reports indicate that several of the detained individuals have been murdered in custody. On April 10th 2017, Representatives Cicilline and Lowenthal led a bipartisan letter of 50 Members of Congress urging …

Via press release from GLAAD: Tonight’s episode of CBS’ Survivor was a gut-wrenching look at the consequences of outing a transgender person against his will. At Tribal Council, contestant Jeff Varner told his tribemates that fellow contestant Zeke Smith is a transgender man. Zeke Smith played in the previous season “Millennials vs. Gen X” before being brought back immediately for the current season “Game Changers.” During …

Fast Company reports: A campaign finance watchdog said today that chief White House strategist Steve Bannon may have illegally benefited from spending by a pro-Trump super PAC while he led Trump’s presidential campaign. The Campaign Legal Center believes Make America Number 1, a super PAC that backed Trump, may have improperly subsidized Bannon’s salary. In a letter to regulators on …

The Raleigh News & Observer reports: Republican legislators’ proposal to defy a U.S. Supreme Court ruling and restore the state constitution’s ban on same-sex marriage won’t get a hearing in the N.C. House, its leader said Wednesday. House Bill 780 was filed Tuesday and says the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage across the country “is null …

On NATO: Trump said NATO is “no longer obsolete” during a Wednesday press conference with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, backtracking on his past criticism of the alliance. During the campaign, he frequently called the organization “obsolete,” saying did little to crack down on terrorism and that its other members don’t pay their “fair share.” On China: Trump told the Wall …

Brian Tashman reports at Right Wing Watch: Today, “The 700 Club” profiled a Christian military-style training camp that helps “turn boys into men,” a concept that enthralled host Pat Robertson, who complained that men today have turned into emasculated wimps. Robertson said college students have “got to apologize for being masculine; they have to apologize for being white; they got …