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Tillerson Issues Transgender Day of Remembrance Statement Despite Doing Nothing to Help Trans People

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Tillerson Says Around the World Attacks on Transgender People Often ‘Are Perpetrated by Government Officials, Undermining the Rule of Law’

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has issued a statement acknowledging Monday as the Transgender Day of Remembrance. The statement itself is noticeably thin, at least in comparison to those issued by his immediate predecessor, Secretary of State John Kerry. 

“Transgender individuals and their advocates, along with lesbian, gay, bisexual and intersex persons, are facing increasing physical attacks and arbitrary arrests in many parts of the world,” Tillerson’s statement reads. “Often these attacks are perpetrated by government officials, undermining the rule of law.”

Under President Donald Trump, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and Attorney General Jeff Sessions rescinded an Obama-era guidance letter detailing how schools can help ensure the civil rights of transgender students are protected. DeVos has also rescinded guidance or other documents supporting disabled children, and most recently, minority children.

“Transgender persons should not be subjected to violence or discrimination, and the human rights they share with all persons should be respected,” Tillerson added.

On this Transgender Day of Remembrance, the United States remains committed to advancing the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all persons. These principles are inherent in our own Constitution and drive the diplomacy of the United States,” Tillerson concluded. 

Aside from issuing a statement in support of LGBT Pride Month, which President Donald Trump did not, Tillerson’s record on LGBT issues is extremely poor.

In June Tillerson admitted he had not even discussed Chechnya’s anti-gay torture and concentration camps with Russia. His State Dept. in May was denying visas to Chechen gay men fleeing persecution.

In 2016, Secretary of State John Kerry issued this statement:

On Transgender Day of Remembrance, the United States solemnly honors the memory of the many transgender individuals who lost their lives to senseless acts of violence.

Transgender persons around the world are targeted by rising levels of violence fueled by hatred and bigotry. This is a global challenge and we all must do more to protect transgender persons on the basis of equality and dignity.

In the United States, our Constitution enshrines freedoms of peaceful assembly, speech and association, and it affirms that everyone has equal protection under the law. Around the world human rights and fundamental freedoms are recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states that every person is born free and equal in dignity and rights. Every person includes transgender women, transgender men, and other individuals who face marginalization on account of their gender expression or gender identity.

Today we stand in solidarity with the incredible resilience and leadership of the transgender community in responding to stigma and marginalization. Transgender persons deepen our diversity, broaden our communities, and strengthen the values we cherish. When all persons reach their full human potential, free from fear, intimidation, and violence, nations become more just, secure and prosperous.

The United States remains committed to advance the human rights of all persons, including transgender persons. On this Transgender Day of Remembrance, we reaffirm equality for all as part of our core constitutional principles and as a human rights priority of U.S. diplomacy.

RELATED STORIES:

US State Dept. Releases #SpiritDay Video, Neglects to Do Actual Work of Supporting LGBT People

Secretary of State Tillerson Admits US Has Not Even Discussed Chechnya’s Anti-Gay Torture Camps With Russia

Trump State Department Denying Visas for Gay Men Fleeing Chechnya’s Kidnappings, Torture and Murders

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Trump Administration Hit With Lawsuit for Removing Pride Flag

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The Trump administration is facing a lawsuit accusing it of breaking federal law by taking down the LGBTQ+ Pride flag at New York City’s Stonewall National Monument, the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ+ civil rights movement.

The U.S. Department of the Interior and Secretary Doug Burgum, as well as the National Park Service and Acting Director Jessica Bowron, are named in the lawsuit filed by attorneys for the Gilbert Baker Foundation and others. Gilbert Baker is the artist who created the rainbow Pride flag.

“In the lawsuit,” The New York Times reported, “the Gilbert Baker Foundation argued that the original Pride flag fell under one of the allowed exceptions: to provide historical context at national monuments. This is the exception that allows Confederate flags to be flown at properties managed by the Park Service, including Gettysburg National Military Park.”

READ MORE: ‘Republicans Have to Lose’: Far Right Extremist Leader Puts Trump on Notice

“This was no careless mistake,” the lawsuit reads, according to a screenshot posted by New York Daily News reporter Molly Crane-Newman. “The government has not removed other historical flags at other national monuments, most notably Confederate flags.”

The suit alleges that the “assault on Stonewall is the latest example in a long line of efforts by the Trump Administration to target the LGBTQ+ community for discrimination and opprobrium.”

“In February 2025, for instance, the administration removed the word ‘transgender’ from prominent sections of the Stonewall monument’s website, as part of its wider campaign to demean and erase the transgender community,” it states.

“The Trump Administration has deleted numerous NPS websites discussing LGBTQ+ history,” it continues, “fired at least one federal employee for displaying a pride flag in his office; banned the use of pronouns in email signatures; renamed a John Lewis-class replenishment oiler named after Harvey Milk, a pioneering gay rights leader who served as a Navy officer and one of the first openly gay elected officials in the United States.”

READ MORE: ‘Insulting’: Fox News Panel Implodes as Host Clashes With Liberal Guest Over Voter ID

It also cites what it calls “a particularly absurd example,” in which images of the B-29 aircraft Enola Gay — the plane that dropped the first atomic bomb — were flagged for deletion, apparently because the images included the word “Gay.”

The lawsuit alleges a “pattern of systemic targeting of the LGBTQ+ community—combined with the starkly disparate treatment of the Pride flag,” which it claims “demonstrates that the decision to alter the Stonewall monument was not just a mistake. It was based on an impermissible animus.”

Numerous New York elected leaders at all levels, including U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal, denounced the administration’s removal of the flag.

The removal became a national flashpoint, drawing hundreds of locals to protest and prompting elected leaders to vow to raise it again.

Activists and officials gathered for multiple demonstrations at the Stonewall National Monument, where they raised a new Pride flag — an act that the Trump administration condemned as a “political stunt.”

READ MORE: Massie Warns of Growing GOP ‘Defections’

 

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Massie Warns of Growing GOP ‘Defections’

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A prominent House Republican who successfully advanced bipartisan legislation to release the Epstein files is predicting there will be more GOP “defections” once the primaries are over.

U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) told Politico that because Speaker Mike Johnson’s majority is so thin, “on any given day, I would just need one or two of my own co-conspirators to get something done” that goes against the Trump administration’s agenda.

He said that “what’s happening is that the retirement caucus is growing and primary days are coming up and passing. Once we get past March, April and May, which contain a large portion of their Republican primaries, I think you’re going to see more defections.”

Massie added that “quietly and privately, people are telling me they agree with me.”

In a surprising revelation, Massie said that House Republicans “are being told every week to stand down, bite their tongue, sit on their hands, do what they’re told, be part of the team and put their brain in neutral.”

READ MORE: ‘Insulting’: Fox News Panel Implodes as Host Clashes With Liberal Guest Over Voter ID

Massie also offered several other pointed remarks.

He noted that after President Trump called him a “moron” at the National Prayer Breakfast earlier this month, pastors were “not impressed and I don’t think anybody was impressed by his performance at the prayer breakfast. It was completely political.”

The Kentucky Republican further directed strong criticism toward Attorney General Pam Bondi after being the only member of his party to, as Politico reported, “spar” with her at last week’s contentious congressional hearing.

“When the attorney general is reduced to a stack of pre-prepared insults to deliver, and when the DOJ is responding to my every tweet with additional unredactions, I don’t think I’m going to change what I’m doing just yet,” he said.

Massie described Bondi as looking “weak and frustrated” at the hearing “when she started talking about the Dow Jones, which has literally nothing to do with her job.”

“I thought that looked bad,” he said. He also pointed to her “stack of insults that were pre-prepared — in politics you might call it oppo research — and you could see her shuffling through them to try and find which one matched the person who was trying to ask her a question at the time. She found my card like right at the end, as you can see she was looking for it.”

READ MORE: ‘Republicans Have to Lose’: Far Right Extremist Leader Puts Trump on Notice

 

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‘Republicans Have to Lose’: Far Right Extremist Leader Puts Trump on Notice

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Far-right extremist leader Nick Fuentes — who brands himself “America First” — once again is putting President Donald Trump and the GOP on notice, saying that Republicans are “gonna get destroyed” in the 2026 midterms and by 2028 it will be “Democrats on steroids.”

“We are headed for an utter and total defeat in the midterms,” Fuentes predicted on his Rumble streaming show on Monday, urging his supporters to not vote in November. Fuentes has 1.2 million followers on the X social media platform.

He said that “the Democrats will take the House, and then it is impeachment City. We are taking a trip to impeachment City.”

Democrats, Fuentes declared, will win the House and the Senate, and “then it’s impeachments, subpoenas, depositions, investigations. Trump might even be removed from office.”

“When all is said and done, he might even be pulled by his own people. That — there is a non-zero chance. As a matter of fact, there’s a good chance that’s gonna happen.”

READ MORE: Rogan on Epstein Files: ‘Looks Terrible’ for Trump

“Trump is getting impeached,” Fuentes continued. “Vance is getting impeached. Hegseth is — they’re all getting impeached. They’re all being subpoenaed. They’re all being deposed.”

“I warned you,” Fuentes said. “I told you, this is what was gonna happen.”

“My message in ’26, you could take it or leave it. Don’t vote. Don’t vote, do not vote in the midterms. The Republicans have to lose. They have to lose. They have to crash and burn. A cleansing fire is the only thing that will save us. It cannot be fixed.”

“F — — Trump, f — — MAGA, f — —  all this stuff. It can’t be fixed. If it could have been fixed, it would have been fixed in 2025, but it wasn’t.”

“They made every mistake. Liberation Day: disaster. DOGE: disaster. Big, beautiful bill: disaster. Epstein files: disaster. Iran: disaster.

“The personnel — Mike Waltz: disaster. Ratcliffe: disaster, Rubio: disaster. Pam Bondi: disaster — all self-inflicted. Trump personnel, Trump policy, Trump strategy, Trump playbook — we tried it your way, it didn’t work.”

“Now we don’t vote. That’s the message. Seriously. Can’t blame anybody else. Bad advice, bad advisors, Biden’s economy. Enough already. It didn’t work. We’re not voting. I’m staying home, and you know what? I hope the Democrats impeach him. I hope the Democrats impeach all of them. I hope they indict everybody. I hope they depose and compel the release of documents, and I hope they find all the criminal behavior, and I hope it destroys the GOP. I hope it creates a crisis for the GOP so severe that they never recover.”

READ MORE: Trump Mocked for ‘Unhinged Tantrum’ as ‘Trump Station’ Story Shifts Again

Fuentes predicted that “in two years, this is gonna be the most unpopular administration in history. It’s gonna be a repeat of 2020. That’s what we’re looking at here.”

“Think about where Trump is — lowest approval rating of any modern president. Trump’s approval is lower at this point in his presidency, lower than Biden at this point, lower than Trump was at this point. Lowest that it’s been in the second term.”

He also lamented the lack of results he and his “America First” followers wanted.

“He’s completely underwater with the under 40 crowd, and it’s only gonna get worse, especially because Trump is not delivering on these things. No mass deportations, economy’s not getting better. Housing prices have literally never been more unaffordable. The wars are escalating, actually, as opposed to getting better. And now, we seriously have to contend with the possibility that in 2028, we get Democrats on steroids. We get Democrats with a vengeance.”

Fuentes has been described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “white nationalist,” an “admirer of fascists,” and someone who “frequently relies on antisemitic tropes.”

According to the Anti-Defamation League, “Fuentes has used his platforms to make numerous antisemitic, racist, homophobic and misogynistic comments,” and spreads “white supremacist propaganda.”

READ MORE: How Trump Used Jesse Jackson’s Death to Argue He’s Not a Racist

 

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