Why Are Top Anti-Gay Activists Holding A Meeting In A US Senate Building Today?
Located in Washington, D.C., the building above is the Dirksen Senate Office Building. It was named after Everett Dirksen, who served first in the U.S. House, from 1933–1949, and then in the Senate, from 1951-1969. The Republican Minority Leader, Dirksen helped to write and pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Sadly, a grotesque act is about to take place in the building that bears the name the of civil rights champion.
Today, top anti-gay activists will be meeting not just with U.S. Senators and their staff, but will be holding that meeting — which is open to the public — for U.S. Senators and their staff in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to further their agenda of hate.
“The Family in America” is the name of a symposium which “will be held from 11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m. in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, room 562,” a press release states. Of course, in order to book a meeting and a room in a Senate office building, you need the support of a U.S. Senator. No word yet on which Senator is sponsoring the event, but “The Family in America” is a project of the Illinois-based Howard Center for Family, Religion & Society, and its protégé, the World Congress of Families.
UPDATE #1:
The meeting space has been pulled. No word on if the meeting has been moved.
Anti-Gay Meeting Of Radical Religious Right Group Canceled By Sen. Mark Kirk
UPDATE #2:
John Boehner finds them a meeting space.
Boehner To The Rescue — Of International Anti-Gay Organization Promoting Russia’s Policies
What will they be discussing?
This:
While the current U.S. administration persists in its efforts to redefine marriage and family, other nations are seeking a reaffirmation of the natural family. Australia has just elected a conservative government and given the largest budget area to Kevin Andrews, long-time defender of the family and World Congress of Families supporter; Russia recently banned the propaganda of “nontraditional sexual relations†to minors; and across Europe and Africa, nations are concerned with life issues, shrinking populations, and the disintegration of the natural family. Here in America, what can our pro-family legislators learn—positively and negatively—by studying our colleagues’ actions abroad?
Yes, they would like to model U.S. law and policy on Russia’s laws that essentially make it illegal to be gay, or to “promote” homosexuality.
Remember earlier this year when Vladimir Putin signed the law that made any discussion of homosexuality a crime in Russia? Remember just before that, when National Organization For Marriage (NOM) president Brian Brown traveled to Russia — but kept his travels a secret — and now stands accused of breaking federal law? Brown spoke with Russian lawmakers, reportedly to urge them not only to continue to ramp up their war on gay people but to remove children from same-sex couples and LGBT parents.
Who was behind Brown’s conversations with Russian anti-gay lawmakers? The World Congress of Families.
Who is holding a symposium in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, room 562, today? The World Congress of Families.
Remember last month, when Tea Party leader Rick Scarborough called for a class action lawsuit against homosexuality? Scarborough runs a group called Tea Party Unity. Who is on Tea Party Unity’s steering committee? Don Feder of the World Congress of Families. (Feder is the author of a lovely little article titled, “Top 10 Ways Democrats Are Like Nazis.â€)
Who is holding a symposium in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, room 562, today? The World Congress of Families.
Now, do the names Austin Ruse, Janice Shaw Crouse, or Steven Mosher ring a bell? If you’re a close follower of the religious right’s anti-LGBT and so-called “pro-family” work, they do. Those three happen to be the main speakers today at the World Congress of Families’Â symposium.
“These shameful individuals represent the worst of America, and it’s an outrage that they will now bring their vitriol to the United States Capitol,” Human Rights Campaign (HRC) President Chad Griffin said in a statement. “After spending years exporting their hate to other regions of the world and contributing to a culture of anti-LGBT violence in Russia, these zealots should be condemned by all Americans and especially by our elected leaders.â€
Ruse, an occasional Breitbart contributor, is the president of the virulently anti-gay Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-FAM). In September, Ruse and over 100 anti-LGBT activists and organizations signed a letter supporting Russia’s anti-gay laws and Vladimir Putin‘s war on gays.
(Yes, more evidence of America’s religious right working to make homosexuality illegal in Russia.)
Janice Shaw Crouse of Concerned Women for America offers a particular brand of anti-gay hate and ignorance. She has claimed the Supreme Court’s decision on DOMA will lead to a “bleak future†including “imprisonment†for Christians — no date set – and claimed that gay people die 20 years younger, commit suicide three times the average rate, are prone to syphilis and anal cancer, and cannot maintain long term relationships.
Griffin notes that Crouse, “celebrated a proposed law in Uganda that would make being LGBT punishable by death. Crouse called it a, ‘biblical and cultural stand against the radical homosexual agenda.’â€
Steven Mosher is President of the Population Research Institute, which Equality Matters calls “a far-right anti-contraception organization.” Author of Population Control: Real Costs, Illusory Benefits, Mosher is a proponent of the anti-women scare meme developed by the religious right, called “demographic winter,” which claims that abortion and contraception should be banned because Muslims supposedly make babies at a higher rate than Christians.
It was turned into a “documentary” in 2008.
Unsurprisingly, NOM cofounder and former chair, Maggie Gallagher, is a subscriber of this farcical scare tactic.
In 2011, Mosher, who is the father of nine children, delivered a short speech (you can listen to it and you should) on his “demographic winter” ideas and admitted he was headed to Russia in 2012, to help them figure out how to make more babies.
More evidence of America’s religious right working to make homosexuality illegal in Russia?
Is it a coincidence that this crowd believes that gay people and same-sex marriage are antithetical to their main goal of populating the world with more conservative Christians in a race against Islam?
Here’s a look at their craziness:
//www.youtube.com/embed/3NfuWba9RR8
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So, we have several of America’s top anti-gay activists, intent on populating America and the world with more Christian babies, holding a meeting organized by the Howard Center for Family, Religion & Society and the World Congress of Families.
The World Congress of Families just happens to have strong ties to Vladimir Putin. They’ll be holding their next conference in Moscow next year.
And they are holding a symposium in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, room 562, today.
Your tax dollars at work, ladies and gentlemen.
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
