Adam M. Rhodes

The Appeal studied cases in which queer defendants faced the death penalty. Anti-LGBTQ+ bias impacted more than half of them.

In May, the federal government and Shelby County, Tennessee, reached a landmark settlement stopping the local prosecutor from enforcing a law that discriminates against people living with HIV.

A review of a decades-old case resurfaces questions of judicial bias in Arizona, and is relevant to the state’s current judicial appointees.

A report by the Vera Institute of Justice and Black & Pink highlights the many ways in which state prisons mistreat transgender people—nearly 90 percent of respondents said they’d been placed in solitary at some point.

Late last year, the U.S. Department of Justice warned the state of Tennessee that its “aggravated prostitution” statute—which makes it a felony to engage in sex work while HIV positive—violates the Americans with Disabilities Act. Activists hope the measure shows how the government can use the ADA to fight ableism around the nation.

Legislation targeting transgender people behind bars is part of a much broader campaign against LGBTQ rights. Advocates say the measures could preview future attacks by the anti-trans movement.

The blame game against trans people is just one of the many diversionary tactics the right has used in our intractable gun violence debate.

As the saying goes, the first Pride was a riot. The only way queer people have won anything is by fighting—in the courts and in the streets.

A trans woman mutilated herself in a New Jersey men’s prison after officials refused to transfer her to a women’s facility.

Advocates have expressed shock at a rapid escalation in the severity of anti-trans legislation, which is increasingly seeking to restrict medical care and public expression, including with threats of criminal punishment.

Robert Suttle was required to register as a sex offender in Louisiana after being convicted of exposing someone to HIV. But despite the fact that New York does not require its own residents to register after such a crime, the state is forcing the label on him anyway—and the Manhattan DA’s office is fighting him.

After a wave of tabloid coverage about pregnancies involving a trans prisoner at a women’s facility, officials gave themselves more power to deny housing placements consistent with gender identity.

Roughly 30 states still have some form of HIV criminalization law or sentencing enhancement on the books. Advocates say it’s long past time for change.

New laws imposing criminal penalties for trans healthcare follow a long legislative history of explicitly targeting queer people in the United States.

Some states have banned the controversial legal defense, but other efforts, including at the federal level, are facing challenges.