Press Releases

(Washington, DC, October 11, 2011) – The U.S. Supreme Court today denied Lambda Legal’s petition for a writ of certiorari in the case of a same-sex couple seeking an accurate birth certificate for their Louisiana-born son whom they adopted in New York. The Louisiana state registrar has refused to recognize the adoption and issue a birth certificate listing both fathers as the boy’s parents.

Paula Ettelbrick, former Legal Director at Lambda Legal and lifelong activist for LGBT equality and social justice, died today, after a long battle with cancer. Ettelbrick was the first staff attorney at Lambda Legal in 1986 and served as its Legal Director from 1988 to 1993.

(New York, October 5, 2011) - Late yesterday, Lambda Legal filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of itself and 16 other LGBT, HIV and health advocacy organizations urging the U.S. Supreme Court to affirm a lower court ruling finding that the federal Privacy Act protects against illegal disclosures that result in suffering unrelated to financial losses.

(New York, October 5, 2011) - Today, Lambda Legal and Legal Services NYC (LS-NYC) released a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) guide entitled New York State Marriage Equality Act: Frequently Asked Questions for Couples and Families with Low or No Income for same-sex couples who are or plan to get married in New York. This series of factsheets explains how marriage equality may impact immigration status, parent-child relationships, public assistance, food stamps, Medicaid, Medicare, housing, consumer issues, Social Security benefits, and New York state income taxes. Lambda Legal and LS-NYC are hosting a community training on these issues on Thursday, October 13 at 9:30AM (at LS-NYC, 40 Worth Street, NYC).

Jon Davidson, Legal Director at Lambda Legal, issued the following statement regarding today's decision by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals vacating an earlier U.S. District Court ruling declaring "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) unconstitutional.

Members of the Positive Justice Project, a national coalition dedicated to ending the targeting of people with HIV for unreasonable criminal prosecution, voiced their support for the REPEAL HIV Discrimination Act that Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) introduced today.

(New York, September 20, 2011) - Today marks the end of "Don't Ask Don't Tell" (DADT) - a discriminatory policy that banned gay, lesbian, and bisexual soldiers from serving their country openly. DADT ruined thousands of careers, and the frequency of discharges disproportionately affected women of color.

(New Orleans, La., September 20, 2011) - Forum for Equality Louisiana has named Lambda Legal as the first recipient of its Justice Acclaim Award in recognition of Lambda Legal’s work on the case of the gay couple seeking a Louisiana birth certificate for their Louisiana-born adopted son.

(Los Angeles, September 13, 2011) - After receiving a letter from Lambda Legal and the Idaho Safe Schools Coalition, Joint School District No. 2 in Meridian, Idaho has amended a policy regarding student clubs, but the revised policy still harms lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students and violates their rights.

Lawyers for the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group of the U.S. House of Representatives (BLAG) informed U.S. District Court Judge Jeffrey White that they "prefer not" to participate in a pilot project to video-tape oral arguments at an October 21, 2011 hearing in Golinski v OPM, a federal challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).