Tallahassee, FL - Legislation to bring Florida’s existing HIV criminalization statutes into alignment with current science successfully passed out of its first committee hearing at the Florida Capitol yesterday. The Florida House Criminal Justice Subcommittee voted 10-3 to advance the legislation (HB 79) after hearing from House bill sponsor Representative Nick Duran (D - Miami) and HIV advocates on the need for reform.
HB 3 Could Jeopardize LGBTQ and Other Local Protections
Written By: Nadine Smith, Executive Director of Equality Florida
If you’ve never travelled to Tallahassee to lobby for LGBTQ equality, this is the year to show up and call on leaders to include our community as equals in the state’s civil rights statute.
Fort Lauderdale — This week President Trump announced a goal of ending HIV transmissions in the U.S. by 2030. For HIV advocates around the country, eradicating HIV has been a viable goal for years since we now have the tools to stop transmissions. Unfortunately, standing in the way of HIV advocates — and now the Trump-Pence administration — is the administration itself. Since taking office, this administration has made headlines in the HIV field for harmful policies directly contradicting the President’s recent hopeful statement.
On January 24, 2019, the Human Rights Campaign, National LGBTQ Task Force, National Center for Lesbian Rights, the ACLU of Florida, the National Center for Transgender Equality, QLatinX, Florida Trans Proud, TransAction Florida, and Equality Florida released the following statement in support of nondiscrimination protections in housing, employment, and public accommodations. The organizations reaffirm their support for fully-inclusive, comprehensive protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
January 22, 2019 — Today the U.S. Supreme Court issued an order allowing the Trump administration’s transgender military ban to go into effect temporarily while challenges to the policy continue in federal courts.
Equality Florida Director of Transgender Equality Gina Duncan issued the following statement in response:
