The Lavender Ledger: Your Strategic LGBTQ+ Reader By Erin In The Morning

Our service for the week to cover the news we did not carry but do not want you to miss.

Inside EITM’s newsroom, we track dozens of breaking stories weekly—tips flood in from readers embedded in state houses, school boards, and organizations across the country. Our sources are everywhere. But here’s our strategic dilemma: while we’re chasing down original leads and working our exclusive angles, critical intelligence is moving through other channels that deserves your attention.

Consider this your weekend drop.

These are the stories that crossed our desk, passed our vetting, and matter to LGBTQ+ people—reported by trusted outlets while we were deep in our own investigations. Think of it as our intelligence-sharing agreement with you: the essential coverage from across the LGBTQ+ media landscape that we’ve been monitoring, verified, and deemed operationally significant.

This week’s important releases:

AOC assures trans kids they’re not to blame for anything: “You are fine just the way you are” by Molly Sprayregen

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has emerged as one of the most outspoken defenders of transgender rights in Congress this year. When Republicans introduced a national trans sports ban, she led nearly every Democrat in opposition and delivered one of the sharpest rebukes on the House floor—condemning the GOP’s push for invasive “genital exams” on student athletes. Now, in a new video message highlighted by LGBTQ+ Nation, she is seen directly addressing transgender Americans with words of solidarity and resolve. At a moment when even some Democrats have gone quiet or compromised on trans rights, Ocasio-Cortez has shown leadership on the issue within the party.

Judge finds anti-trans Republican Florida Congressman Cory Mills to be a danger to women, by Christopher Wiggins

So often, the loudest voices railing against transgender rights turn out to be projecting their own darkness. The same politicians who claim trans people are a “danger to children” or a “threat to women” are frequently the ones exposed as actual perpetrators of harm. The latest example: Florida Rep. Cory Mills—a fierce advocate of anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ legislation—has been hit with a court injunction after his former girlfriend sought protection from him. According to reporting from The Advocate, the court found that she “has reasonable cause to believe she is in imminent danger of becoming the victim of another act of dating violence.” Read about it at The Advocate.

UK warned its treatment of trans people could breach European Convention on Human Rights, by Chantelle Billson

The global situation for transgender people continues to worsen—and nowhere is that crisis more visible than in the United Kingdom. Many of the anti-trans policies now spreading across the world were first incubated there, exported as blueprints for restriction and repression. Following recent court rulings, the U.K. now faces the possibility of a national bathroom ban for transgender people, on top of catastrophic healthcare delays that have left some adults waiting the equivalent of multiple lifetimes—up to 200 years—for treatment. After years of politically motivated crackdowns on trans youth and adults alike, PinkNews reports that the country may be in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights.