Press Release

(New York, July 12, 2011) - Yesterday, Lambda Legal filed an amicus brief in a case involving Cristina Ojeda and Monica Alcota, a married binational lesbian couple from Queens, New York.

Today Lambda Legal filed a petition for a writ of certiorari asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case of a same-sex couple seeking an accurate birth certificate for their Louisiana-born son whom they adopted in New York. The state of Louisiana has refused to recognize the adoption and issue a birth certificate listing both fathers as the boy's parents.

Today, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals lifted the stay on the injunction issued by the district court in the Log Cabin Republicans' challenge to "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT). The government is once again enjoined from enforcing DADT anywhere in the world. The government was enjoined once before for eight days, before a different set of Ninth Circuit judges issued the stay of the injunction in this case.

On Friday, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a brief strongly arguing that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional in a case brought by Lambda Legal and Morrison & Foerster LLP on behalf of Karen Golinski, a lesbian federal court employee denied medical coverage for her wife, whom she married when same-sex couples could do so in California. The DOJ had previously announced they would no longer defend DOMA, but this is the first legal filing in the country in which they have fully argued to a court that DOMA is unconstitutional. They asked the federal court not to dismiss Golinski's claim.

(New York, June 30, 2011) - Today, the Appellate Division, Third Department, of the New York State Supreme Court, issued a ruling that the New York Human Rights Law (NYHRL) does protect public school students against discrimination and harassment. Lambda Legal issued the following statement from Thomas W. Ude, Jr., Senior Staff Attorney at Lambda Legal:

"We applaud the Third Department's ruling that the New York State Human Rights Law protects all public school students against discrimination and harassment.

Days after New York voted for marriage equality, Lambda Legal goes back to court in New Jersey representing Garden State Equality and seven same-sex couples.

Today, the New York state legislature voted to pass the marriage equality bill introduced by Governor Andrew Cuomo, ending the exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage in New York. New York becomes the sixth state in the nation, in addition to the District of Columbia, where same-sex couples have the right to marry.

(Baltimore, MD, June 23, 2011) - The American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland and Lambda Legal hailed a ruling by the Washington County Circuit Court recognizing that Maryland's law protecting persons from being forced to testify in court against their spouse applies equally to same-sex spouses validly married outside of Maryland. The ruling sends a strong message that legally married same-sex couples are entitled to recognition of their marriages under Maryland law.

(Portland, OR, June 21, 2011)—This morning, Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit on behalf of Alec Esquivel, a state employee who was denied insurance coverage for medically necessary surgery because he is transgender.

(Madison, Wisconsin, June 20, 2011)—Today, the Circuit Court, Branch 11 in Dane County, Wisconsin, upheld as constitutional the state's Domestic Partner Registry.