Blogs

by President Heidi R. Lewis
June 2, 2025

I write this blog from Colorado Springs, CO. Stolen land—the unceded territory of the Ute Peoples, to be precise—developed with stolen and exploited labor. I do so, because as Sandra Guzmán points out, land acknowledgements “recognize and respect Indigenous peoples as the traditional stewards of their lands and the enduring relationship that exists between Indigenous peoples and their traditional territories.”

“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
—James Baldwin, “As Much Truth as One Can Bear” (1962)

“It's not wrong to feel like the world is fucked up beyond repair, but...you can try to repair what you can, using whatever skills you might have.”
—Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, Miss Major Speaks: Conversations with a Black Trans Revolutionary (2023)

Legislative attacks on LGBTQ folks have become more pronounced since Donald J. Trump took office again this past January, evidenced, in large part, by the numerous executive actions he’s issued. Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government. Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing. Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling. Quality and Safety Special Alert Memo on Provision of Gender Affirming Care to Children. Proposed Rule Aiming to Change ACA Coverage of Gender-Affirming Care. State Medicaid Director Letter “Re: Puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgery related to gender dysphoria.” HHS Letter “Urgent Review of Quality Standards and Gender Transition Procedures.” These are just some. There are many others.

As noted by the American Bar Association, executive orders “have the force of law,” even though they’re not legislation. Think Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s order forcing Japanese Americans into concentration camps, Lyndon B. Johnson’s order imposing civil rights obligations on federal contractors, or Trump’s executive action rescinding Johnson’s. Executive orders don’t require approval from Congress, and Congress can’t simply overturn them, but they can pass legislation that might make them “difficult or even impossible” to carry out. There are also checks and balances in the Constitution meant to ensure no branch of government has more power than another, and presidents cannot legally circumvent those checks and balances or take power from other branches of government using executive orders. As the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) points out, any president is “misusing executive order authority” if they order the government to “take actions that are not authorized by the Constitution or are in violation of federal laws.” At the same time, the ACLU also notes, “An executive order can be lawful and still cause harm, especially when it threatens important civil liberties or civil rights.”

When I took office almost two years ago, I stood in front of the Membership Assembly at our annual conference and acknowledged there were more than 370 active bills across 49 states that would block transgender people from receiving healthcare, education, legal recognition, and the right to publicly exist. For context, 91 anti-trans bills were considered in 2020, that number jumped to 153 in 2021, 174 were considered the following year, there were over 600 in 2023, and 701 bills were being tracked last year. This year alone, over 900 bills have been under consideration. Over 100 have passed, 729 are still active, and only 76 have failed. The ACLU is also currently tracking nearly 590 anti-LGBTQ bills, up from the 533 it tracked last year. States considering more than 16 anti-LGBTQ bills include Virginia, West Virginia, Tennessee, South Carolina, Mississippi, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Texas, Montana, and Idaho. Vermont is the only state where there aren’t any anti-LGBTQ bills being tracked.

Additionally, the Prison Policy Initiative reports trans folks experience violence victimization at 2.5 times the rate of cisgender people, with Black trans women accounting for nearly 3/4 of known victims; lesbian and gay people experience violent more than twice the rate of heterosexual folks; and bisexual people at a rate of almost seven times more than heterosexual people and almost three times more than lesbian and gay people.

Make no mistake. Our LGBTQ friends, family, colleagues, and neighbors are in danger.

And as sure as I know that, I know we will resist. As sure as we will dance, sing, sleep, cry, laugh, love, scream, walk, run, read, eat, pray, drink, pause, push, pull, meditate, rest, slay, whisper, march, study, teach, live, and die, we will resist. To be sure, resistance looks, feels, and sounds different for all of us. It exists in many different ways and in many different places and spaces.

And for me, right now, it’s this.

One Day during the Late 1980s

“Nana? Papa? Don’t God got better stuff to do than worry about who’s gay and who’s not?”

My Papa, my mom’s dad, was an African Methodist Episcopal reverend. I won’t pretend he was what we might call an ally of LGBTQ folks, let alone a comrade or accomplice, but I don’t remember him ever condemning LGBTQ folks in the name of Jesus. In fact, I don’t remember him condemning anyone for anything at all. He preached love, understanding, and accountability—within and outside the church—and he would always remind folks that no one had a heaven or hell to put anyone else in. My Papa was absolutely a Ten Commandments man. He named every single one of them every single Sunday. But most of his sermons were anchored in the Golden Rule. I loved that about him. Still do, even though I’ve taken a Toni Cade Bambara approach for years.¹ So, I’m not sure why that question popped into my head that day. Maybe it was something I heard on the Christian talk radio station we listened to on the way home from church or maybe it was something I heard while eavesdropping. I was probably 7 or 8 years old, maybe 9, and I was already curious.

How did they respond? I don’t exactly remember, but I do remember it being similar to responses I was getting more and more from elders who entertained my curiosity at least to some degree. “That girl gon’ be a lawyer or doctor or somethin’ one day.”

One Day during My First or Second Year at Colorado College—Some Time between 2010 and 2012

“I swear I think Chase like girls. I can have a house full of kids, AJ’s boys and her girls. And as little as they are, they already doin’ that flirty, giggly shit. And I swear she be frustrated with her friends. She look at them like they look at AJ’s friends and vice versa. I could be off, but I don’t think so. I got a feeling.”

I was having lunch with two colleagues, and one of them—a white lesbian, go figure—was adamant that Chase, my daughter, was too young to be curious about her sexuality. Mind you, Chase was 6 or 7 years old, and I—like many kids—was already kissing under the playground slide at that age.

October 26, 2017

“Mom, when do you know if you like girls or boys?”
“If you askin’, you know. And if you askin’, it’s probably girls or both, which is absolutely okay. So, am I right? Do you like girls? Girls and boys?”
“Yeah. I think I like girls. Maybe both. I think some boys are cute.”
“Aaaaw, Chase. That’s so cool. Girls are beautiful, so I definitely get it. And you know I like men. So, I obviously get that, too. And let me tell you somethin’ else. You gon’ run into a lot of homophobic people for the rest of your life. Hell, we related to some. But I promise if you ever experience that, you tell me and dad as fast as you can. We’ll handle it, and they won’t ever fuck with you again. I promise.”

So, I was right.

She was 11 years old and hadn’t been in the 7th grade for long. Over time, she went from understanding herself to be bisexual to queer to bisexual again to lesbian—a Black lesbian, to be exact.

One Day Not Long After That

“_____________________ your preferred pronouns.”
“For real. And actually, they’re just my pronouns.”
“Oh shit, Rushaan. You right. My bad.”
“It’s all good. Really.”

I can’t remember the context for the life of me. Most importantly, don’t ever get it twisted. I need checked from time to time. Always will when it comes to the oppressive shit I’ve internalized. Because privilege is real. And I got several.

Last Month

“I want to charge you up and get us ready for battle. But I also don’t. I don’t want to bring it up when you don’t want to talk about it. And I know you got other people you talk to, too.”
“No, but I do want that.”
“Okay, bet. ‘Cause I promise you that if it go down, y’all can get up in our attic and hide out ‘til it’s safe. It’ll be hot as hell up there, and we can’t be buyin’ and cookin’ too much extra food and stuff, if we don’t want to get caught. So, we’ll slide y’all some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches up there. Get y’all a bucket for washin’ and stuff. And at some point, we need to do some fight trainin’. Target practice or somethin’. ‘Cause they ain’t playin’, so we can’t either.”
“Yesssssssssssssss.”
“We got this, bro. If the revolution come, I’m not gon’ sit up here and promise you we all gon’ make it. How could I? How could anyone? Hell, I might not make it. You might not. But some of us gon’ make it. And what I know fa sho is we gon’ fight ‘til we can’t fight no more. And if we make it? After the dust settle? I promise we gon’ be doin’ exactly what we doin’ right now. We gon’ read, think, discuss, write, and teach. That’s who we are. That’s what we do.”

I was chatting again with Rushaan, my colleague and friend, about what life has been and might be like for him as a transgender queer immigrant in the U.S. during a second Trump administration.

We also talked about my kids. We lamented his cat’s illness and my dog’s. We laughed about our partners who are more alike than I think they’ll ever know. We talked about my struggles with anti-Black sexism in academia. We giggled about wild documentaries we told each other to watch. We screamed about and laughed at our haters. We ideated. We made a lot of plans, knowing "only" a few will probably materialize. We talked about his sabbatical coming to end. We talked about mine just beginning. We talked about the now 5th year and 7th season of his Colorado Springs LGBTQ+ Oral History Project. We talked about shit I can’t even remember. For hours. As we do. 

Today, Right Now

It’s wild to think Chase has been out for this long, almost a decade. I’m normally teaching in Berlin during U.S. Pride, but not this year. And we ‘bout to turn up, fa sho.

¹ In Claudia Tate’s Black Women Writers at Work (1983), Bambara said, “I'll be damned if I want most folks out there to do unto me what they do unto themselves.” I swear the OG was bad to the bone.

Per my strategic plan, “Reconnect, Repair, Restore: A More Thoughtful, Transparent, and Trustworthy NWSA,” these blogs are meant to give you a chance to get to know me and to get you excited about our upcoming annual conference. This one is meant to do both, as one of our special sessions will celebrate the 55th anniversary of Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera founding the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR). Until we see you in November, please continue to take good care of yourself, your loved ones, and your communities to every extent possible.

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