As I keep saying this is a small very loud mostly religious driven minority using ever tool and lie they can to change perception of the LGBTQ+ to erase them from society to create the cis straight society they want to force on everyone. We must counter them by being as loud and forceful to not only refute their lies but also promote the joy of living freely as an inclusive society. Hugs
Close-Up of rainbow flag with crowd In background during LGBT Pride Parade. Getty Images.
Ohio lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have introduced several LGBTQ-related bills so far this General Assembly.
Republicans have put forth a drag ban bill, a piece of legislation that would make it harder for a student to use a different name or pronoun at school, and a bill requiring transgender political candidates to list their deadname, among others.
On the other side of the aisle, Democrats have introduced the Ohio Fairness Act and a bill that would ban conversion therapy.
An Ohio court partially overturned a ban on gender-affirming care for LGBTQ youth earlier this year, meaning doctors can still prescribe puberty blockers and hormone therapy.
Anti-LGBTQ bills
Ohio House Bill 249 would ban drag performers from performing anywhere that is not a designated adult entertainment facility. State Reps. Angie King, R-Celina, and Josh Williams, R-Sylvania Twp., introduced the bill, which has had sponsor testimony.
This is a re-introduction of a bill from the previous General Assembly that did not make it out of committee and faced much opposition.
Ohio House Bill 190 would require parental permission for schools to use different pronouns or different names for students that don’t match up with the biological sex or birth name.
Williams and state Rep. Johnathan Newman, R-Troy, introduced the bill, which has had sponsor testimony.
Ohio House Bill 172 would ban children 14 and older from receiving mental health services without parental consent. Newman also introduced this bill, which has had sponsor testimony.
Ohio House Bill 196 would require political candidates to list their former names on candidacy petitions. This, however, would not apply to names that have been changed due to marriage. King and state Reps Rodney Creech, R-West Alexandria, introduced the bill, which has had sponsor testimony.
Ohio House Bill 262 would designate the weeks from Mother’s Day to Father’s Day as Natural Family Month. Williams and state Rep. Beth Lear, R-Galena, introduced the bill, which has had sponsor and opponent testimony.
Pro-LGBTQ bills
Ohio Senate Minority Leader Nickie Antonio, D-Lakewood, has introduced a few bills that support LGBTQ people. Antonio is the only openly gay lawmaker in the Ohio General Assembly.
Ohio Senate Bill 70, also known as the Ohio Fairness Act, would expand anti-discrimination laws to include sexual orientation and gender identity. House Bill 136 is a companion bill.
Antonio has introduced the Ohio Fairness Act in every General Assembly since she was elected to the Ohio House of Representatives in 2011 and this is the first time since 2018 the bill has no Republican support.
Ohio Senate Bill 71 would ban any licensed health professionals from doing conversion therapy when providing mental health treatment to minors. Antonio and state Sen. Beth Liston, D-Dublin, introduced the bill. House Bill 300 is a companion bill.
Ohio Senate Bill 211 would designate the first full week of June as “Love Makes a Family Week.” Antonio introduced this bill as well.
None of these bills have had any hearings so far this General Assembly. Ohio lawmakers are on summer break and will come back to the Statehouse this fall.
Mehdi moderates a panel with YouTube star Brian Tyler Cohen, LA city council member Nithya Raman, and podcaster Van Lathan, LIVE in Los Angeles!
Mehdi and Zeteo concluded our one-year anniversary tour last week, with a final stop in the city that has made headlines in recent days and weeks, after the Trump administration deployed the National Guard against protesters.
Yes, Los Angeles. Political commentator and YouTuber Brian Tyler Cohen: “If it was happening in another country… We would not hesitate for a single second to call it autocracy, authoritarianism, or a dictatorship”
In this special live recording, Mehdi sits down with Cohen, as well as LA City Council member Nithya Raman and “Higher Learning” co-host Van Lathan for a conversation on President Donald Trump’s targeting of LA protesters and immigrants, Democrats’ response, and the media’s handling of Trump 2.0.
LA Councilmember Nithya Raman: “There is an incredible amount of fear right now,” Raman tells Mehdi. “They’re [ICE] showing up at workplaces. They’re showing on street corners. They’re showing up taking street vendors who are selling outside of a Home Depot…
They showed up outside of an elder care facility in Santa Monica and took workers from there. I mean these are kidnappings.” Mehdi asks Lathan, who frequently appears on CNN, about whether he believes the media is meeting the moment right now when it comes to covering Trump’s second term.
Van Lathan: “The legacy media right now is made to serve a commercial break ‘I’m mad on the left,’ ‘I’m on the right,’ ‘I am the host, you two stop fighting! We’ll be right back,’ ‘Proctor & Gamble.’” Did you like this video? It was published on zeteo.com several days ago.
If you would like early access to more exclusive content like this, then do consider becoming a paid subscriber. It costs as much as a single coffee a month, gives you early access to all our fearless, independent reporting, and goes a long way in supporting our mission of bringing the best of journalism to YOU our subscribers. So what are you waiting for?
The minority groups trying to push hate on the LGBTQ+ are well funded by billionaires like J.K. Rowling and the Christian church. They are using every media they can to turn young people against the LGBTQ+ using the most misinformation they can generate. And as much as they want / demand society return to their fantasied Christian 1950s pro white cis straight only country it was not true then and can’t be true now. Their goal is the total erasure of the LGBTQ+ and also any rights for those gained in the civil rights act. Below is a quote from the article. Hugs.
“I’m almost 40 and have seen so much progress like equal marriage,” Kelly says. “But something is changing. Hatred towards people like me is becoming mainstream again.”
Demonstrators participate in an event called “Show the flag: For queer visibility in the Bundestag!” in front of the Reichstag building that houses Germany’s lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, in Berlin, on July 8. The conservative president of the Bundestag said the rainbow flag would no longer be raised on top of the parliament building during Pride month, which in Germany runs from June 28 until July 27.
Odd Andersen/AFP via Getty Images
The tree-lined neighborhood near Nollendorfplatz square in central Berlinis as gay today as it was a century ago.
It’s where Christopher Isherwood wrote novels chronicling the rise of the Nazis amid the city’s rich queer nightlife that inspired the musical Cabaret.
Every summer, the neighborhood throws its own smaller-scale LGBTQ+ Pride event separate from the city’s main annual parade taking place this weekend.
It’s just one of more than 200 Pride events taking place in Germany this year. But with far-right extremist groups staging anti-Pride protests, many Pride attendees fear for their safety.
Sipping on a cocktail as the street party gets underway, 62-year-old Georg Schmidt says he’s relieved that this event is a relaxed affair. He says he attended a different local pride parade last month across town in the district of Marzahn and the mood there was tense.
“There was a massive police presence to shield us from anti-Pride protests. We only felt safe because the police kept us apart,” Schmidt says.
Revelers march down the Leipziger Strasse street during a Pride parade in Berlin, July 23, 2022.
Markus Schreiber/AP
Sabine Volk, a researcher at the Institute for Research on Far Right Extremism at the University of Tübingen, says these groups attract young men who promote what they call traditional family values — a kind of pride that has little to do with rainbow flags.
“The key slogan is that the German flag and Germany itself is already colorful enough,” Volk says. “And the overall message is that queer life does not have a place in Germany.”
President of German Parliament Bundestag Julia Klöckner speaks to the media on July 8 in Berlin.
Thomas Trutschel/Photothek via Getty Images
Speaking on public broadcaster ARD, Merz signaled his support for the rule at Germany’s parliament, the Bundestag, with the words, “the Bundestag is not a circus tent” — a remark to which many have taken umbrage.
Merz backs his colleague’s argument that the lower house must maintain neutrality and cannot support events with a political agenda.
Nyke Slawik speaks during a parliamentary debate on queer hate crime in the Bundestag. Photo: Carsten Koall/dpa (Photo by Carsten Koall/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Carsten Koall/picture alliance via Getty Images
Opposition Green Party lawmaker Nyke Slawik criticized the move. “Declaring the rainbow a political symbol is highly problematic” stressing that “queer people are not an ideology; they are people!” Slawik told public broadcaster ZDF.
Slawik argues they are people increasingly in need of protection. Germany’s federal police report an almost tenfold increase in reported queerphobic hate crimes since 2010 and they believe the majority of cases go unreported.
The issue is not divided by party political lines; criticism of Merz’s choice of words has come from within his own party. Sönke Siegmann, the chair of the Christian Democrats’ LGBTQ+ Association, says some within his party are still catching up on terminology.
“If you say queer in my party, most people take a deep breath and say: ‘Oh, that’s a left-wing term,’ ” Siegmann observes. He says he has spoken with Merz since he made his “circus tent” comments.
“We explained to him what queer really means and two days later when asked in Parliament about LBGTQ+ hate crimes and what his government will do about them, Merz actually used the term queer,” Siegmann says.
Back inthe Nollendorfplatz area, rainbow flags fly every month of the year. But local resident Chris Kelly says the mood here is not as “live and let live” as it once was. He recently opened a boutique that sells high-end garments made from industrial strength rubber. He says business is good and he has a broad customer base, but it was almost impossible trying to find premises for the boutique.
“We found plenty of suitable spaces to rent and our finances are solid, but a lot of landlords rejected us, saying they didn’t want people like us,” Kelly remembers. “Real estate agents had warned us, but I was flabbergasted to encounter such prejudice in Berlin’s queerest, gayest neighborhood.”
Kelly’s store is located just down the street from Romeo and Romeo, a gay bar whose owner was attacked last month. Kelly says he too gets more verbal abuse than he used to and he hears again and again of attacks on members of the LGBTQ+ community.
“I’m almost 40 and have seen so much progress like equal marriage,” Kelly says. “But something is changing. Hatred towards people like me is becoming mainstream again.”
Kelly points out that a few doors down in the other direction is where the legendary nightclub Eldorado stood until the Nazis closed it down in 1933, eventually sending its queer clientele to concentration camps.
A commuter walks down the steps of Berlin’s Bundestag subway station, decorated with rainbow colors, the symbol of the LGBTQ+ community, on July 24.
John MacDougall/AFP via Getty Images
As preparations for Berlin’s main Pride parade get underway, the city police say they’ve received a permit request for a counterdemonstration protesting “against Pride terror and identity disorders.”
In reaction to the Bundestag president’s decision not to fly the rainbow flag on top of parliament this year, Berlin’s transport authority has decorated its Bundestag subway station stop in rainbow colors, writing on Instagram: “So our Bundestag is ready for Pride.”
Kelly urges people to attend Pride and stand up to a new generation of the far-right. He has no desire to say Goodbye to Berlin and the neighborhood around Nollendorfplatz, as Isherwood was forced to do.
Of course, I’m just joking, but I might be starting something here. If MAGAts can believe in chemtrails (and they do), then they can believe President Barack Obama used Kenyan voodoo to give Trump cankles. They already believe in a lot of crazy shit.
The Trump administration claims that Obama committed treason by ordering an investigation into Russia collusion, but how is that treason? Who is it treasonous to, Trump? Is it treasonous to Russia? And how is ordering an investigation into an attack against our country treasonous? I think it’s more treasonous to ignore it or lie about it. It should be treasonous to take Putin’s side over America’s.
If Trump were president in World War II, and Russia had bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, he would have called it a “hoax” and “fake news.”
Now, Trump is coming up with more bullshit to distract his zombies from the Epstein case. He’s howling for prosecuting Beyonce and Oprah. Even if what he was howling about was true, a president (sic) is supposed to let the Justice Department do its job, and leave it alone. Here, Trump wants the DOJ to prosecute Beyoncé and Oprah for supporting his political opponent.
MAGAts have been asking us, “How is Trump fascist?” Ordering the prosecution of your political opponents is just one example of fascism.
One final note: I do know that voodoo is not Kenyan. (snip)
Die, Die, UVA DEI, Die by Clay Jones
A board without diversity will hire the next UVA president Read on Substack
Abigail Spanberger will be Virginia’s next governor. Governor Glenn Youngkin knows this and has probably known throughout his regime that not only was he limited to one term, but so was his party. Just as Trump left things horrible for Joe Biden to clean up in 2021, Youngkin is leaving a mess for the next governor. With help from the Trump regime, one of those messes is at UVA, the University of Virginia.
As you may remember, Trump’s politicized Department of Justice, chock-full of goons, has forced out the president of UVA over DEI policies. They used his integrity against him, blackmailing him by withholding federal funds unless he resigned.
Now, UVA’s Board of Visitors will hire a new president. Unfortunately, the board is stocked entirely of right-wing fucknuts appointed by Glenn Youngkin, including former state Attorney General and member of the first Trump regime, Ken Cuccinelli. The board is nearly as White as the Trump cabinet. Even the two non-white members probably love them some mayonnaise sandwiches.
Trump has stripped funding for schools to implement his anti-DEI policies, which include shutting down student protests. Columbia University recently agreed to pay a $200 million fine to protect its funding, but lost a huge chunk of its independence to the Trump regime. (snip-MORE, and it’s very good!)
Sayfollah Musallet, a Palestinian-American born in Florida, was visiting family in the West Bank town of Al-Mazra’a ash-Sharqiya when Israeli settlers brutalized him, beating him unconscious and blocking an ambulance from reaching him, according to the victim’s family. The young Palestinian-American was pronounced dead by the time he arrived at a hospital.
And although days have passed since Sayfollah was apparently killed by Israeli settlers, no one from the White House has contacted the family. No one from Congress. No one who represents Florida, where Musallet hails from.
Kamel Musallet, Sayfollah’s father, spoke with Zeteo’s political correspondent Prem Thakker about the lack of accountability from both US and Israeli officials over the ongoing settler violence in the West Bank. “An American has been killed by Israeli violence… Israeli settler terrorism,” Kamel told Prem.
Sayfollah is the seventh American killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the past 21 months. Most US politicians remain conspicuously silent about the widespread violence carried out by Israeli settlers.
This video was released earlier on Zeteo.com, if you want to get earlier access, make sure you subscribe: zeteo.com/subscribe
The denial of federal money to assist Maryland’s flood recovery continues a trend of spurning devastated residents in states with Democratic governors.
After the recent deadly flooding in Texas, Trump and his administration promised, and ultimately approved, FEMA aid for the Republican-controlled state. In the time since, FEMA’s response there has received criticism — including from the agency’s now-former head of urban search and rescue operations, who just resigned in disgust.
But the fact that Texas received a promise of FEMA aid at all was noteworthy. As I wrote at the time, it was a markedly different stance than the one Trump’s administration has taken with numerous states led by Democratic governors — such as North Carolina, Washington and California — who’ve had their requests for federal assistance denied.
Ja’han Jones is an MSNBC opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog. He is a futurist and multimedia producer focused on culture and politics. His previous projects include “Black Hair Defined” and the “Black Obituary Project.”
While America’s distracted by the Steven Colbert Show drama and South Park revenge, Trump’s government just dropped over a billion dollars to build the largest detention center in U.S. history
Welcome to Fort Bliss—A $1.2 Billion Dystopian Human Suffering Factory—Funded By You.
You read that right.
Everything is bigger in Texas. $1.26 billion taxpayers money funneled to private pockets. 5,000 prisoners. No due process. Tent concentration camp in a desert.
America 2025 – Detention Will Make You Free
What’s Being Built—And Why It Should Terrify You
A $1.26 billion federal contract has been awarded to construct a 5,000-bed detention camp at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.
It will be operated under military supervision with private contractors and no guaranteed legal oversight.
This is part of a broader Trump-era policy goal: scaling ICE detention to 100,000 beds nationwide—up from around 40,000.
This facility is slated to fast-track deportations under EO 14159, which targets up to 1 million removals per year.
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Fort Bliss? It’s Another Alligator Auschwitz,
Of Texas Desert Kind
Let’s be clear: this isn’t just a holding site—it’s inhumane state-sanctioned cruelty.
Fort Bliss sits in El Paso’s desert, where summer temps regularly hit 100–110°F. Inside tents, that can spike above 120°F. No air conditioning. No proper plumbing. Just canvas and suffering. And in winter? Temperatures dip below freezing at night, with no insulation to protect detainees.
Just like at Florida’s now-notorious “Alligator Alcatraz,” ambulances driving through the gate will be a daily feature. Already, reports from that prototype camp detail detainees suffering from medical neglect, contaminated food, and makeshift showers rigged with hoses. Some have called it “worse than jail”—and Fort Bliss will be five times bigger.
Here’s what we know—and why it’s enraging—that private contractors stand to profit from building this $1.2 billion tent detention camp at Fort Bliss:
Based in Virginia, without previous large-scale detention experience, mostly focused on smaller administrative and logistics contracts (often under $2 million).
Disaster Management specializes in erecting large-scale temporary housing (often used in refugee projects). It has received over $500 million in federal contracts since 2020.
Its workforce practices have drawn legal and ethical scrutiny: a 2022 Department of Labor review found wage and overtime violations, leading to nearly $16 million in recovered back pay and compliance enforcement.
Amentum(Another Subcontractor)
A large engineering and tech services firm tapped to support unspecified portions of the Fort Bliss project, likely involving logistics, structure builds, and base coordination.
Why This Should Outrage You
It’s Yet Another Trumpian Grift! Public Funds Are Fueling Private Profits Taxpayer money is funding manufacturers of suffering—people with no due process detained in harsh, tented desert conditions. It’s a state funded deliberate cruelty.
The Blueprint of Authoritarianism
Let’s break it down:
Scapegoat a vulnerable group.
Detain them en masse with no trial.
Use military infrastructure and private contractors to bypass accountability.
Build in remote areas—out of sight, out of mind.
Brand it with Orwellian irony.
“Fort Bliss”? That’s not just cruel. It’s fascist stagecraft.
This isn’t about security. It’s about dehumanization at scale, with taxpayer money funding open-air internment that recalls the ugliest chapters of history. Sound familiar?
PolitiSage
The International Criminal Court Must Indict Donald Trump NOW.
Read more
10 days ago · 2292 likes · 111 comments · Morgaan Sinclair, Ph.D.
What You Can Do
Expose it – Share this article. Make people say the name: Fort Bliss Concentration Camp.
Demand Oversight: Call reps. Demand medical transparency, independent inspections, and an immediate halt to construction.
Support Legal Aid: Many detainees will have no lawyer. Contribute to immigrant defense funds now.
Final Thought
Stop saying “it can’t happen here.” It already is.
We’re not just locking people up—we’re engineering human suffering. And we’re doing it with public funds, in military facilities, under desert sun, with names like Alligator Alcatraz, Fort Bliss to mock our conscience.
If we let this slide, history won’t ask if we knew. It will ask why we stayed silent.
Being Liberal Substack – From Revolution to Resistance is a reader-supported publication. Subscribe. Resist. Share. Fight.
Trump doesn’t rule out pardon for Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine MaxwellIt comes as Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche met with Maxwell – who’s serving 20 years in prison for sex trafficking – for a second time.
Ghislaine Maxwell, who sources told ABC News initiated the meetings with the Department of Justice, answered questions for about nine hours over two days after being granted a limited form of immunity, the sources said.
The immunity allowed Maxwell to freely answer Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s questions without fear that her responses could later be used against her, the sources said.
The so-called proffer immunity is commonly granted to individuals prosecutors are seeking to make cooperators in a criminal case. Maxwell has already been tried, convicted and sentenced for sex trafficking underage girls.
FILE – Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, points to a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, during a news conference in New York on July 2, 2020.
John Minchillo/AP
DOJ did not immediately respond to request for comment. A lawyer for Maxwell did not immediately respond.
The second meeting between Maxwell and Blanche lasted for about three hours.
Maxwell’s attorney, David Markus, told ABC News afterward, “There have been no asks and no promises.”
Markus said Maxwell was asked about “maybe 100 different people” during her interview with the deputy attorney general. He said she answered every question.
“She didn’t hold anything back,” Markus said.
He declined to be specific about who Maxwell was asked about or whether she provided information about others who might have allegedly committed crimes against victims, as Blanche said he was seeking.
“We haven’t asked for anything. This is not a situation where we are asking for anything in return for testimony or anything like that,” Markus added on Friday. “Of course, everybody knows Ms. Maxwell would welcome any relief.”
Blanche didn’t speak to reporters upon his arrival at the federal courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida. On social media, Blanche said he would reveal what he learned from Maxwell “at the appropriate time.”
FILE – Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, points to a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, during a news conference in New York on July 2, 2020.
John Minchillo/AP
The first meeting between Maxwell and Blanche on Thursday lasted six hours.
Maxwell is currently appealing her 20-year prison sentence for child sex trafficking and other offenses in connection with Epstein, the deceased financier and convicted sex offender.
“We don’t want to get into the substance of the questions,” Markus had said about Thursday’s meeting. “There were a lot of questions and we went all day and she answered every one of them. She never said ‘I’m not going to answer,’ never declined.”
It is almost unheard of for a convicted sex trafficker to meet with such a high-ranking Justice Department official, especially one who used to be the president’s top criminal defense attorney.
ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Mary Bruce asked President Donald Trump on Friday if clemency is on the table for Maxwell.
“I can’t talk about that now because, you know, it’s a very sensitive interview going on,” Trump responded. He went on to call Blanche a “great attorney” and said “I don’t know exactly what’s happening. But I certainly can’t talk about pardons.”
Trump was also pressed by ABC News’ Bruce if he can trust what Maxwell is telling the DOJ during these interviews.
“Well, he’s a professional lawyer. He’s been through things like this before,” Trump said, referring to Blanche.
After Trump’s comments on Friday about clemency, ABC News asked Maxwell’s attorney whether that gave her an incentive to tell Blanche what he wanted to hear.
“No,” Markus answered. “She wants to tell the truth.”
Markus said Maxwell’s legal team has not approached Trump about a pardon, but suggested it could happen in the future.
“We haven’t spoken to the president or anyone about a pardon just yet. And listen, the president this morning said he had the power to do so we hope he exercises that power in the right and just way,” he said.
Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche look on as US President Donald Trump (not on frame) speaks during a news conference in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House on June 27, 2025, in Washington, DC.
Andrew Caballero-reynolds/AFP via Getty Images
Annie Farmer, who testified against Maxwell at trial, questioned why Maxwell was granted a meeting with the deputy attorney general in the first place.
“It’s very disappointing that these things are happening behind closed doors without any input from the people that the government asked to come forward and speak against her in order to put her away,” Farmer said. “There were so many young girls and women that were harmed by her.”
Maxwell’s attorney said on Friday she’s been treated poorly for the last five years and is grateful to be able to meet with Blanche as she appeals her sex trafficking conviction and seeks to leave prison.
“If you looked up scapegoat in the dictionary, her picture would be next to the definition,” Markus said. “She’s keeping her spirits up as best she can.”
Blanche’s meetings with Maxwell comes as the Justice Department has tried to quiet calls from Senate Republicans to release more information about Epstein and his interaction with high-profile figures.
And it comes as questions swirl about Trump’s connections to Epstein and reports that his name appeared in the Epstein files.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Attorney General Pam Bondi told Trump in May that his name was mentioned in the Epstein files multiple times, along with other high-profile people.
Trump has denied that account, and appearing in the files is not necessarily indicative of any wrongdoing.
“I want all the information out,” said Republican Sen. Josh Hawley.
“Just put everything out, make it as transparent as you can,” echoed Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham.
The Justice Department said earlier this month that it planned to release no additional information despite an earlier commitment to do so.
Scottie's Playtime 