President Barack Obama embraced Lyndon B. Johnson’s civil rights legacy Thursday in a speech that credited the former president with helping to open the doors to equality for countless Americans, including those who are LGBT.
“Because of the Civil Rights movement, because of the laws President Johnson signed, new doors of opportunity and education swung open for everybody — not all at once, but they swung open,” Obama said. “Not just blacks and whites, but also women and Latinos; and Asians and Native Americans; and gay Americans and Americans with a disability. They swung open for you, and they swung open for me. And that’s why I’m standing here today — because of those efforts, because of that legacy.”
Obama’s speech at the Civil Rights Summit at Johnson’s presidential library in Austin marking the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Civil Rights Act was not the first time the nation’s first African-American president has tied the Civil Rights movement to the LGBT-rights movement.
“We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths – that all of us are created equal – is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall,” Obama said during his second inaugural address, repeating a phrase he used during a Barnard College commencement speech in May 2012.
When Obama marked the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington last August, he said that those who came to Washington in 1963 pushed the nation forward. “Because they marched, America became more free and more fair — not just for African Americans, but for women and Latinos, Asians and Native Americans; for Catholics, Jews, and Muslims; for gays, for Americans with a disability,” Obama said. “America changed for you and for me.”
Obama’s LGBT-rights legacy is certainly not lost on the president. And arguably nor is the work left to be done.
“I think it’s fair to say that there has been enormous progress made under this administration when it comes to LGBT rights — historic progress. And that’s something the President wants to continue and wants to see continue,” White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters aboard Air Force One.
The first sitting American president to openly endorse same-sex marriage, he has all but ensured that a Democrat will never again be able to run for the White House without supporting marriage equality. Under his direction, Attorney General Eric Holder, the nation’s first African-American attorney general, and the Justice Department ceased defending the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in federal court. When the Supreme Court heard arguments in same-sex marriage cases for the first time in March 2013, Obama’s solicitor general, Donald Verrilli, urged the Supreme Court justices to strike down DOMA as well as California’s same-sex marriage ban. The repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” bears his signature. And early on Obama endorsed the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA).
Where Obama has come up short — in refusing to sign an executive order protecting LGBT federal contractors from workplace discrimination — he has faced heightened criticism, in large part because of how out of character it is from his broader civil rights record. That proposed executive order, which Obama once supported as a candidate for president in 2008, is based on Executive Order 11246, which has been expanded by a number of presidents to prohibit federal contractors from discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex and national origin.
In light of the setting for Obama’s speech today, it is worth noting that executive order was first signed by President Johnson.
“[W]e are here today because we know we cannot be complacent,” Obama said Thursday. “For history travels not only forwards; history can travel backwards, history can travel sideways. And securing the gains this country has made requires the vigilance of its citizens. Our rights, our freedoms — they are not given. They must be won. They must be nurtured through struggle and discipline, and persistence and faith.”
Ultimately, Obama said, the nation moves forward. “However slow, however incomplete, however harshly challenged at each point on our journey, however flawed our leaders, however many times we have to take a quarter of a loaf or half a loaf — the story of America is a story of progress.”
[Photo: Barack Obama in the Oval Office replica at the LBJ library. Credit: Official White House Photo by Pete Souza.]
Back in May, just after our 31st anniversary, I asked readers which of four classic cover interviews from our early years they'd like to see in print again: Greg Louganis (March 9, 1995), Sir Ian McKellen (Jan. 25, 1996), Camille Paglia (Feb. 1, 1996), or Eartha Kitt (Nov. 14, 1996). None of these conversations exist online, and they haven't been seen since their original print dates.
Out of more than 200 responses, 8% chose Paglia, 27% picked Louganis, 29% went for McKellen, and an impressive 36% cast their vote for Kitt.
Kitt, who passed away in December 2008, seemed a fitting choice to revisit. A pop culture icon for her turn as the second Catwoman (following Julie Newmar) on the late-1960s, camp-classic TV series Batman, she was slated to appear at Washington's legendary jazz nightclub Blues Alley when we spoke.
A new Pew Research Center survey finds that 59% of LGBTQ U.S. adults under age 50 who have never been married say they want to marry someday -- nearly the same as the 63% of non-LGBTQ adults who do. About 12% of each group say they never want to marry, while more than one-quarter are unsure of their future marriage plans.
By age, younger Americans who have never been married are more eager to wed than older peers, who are less certain and more doubtful about ever marrying.
Among those aged 18 to 29 who have never married, 67% of LGBTQ adults and 73% of non-LGBTQ adults say they want to marry someday. By contrast, just 48% of LGBTQ adults and 49% of non-LGBTQ adults aged 30 to 49 say the same, with nearly one-third in each group unsure.
With Obergefell at risk and 32 states poised to restrict same-sex marriage, LGBTQ advocates push to enshrine protections at the state level.
By Maximilian Sandefer
August 6, 2025
On June 22, 2022, the Supreme Court issued a landmark decision with Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. Abortion rights were now no longer guaranteed nationwide as the issue was left up to the states. This shock reversal of over 49 years of precedent left reproductive rights activists scrambling as anti-choice state laws stemming from as far back as 1864 were revived and reinstituted.
As people's ability to access to reproductive care dwindled in conservative-led states, activists also found their footing. The 2024 election saw abortion rights ballot measures win in seven out of ten states. As we navigate a landscape where it will likely be a long time before we see any form of successful federal legislation protecting a woman's right to choose, state-by-state activism seems to be the driving force behind change.
These are challenging times for news organizations. And yet it’s crucial we stay active and provide vital resources and information to both our local readers and the world. So won’t you please take a moment and consider supporting Metro Weekly with a membership? For as little as $5 a month, you can help ensure Metro Weekly magazine and MetroWeekly.com remain free, viable resources as we provide the best, most diverse, culturally-resonant LGBTQ coverage in both the D.C. region and around the world. Memberships come with exclusive perks and discounts, your own personal digital delivery of each week’s magazine (and an archive), access to our Member's Lounge when it launches this fall, and exclusive members-only items like Metro Weekly Membership Mugs and Tote Bags! Check out all our membership levels here and please join us today!
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