Listen Up Girl

Today on Listen Up Girl: two anti-trans measures on Colorado's November ballot that opponents say could reach every kid in the state, a former Texas House speaker admitting his party's anti-trans ads aren't working, Ukraine naming LGBTQ+ people in its new National Human Rights Strategy, the fight over painted-over rainbow crosswalks in Swampscott, Massachusetts, a Florida drag queen turning Miami Beach's removed crosswalk into Pride funding, a FIFA report on homophobic abuse at the World Cup, and a goodbye to Argentine trans trailblazer Ana Lupez.

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Today on Listen Up Girl: A federal judge orders Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to answer questions under oath about his anti-trans statements in the lawsuit challenging the trans military ban, and warns a deposition is next if he dodges. Former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, the first openly bisexual senator, is reportedly backing Republican Jay Feely, who's campaigning on anti-trans sports politics in Arizona. Hungary's parliament repeals the anti-LGBTQ+ provisions of Viktor Orbán's 2021 "child protection" law. A Texas school district cancels Little Shop of Horrors after a girl is cast as Seymour. An investigation finds Meta is paying at least 29 a...

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James Talarico took nine days off the campaign trail with the flu. A senior administration adviser responded by suggesting he'd had bottom surgery, and the vice president followed with a gay joke at a Texas airport. Today on Listen Up Girl: what the smear campaign against Texas's Democratic Senate candidate says about who it's really aimed at.

Also today: Broward County denies the Stonewall National Museum, Archives & Library an operating grant a...

Two trans members of the Ohio Democratic Party's Pride Caucus resign within 24 hours, saying party leaders blocked them from sharing a statement supporting the party's own candidate for governor. Today on Listen Up Girl: what happens when a party asks its Pride Caucus to stay quiet.

Also today: Army Reserve Lt. Nic Talbott, lead plaintiff against the trans military ban, receives his separation paperwork even though he won in the appeals court. Daniela Fuentes, a trans woman who built a life in Miami, is deported to the Central African Republic and says she now hides to survive...

Three weeks before the midterms, some Democrats are running ads that echo Republican attacks on trans people. Today on Listen Up Girl, Zach breaks down why HRC president Kelley Robinson says that strategy is "doing too much and getting too little," and what she says candidates should do instead.

Also today: the president mocks a New York parentage bill with "hi, gestating." A Tennessee appeals court orders a new trial in the 2022 killing of Paris Lee, a Black trans woman in Memphis, because jurors weren't told she was trans. A federal judge dismisses a Pennsylvania spa worker's...

Today on Listen Up Girl: Sunday was National Coming Out Day, and we look back at how it started and why it still matters. The new White House press secretary holds her first briefing as her old posts pushing Pizzagate and false claims about trans people resurface. A Republican running for California governor airs an AI-generated anti-trans ad that puts words in his opponent's mouth. The BBC blurs out a "Protect the Dolls" T-shirt on Strictly Come Dancing. Doctors in India pull back from trans care under a new law. And a new documentary describes what happened after Vivian...

On Tuesday, a federal rule cuts off Medicaid and CHIP funding for gender-affirming care for minors. California, Maine, and Illinois are stepping in with state money. Virginia and Arizona, both led by Democratic governors, are not. Today on Listen Up Girl, Zach breaks down what that means for families and what Gov. Abigail Spanberger said Friday.

Also today: Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown calls a super PAC ad featuring detransitioner Soren Aldaco "a complete lie" and turns the focus to Sen. Jon Husted's Epstein files vote. Britain's public broadcaster apologizes in the High Court to Benjamin Cohen and...

A gay man who grew up in Arizona was deported to Equatorial Guinea, a country he had never been to, and held in a hotel where he says he was beaten. Today on Listen Up Girl: a federal judge orders the government to bring Ahmed Soliman home, and why dozens of others are still waiting.

Also today: the Republican National Committee attacks Texas Senate candidate James Talarico and New Hampshire's Chris Pappas for saying they admire Pete Buttigieg. The Ninth Circuit rules Arizona can't require surgery for trans people to update their birth certificates. New York City...

The president used an anti-trans slur three times against South Carolina Senate candidate Dr. Annie Andrews, who isn't trans. Today on Listen Up Girl, what that attack says about the campaign strategy behind it, and why distancing yourself from trans people doesn't buy protection.

Also today: Justice Samuel Alito's new book, So Ordered, calls the Obergefell marriage equality ruling "perhaps the decisive point" in the country's turn against religious liberty. The Oklahoma Supreme Court rules 6-3 that state law never allowed changes to the sex on a birth certificate. Taipei police raid the gay bar Commander D...

Can a Democratic House actually protect trans people with the orange convicted felon still in office? Today on Listen Up Girl, Vermont Rep. Becca Balint, the only out LGBTQ+ member of the House Judiciary Committee, lays out the tools: subpoenas, oversight hearings, and the power of the purse. She also calls out Democrats running anti-trans ads.

Also today: students and teachers at Fairview High School in Pennsylvania rally behind trans homecoming queen Sammi Gutierrez, and the district refuses to bow to online backlash. Gay Punjabi makeup artist and influencer Mad Sandhu is shot and killed outside a...

Are fewer young people queer, or are fewer willing to say so out loud? Today on Listen Up Girl, new federal youth survey data shows the share of ninth graders identifying as gay or bisexual dropped from 17% to 11% in two years, while older teens and young adults are holding steady.

Also today: Minnesota Republican state House candidate William Beck repeats the conspiracy theory that chemicals in the water are changing frogs' sex. Jonathan McKinsey, a transgender father and software engineer, is shot and killed in Dublin, California, days before a custody hearing, and his in-laws are charged...

Today on Listen Up Girl: Becca Good and Renee Good's family file two federal lawsuits over Renee's killing by an ICE officer in Minneapolis, naming Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem, and other senior officials. Elliot Page joins the Gender Liberation Movement to demand that NYU Langone, Mount Sinai, and NewYork-Presbyterian restart gender-affirming care for trans youth and apologize to the families they turned away. The South Carolina Arts Commission denies grants to the Greenville Gay Men's Chorus and Proud Mary Theatre Company, the only two LGBTQ+ groups under review, and the chorus is weighing legal action. Dame Esther Rantzen, founder...

Today on Listen Up Girl: The "Press 3" option for LGBTQ+ youth is back on the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, after Sen. Tammy Baldwin and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi wrote it into federal law. But The Trevor Project was shut out of running it, and the administration won't say how counselors will treat trans kids. In Pennsylvania, Republican state Rep. Aaron Bernstine reportedly hurled a slur and an AIDS smear at gay Democratic Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta in a crowded Harrisburg bar. Turkey's crackdown widens as prosecutors indict queer pop star Mabel Matiz for a music video showing two men dancing, and the...

Today on Listen Up Girl: California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed six LGBTQ+ bills into law, including AB 1930, which blocks state agencies from helping federal investigators access trans people's medical records. A new Human Rights Campaign Foundation survey of 826 educators finds that teachers in states with anti-LGBTQ+ policies are afraid to step in when LGBTQ+ students are bullied. In the Netherlands, a national youth survey shows positive views of gay people among teenagers have dropped sharply, and researchers are pointing to manosphere influencers. Japanese volleyball player Rui Takahashi becomes the first out gay athlete in Japanese men's pro sports, with...

Today on Listen Up Girl: The Education Department formally rescinded the 2024 Title IX rule protecting LGBTQ+ students and restored the 2020 rules with no public comment period. The administration asked the Supreme Court to let the Bureau of Prisons cut off hormone therapy and other gender-affirming care for trans people in federal custody. Ana Brnabić became Serbia's acting president, the first out gay president in the Balkans. A federal appeals court reversed a ruling that let nonbinary Puerto Ricans get an "X" marker on their birth certificates. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Marcia Gay Harden, André De Shields, and Junior LaBeija took th...

Ken Paxton spent a week attacking Drag Race star Alyssa Edwards to score points against James Talarico. She answered with an open letter and one line: Texas is big enough for all of us. Today on Listen Up Girl, Zach Randles-Friedman breaks down the exchange and what it says about the Texas Senate race.

Also today: FCC Chair Brendan Carr fires back at 68 House Democrats over TV warning labels for trans and nonbinary themes, citing a Muppet Babies episode where Gonzo dresses as a princess. Colombia withdraws from the Equal Rights Coalition it was co-chairing with Spain...

Listen Up Girl | Saturday, September 26, 2026

Alaska Senate candidate Mary Peltola, a former Anchorage Pride grand marshal, faces allegations from former staffers that she used anti-gay and ableist slurs. Her campaign denies the anti-gay slur and says she regrets the other language. Queer voters are debating what it means for a race that could decide the Senate.

The administration's FDA nominee, Dr. Heidi Overton, sidestepped basic questions at her confirmation hearing, from IUDs to the MMR vaccine. We also look at her record opposing gender-affirming care for trans youth.

Queer nightclubs in Los Angeles...

Six stories today, two of them political. Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville spends twenty minutes on the Senate floor warning about "furry pilots" and calling trans people mentally ill. HIV and STI samples from the Seattle LGBTQ+ Center are now processed at a lab in Texas, raising privacy concerns given the state's pursuit of LGBTQ+ medical records. Two men face hate crime charges after an attack on a San Jose State University student. Dutch Prime Minister Rob Jetten visits the Stonewall Inn during the UN General Assembly. We remember Harriet Hancock, founder of the Southeast's first PFLAG chapter and organizer...

pisode: Listen Up Girl, Wednesday, September 23, 2026
Host: Zach Randles-Friedman

Today's episode is about visibility: who gets seen, who gets erased, and who decides.

Story 1: UNT pulls its LGBTQ archive page
The University of North Texas deleted the webpage for its LGBTQ archive, a collection of more than 15,000 items documenting queer life across the South and Southwest. It came down less than a day after Republican state Rep. Brian Harrison posted screenshots and called it "transgender indoctrination." GOP megadonor Monty Bennett amplified the attack, and Harrison celebrated the removal as a win. The collection...

Today on Listen Up Girl: VP JD Vance falsely calls the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence "devil-worshipping" at a Kansas rally — and gets their name wrong in the process. A Duluth, Minnesota man faces hate crime charges after allegedly stabbing a man in a bar bathroom over his perceived sexual orientation. Seattle's City Council votes unanimously to extend civil rights protections to polyamorous and other nontraditional families. A Portland synagogue's weekly Torah study group reads the Rosh Hashanah texts through a queer lens. And Ekurhuleni Pride marches through Springs, South Africa, with the city's executive mayor walking alongside organizers. Your da...

Today on Listen Up Girl: a sworn ethics complaint accuses Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert of affairs with two female staffers and one male aide, Ohio Rep. Marcy Kaptur runs anti-trans ads ahead of Election Day, India's Allahabad High Court orders police protection for a Hindu-Muslim lesbian couple, students win their fight against a school that banned every club to avoid allowing a gay-straight alliance, a gay couple's surrogacy fight becomes a family and a children's book, Milwaukee's All Saints' Cathedral names the Episcopal Church's first transgender dean, and George Takei celebrates 18 years of marriage to husband Brad Altman. Your...

Today on Listen Up Girl: Delaware Congresswoman Sarah McBride, the nation's first transgender member of Congress, is misgendered twice by a Republican congressional candidate at a public forum — and he gets removed from the stage. Michigan state Senator Jeremy Moss talks to the Washington Blade about his run for Congress and why the Equality Act is his top priority. Indonesia's top Islamic clerical body pushes a bill that would criminalize LGBTQ people and their advocates. Aid for AIDS of Nevada celebrates 40 years of its Black & White Party fundraiser in Las Vegas. Madonna is announced as the opening performer for th...

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Today on Listen Up Girl: The Trump administration's proposed 2030 Census rules could effectively force transgender Americans to disclose their status just by filling out a mandatory form. The Pentagon's mandatory testosterone screening policy for troops faces a public FDA expert meeting today, even as trans service members remain barred from the same hormone therapy. Cuba's new Civil Registry Law takes effect, making legal gender change unrestricted for adults. Hungary's new government under PM Peter Magyar moves to repeal Orban-era anti-LGBTQ+ laws on both adoption and "promotion" to minors. Bisexual Awareness Week kicks off. And "The Traitors...

Today on Listen Up Girl: Baltimore's LGBTQ+ community mourns Sophie Lee, a 27-year-old trans woman shot and killed in the Barclay neighborhood. New Hampshire Congressman Chris Pappas wins his state's Democratic Senate primary, putting him one win away from becoming the first openly gay man elected to the U.S. Senate. A federal judge dismisses the DOJ's lawsuit against California's trans-inclusive school sports policy. And Switzerland's government backs a nationwide ban on conversion therapy. Your daily dose of LGBTQ+ news, every weekday.

Hosted by Zach Randles-Friedman

https://www.listenupgirl.com/

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Today on Listen Up Girl: Turkish authorities launch a nationwide crackdown on LGBTQ+ groups, detaining dozens and drawing condemnation from human rights organizations across Europe. An Indiana prosecutor declines to charge the woman behind the false report that separated Pete Buttigieg's family. Grindr agrees to a $35 million UK settlement over sharing users' HIV status and other sensitive data. Iceland quietly expands blood donation access for gay and bisexual men. We remember costume designer Bob Mackie, dead at 87. Pittsburgh saves a piece of its queer history. And the Gay Softball World Series breaks attendance records in Columbus. Your daily dose...

Today on Listen Up Girl: shareholders push Nike to reconsider trans-inclusive healthcare coverage, over 450 patients in Wales have gender-affirming surgeries cancelled with no review yet underway, Saddle Lake Cree Nation declares itself a safe haven for gender-affirming care amid Alberta's youth care ban, transgender cricketer Anaya Bangar gets cleared to play in Australia, Olivia Hill makes history at Nashville City Hall, Lilly Wachowski says Harry Potter fans are funding anti-trans activism, and Bisexual Awareness Week is on the way. Your daily dose of LGBTQ+ news.

New episodes every weekday. Subscribe and follow @TheRealZachRE for more.

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Today on Listen Up Girl: Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach gives three cities 60 days to repeal their local conversion therapy bans, leaning on a recent Supreme Court ruling. In Ghana, Archbishop Cyril Kobina Ben-Smith reverses his past support for anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, publicly opposing a bill that would criminalize simply identifying as queer. In Spain, Marcus Massalami becomes the first full-time drag king cast on Drag Race España, a franchise first. Back home, North Charleston gets a brand-new LGBTQ+ bar and community space called The Velvet Pony, the Charleston Pride Pageant returns this Thursday, and D.C.'s LGBTQ+ C...

This September 11th episode opens with a tribute to LGBTQ+ people lost in the 2001 terrorist attacks, naming gay Flight 77 co-pilot David Charlebois and gay Flight 93 passenger Mark Bingham, who helped storm the cockpit before the plane went down in Pennsylvania. The episode then turns to its single political story: Philadelphia drag performer and designer Chantal Waldorf, a Nicaraguan immigrant detained by ICE after Temporary Protected Status for Nicaraguans was revoked, with the local drag community organizing legal fundraising and a benefit show on September 13th. From there, the show shifts to a genuine policy win, as Iceland implements new...

Today on Listen Up Girl: a Missouri Republican is charged with plotting to plant cocaine on his own primary opponent, a hate group celebrates a canceled hockey Pride night, Northern Ireland's Pride organizations bar their own government from official participation, one mom's 19-year fight to make school forms inclusive, Miss Continental crowns a new queen in its 45th year, and the wild true story of how a couple tricked 1970s New York City into marrying them. Your daily dose of LGBTQ+ news, every weekday.

On today's episode of Listen Up Girl, Missouri Republican state House candidate Thomas...

Today on Listen Up Girl: Congresswoman Sarah McBride calls for Pete Hegseth's impeachment, Elliot Page opens up about Hollywood's silence since "The Odyssey," the first drag queen on U.S. "Big Brother" talks life after eviction, a new Arlington bar honors gay rights pioneer Lilli Vincenz, Black Trans Men of Ohio's retreat sets an applicant record, and the wild true story of Merrymount, America's first queer colony. Your daily dose of LGBTQ+ news, every weekday.

Hosted by Zach Randles-Friedman

https://www.listenupgirl.com/

Follow me at https://www.instagram.com/therealzachre/

Today on Listen Up Girl: passengers restrain a man mid-flight after a racist, anti-gay outburst, a Wisconsin campus assault case heading to trial, the Dallas Stars dropping Pride Night and the fan backlash, a major trans rights win in Bulgaria, a San Francisco library preserving LGBTQ+ children's book history, and Ecuador's new adoption law shutting out LGBTQ+ families. Your daily dose of LGBTQ+ news, every weekday.

Hosted by Zach Randles-Friedman

https://www.listenupgirl.com/

Follow me at https://www.instagram.com/therealzachre/

Podcast music: https://dillonderosa.com/ Thank you Dillion!!! <...

Today's episode: Texas state Rep. Venton Jones marries the man he proposed to on the House floor. A trans South Asian immigrant nonprofit in San Francisco rallies community support to stay open. Connecticut lawmakers threaten subpoenas after a children's hospital quietly ends gender-affirming care under DOJ pressure. A Wyoming judge rules a transgender bartender must stand trial after drawing a gun in self-defense. A thousand people prepare to lobby the UK Parliament against new trans restrictions. And in Kansas, a group of transgender men are exposing the absurdity of the state's bathroom law — by following it exactly. New episodes ev...

Today on Listen Up Girl: the administration asks the Supreme Court to allow the immediate firing of 29 transgender troops ahead of trial, six transgender Idahoans sue over a bathroom law with penalties up to life in prison, a South Carolina family is driven out of state after years of harassment, New York lawmakers push to repeal a 1985 ban on gay bathhouses, an infamous anti-LGBTQ+ bar in Idaho might become a gay bar, and San Francisco is named the best city in the world for LGBTQ+ life. New episodes every day. Find us at listenupgirl.com.

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Three stories today. Twenty-two states sue the federal government over a new rule stripping Medicare and Medicaid funding from gender-affirming care for minors, set to take effect October 13th. An Idaho minister is found guilty of trespassing after refusing to leave the governor's office during a protest against the state's bathroom ban. And Bolivia records its first same-sex civil marriage after a nearly four-year legal fight.

Listen Up Girl is your daily LGBTQ+ news podcast — keeping you informed, connected, and in the fight.

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Today on Listen Up Girl: Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey wins his primary by nearly 30 points after making trans rights the centerpiece of his campaign against a challenger who'd questioned defending trans kids. A new EEOC settlement gives thousands of Christian-affiliated employers a permanent shield from gender-identity discrimination claims. A teenager stands trial in the UK for the murder of a gay man in a suspected homophobic attack. Out soccer star Esther González faces backlash for signing with a Saudi club. Mary Austin breaks decades of silence about her life with Freddie Mercury. And King of Drag returns for s...

On this episode of Listen Up Girl, Zach Randles-Friedman covers the administration's return to the Supreme Court seeking to reinstate its ban on transgender military service, after a federal appeals court ruled the policy likely unconstitutional — a ban that remains in effect for now regardless of the outcome. The episode then turns to Massachusetts, where hospital systems including Fenway Health, Bay State Health, Outer Cape Health Services, and Greater Lawrence Family Health Care have quietly scaled back or ended gender-affirming care for trans youth despite state law explicitly protecting it, driven by fear of losing federal funding — a case stud...

Today's LGBTQ+ news: California lawmakers race today's deadline to get a slate of LGBTQ+ bills — including a fix for injectable PrEP coverage — to Governor Newsom's desk, former NBA player Matt Ryan inserts himself into the WNBA's manufactured trans athlete debate, Georgia Southern University pays $250,000 to settle a lawsuit from a worker fired after pushing for free chest binders for transmasculine students, Moms for Liberty and the Thomas More Society team up to target school anti-outing policies, gay Philadelphia Eagles cheerleader Jackson O'Brien's viral call to his mom, and comedian Amber Ruffin gets "en-gay-ged" to partner Kelsi Cleary-Hammarstedt in a deli...

Today's LGBTQ+ news: far-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos gets detained by ICE despite years of cheering the agency on, Houston opens its first emergency shelter built for unhoused LGBTQ+ teens, a GOP-led group refuses to correct a misleading voter guide misusing pediatricians' name to sell an anti-trans sports ban, actress Missi Pyle has an unplanned coming-out moment on a Netflix podcast, we look back at the quietly erased love story of sports legend Babe Didrikson Zaharias, and Hunter Biden gets oddly specific about his own sexuality in a new interview.

Hosted by Zach Randles-Friedman

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Today's episode of Listen Up Girl covers six stories, with two carrying a political throughline. A federal judge in Texas, David Hittner, struck down the state's Senate Bill 12 drag show ban for the second time, ruling it unconstitutionally vague and overly broad enough to sweep up cheerleaders, cosplayers, and celebrity impersonators alongside actual drag performers — and telling anyone who doesn't like drag to simply not attend. Author and former pastor John Pavlovitz went viral this week pushing back on conservatives trying to claim Dolly Parton's legacy after her death, arguing her decades of unconditional support for marginalized people put he...

Today's episode of Listen Up Girl covers six stories, with only two carrying a political throughline. A Grand Island, New York wastewater treatment plant employee, Timothy Burns, has filed suit against the town, alleging years of homophobic harassment, a false report meant to damage his professional standing, and retaliation tied to a disability accommodation. On the political side, 179 members of Congress — led by Congressional Equality Caucus chair Mark Takano along with Senators Tammy Baldwin and Jeff Merkley — filed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to uphold Colorado's nondiscrimination policy for its universal preschool program, in a case set for...