BY JADE SALAZAR

When filmmakers and partners, Dominique Cardona and Laurie Colbert, began to notice an influx of what seemed to be lesbian nannies popping up in their Toronto neighborhood, they quickly became intrigued. After asking around, they learned that the employers actually preferred lesbians because they did not bring men back to their homes. Being directors of films like, “Thank God I’m a Lesbian” and a favorite of any women’s studies course, “My Feminism”, they were understandably fascinated by this phenomenon and the stories of these women and decided to turn the idea into a film. Though the main character is a lesbian, the Canadian directors found it important to not make that a major plot point.

Nicola Correia Damude, who plays the part of Margarita, said, “[We need to be] telling people’s stories [and] not constantly differentiating. It’s the same with race as well. It’s always a Black film or Latino film or gay film. I think we’ll have really gotten somewhere when we start writing stories about people[…]. When an LGBT character can play any lead, when a person of color or any other ethnicity can play any lead and not have it be a focus.”

Read more at TaggMagazine.com

Tagg Magazine is a print and online resource for LBT women in the DC Metropolitan and Rehoboth, DE areas.

The post ‘Margarita’ is more than just queer first appeared on Lesbian.com.

On Friday, Secretary of State John Kerry delivered remarks at the U.S. Embassy in London, where he announced thabht, effective immediately, the State Department will consider the visa applications of same-sex spouses in the same manner as opposite-sex spouses:

“One of our most important exports by far is America’s belief in the equality of all people. Now, our history shows that we haven’t always gotten it right. As I mentioned yesterday in Islamabad, slavery was written into our Constitution before it was written out. And we are still struggling to make equal the rights between men and women and to break the glass ceiling and to make sure that all people are created equal. That is what we try to do, I think wearing our heart on our sleeve, and sometimes our warts, more than almost any other nation on the face of the planet. We believe in working to do better and to live up to these higher values, and we try to do it in a lot of different ways.”

Read more at TheSeattleLesbian.com

The Seattle Lesbian online magazine reaches more than 188,000 readers per week globally.

The post Visa changes for same-sex couples announced first appeared on Lesbian.com.

BY 429Magazine

DOMA may be no more, but a myriad of questions remain because of the mismatch between federal and state law. In some states, same-sex marriages are recognized, and so same-sex couples enjoy the same rights as heterosexual couples. In other states, marriage rights aren’t so clear, and here we pose an answer to one issue: immigration, a critical question for the estimated 26,000 same-sex couples in which one partner is not a legal citizen.

Now, with DOMA in the dirt, U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services will cease to make discriminatory distinctions between heterosexual and homosexual married couples. For the last two years, the agency maintained a list of same-sex visa petitions that were denied under DOMA. These denials will be reversed without requiring couples to submit new applications. A marriage is a marriage. Fortunately for LGBT couples, even in states where same-sex marriage is prohibited, all couples are afforded immigration rights, gay or straight.

Read more at dot429.com

The post How the death of DOMA impacts binational queer couples first appeared on Lesbian.com.

A crowd of more than 200 mostly Latino teenagers and young adults cheered at a Capitol Hill church on Tuesday as a lesbian bi-national couple exchanged marriage vows at an annual event organized to promote passage of immigration reform legislation pending in Congress.

The decision by organizers of the 2013 Annual DREAM Act Graduation Ceremony to include a same-sex wedding as part of the event held at the Lutheran Church of the Reformation was viewed by activists as a sign of solidarity between the LGBT community and the U.S. immigration reform movement.

“We are working for the rights of all Americans, and whether you are straight or gay or bisexual or whatever your national origin or religion, our country draws its strength from our diversity,” gay U.S. Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.) told the gathering.

Read more at Washington Blade

Washington Blade is America’s leading gay news source.

The post Lesbian wedding featured at Dream Act event first appeared on Lesbian.com.

Washington DC rally for immigration reform. Photo: Serenae/Flickr

BY MICHAEL K. LAVERS
Washington Blade

Immigration Equality Executive Director Rachel Tiven on Monday said she does not expect same-sex couples will be included in the comprehensive immigration reform bill a bi-partisan group of senators could potentially introduce by the end of the week. Tiven’s comments come roughly three months after President Obama publicly unveiled an immigration reform proposal that includes bi-national gay and lesbian couples.

“We are not expecting LGBT families to be included in the Gang of 8 bill,” she told the Washington Blade during a conference call ahead of a rally in support of comprehensive immigration reform on Wednesday that is expected to draw tens of thousands of people to the U.S. Capitol. “That in our minds means that of course the bill is incomplete.”

Read more at Washington Blade

Washington Blade is America’s leading gay news source

The post Gay couples left out of ‘Gang of 8’ bill first appeared on Lesbian.com.

The Department of Homeland Security intends to spell out in written guidance that immigration officers should consider “long-term, same-sex partners” as families when considering whether to exercise prosecutorial discretion in the potential deportation of an undocumented immigrant.

In a letter dated Sept. 27, 2012 to Congress, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano affirms U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement intends to disseminate this guidance to personnel in the field.

“In an effort to make clear the definition of the phrase ‘family relationships,’ I have directed ICE to disseminate written guidance to the field that the interpretation of the phrase ‘family relationships’ includes long-term, same-sex partners,” Napolitano writes.

Read more at Washington Blade

Washington Blade is America’s leading gay news source.

The post DHS to spell out LGBT protections in guidance to immigration officials first appeared on Lesbian.com.