NATIONAL
Jason Collins—the NBA’s first openly gay player, who went on to become a pioneer for inclusion—died at age 47 after an eight-month battle with an aggressive form of brain cancer, according to media reports.
Collins spent 13 years as a player in the league for six different teams, and came out toward the end of his career. Per the AP, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said, “Jason will be remembered not only for breaking barriers, but also for the kindness and humanity that defined his life and touched so many others. On behalf of the NBA, I send my heartfelt condolences to Jason’s husband, Brunson, and his family, friends and colleagues across our leagues.”
According to Allan Marrero and husband Matthew Marrero, ICE kept them apart for 150 days, per Instinct, citing The Washington Blade. They said that a seemingly routine marriage-based green card interview was supposed to be another step toward building their life together in New York City—but that Allan (a Cayman Islands native) was detained during the couple’s appointment at Federal Plaza in Manhattan back in November.
New York Transgender Advocacy Group (NYTAG) co-founder/Executive Director Kiara St. James passed away from cancer on May 8, Gay City News reported. Among other accomplishments, St. James spent years working to pass GENDA (a New York law that prohibits discrimination based on gender identity or expression), which was finally enacted in 2019.
The Seattle Police Department arrested a suspect after a 19-year-old transgender University of Washington student was fatally stabbed in an off-campus student apartment complex on May 10, according to ABC News. The 31-year-old man surrendered to the Bellevue Police Department and has been booked into the King County Jail for investigation of murder. Authorities immediately launched a manhunt after the stabbing, and police released photos of a suspect.
In Brooklyn Supreme Criminal Court, prosecutors said that gay dancer O’Shae Sibley was “living his best life” before a Brooklyn teen fatally stabbed him, per Gothamist. The attorneys said that as Sibley and his friends danced to a Beyonce song at a gas station, they encountered a “hateful” verbal assault of racist and homophobic slurs from a group that included then-17-year-old Dmitriy Popov—and things escalated from there. Popov, now 20, faces charges of second-degree murder as a hate crime, criminal possession of a weapon and several other crimes, and could spend up to 25 years to life in prison.
The Seattle Times revealed that a key organization behind Them Before Us (a part of the Greater Than campaign that is pushing against same-sex marriage) is being funded by the conservative Christian business Hobby Lobby, LGBTQ Nation noted. Them Before Us’s 2024 filings show a $300,000 donation from The Servant Foundation—a Christian organization that Hobby Lobby founder David Green and his family are funding.
The Justice Department announced a settlement with PayPal Inc. to resolve a fair lending investigation into what it called a “discriminatory investment program created for Black and minority-owned businesses,” per a press release. The settlement requires PayPal to launch a new Small Business Initiative that excludes criteria based on race, national origin or other protected characteristics.
And in a related development, the American Bar Association council that oversees law school accreditation voted to eliminate a rule that requires law schools to demonstrate their commitment to diversity in recruitment, admissions and student programming, Reuters noted. The rule has been suspended since February 2025, after President Donald Trump began cracking down on DEI efforts.
Glenn Burke and Billy Bean—the first two known gay players in Major League Baseball—will be part of a new display at Los Angeles’ Dodger Stadium honoring their contributions to baseball and the LGBTQ+ sports community, Outsports noted. During Dodgers Pride Night on June 5, the team will unveil this tribute to Bean and Burke on the ballpark’s centerfield plaza.
Ben Letvin, an openly gay junior at the University of Minnesota, won two individual titles and finished second in a third category at the GymACT National Championships in Oklahoma City, Outsports noted. Letvin won the men’s floor exercise and vault titles, and finished as runner-up in the all-around category.
Six decades after leaving Cal State LA to pursue a professional tennis career and become the top player in the world, Billie Jean King graduated—at age 82—after completing her bachelor’s degree in history, USA Today noted. “This is right up there,” King told USA Today’s Studio IX of the accomplishment. “I’m the first one in my immediate family [to graduate college], which is important to me.”
Galveston’s Robert’s Lafitte—the oldest gay bar in Texas—could be shut down in weeks unless it makes thousands of dollars in repairs, per The Independent. The bar first opened under the name Lafitte’s in 1965. An online fundraiser has raised more than $14,000.
WORLD
The Polish capital of Warsaw registered its first same-sex marriage, implementing court decisions that require the country to recognize same-sex marriages registered abroad, PBS News reported. Warsaw Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski promised his city would proactively recognize other Polish same-sex marriages registered elsewhere in the EU—even without a court ruling.
Uganda’s Parliament dropped the proposed Sexual Offenses Bill after a decade of failed attempts to have it enacted, according to Erasing 76 Crimes. The bill would have codified sex-related crimes, including crimes related to homosexuality. However, everything it proposed was already illegal under the Penal Code and other laws.
GayCities ran an article on the top five European cities for solo travel, based on research that the luggage company Eminent conducted. In order, they are Prague, Budapest, Madrid, Vienna and Lisbon.
It turned out that last October in South Korea, a same-sex couple filed a human-rights petition after one partner was denied marriage leave, The Korea Herald reported. It is believed to be the first such petition in the country alleging discrimination over marriage leave for a same-sex couple.
Newly elected Munich Mayor Dominik Krause, 35, made history when he won the election and celebrated by publicly kissing fiancé Sebastian Müller, Out noted. The election marked the first time a Green Party candidate or out gay politician will lead the German city.
Instagram recently suspended more than 100 LGBTQ+ accounts worldwide, including an estimated five to 10 Dutch accounts—among them, prominent queer organizations and nightclubs in Amsterdam—for the second time in six months, per NL Times. The Dutch accounts included those of The Queer Agenda, Club Church, the gay sauna Nieuwezijds and the club Tillatec, which lost 40,000 followers in the most recent purge.
Grammy-nominated hitmaker Bebe Rexha and DJ/pop icon Paris Hilton will headline this year’s WorldPride, which will take place in Amsterdam on July 31 and Aug. 1, per Out. The lineup will also include Dutch dance music superstar Oliver Heldens, house-music pioneer Honey Dijon and queer artist/songwriter MNEK, among others.
Boundary-pushing artists Joost Klein, Käärijä and Tommy Cash—who each came close to winning the Eurovision Song Contest—officially launched their long-awaited collaboration project, per a press release. The Boyband EP is available now, and the video for the single “I Miss Us” is here. The release also stated, “All revenue generated by ‘I Miss Us’ will be donated in full to Musicians Without Borders, supporting children in Palestine and those affected by conflict around the world.”
Legendary British LGBTQ+ actor Sir Ian McKellen claimed that the Star Wars actor Alec Guinness—whom McKellen called a “latent bisexual”—once “pleaded” with him to not actively campaign for gay rights, The Independent noted. McKellen told The Guardian that Guinness “thought it somewhat unseemly for an actor to dabble in public or political affairs and advised me, sort of pleaded with me, to withdraw. Advice from an older generation, which I didn’t follow.”
Gay Canadian adult-film star Milo Miles said that he was detained for more than eight hours by U.S. Customs before receiving a 10-year ban from the country, according to Out. The organization Maggies has said that U.S. Customs can deny entry to people they believe are sex workers, even if they’ve never been convicted.
Iraqi-German DJ/producer Boys Noize (aka Alex Ridha)—who had one of his earliest gigs at the gay German house nightclub La Cage—released the single “Shut It Down,” featuring Taichu, per a media release. Ridha has worked with a diverse group of artists, including Lady Gaga, Virgil Abloh and Frank Ocean.
SHOWBIZ
Queer songwriter Atia “INK” Boggs took home the BMI Pop Award for Song of the Year for her work on Kendrick Lamar’s chart-topping hit “luther,” a press release noted. The track was BMI’s most-performed pop song of the year, and marked only the seventh time that the award has gone to a Black artist.
Janet Jackson took the stage May 8 at the 2026 Grammy Hall of Fame Gala to mark the induction of her landmark 1989 album Rhythm Nation 1814—and urge for peace, unity and positivity, Forbes noted. Some of the other album honorees included 2Pac’s All Eyez on Me, Lucinda Williams’ Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, Selena’s Amor Prohibido and Radiohead’s OK Computer.
Legendary actress Sally Field—who currently stars in the Netflix movie Remarkably Bright Creatures—joked with People about how her son Sam Greisman jokes that growing up on the set of Steel Magnolias made him gay, LGBTQ Nation noted. Field has been a longtime staunch LGBTQ+ ally; in 2019, she spoke out in support of the Equality Act in a Human Rights Campaign video.
The relationship between fashion figures Alexander McQueen and Isabella Blow is set to be brought to the screen in a new short film starring out actor Russell Tovey and Oscar winner Olivia Colman, Variety noted. Gay Brit filmmaker Andrew Haigh is directing “Wild Bird,” which will come from WePresent, the Oscar-winning arts platform of WeTransfer.
Lady Gaga released a new live project, Mayhem Requiem, via Apple Music, Pitchfork noted. The album—recorded during a no-phones-allowed show at Los Angeles’ Wiltern Theatre in January—“reimagines” her 2025 album Mayhem with new arrangements.
Queer actress/Oscar nominee Stephanie Hsu is joining Oscar nominee Guy Pearce (Memento) and Emmy winner Hannah Waddingham (Ted Lasso) in the crime-thriller The Teller, according to Deadline. The movie “will tell the story of Violet, an overlooked bank teller whose life takes a turn when a rogue FBI agent manipulates her into robbing her own bank, but the heist is just the opening move in a much bigger con.”
Queen Latifah is joining The Voice as a coach for the show’s 30th season, per Deadline. She will join veterans Kelly Clarkson and Adam Levine as well as fellow rookie Riley Green.
NBC has canceled the Zachary Quinto-led show Brilliant Minds after two seasons, TVLine noted. The show followed Oliver, a neurodivergent neurologist who was noted for his unique way of investigating medical situations. The show was based on the life and work of the late queer British neurologist Dr. Oliver Sacks.
Chicago house-music icon Jamie Principle‘s 1982 track “Your Love” was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress, joining 24 other recordings, CBS News noted. Principle entrusted the track to his friend Louie Gomez, who remixed it and passed it to the late gay DJ Frankie Knuckles—and he played the song at his Chicago clubs, including The Warehouse and The Power Plant.
The Gayming Awards revealed a lineup of guest stars will be joining hosts Dawn (RuPaul’s Drag Race season 16; All Stars 11) and Erika Ishii (Game Changer) for the event that will air June 8 exclusively on WOW Presents Plus, a press release noted. Farrah Moan, Rock M Sakura and The Gaymer Guys will also be at the ceremony, which will honor Darion Lowenstein with the Gayming Icon Award and drag legend Trixie Mattel with the new LGBTQ+ Content Creator Superstar Award.