Queer-Bearing Tree on the U.S./Mexico Border | This Way Out Radio Episode # 2007
Queer activists occupy a 40-foot tall tree to block Trumps Border Wall in south Arizona - This Way Out’s Lauren Schmitt reports. In Newswrap Germany’s far-right AfD scores its biggest state-election showing since the Nazis — as rainbow-flagged protesters take to the streets! Ninety percent of LGBTQ+ groups worldwide report losing funding since 2025 — putting many at risk of closing their doors! Sierra Leone’s queer crackdown sends two activists fleeing after police raid a gay party and issue warrants for their arrest! The Trump administration targets “gender ideology” in a controversial new study — critics call the un-peer-reviewed report pseudoscience! And Sacramento’s Lavender Heights fights back — LGBTQ+ residents launch a community patrol after a string of anti-queer attacks!
Featured speakers: A protester named Nikita, creator of Lavender Heights Community Patrol Zachary Basler, Lauren Schmitt, Kate Scott, Santa Cruz county Sheriff David Hathaway, “Hawk”, “Rain”.
Credits: Associate Producer and Host Lucia Chappelle, Producer/ Brian DeShazor, News writer Jeb Backe, the feature was produced by Lauren Schmitt, NewsWrap reporters Sarah Montague, Nathalie Muñoz music: Cast album Redwood, music from the Arizona protest.
All this on the September 14, 2026 Edition of This Way Out!
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This Way Out
NewsWrap
Program 2007 Distributed 09/14/26
The extremist Alternative for Germany party received the largest showing in a state election for a far-right platform since the Nazis. AfD secured nearly 44% of the vote in the small eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt in the historic win. Though the party will need an absolute majority to govern the state, many reports warn that this victory could open the way. AfD now has 39 of the state parliament’s 83 seats – just three short of the 42 needed for an absolute parliamentary majority.The party is actively attempting to poach conservative lawmakers to gain a majority and govern the state. Most German parties are building a “firewall” against the far-right, refusing to work with or form a coalition with AfD.
AfD opposes same-sex marriage, calls for mass deportations, and seeks to limit Islamic expression. AfD Co-chair Alice Weidel called the Saxony-Anhalt vote a "dream result.” Paradoxically, Weidel is a lesbian in a civil partnership with Sarah Bossard, a Sri Lankan immigrant . She sees no contradiction between her personal life and AfD’s anti-LGBT and anti-immigrigant platform. Weidel maintains that the party will provide safety for homosexuals by cracking down on immigration, which will supposedly prevent violence against gays by so-called “Muslim gangs.” She’s also a staunch opponent of what she calls “gender ideology.”
Grassroots movements opposing AfD took to the streets the weekend of the September 6th election flying rainbow flags – a direct protest against the party’s plan to remove rainbow flags from schools in the state. A protester named Nikita spoke to the BBC about the anti-AfD movement:
[AUDIO - BBC]
“Why not degrade them? Because they're degrading the people around here all the time because of their sexual preferences, because of the colour of their skin, where they're from. And yeah, that's for me a Nazi. Of course they are.”
90% of LGBTQ+ worldwide organizations have lost funding since January 2025— that’s according to research from Outright International. In their findings published September 10th, the global LGBTIQ advocacy group surveyed over 200 organizations across 94 countries. Four in ten of the respondents who lost funding said they were at severe or immediate risk of closure.
Outright International’s report attributes the strain largely to the shutdown of USAID, funding cuts to the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief known as PEPFAR, and the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the United Nations LGBTI Core Group. In Outright’s words, “The effects have cascaded far beyond US government funding: corporate, institutional, and philanthropic donors have also shifted, stalled, or quietly withdrawn, often without public scrutiny.”
The deterioration of support has harmed the people who need it the most. That especially goes for those dealing with multiple forms of marginalization, like a disability or refugee status. They could lose access to their only options for healthcare, legal advocacy, housing, or protective services when an organization has to cut core programs.
Alberto de Belaunde is one of the authors of the report titled, “Breaking Point: The Urgent Need to Invest in Global LGBTIQ Movements.” de Belaunde told the Bay Area Reporter, “This is the moment for empathy and for action, because the resources, the infrastructure, and the people we are losing because of these funding cuts are not going to come back if we don’t fight for them to be preserved.” The report’s authors applaud the resilience of the aid workers and the adaptations they have made to serve their communities under such pressure. They add, “This report is an effort to make those costs — and that resilience — visible.”
Two LGBTQ+ activists from Sierra Leone have been forced to flee abroad after being targeted in an anti-gay police crackdown. On August 30th, local police raided a private party for gay men in the capital city of Freetown. Dozens were arrested while others were able to elude capture. Two of the escapees were executive director of the LGBT+ rights organization Pride Equality George Reginald Freeman Browne and his partner and fellow activist Edwin Bolaji Deen.
Following the raid, police issued warrants for the arrest of Browne and Deen on charges of “homosexuality and LGBTI social activity.” A reward is being offered for information leading to their arrests. Since Browne and Deen fled the raided party, the police claim that their activist work is “likely to cause the breach of the peace.” The couple has subsequently received harassment and death threats from friends and family.
Until now, the West African nation has rarely enforced its British colonial era anti-homosexuality law. The 19th century statute was kept on the books after Sierra Leone achieved independence in 1961. According to the antiquated regulation, any man found guilty of “buggery” can be imprisoned from 10 years to life.
Freeman Browne told the news outlet Erasing 76 Crimes, “the colonial law is still used as a lever to extort money from LGBT+ people.” Police wanted notices for the capture of individuals suspected of homosexuality are fueling a growing climate of fear within the LGBT+ community, according to other reports.
“There have been consistent reports of discrimination and violence being committed against LGBT people in recent years, including assault, threats, harassment, blackmail, familial rejection, and the denial of basic rights and services,” according to the queer advocacy group Human Dignity Trust.
The increase in homophobic action and police harassment is exactly the kind of thing Pride Equality is working against. But for now its leader and his partner are being subjected to the very prejudice they are trying to prevent.
The Trump administration has just released a study that’s supposed to academically justify their anti-LGBTQ+ platform. The paper released by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), is titled “Where the Clinic Meets the Movement: Does Gender Ideology Arm Left Wing Authoritarian Psychology?” The study bizarrely proclaims , “These findings suggest that gender ideology is associated with [left-wing authoritarianism] and willingness to justify political violence.”
The agency that has been recently plagued by conspiracy theories and disinformation alleges that so-called “left-wing authoritarianism” and “gender ideology” were used to justify violence against President Donald Trump, right wing influencer Charlie Kirk, United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, Immigration and Customs Enforcement buildings, the police, and in its words,“wealthy people’s property.” The report used an online survey that polled over 1,200 U.S. residents — only 13 of whom identified as transgender or gender nonconforming. The study was published without a peer review process, leaving critics to label it pseudoscience.
Human Rights Campaign president Kelley Robinson said, “This so-called study, sponsored by an extreme right-wing advocacy organization, is another example of the outcome leading the research - MAGA Republicans want to sow hatred against our fellow Americans in a desperate attempt to distract from their failures ahead of the midterms.”
Community members in Sacramento, California’s Lavender Heights neighborhood are raising safety concerns for the LGBTQ+ residents and taking steps to defend themselves. Flyers are being posted around the neighborhood highlighting the anti-queer hate crimes that have taken place during the past year – all within five blocks. The attacks have ranged from hateful slurs to someone being killed. The historically gay neighborhood is calling on officials to take on the responsibility for protecting their community.
Just a few hours after the end of the Sacramento Rainbow Festival on Sunday September 6th, a married lesbian couple was injured in an assault outside a gay nightclub. Zachary Basler has led the creation of a volunteer-led Lavender Heights Community Patrol. He says that even more attacks have happened, but are not in the public record because they were never reported. Basler told ABC10 local news:
[AUDIO - ABC10]
“We actually have two additional people. One is a minor and we're currently protecting their identity because they're a minor and there's another one who's afraid of retribution if they come forward.”
Community-led protection is filling the gap left by the frustrating lack of adequate police response. Basler’s patrol has already recruited 25 volunteers to be out on the streets during high traffic times. Volunteers will be wearing lavender vests and use flashlights and whistles to draw attention to potentially threatening activity. They will work in pairs to keep a watchful eye, report concerns, deter violence, and serve as a visible reminder that no one is alone.
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