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For Immediate Release
April, 14 2014, 11:44am EDT
Contact:
Angela Dallara | angela@freedomtomarry.org | 646.430.3925
Federal Judge Rules Ohio Must Respect Married Same-Sex Couples
New York, NY
Today U.S. District Judge Timothy Black struck down part of a constitutional amendment in Ohio that denies gay couples the freedom to marry and withholds legal respect for gay couples who have gotten married. He ordered the state to treat couples married elsewhere like any other couples who marry out of state -- as married.
Evan Wolfson, president of Freedom to Marry, released the following statement:
"Couples who are married should be treated as married no matter where they are in the country, including Ohio. Couples should not have to play 'now you're married, now you're not' as they travel, work, move, or return home. This is a good day for families and businesses in Ohio, and a good day for the Constitution and America."
Freedom to Marry is the gay and non-gay partnership working to win marriage equality nationwide. Headed by Evan Wolfson, one of America's leading civil rights advocates and lawyers, Freedom to Marry brings new resources and a renewed context of urgency and opportunity to this social justice movement.
LATEST NEWS
Trump Threatens to Jail Journalists Who Received Leak About US Pilot Downed in Iran
“We think we’ll be able to find it out because we’re going to go to the media company that released it and we’re going to say: ‘National security—give it up or go to jail,'" the president said.
Apr 06, 2026
President Donald Trump vowed Monday to find the "leaker" who disclosed that US forces could not locate the second pilot stranded in Iran after their F-15 fighter jet was shot down, threatening to jail unnamed journalists who received the information if they do not reveal its source.
Trump claimed that Iranian authorities did not know that a second pilot of the downed two-seat warplane was missing until after the news report, which made the US rescue mission "much more difficult."
“We’re looking very hard to find that leaker,” Trump said. “We think we’ll be able to find it out because we’re going to go to the media company that released it and we’re going to say: ‘National security—give it up or go to jail.'”
Trump: "They didn't know there was somebody missing until this leaker gave the information. Whoever it was, we think we'll be able to find out, because we're gonna go to the media company that released it and we're gonna say, 'National security. Give it up or go to jail.'"
[image or embed]
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) April 6, 2026 at 10:27 AM
“The country, Iran, put out a major notice... offering a very big award for anybody that captures the pilot," Trump continued. "We have to find that leaker, because that’s a sick person. Probably didn’t realize the extent of how bad it was."
"We’re going to find out," he added. "It’s national security, and the person that did the story will go to jail if he doesn’t say.”
While the president did not say which "media company" he was talking about, the first widely cited reporting about the missing second pilot was broadcast Friday by CNN, CBS News, and The New York Times.
Israel journalist Amit Segal—who has close high-level links to the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—claimed Monday on his Telegram channel that he was the first to publish information on the second pilot.
"We are about to see Trump’s promise to find and imprison whoever leaked the info about the second pilot vanish into the ether," US investigative journalist Ryan Grim said on social media Monday in response to Segal's post.
Both pilots were successfully rescued. Some critics mocked Trump for presuming that Iranians would not know that the two-seat F-15 is crewed by multiple pilots.
Since early in his first administration, Trump has discussed jailing journalists and political foes who leak or refuse to say who disclosed information. The president has also long denigrated journalists as the "fake news media" and the "enemy of the people," sowing distrust of an entire profession that culminated in physical attacks on reporters during the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection.
Trump's threat comes as the president said he is "considering blowing everything up” in Iran if the country's leaders don't reopen the Strait of Hormuz by Tuesday night. This, after Trump said during a nationally televised address last week that he would bomb Iran "back to the Stone Ages" if the vital waterway is not reopened.
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Gas Prices in US Already Up 35% as Iranians Threaten to Close Another Strait Over Trump War
Rep. Don Beyer blamed the surge in gas prices on President Donald Trump's decision to wage "an illegal war against Iran with no plan or strategy."
Apr 06, 2026
As President Donald Trump continues threatening to commit war crimes in Iran by bombing power plants, Iran is signaling that it could put a further squeeze on global oil prices by shutting down yet another strait used for transporting petroleum outside the Middle East.
Ali Akbar Velayati, a former Iranian foreign minister and a top adviser to Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, threatened in a Sunday social media post to close down the Strait of Bab al-Mandeb, a waterway adjacent to the coast of Yemen that is under control of Iran-backed Houthi militants.
“If the White House dares to repeat its foolish mistakes," Velayati cautioned, "it will soon realize that the flow of global energy and trade can be disrupted with a single move."
As Al Jazeera noted in a Monday report, the Houthis already shut down the strait during Israel's war on Gaza, and doing so again at the same time Iran has shut down the Strait of Hormuz could send global energy prices to unprecedented highs.
"The strait is a vital route through which Saudi Arabia sends its oil to Asia," Al Jazeera reported. "If Bab al-Mandeb and the Strait of Hormuz were both shut, that would block 25%... of the world’s oil and gas supply."
Oil prices have shot up since Trump launched his illegal war with Iran more than a month ago, and on Monday the price of Brent crude oil futures was trading at $110 per barrel, while the average price for gas in the US rose to $4.12 per gallon, according to data from AAA.
Democratic members of the US Congress Joint Economic Committee (JEC) last week released a study estimating that, thanks to Trump's war, Americans are paying 35% more to fill up their cars than they were paying a month earlier.
Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), a member of the JEC, pointed to the report in a Monday social media post and said Americans were getting hit with major price shocks because "President Trump decided to wage an illegal war against Iran with no plan or strategy."
Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH), Ranking Member of the JEC, told WMUR that Trump's Iran war took an already bad situation for American families and made it worse.
"Families are already being pushed to the brink," Hassan said. "That was true before the war started, by the cost of everything from groceries to rent to healthcare insurance premiums and prescriptions and even more. But now they're being forced to pay more at the pump."
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At Easter Egg Roll With Kids, 'Deranged Lunatic' Trump Defends War Crimes Threat
"The 25th Amendment exists for a reason," US Rep. Yassamin Ansari said in response to the US president's threat to bomb Iran's power plants and bridges.
Apr 06, 2026
US President Donald Trump on Monday defended his threat to commit grave war crimes in Iran, telling reporters at the annual Easter Egg Roll at the White House—with children in the background—that bombing the country's bridges and power plants would be justified despite warnings of "catastrophic harm" to tens of millions of civilians.
Asked how it wouldn't be a war crime for the US military to launch a large-scale assault on Iran's civilian infrastructure, Trump pointed to Iranian security forces' recent killing of protesters and called Iranian leaders "animals."
"We have to stop them, and we can't let them have a nuclear weapon," the president continued. American intelligence agencies and international watchdogs have repeatedly assessed that Iran is not developing nuclear weapons.
Watch:
Reporter: How would it not be a war crime to strike Iran’s bridges and power plants?
Trump: They’re animals. pic.twitter.com/rWrj7oeTNx
— Clash Report (@clashreport) April 6, 2026
Brian Finucane, senior adviser to the US Program at the International Crisis Group, said in response to Trump's remarks that "prior crimes against the Iranian people do not excuse fresh war crimes against the Iranian people."
Trump also told reporters, absurdly, that "the time the Iranian people are most unhappy... is when those bombs stop." US-Israeli attacks, which began in late February, have killed around 2,000 people in Iran so far and destroyed or damaged tens of thousands of civilian structures, including apartment buildings, medical facilities, and universities.
Over the weekend, Trump set new deadline of Tuesday at 8 pm ET for the total reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. If Iran doesn't agree to his administration's terms, the US president said Sunday that he is "considering blowing everything up"—a threat of indiscriminate attacks that would violate international law and kill many civilians.
"The 25th Amendment exists for a reason," US Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.) wrote in response to Trump's Easter-morning threat. "The president of the United States is a deranged lunatic, and a national security threat to our country and the rest of the world."
The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that US military planners are "pulling out existing lists of potential targets to provide the president options if he decides to attack energy infrastructure" in Iran.
Amnesty International warned last month in response to earlier Trump threats that a major attack on Iranian energy infrastructure "would unleash catastrophic harm on millions."
“When power plants collapse, horrific consequences cascade instantly," said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty’s senior director of research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns. "Water pumping stations would stop functioning, clean water would become scarce, and preventable diseases would spread. Hospitals would lose electricity and fuel, forcing surgeries to be cancelled and life-support machines to shut down. Food production and distribution networks would collapse, deepening hunger and causing widespread food scarcity. Many businesses would also shut down with devastating economic consequences, including mass unemployment."
Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council, said Monday that US lawmakers must investigate Trump's "targeting and threatening of civilian sites in Iran, including by utilizing all tools at Congress’ disposal including subpoena power to secure documentary evidence and testimony from relevant officials."
"Any actions that violate US and international law regarding the conduct of war must be thoroughly investigated and appropriate accountability pursued," said Abdi. "We cannot allow such brazen disregard for civilian life to be normalized."
First Lady Melania Trump, who accompanied the president to the White House Easter Egg Roll on Monday, defended the US-Israeli assault on Iran as a war for the "future" of Iran's children.
Melania Trump: All of this is happening for their future. They will be safe in the years to come.
Trump: We are fighting for the children who are in a war zone. pic.twitter.com/2GHTqA5nWM
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 6, 2026
The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said last week that at least 216 children have been killed by US-Israeli bombing in Iran, with many of the deaths caused by a US strike on an Iranian elementary school on the first day of the war.
“Children in the region are being exposed to horrific violence, while the very systems and services meant to keep them safe are coming under attack,” said UNICEF executive director Catherine Russell. “Urgent action is needed by all parties to conflict to protect the lives of civilians and uphold the rights of children."
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