How This 92-Year-Old Trans Woman Took on the Government — and Won

How This 92-Year-Old Trans Woman Took on the Government — and Won Image Credit: YouTube

A 92-year-old veteran just bagged a major victory for transgender spouses in the U.S. While it represents only one victory in an ongoing struggle, the feisty nonagenarian proves it’s never too late to stand up for your rights.

When her longtime husband of 10 years died in 2012, Robina Asti applied to the Social Security Administration (SSA) for survivor benefits, the insurance payments granted to widows and other close relatives of a deceased person. After a year of review, the SSA denied her application citing the case’s “unusual” nature. At the time of Asti’s marriage, the rejection claimed, she was not a woman and therefore did not qualify for widow’s benefits.

The SSA delivered this verdict despite the fact that Asti’s pilot’s license, social security, driver’s license and U.S. passport declare her a woman. 

Lambda Legal, the LGBT advocacy group, backed Asti’s campaign and last week — on Valentine’s Day, no less. Asti then found an unannounced payment sitting in her bank account. 

In a moving video created by Lambda for the campaign, Asti recounts her experiences as a pilot, as a trans woman and as a wife. Before her transition in 1976, she flew airplanes for the Navy during World War II, and in the decades after the war she worked her way up to be vice president of “a pretty big” mutual fund.

“The prejudice against me changing was extraordinary,” Asti says in the video. “Once I made the change, I became a woman in body, and soul and mind.” She soon followed suit, legally becoming a woman. 

She describes meeting her husband, Norwood Patton, in a bar shortly after her transition. He didn’t respond well at first when she told him about her change, but within a week came back to her with a change of heart. “He told me, ‘Look, I don’t care. You’re a woman, I’ve only known you as a woman, you are a beautiful woman and I love you, I’m very devoted to you and I want always to be with you,’” Asti says as her voice cracks. “And that was the summation of it. … It was without a doubt the finest time of my life. He was 97 when he died, so we were a couple of old fogies.”

And yet the SSA didn’t recognize Asti’s gender nor her marriage to Patton. When she heard about the denial, she said, “I was shocked. I was shamed. That is so insulting. It was just devastating.”

Asti’s success is no mean feat; getting an official administration to recognize the plight of even one individual should be celebrated. But as she says in the video, there are countless of other people in the trans community who have lost the support of their friends and family, and for whom suicide seems the only option “because they didn’t have anyone to look at them and say, ‘I understand.’”

For Asti, this case was never about the money. Rather, she was fighting for “the act of humanity necessary here” and the wider issue that needs to be addressed.

Indeed, by forcing the SSA to re-evaluate her case, Asti has given hope to other transgender spouses in similar states of limbo. But it’s important to remember that despite Asti’s success, the SSA has not yet changed its policy, or even delivered anything in writing that could pave the way for future policy changes. That still leaves many people not guaranteed the same legal protection as their peers. 

“Lambda Legal has recieved calls from other transgender spouses trapped in SSA limbo, as Robina was,” Dru Levasseur, Transgender Rights Project director at Lambda Legal, said in a press release. “We await changes to the SSA policy that would clarify its position on transgender spouses to ensure this does not happen to others, which we are hopeful will soon be released.”

Lauren Davidson

Lauren Davidson is a British freelance journalist living it up in New York. She’s written for The Wall Street Journal, The Times (of London) and The Atlantic, among others, and has a master’s degree from the Columbia School of Journalism.

PolicyMic

How This 92-Year-Old Trans Woman Took on the Government — and Won

Personal Financial Disclosure Analysis: What Took Us So Long?

We’re happy to bring you the updated Personal Financial Disclosure section of our website!

It may seem surprising that 2012 data on the personal finances of lawmakers, the Supreme Court and the executive branch is considered new in January 2014. But processing these disclosures and getting the information they contain into a searchable database is not for the faint of heart. Let us explain.

Every year on May 15, members of Congress, Supreme Court justices and high-ranking members of the executive branch are required to file a form detailing their personal finances for the previous year. Filers who are not ready can request an extension, which gives them up to an extra three months to file.  That means the public — including the Center for Responsive Politics — can’t even begin to look at the filings until between five and eight months after the end of the calendar year covered.

Reports can be submitted electronically, though that’s not required. An electronic filing requirement was originally included as part of the STOCK Act, but the provision was removed in the subsequent S. 716, which passed in May 2013. Though electronically submitted forms are much easier to read than the handwritten ones, even then the forms are only available as PDFs and are not searchable. And we don’t currently have the capability to pull information from handwritten filings through OCR (optical character recognition). We hope to soon!

In order to provide searchable data to visitors of our website, including CRP-added industry codes, we must hand-enter each item from each page of the forms. Every asset, transaction, income amount, trip, gift and position held is keyed in by a real person.  Needless to say, this takes a long time.  

Some filers submit blurry, handwritten reports. Others hand in hundreds of pages of brokerage statements. And some submit amended reports with little or no information connecting the amendment  to the original report.

Beyond that, financial data can be confusing. Sometimes the value of an entire portfolio is listed along with the values of each underlying asset, which can lead to overreporting if the duplications aren’t caught. Another common challenge we encounter is accurately coding an asset as a bank account or a stock invested in a banking institution.

All of these issues require special care and make creating the PFD dataset a time-consuming process.

We’ve done our very best to provide accurate, searchable and downloadable information. Please let us know what interesting things you are able to do with the database and alert us to any mistakes you think we might have made along the way.

Thanks, and happy hunting!

OpenSecrets Blog

Personal Financial Disclosure Analysis: What Took Us So Long?

Strongman of Egypt: How General Al-Sisi Took the Revolution"s Thunder

Bahira Galal is a sweets maker in Giza. Her shop is in the rising middle-class neighborhood of Mohandiseen, where she makes and sells a novelty item: chocolate treats with General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s picture on top. Galal is “showing support for the army” according to a local report at al-Watan news.

“I like al-Sisi very much and think of him as a national symbol because he saved the country from the deposed president’s danger,” Galal said.

Her sentiment towards the Egyptian general is not unique. In fact, al-Sisi’s image can be seen almost everywhere, from posters on cars and shops to little personal items, and even heard on TV songs.

Since President Mohamed Morsi was deposed by the army in early July after mass protests against his regime, General al-Sisi’s star has been rising — not only in Egypt, but in the strong reactions his military rule has evoked across the region.

Al-Sisi, as Galal and her peers see him, is a hero who saved Egypt from the Muslim Brotherhood and is now battling a war on terror, with the approval of Egypt’s majority. The violent armed attacks from Brotherhood affiliates on police stations and governmental institutions has only seemed to cement al-Sisi’s appeal, rallying millions behind him.

Morsi could not know on August 12, 2012, that he was appointing the man who would force him out of power only 10 months later. The 58-year-old general, who studied for one year, in 2006, at the United States Army War College, is the youngest member to be made a part of Egypt’s Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF). Under fallen dictator Hosni Mubarak, he was the head of military intelligence and commander of the Northern Military Region in Alexandria in 2008.

In seeking to replace the old guard generals, Morsi may have seen al-Sisi as the right candidate due to his reputation as a devout Muslim. The appointment received warm welcome from the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies, who praised Morsi for choosing “a military leader who prays.” Shortly after his appointment, a picture of al-Sisi leading a prayer group of soldiers was shared and cheered on social media.

In early July, the military’s overthrow of Morsi became an easy task after tens of millions of Egyptians took to the streets demanding he step down and calling on the military to protect them. Al-Sisi gave all parties 48 hours to work out differences, threatening that the army would otherwise intervene with a “road map” for the future. Morsi rejected the military proposal and said he would “protect his legitimacy with his life.” Clashes erupted between pro- and anti-Morsi supporters during the countdown.

“We [the military] rather die than see Egyptians afraid,” al-Sisi then said in a televised speech as he deposed Morsi, suspended the constitution and appointed Adli Mansour, the head of the Constitutional Court, as interim president.

Al-Sisi’s decision was met with widespread celebration as Egyptians held posters with his image high in the air, and he emerged to many as a national hero. But to the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Sisi quickly became “a traitor” who had deposed their democratically elected president, foreshadowing more violence to come. Al-Sisi later told The Washington Post that “simple Egyptian people were crying in their homes” after he took over.

In the subsequent weeks, the violent response from supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood saw scores killed and a number of churches and police stations attacked. In one case, the Kirdasa town police station was raided by militants as gruesome videos of the attack burst out on social media websites.

In one video, militants killed the Kirdasa police chief and dragged and beat his dead body in front of the camera. The Egyptian Ministry of Interior has said over a 100 of its police force has been killed in recent weeks.

Middle-class, religiously-moderate Egyptians who were largely the driving force behind the revolution welcomed the state of emergency and the curfew for the sake of bringing an end to violence. Today, al-Sisi’s image in the press depends on which bent it is coming from: the national, leftist and liberal media tend to portray him as the defiant patriotic leader who is fighting an enemy that seeks to drag Egypt back into the Dark Ages, while the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates paint him as a traitor realizing an “American-Zionist” plan to divide Egypt, and have called for al-Sisi’s removal and trial.

But in popular terms, not since Gamal Abdel Nasser, the regional and international symbol of anti-colonialism in the 1950s and 60s, have Egyptians been so attached to a leader as they are now with al-Sisi.

Even after more than 500 people died in the attack and evacuation of two large sit-ins of Morsi backers, many Egyptians support the military’s choice of using force — even if unequal and lethal — to disperse the protests and stabilize the streets. Liberal media aired footage of armed protesters shooting at the police, dispelling the belief that the sit-ins and protesters were all peaceful. They also aired national love songs in support of the military, with some channels showing a side bar that read, “Egypt fights terrorism.”

Al-Sisi spoke openly about why the actions taken against Morsi and leaders in the Muslim Brotherhood were necessary. He accused Morsi of having close ties with Hamas and allowing Jihadists to enter the country and train in Sinai during his year in power. One leader in that group told the press that the prison breakout which freed Morsi during the 18 days of rage in 2011 was in fact orchestrated by Jihadist groups, and he named Hamas.

Now, while Morsi remains held at an undisclosed location, accused of treason and inciting violence, al-Sisi has become a public candidate for the office. Last week, the movement that sparked the June 30 protests, Tamarod, or Rebel, said it would support General al-Sisi for president if the current security situation lingers. Leftist leader and former presidential nominee Hamdeen Sabah expressed his approval for al-Sisi’s nomination.

Al-Sisi’s supporters see this as a needed step for the country to regain stability, and for the road map toward democratic rule to be implemented. But al-Sisi was not so forthright about his willingness to accept the position. He told the Washington Post that he “does not aspire for high office” and that Egyptians’ love “is all what he wants.”

The increasing calls of support for al-Sisi have made some Egyptian liberals uneasy; though they may support the military in its effort to curb militant Islam attacks, they have not come to agreement on a military president in post-revolution Egypt. And for the Islamists, the goal has clearly shifted from reinstalling Morsi to deposing al-Sisi.

Meanwhile, on Sunday, the Constitutional drafting advisers were named as the newly appointed government appears more on track toward reviving the country’s economy. The following weeks will paint a clearer picture of the road map for Egypt — as well as the true aims of General al-Sisi as he attempts to steer the country away from further violence.

Truthout Stories

Strongman of Egypt: How General Al-Sisi Took the Revolution"s Thunder

Snowden Took An Oath, But So Did Obama

Donna Anderson
Infowars.com
June 13, 2013

While it’s true that, at some point during his colorful past, Edward Snowden took an oath of secrecy, the powers that be seem to be forgetting that Obama took an oath, too. Let’s just compare the two and see who’s really in violation, shall we?