Pride Edinburgh suspend political party participation citing 'Supreme Court ruling'
Our community members are treated to special offers, promotions and adverts from us and our partners. You can check out at any time. More info
Pride Edinburgh have announced they will be suspending political participation for this year's march following the recent Supreme Court ruling on the legal definition of a woman.
Organisers of the event shared their 'alarm and concern' on the 'rollback of protections and support for the transgender community' within the UK and the resulting lack of meaningful action by politicians.
Sharing their decision on Facebook, Pride Edinburgh wrote: "As we make the final preparations for Pride Edinburgh 2025: We are visible, marking our 28th event in our 30th year, we do so with a deep sense of urgency and concern.
"The organising team is alarmed by the ongoing rollback of protections and support for the transgender community, driven by those in power across both the Scottish and UK governments and political parties.
"At its core, pride exists to amplify community voices, empower individuals, and hold institutions accountable. any move to silence or exclude undermines these very principles. We share the community's anger, grief, and frustration.
"Following the recent supreme court ruling and the continued lack of meaningful political action. We stand in unwavering solidarity with our trans siblings. they deserve better.
"It is clear those in power and the combined voices of political parties across the UK, by their silence and inaction, are not hearing the voices of our community, and it would be wrong for Pride Edinburgh 2025 to give political parties a platform at our event.
"Therefore, the first time in our history, Pride Edinburgh is suspending the participation of all political parties from our 2025 event."
In light of this, political parties will not be invited to give the traditional pre-march speeches, political parties will not be able to have stalls at the community fair, and they will not be permitted to partake in the march.
They continued: "Instead, in the spirit of reclaiming pride's purpose, we are proud to support our partners at the equality network, who will host a community-led speeches stage on the morning of the march. This stage, located away from the Scottish Parliament, will feature specially invited speakers from within the community and beyond. full details will be announced by the equality network in due course.
"We are also honoured to confirm that the sisters of perpetual indulgence will once again lead the community in their traditional minutes noise and minutes silence ahead of the march.
"Pride remains open to all individuals who support the values of equality, visibility, and justice. individual MP's, MSP's, and members of political parties are welcome to join us in a personal capacity, in solidarity with the LGBTQIA+ community."
They went on to reiterate that this is not a ban against political parties and individuals, but a suspension, adding: "Pride Edinburgh has never issued a ban and we will not begin now.
"There will be no bans issued for pride 2025."
Edinburgh Live has contacted political parties for comment.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Herald Scotland
40 minutes ago
- The Herald Scotland
Politicians making final push for votes ahead of Holyrood by-election
🗳️ Less than 2 days before polls open in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse! Fab to speak to so many folk who are excited to vote for @KatyLoudonSNP this Thursday 💛 #ActiveSNP #TeamSNP #VoteSNP — Sarah Masson (@_sarahmasson) June 3, 2025 It comes in the wake of a campaign which has been, for the most part, dominated by the rise in support for Reform UK – and a row over one of the party's online adverts. The ad alleged that Mr Sarwar would 'prioritise' the Pakistani community – but it was quickly branded racist by Labour, who together with rivals in the SNP demanded it should be taken down. Great to have @Nigel_Farage in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse today. Vote Reform. Get Reform. ✅ — Reform UK Scotland (@ReformUKScot) June 2, 2025 SNP leader and Scottish First Minister John Swinney meanwhile urged voters in the constituency to back his party in a bid to 'stop Nigel Farage'. His plea comes after an opinion poll in Scotland last month indicated Reform could come second in next year's Holyrood elections, ahead of both Labour and the Tories. On the doorstep, it is clear the SNP is completely failing communities in Scotland. Only Scottish Labour can beat the SNP in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse. 🗳️Vote @DavyRussell4HLS on Thursday! — Elaine Stewart MP (@ElaineStewartMP) June 3, 2025 Speaking ahead of the by-election, which is taking place after the death of Scottish Government minister Christina McKelvie, Mr Swinney said that the campaign 'has made it crystal clear that the SNP is the only party listening to people and taking action on what matters to them'. The First Minister claimed: 'The Labour Party has lost its way and Keir Starmer's abject failure to deliver on his promises has led to the concerning rise of Nigel Farage across the UK – something that will worry many across Scotland. Just two days to go until the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election on Thursday 5th June 🗳️ It was great to be out yesterday in Larkhall to support @ScotTories candidate Richard Nelson. — Alex Burnett MSP (@AJABurnett) June 3, 2025 'Farage does not care about Scotland, and he also poses a threat to many of the things that we hold dear – our NHS, our parliament, and transformative policies like free tuition.' Mr Swinney insisted: 'This by-election is an opportunity to reject the politics of Farage and make sure Scotland's interests are front and centre, and only a vote for the SNP will do that.' However, Scottish Labour deputy leader Jackie Baillie insisted: 'The Reform circus is nothing but a convenient distraction for the SNP – this by-election is a direct fight between Scottish Labour and the SNP.' A lot of people are frustrated that they have been let down by the SNP, Conservatives and Labour but it's the Liberal Democrats who are offering real change, not Reform. Last year's general election shows that we are winning again. If you want change, come with us. — Scottish Lib Dems (@scotlibdems) June 2, 2025 She said that Thursday's poll gives voters 'the chance to put this incompetent SNP government on notice and chart a new direction for the whole of Scotland'. Ms Baillie stated: 'The SNP's woeful record is plain to see here – chaos in local NHS services, high streets in decline, and a generation of young people let down. 'The SNP government has failed this community and Katy Loudon has made it clear she will toe the party line no matter what – but Davy Russell will be a tireless champion for the community he calls home.'
Western Telegraph
an hour ago
- Western Telegraph
Politicians making final push for votes ahead of Holyrood by-election
With voters in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse going to the polls on Thursday June 5, parties are making their final push for votes – with both First Minister John Swinney and the Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar expected in the constituency on Wednesday. 🗳️ Less than 2 days before polls open in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse! Fab to speak to so many folk who are excited to vote for @KatyLoudonSNP this Thursday 💛 #ActiveSNP #TeamSNP #VoteSNP — Sarah Masson (@_sarahmasson) June 3, 2025 It comes in the wake of a campaign which has been, for the most part, dominated by the rise in support for Reform UK – and a row over one of the party's online adverts. The ad alleged that Mr Sarwar would 'prioritise' the Pakistani community – but it was quickly branded racist by Labour, who together with rivals in the SNP demanded it should be taken down. Great to have @Nigel_Farage in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse today. Vote Reform. Get Reform. ✅ — Reform UK Scotland (@ReformUKScot) June 2, 2025 SNP leader and Scottish First Minister John Swinney meanwhile urged voters in the constituency to back his party in a bid to 'stop Nigel Farage'. His plea comes after an opinion poll in Scotland last month indicated Reform could come second in next year's Holyrood elections, ahead of both Labour and the Tories. On the doorstep, it is clear the SNP is completely failing communities in Scotland. Only Scottish Labour can beat the SNP in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse. 🗳️Vote @DavyRussell4HLS on Thursday! — Elaine Stewart MP (@ElaineStewartMP) June 3, 2025 Speaking ahead of the by-election, which is taking place after the death of Scottish Government minister Christina McKelvie, Mr Swinney said that the campaign 'has made it crystal clear that the SNP is the only party listening to people and taking action on what matters to them'. The First Minister claimed: 'The Labour Party has lost its way and Keir Starmer's abject failure to deliver on his promises has led to the concerning rise of Nigel Farage across the UK – something that will worry many across Scotland. Just two days to go until the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election on Thursday 5th June 🗳️ It was great to be out yesterday in Larkhall to support @ScotTories candidate Richard Nelson. — Alex Burnett MSP (@AJABurnett) June 3, 2025 'Farage does not care about Scotland, and he also poses a threat to many of the things that we hold dear – our NHS, our parliament, and transformative policies like free tuition.' Mr Swinney insisted: 'This by-election is an opportunity to reject the politics of Farage and make sure Scotland's interests are front and centre, and only a vote for the SNP will do that.' However, Scottish Labour deputy leader Jackie Baillie insisted: 'The Reform circus is nothing but a convenient distraction for the SNP – this by-election is a direct fight between Scottish Labour and the SNP.' A lot of people are frustrated that they have been let down by the SNP, Conservatives and Labour but it's the Liberal Democrats who are offering real change, not Reform. Last year's general election shows that we are winning again. If you want change, come with us. — Scottish Lib Dems (@scotlibdems) June 2, 2025 She said that Thursday's poll gives voters 'the chance to put this incompetent SNP government on notice and chart a new direction for the whole of Scotland'. Ms Baillie stated: 'The SNP's woeful record is plain to see here – chaos in local NHS services, high streets in decline, and a generation of young people let down. 'The SNP government has failed this community and Katy Loudon has made it clear she will toe the party line no matter what – but Davy Russell will be a tireless champion for the community he calls home.'
New European
an hour ago
- New European
Trump's war against the law
The earliest source is the newspaper editor and publisher Horace Greeley's book The American Conflict (1865), which reports Old Hickory's alleged declaration on the basis of a former congressman's recollection. According to Jackson's best biographer, Jon Meacham, the claim was 'historically questionable but philosophically true'. As far as historians can tell, President Andrew Jackson never uttered the threat to the chief justice that is still so frequently attributed to him. In 1832, after the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the Cherokee nation in Worcester v Georgia, Jackson supposedly said: 'John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it.' What Jackson did say to his longtime associate, John Coffee, was: 'The decision of the Supreme Court has felt still-born, and they find that it cannot coerce Georgia to yield to its mandate'. All of which matters because the spirit of Jackson is now routinely invoked by the MAGA movement as Donald Trump wages a fast-escalating war with the courts. As far back as 2021, JD Vance said that his advice to his future boss would be to fire all civil servants: 'And when the courts – because you will get taken to court – and when the courts stop you, stand before the country like Andrew Jackson did and say: 'The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.'' More recently, on February 9, the vice president posted on X: 'Judges aren't allowed to control the executive's legitimate power'. In a podcast released on May 21, he warmed to his theme in conversation with Ross Douthat of the New York Times. 'I know this is inflammatory, but I think you are seeing an effort by the courts to quite literally overturn the will of the American people'. Chief justice John Roberts, Vance continued, was failing in his supervision of the judiciary: 'You cannot have a country where the American people keep on electing immigration enforcement and the courts tell the American people they're not allowed to have what they voted for. That's where we are right now.' The Democratic Party is in a state of aphasic shock, paralysed by the electoral disaster of November 5. Both houses of Congress are controlled by the Republicans, who, with a tiny number of exceptions, are craven in their obedience to Trump. That leaves journalists, a great many of whom continue, valiantly, to speak truth to power; but do so in the face of increasing intimidation and, in some cases, knowing that their proprietors have business exposure outside the media sector that makes them fearful of Trump. So – in practice – the line that stands between the republic and authoritarianism is judicial. At the time of writing, there have been 251 legal challenges to this administration, whose actions have been halted in at least 181 cases. Time and again, Trump and his senior officials have found themselves obstructed by judges from all over the country whose orders have nationwide force. As the solicitor general, D John Sauer, has complained, this means that the government has 'to win everywhere, while the plaintiffs can win anywhere'. Last Wednesday, the US Court of International Trade ruled against the president's tariff regime, finding that 'the Constitution assigns Congress the exclusive powers to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises' and that 'any interpretation of IEEPA [the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act] that delegates unlimited tariff authority [to the president] is unconstitutional.' Helpfully reposting photos of the three trade court judges, Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, claimed on May 29 that 'We are living under a judicial tyranny'. A federal appeals court last week granted a suspension of the order, meaning that, for now, Trump can pursue his deranged tariff strategy, pending further legal action. On Truth Social, he posted that he hoped 'the Supreme Court will reverse this horrible, Country threatening decision, QUICKLY and DECISIVELY.' But will it? On Friday, the highest court in the land gave the administration interim approval to revoke a Biden-era humanitarian programme to grant temporary residency to more than 500,000 migrants facing political turmoil or warfare. This 'humanitarian parole' system is intended to help people from countries like Nicaragua, Venezuela, Cuba and Haiti. On May 19, the supreme court also gave emergency approval to the government to lift the separate 'Temporary Protected Status' from nearly 350,000 Venezuelan migrants. The case is still subject to appeal. But immigration officials may now proceed with mass deportation – perhaps to the Salvadoran gulag. Yet the president and his allies remain furious with the general response of the judiciary to MAGA's egregious 'remigration' plan. On April 7, the supreme court ruled that the government must give 'constitutionally adequate notice' to individuals before their removal under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act; 12 days later, it intervened again, this time in the middle of the night, to block deportations of Venezuelans from Texas under the same antiquated legislation. The court has also ruled that the administration must 'facilitate' the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the 29-year-old migrant who had been living in Maryland for 13 years, sent back to El Salvador after what the government has admitted was an 'administrative error'. In this case, as in many others, Trump and his team have opted for what the US legal scholars Leah Litman and Daniel Deacon refer to aptly as 'legalistic noncompliance': quibbling over what 'facilitate' means precisely, resorting to pedantry and slow-walking action mandated by the courts. With characteristic indifference to the responsibilities of his office – not to mention the oath that he took – the president himself has become an expert in non-expertise, claiming to have insufficient legal knowledge to offer an opinion on even the most basic juristic questions. Asked on NBC's Meet the Press on May 4 whether citizens and non-citizens alike deserved due process, Trump said, 'I don't know. I'm not, I'm not a lawyer.' Pressed by Kristen Welker on the substance of the Fifth Amendment which refers to the rights of the 'person', the president replied: 'It might say that – but if you're talking about that, then we'd have to have a million or two million or three million trials.' In an interview with the Atlantic to mark the first 100 days of his second presidency, Trump insisted that he would abide by any supreme court ruling – but went on to complain that 'we have some judges that are very, very tough. I believe you could have a 100% case – in other words, a case that's not losable – and you will lose violently. Some of these judges are really unfair.' His language was less restrained in a special Memorial Day post on Truth Social in which he attacked 'JUDGES WHO ARE ON A MISSION TO KEEP MURDERERS, DRUG DEALERS, RAPISTS, GANG MEMBERS, AND RELEASED PRISONERS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, IN OUR COUNTRY SO THEY CAN ROB, MURDER AND RAPE AGAIN – ALL PROTECTED BY THESE USA HATING JUDGES WHO SUFFER FROM AN IDEOLOGY THAT IS SICK, AND VERY DANGEROUS FOR OUR COUNTRY'. Which shows that this is a temperamental as well as a constitutional clash. Trump demands instant gratification; the courts exist to deliberate. This incompatibility is now becoming perilous for the republic. Miller, meanwhile, has said that the administration is 'actively looking' at suspending habeas corpus for migrants – the individual's fundamental legal right to challenge his or her detention. In this context, it is worth noting that Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, revealed in a senate committee hearing on May 20 that she completely misunderstood this most basic legal doctrine, defining it as 'a constitutional right that the president has to be able to remove people from this country.' Even more revealing was what Miller went on to say: 'Look, a lot of it depends on whether the courts do the right thing or not.' In other words, the government will abide by judges' decisions – as long as they do what the administration wants. Suggested Reading Why do they hate us so much? Jay Elwes In Federalist No 78 (1788), Alexander Hamilton, writing as 'Publius', expressed fears that have rarely seemed more pertinent. The judiciary, he said, was by far the weakest of the three supposedly co-equal branches of government (the other two being the executive and the legislature); having 'no influence over either the sword or the purse; no direction either of the strength or of the wealth of the society; and can take no active resolution whatever. It may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment'. What were once abstract issues for constitutionalists to debate in the lecture hall are now all too practical and menacing. To start with, Mike Johnson, the House speaker, threatened in March to use the congressional 'power of funding' to 'eliminate an entire district court'. Founded in 2019, the Article III Project (A3P) mobilises thousands of phone calls, emails and social media messages to members of Congress to back Trump against the judiciary and is supporting bills introduced by senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, and representative Darrell Issa of California to stop federal district judges from issuing nationwide court orders. More alarming is the surge in outright intimidation of the judiciary. Since Trump's return, unexplained pizza deliveries have been made to federal judges and their families – a way of telling them that their enemies know where they live. Deplorably, many have been made under the name of Daniel Anderl, the son of a federal judge who was murdered in 2020 while protecting his parents from a furious litigant. Judges considered hostile to Trump have also been 'swatted', where a hoax call is made to summon a SWAT team to a particular address – in the hope that heavily armed police officers, following procedure, will inadvertently traumatise whoever is at the location in question. On April 25, Hannah Dugan, a Wisconsin circuit court judge, was arrested and has now been indicted for allegedly assisting an undocumented immigrant in evading arrest. On Friday, 138 former judges filed a legal argument warning that Dugan's indictment 'threatens to undermine centuries of precedent on judicial immunity, crucial for an effective judiciary.' Pam Bondi, the attorney general, takes a different view. 'The [judges] are deranged is all I can think of,' she said on the day of Dugan's arrest. I think some of these judges think that they are beyond and above the law. They are not, and we are sending a very strong message today. If you are harbouring a fugitive, we will come after you and we will prosecute you. We will find you.' Most shocking of all are the formal discussions among senior judges, revealed by the Wall Street Journal, about forming their own armed security force. At present, the Supreme Court is protected by a special police service which it also oversees; other courts, in contrast, deploy US marshals. Notionally, these officers have a statutory duty to follow the judiciary's instructions. In practice, they work for the Department of Justice, and therefore for Bondi. What, in practice, would happen if the Trump administration flagrantly defied the Supreme Court? Thanks to the court's own landmark ruling last July, the president himself enjoys immunity; he could also pardon officials accused of criminal contempt. Another option is civil contempt, which seeks to enforce future compliance (the person in contempt of this kind is said to 'hold the keys to his own cell'). The advantage here is that the courts can deputise other agencies to enforce their rulings. But which agencies, precisely? Which, in this climate of fear, would be willing to risk retribution from MAGA? Chief Justice Roberts is an 'institutionalist' which means that his highest allegiance is to the preservation of the system that protects the constitution. In the words of his biographer Joan Biskupic, 'he elevated the institutional integrity of the Court above all'. And, to be fair to Roberts, he wrote in his most recent end-of-year report: 'Within the past few years… elected officials from across the political spectrum have raised the spectre of open disregard for federal court rulings'. When Trump posted in March that a judge frustrating his deportation plan 'should be IMPEACHED!', the chief justice issued a direct rebuke, declaring that this was 'not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision.' Yet it is precisely this value-system that may deter Roberts from a direct confrontation with the president. For the institutionalist, the prospect of the Supreme Court appearing impotent before an autocratic president is intolerable. Paradoxically, because such a defeat would shatter his worldview, he will postpone the moment of reckoning as long as he possibly can. But he cannot do so indefinitely. High Noon is approaching, and only one of the gunfighters – president or Supreme Court – can prevail. The outcome of that contest depends on a question of global consequence: whether the US remains, as it has long been, a nation of laws; or becomes something altogether more dangerous.
