WASHINGTON (AP) - Prosecutors have dropped all charges against an openly gay Iraq War veteran who twice chained himself to a White House fence to protest the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

Lt. Dan Choi and James Pietrangelo, a gay army captain honorably discharged for disclosing his sexual orientation, were in court Wednesday on charges of failure to obey police orders during the March and April protests. All charges were dropped against them. Choi and his attorney had subpoenaed President Barack Obama to appear, but an attorney for the prosecution said the subpoena wasn’t served.

Prosecutor Christine Chang declined to comment on why the government dropped the case. Choi said he believes Obama administration officials didn’t want to draw attention to the policy.

WASHINGTON (AP) - D.C.’s highest court has ruled against opponents of the city’s same-sex marriage law, saying they cannot ask voters to overturn it. Opponents had wanted to challenge a law that took effect in Washington in March allowing same-sex couples to marry. They attempted to get approval to put an initiative on the ballot asking city voters to define marriage in the city as between one man and one woman. But city officials balked, saying a district human rights law barred initiatives that would authorize discrimination. On Thursday, the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled 5-4 that officials had the authority to keep the measure off the ballot and acted appropriately.

HELENA, Mont. (AP) - A proposed sex education program that teaches fifth-graders the different ways people have intercourse and first-graders about gay love has infuriated parents and forced the school board to take a closer look at the issue.

Helena school trustees were swamped Tuesday night at a hearing that left many of the hundreds of parents in attendance standing outside a packed board room. They urged the school board in this city nestled in the Rocky Mountains to take the sex education program back to the drawing board.

The proposed 62-page document covers a broad health and nutrition education program and took two years to draft. But it is the small portion dealing with sexual education that has drawn the ire of many in the community who feel it is being pushed forward despite its obvious controversial nature.

Parents appeared most worried about pieces of the plan that teaches first-graders about same-gender relationships, fifth-graders that sexual intercourse includes “vaginal, oral, or anal penetration,” and high school students about erotic art. The curriculum would also teach kindergartners anatomical terms such as penis, vagina, breast, nipples, testicles, scrotum and uterus.

“They made this more controversial by adding in all this stuff like same-gender relationships to small children, teaching body parts to kindergartners, and teaching erotic art to ninth through 12th-graders,” Mikal Wilkerson, who has five children in the school system and a husband who sits on the school board, said Wednesday in an interview. “They even teach about anxiety about sexual performance in high school.”

Supporters say the proposed health education curriculum contains honest, science-based information on wellness and allows students to make better decisions. At Tuesday’s meeting they urged the board to accept the policy.

“This is about reality and truth so our kids don’t grow up in La-La Land, and have sufficient knowledge to make informed decisions,” Mary Ann Dunwell said in the Helena Independent Record.

The board takes the issue up again next month, and the outrage suggests that members could alter the plan to deal with all the complaints. One resident said parents may have to consider impeachment of board members or a lawsuit if it goes forward.

Marianne Rencher, a lawyer who will have a second-grader and a kindergartner in the school system next year, wants certain aspects of the sex education program taken out, particularly the fifth-grade curriculum about intercourse. She said the rest of the health program could go forward while the sex education is recrafted.

Trustee Terry Beaver said he thinks much in the policy is favorable, but believes the public backlash means they should carve out the sexuality elements and deal with them separately.

“It appears to be a strong divisive issue. I think when the community is that strongly divided we need to take a further look at it,” Beaver said.

Beaver said his issue with the plan revolves on whether certain components are being taught too young.

“I don’t know that anything needs to be taken out,” he said. “Some of it might be age inappropriate. We are going to have to consider how we teach it and when we teach it.”

RIVERSIDE (AP) - If the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy were lifted today, Mike Almy would not think twice about returning to the Air Force.

The former major who was fired in 2006 for being gay will testify Thursday in federal court in Riverside during a non-jury trial that is presenting the biggest constitutional test in recent years to the military’s policy banning openly gay service members.

Almy is one of two former service members scheduled to testify this week on behalf of the lawsuit filed by the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay rights organization challenging the policy’s constitutionality. Lawyers for the group are seeking a federal injunction to immediately halt the policy banning openly gay service members.

The case has put the Obama administration in the awkward position of defending a policy the president is pushing Congress to repeal.

More than 13,500 service members have been fired under the law since 1994.

Almy was dismissed after a routine computer search turned up personal e-mails he wrote while deployed in Iraq. After the e-mails were given to his commander, he was handed discharge papers marked “homosexual admission” as the reason

“Despite this treatment, my greatest desire is still to return to active duty as an officer and leader in the United States Air Force, protecting the freedoms of a nation that I love; freedoms that I myself was not allowed to enjoy while serving in the military,” Almy wrote in an April 26, 2010 letter to President Obama asking him to overturn the law.

Jenny L. Kopfstein, a decorated Navy officer from San Diego who was discharged in 2002 after telling her commanding officer she was gay, will testify Friday.

Log Cabin Republican members have spoken on behalf of an active gay serviceman whom lawyers said decided not to risk being discharged for appearing in court, lawyers say. His name will not be released.

Government attorneys say the issue should be decided by Congress and not in a federal courtroom in Southern California.

In deciding to hear the challenge, U.S. District Judge Virginia A. Phillips said the “possibility that action by the legislative and executive branches will moot this case is sufficiently remote.”

The plaintiff’s attorney, Dan Woods argued the policy violates the rights of gay military members to free speech, due process and open association.

“Don’t ask, don’t tell” prohibits the military from asking about the sexual orientation of service members but requires discharge of those who acknowledge being gay or are discovered to be engaging in homosexual activity, even in the privacy of their own homes off base.

The case is unique in that it is not based on an individual’s complaint but rather is a broad, sweeping attack on the policy.

JACKSON (AP) - A rural school district that canceled its prom rather than allow a lesbian student to attend with her girlfriend has agreed to pay $35,000 to settle a discrimination lawsuit the ACLU filed on her behalf.

The district also agreed to follow a non-discrimination policy as part of the settlement, though it argues such a policy was already in place.

Constance McMillen, 18, said the victory came at the price of her being shunned in her small hometown of Fulton.

“I knew it was a good cause, but sometimes it really got to me. I knew it would change things for others in the future and I kept going and I kept pushing,” McMillen said in an interview Tuesday.

The flap started in March when McMillen challenged the Itawamba County School District’s rules banning prom dates of the same gender and allowing only male students to wear tuxedos. The district responded by canceling its prom, prompting the ACLU to file suit claiming the teen’s rights had been violated and demanding the prom be reinstated.

U.S. District Judge Glen H. Davidson refused to make school officials hold the prom, but he said in a March 23 ruling that the district had violated McMillen’s rights.

The district later announced parents would sponsor another prom chaperoned by school officials. But ACLU lawyers claimed the event was a “sham prom” attended by only about 10 students, while most of McMillen’s classmates partied at a private event elsewhere, a claim the school denied. McMillen’s suit also says she’s been harassed for her stand against the school’s policy.

McMillen’s lawyers filed notice Monday in U.S. District Court to accept a judgment offer from the Itawamba County School District that will pay $35,000, plus attorney’s fees. As part of the agreement, the school district also said it would follow a policy not to discriminate based on sexual orientation in any educational or extracurricular activities or allow harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

School officials contend that their agreement to follow the non-discrimination policy merely reaffirms inclusiveness rules the district already had, said school board attorney Michele Floyd. She said the district’s insurance company will pay McMillen.

District officials said in the settlement offer that they didn’t believe they violated McMillen’s rights.

The ACLU, however, contends that if the district really had such an inclusiveness policy all along, it wouldn’t have banned same-sex prom dates. It also said the district is the first in Mississippi to implement a policy banning discrimination and harassment on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Ben Griffith, the attorney who represented the district in the suit, said school officials are focused on preparing for the upcoming fall semester and wanted to avoid protracted litigation.

“The defendants have consistently taken the position throughout this case that their actions and conduct at all times have been constitutional and lawful in every respect,” Griffith said.

Christine P. Sun, an ACLU lawyer, said the case has “inspired countless other people around the world to stand up for what’s right.”

McMillen has moved to Memphis, Tenn., where she plans to attend Southwest Community College in the spring, majoring in psychology. She said she’ll use the settlement money for her college education.

She eventually withdrew from Itawamba Agricultural High School and finished her senior year at a school in Jackson, Miss.

Eliza Byard, executive director of GLSEN: The Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, said only 12 states and the District of Columbia require school district to have policies recognizing sexual orientation and gender identity.

McMillen’s case gained national attention and she was featured on talk shows and served as a grand marshal for New York’s Gay Pride Parade, among other events. She also visited the White House.

Sun said the ACLU had represented other students in similar cases around the country, but none had garnered as much attention as McMillen’s legal battle.

McMillen said she thinks the case resonated with so many people because “prom is a common theme and everyone knows how it feels to want to go to prom. With my story, even if people didn’t agree with being gay, they understood. They figured out how cruel some people can be.”