A man casts his ballot at a polling station during the new Family Code referendum in Havana, on September 25, 2022.
Photo by YAMIL LAGE/AFP via Getty Images
Cuba has voted to legalize same-sex marriage, election officials said on Monday.
The country voted in a referendum to amend its Family Code, which is part of the constitution.
Decades ago, LGBTQ people in Cuba were persecuted and sent to labor camps.
Cubans voted to legalize same-sex marriage, election officials said on Monday, a significant move in a country that saw harsh persecution for its LGBTQ community decades ago.
Millions of people across the country took to the polls Sunday to vote in a referendum that would amend the country’s Family Code, which is a part of its constitution. According to election results, around two-thirds of people who voted in the referendum did so in favor of the amendments.
“With [66%] of votes for Yes #Cuba ratifies the new Families Code,” Cuba’s embassy to the UK wrote on Twitter shortly after 8:30 a.m. local time in Havana, Cuba’s capital city.
The result — which needed 50% voter approval to pass — also legalized same-sex adoption. It’s a significant moment for the island country which, during the 1960s and 1970s, persecuted LQBTQ people and sent to labor camps.
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