400 people showed up to last night's packed NYC fundraiser for the National Equality March, which raised more than $16,000.

Today David Mixner announced a new group of endorsements of the March from religious leaders.

Students for the National Equality March reports:

"On Saturday, October 10, the day before the National Equality March (NEM), students will come together with service members organizations, including the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, Servicemembers United, Knights Out, and the GW Veterans, to protest and call for an immediate end to the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy, which denies students equal opportunity to participate in ROTC programs and gain access to grants and scholarships. According to Dave Valk, student outreach coordinator for NEM, it will be a silent protest with participants wearing duct tape over their mouths. The protest will move to George Washington University where Lt. Dan Choi and other leaders will speak and ask participants to tear off the duct tape, 'because we will no longer be silent on these issues.' … 'The Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy is discriminatory, wasteful, and dangerous,' said Valk. 'The sight of thousands of young people protesting the policy in the streets of Washington will make it clear that the policy is doomed.' The call to action has received endorsements from over 100 student leaders, including the student body presidents of top universities."

Towleroad has learned that NoH8 photographers Adam Bouska and Jeff Parshley will be helping to promote this action, which seems to make perfect sense.

Here's the National Equality March schedule of events.

The Equality Idol finalists have been chosen. The winner will get to speak at the March.

Four songs were chosen as finalists in the 'National Equality Song' contest. They are “Courage of Conviction” by Julie Clark, “Equality” by Todd Fernandez, “Our Time Has Come” by Sean Chapin, and “Stand For Love” by Toby Madigan.
You can listen to them here.

The winner will perform live on stage with a choir during the musical
portion of the rally and receive a donated round trip
airline ticket to the March should he or she live more than 250 miles away from D.C.

Instructions on how to vote for the winners of both the song and speech contest are here.