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Loading ...Obama posts campaign pledges on LGBT rights
11.19.2008 9:41am EST
(Washington) President-elect Barack Obama has laid out his commitment to LGBT civil rights in an eight-point plan posted on his transition Web site.
It calls for passage of the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act; a gender-inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act; repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell; repeal of the federal Defense of Marriage Act; opposition to any attempt to reintroduce an amendment to the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage, support for inclusive adoption rights; and an expanded war on HIV/AIDS.The program is identical to Obama’s positions during the campaign and LGBT rights groups said it shows that the president-elect is committed to keeping his word.
The Matthew Shepard Hate Crime Act would add sexual orientation to the list of categories covered under federal hate crime law. It passed the House in 2007 and the White House threatened to veto it. In an effort to get around a veto, the Senate version was tied to the 2008 defense authorization bill. It passed but then went to conference, where it was stripped out.
Obama was a co-sponsor of the bill. On his transition Web site, Obama notes that in 2004, crimes against LGBT Americans constituted the third-highest category of hate crime reported, making up more than 15 percent. As a state senator in Illinois, Obama helped pass tough legislation that made hate crimes – and cthe onspiracy to commit them - against the law.
Obama, in his eight-point plan, also supports the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, and says it must include gender identity.
ENDA passed the US House in 2007 without protections for the transgendered, but was not taken up by the Senate.
The legislation would make it illegal for employers to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation in hiring, firing, promoting or paying an employee.
ENDA as originally introduced by Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass) included transpeople, but Frank removed those protections in committee, saying it would be impossible to pass the bill if it included gender identity.
More than a dozen LGBT groups immediately distanced themselves from the legislation. Frank has since said he would fight to ensure an inclusive ENDA is passed.
Obama’s support for an inclusive ENDA virtually assures it will include gender identity when it is reintroduced in the next session of Congress.
“While an increasing number of employers have extended benefits to their employees’ domestic partners, discrimination based on sexual orientation in the workplace occurs with no federal legal remedy,” Obama says on the transition site.
Legislation to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the ban on gays serving openly in the military, was taken up in committee this year for the first time, but did not make it to a vote.
DADT was enacted in 1993. Since then more than 12,000 servicemembers have been dismissed when it was learned they are gay. According to statistics from the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, which advocates for gays in the military, an average of two service members each day are dismissed under the law .
“The key test for military service should be patriotism, a sense of duty, and a willingness to serve. Discrimination should be prohibited,” the Obama transition site says.
“Obama will work with military leaders to repeal the current policy and ensure it helps accomplish our national defense goals.”
The Web site also touts Obama’s commitment to same-sex families, but he remains reluctant to support gay marriage.
“Barack Obama supports full civil unions that give same-sex couples legal rights and privileges equal to those of married couples.” the transition site says.
“Obama also believes we need to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act and enact legislation that would ensure that the 1,100+ federal legal rights and benefits currently provided on the basis of marital status are extended to same-sex couples in civil unions and other legally-recognized unions. These rights and benefits include the right to assist a loved one in times of emergency, the right to equal health insurance and other employment benefits, and property rights,” the Web site says.
He also supports adoption rights for all couples “regardless of their sexual orientation.”
Obama’s plan also offers a comprehensive plan for combating HIV/AIDS.
“In the first year of his presidency, Barack Obama will develop and begin to implement a comprehensive national HIV/AIDS strategy that includes all federal agencies. The strategy will be designed to reduce HIV infections, increase access to care and reduce HIV-related health disparities,” the Web site says.
Part of that plan would see a diminished role for the Bush administration’s dependence on abstinence education, as well as distributing contraceptives in prisons and lifting the federal ban on needle exchanges.
Of course Obama is all talk right now, because he’s still just the president-ELECT. How can it even be possible, let alone justifiable, to jump all over the man because he hasn’t taken any action in the matter of glbt rights? He’s not the president yet, and therefore has no power to really do anything at the moment. Besides, what he’s promising to do is a lot more than we, as a community, have gotten from any president-elect, or president, ever.
Give him time…that, and he’s got a few things that are a little more pressing to deal with…like the economy? If that isn’t fixed everyone, gay and straight, is screwed…
I would have to say that it would be a absolutely wonderful day if Mr. Obama can see these, or at least a majority of these initiatives implemented without further obstructions from the bigoted, extremist, hateful religious fanatics. I do think that he is heading down the right track and full equality is still down the road a bit. The Gay Community has made so many advancements in the last 20 – 30 years, the days of hiding and taking a back seat on the bus, as it were, are forever gone!!
That’s my point. He uses the shorthand acronym instead of spelling it out. Why? Cumbersome language? Maybe. But the vast majority of people don’t even know what lgbt stands for. It seems to me lgbt is safer. And therein lies the problem: if he can’t even spell it out that makes the commitment suspect to me anyway.
Let’s face it: Barack Obama is a master rhetorician. He doesn’t make ‘mistakes’ like this. It’s on purpose. He doesn’t use shorthand to describe other groups. You can accuse me of reading into it. But as a former speech writer I see the finer details…
I’m not drawing specific conclusions. I’m just pointing put an issue that seems germaine to the conversation. Agree or not you have to see that there is some significance. I think it’s more about not getting gays and lesbians. After all, when you come out to people do you use lgbt?! By exclusively using that acronym he ‘de-gayed’ the message to a large extent. Is that good or bad? I think it’s bad.
Sorry for typos…doing this on my phone.
This Andy Fraser video says it all –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CO_ixw5fThQ
Lots of talk. Where is the action. The Gay community has exploded into activism these last two weeks, only to be met by silence from Obama. Obama plans on using Executive Orders to undo most of Bush’s mess. But you’ll notice Obama has won’t used Executive Order to end Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. Obama has NO plans on wasting ANY of his political capital on gays. Get used to it. DADT will still be on the books in 2012 and there will be no marriage equality for gays either. Obama is a fraud. Wait and see. Donnie McClurkin is really proud of Obama, but will you be by the time re election comes around?
I’m all for civil unions even if it means that society as a whole will still see us as lower than heterosexuals.
Denmark was the first country to implement civil unions since 1989 and still registered partners cannot adopt, with the exception that one party can adopt the biological children of the other. The United Kingdom civil partnerships are more equitable and tend to mirror marriage more but it falls short of that and every so often cases of clerks discriminating against gay couples who want to adopt come up amongst many other incidents of discrimination and violence. Gay people are still treated by the population both recently arrived and those native as less than. They do have rights but are still considered inferior legally in name by the government when compared to heteros and as such they are viewed and treated by society.
Reason doesn’t work in the US. The Zeta Zeta said: “… faith and muscles are the only way to get things done.”
And BIG MONEY with faith and muscles is a very FRIGHTENING idea. Let us hope that time has not come, but with the money from the Mormons, it is very frightening indeed! This is a scary time to be living in the United States. Let us hope it is indeed a “time for change we can live with”, peaceably and in harmony. <=== says shaking his head in great doubt.
Rodney Moore….actually civil unions weren’t invented in Vermont at all. The very first country to start them was Denmark in 1990 long before the first country of Holland introduced same-sex marriage.
Though I’m not a fan of civil unions as opposed to nothing, the only country where they’ve proved successful is the UK (civil partnerships) that offer every right and privilege of marriage including adoption. It was legislated by a free vote of parliament (overwhelmingly), with little or no opposition from the state church. Further, before civil partnerships were introduced, British immigration law also allowed (and still does) gay British citizens to bring in their foreign-born partners to reside in the UK as well as the right to work and obtain benefits. It is still in effect. We don’t even have that yet in the U.S.
I can’t see what everyone’s knickers are getting all in a twist about here. Obama hasn’t even taken the oath of office yet, but it seems that every other person is more than willing to drag him down! At least give the man some time to make his appointments to his cabinet, and to the judiciary, before making summary judgement against him!
Theres a very old saying “Pick your battles”, that certainly applies to this instance. What do we need more? And end to DADT and DOMA? Passage of ENDA and MSHCA? Gay marriage? An economy that allows anyone of any creed to retire? To even have a job? It seems to me that the President-Elect has plenty on his plate without a lot of his “base” going off on him before he’s even had a chance.
I am extremely hopeful.
Would you have preferred McCan’t / Pow-Pow?
The re-criminalization of sodomy, GLBT “detention” camps (a new use for Gitmo, possibly?), and the death penalty for gaysex wouldn’t have been far behind, if the Dominionists and Reconstructionists like Ahmanson had gotten their way (they are the hard-core financial backbone of the Reptilican’t’s septic – tank sewage -sludge – sucking – bottom – feeding “base,” AKA the “Konservative Kristianist Kultist Krazies” and the PAGAN FERTILITY CULTS like the paeophile Romans and the Magic Underpants crowd).
Rejoice and be EXCEEDING glad for what you DID GET instead. If Pres.-Elect Obama doesn’t get it all done in his first term, I’ll GLADLY vote to give him a second one to finish up.
Sheesh! Quit whining about the WORD “marriage” … if we get the 1000+ FEDERAL rights and “Full Faith And Credit,” WHO CARES ABOUT THE WORD?
Not me, certainly. It’s a red flag. Leave it alone
Bud Burgoon-Clark
happily loined together in
not-so-holy-matrimony
Insane Diego, CA USA
NOT a 2nd class citizen FOR LONG!
Are we that desperate that if a politician mentions us in speeches we give our undying love? Really? Mr. Obama talks (writes) a decent game, but what realistically can he do on his own? I was happy to hear us mentioned in the victory speech. But his public stand on marriage still conveys the message to everybody that, WE ARE NOT EQUAL to everybody else. Not even murderers, rapists, death row prisoners… That one line of thought – he doesn’t believe in same sex marriage, undercuts all the promises he makes. Aren’t we all sick of being pieces in the game of politics yet? We deserve equal rights, he says. So why is he publicly against one very basic right. People say it’s just a word. Well, no, it is much more than that. In all of its myriad forms, it is still the single social institution that crosses every border, inhabits every culture, exists whether you practice any religion or none at all, and is recognized worldwide. So, yes, that word means a lot. And to say you don’t believe in that word for one group says an awful lot about inequality. And makes me question the intensity those 8 points will be dealt with.
Do we still have people that misunderstand DOMA? States marry people, not the federal government. The federal government only has the power to recognize those marriages that the states have allowed.
In other words, repealing DOMA means that the Federal Government would recognize the same-sex marriages of Massachusetts and Conneticut as marriage!
“REASON is our tool, and it should guide our collective actions, Mr. Moore. ”
Reason doesn’t work in the US. The people here view it as a sign of weakness, and that faith and muscles are the only way to get things done
More empty promises from Obama.
If he cares so much about lgbt rights why didn’t he make it perfectly clear that he supported our right to marry in california? Could it be because he said otherwise and the fundies used his own words and rightfully so to win the ban. Obama is a two terms President, there’s one more election he has to win so don’t expect anything from him. He threw us under the bus in this past election he’s going to do it again. He is not going to go against the support he saw prop 8 got from his supporters. Sorry to say it but don’t expect much from him with any DOMA or same sex marriage rights. He’s not going to come against the majority of Latinos and blacks who voted for prop 8 and voted for him in droves.
Let’s just consider ourselves lucky if he manages to pass the the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act and maybe the repeal of Don’t Ask, they see us as dispensable entities already so that last one has a better chance of happening.
Until the day I die, I will never understand the reluctance of some in my community to support a man who has repeatedly taken the most progressive stand on LGBT rights of any major candidate. This is a man who from his first speech at the 2004 Democratic convention mentioned us and has continued to mention and support us including in his victory speech in Chicago on November 4, 2008. Yet, to our embarassement nearly 25% of our community voted for McCain. And where was our great gay leadership getting out the gay vote and supporting this candidate? The good news is I am very impressed with the response to Prop. 8 and our community coming together and demonstrating through out the country. I honestly believe this is a golden opportunity for us to advance our rights towards full equality. But we have to be committed to it. If we cave into to racism or get lazy this opportunity will fall through.