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Marriage advocate to speak out for LGBT workers

Wolfson among speakers for Freedom to Work’s premier ‘Situation Room’

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Evan Wolfson, Freedom to Marry
Evan Wolfson

Freedom to Marry President Evan Wolfson is set to speak at Freedom to Work’s “Situation Room” (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)

A longtime LGBT advocate at the forefront of the movement to advance marriage equality may take a slightly different tune on Thursday when he’s set to speak out on ways to advance LGBT workplace non-discrimination protections.

Evan Wolfson, president of Freedom to Marry, is scheduled to be among the speakers at Freedom to Work’s premier “Situation Room” in New York City at New York Law School — the first in a series of public forums to strategize on the way forward for the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

Wolfson told the Washington Blade he envisions that his participation will facilitate a discussion on the ways successes from the marriage equality movement can be applied to ENDA.

“It’s going to really be more of a conversation about what are some of the lessons that we applied from history and from other movements in the shaping our strategy and campaign to bring the freedom to marry to the United States, and how can we apply some of those in the work to end employment discrimination,” Wolfson said.

The cross-pollination of the marriage equality strategy to other movements isn’t new for Wolfson, who said he’s been asked by other campaigns — ranging from the environment to voting rights efforts — to talk about the ways in which marriage equality achievements can be applied to these initiatives.

Although he’s credited with being a founder of the marriage equality movement, Wolfson is no stranger to advocating on behalf of other LGBT causes. In 2000, he argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that a New Jersey law prohibiting the Boy Scouts of America from banning gay scouts was constitutional. The court ultimately ruled the other way.

Other LGBT causes in which Wolfson said he’s been involved are employment cases, work to abolish state sodomy laws as well as protections for people with HIV/AIDS.

“In all my years working in our movement, I’ve never really been a fan of pitting one so-called issue against the other,” Wolfson said. “To my mind, marriage has never been just about marriage. Marriage has been a powerful vocabulary of helping people understand who we are as LGBT people and to tap into their values of fairness and respect and help them move.”

After talking on this initial panel, Wolfson said he’ll speak out to aid LGBT workplace non-discrimination efforts “where it can be appropriate and helpful,” but added he has no immediate plans to do so.

“Obviously, my primary mission right now is continue leading the campaign to win the freedom to marry, and I want to finish the job, and we are not done,” Wolfson said.

Freedom to Work President Tico Almeida first announced the “Situation Room” in July as a way for groups working on federal workplace non-discrimination protections to lay out their contributions to the effort.

Wolfson is set to speak on a second panel as part of the “Situation Room” alongside Almeida in a session titled, “Lessons from Freedom to Marry for the Campaign to Win the Freedom to Work,” according to a statement from Freedom to Work.

Another panel earlier in the day is set to consist of Brad Sears, executive director of the Williams Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles, as well as two LGBT advocates representing both major political parties: Gregory Angelo, executive director of the National Log Cabin Republicans; and Melissa Sklarz, president of Stonewall Democrats of New York City.

In a statement, Almeida billed the “Situation Room” as a bipartisan event said it would help lead to victory for ENDA on the Senate floor, where a vote is expected to take place later this year.

ā€œWe’re honored to host a bipartisan group of leading experts and advocates for this first of a kind ENDA event,” Almeida said.Ā ā€œI’m confident we’re going to win a big Senate victory this year, and then ride that momentum into a robust campaign in the House of Representatives.”

The program, which is scheduled to begin Thursday at 2 pm, is set to be webcast live at the LGBT blog Towleroad.com. Moderating the first panel will be Towelroad legal editor and New York Law School professor Ari Ezra Waldman of New York Law School.

Almeida declined to comment on who’s set to moderate the second panel with Wolfson, but added additional speakers will be named later in the week.

A second ENDA “Situation Room” is planned later for Miami, which Almeida said will include Spanish-language content for Latino voters. Depending the timing of the ENDA Senate vote, similar events may place in Phoenix, Las Vegas and Philadelphia.

“Given where the undecided senators reside in states like Arizona, Nevada, and Florida, we believe Latino voters are a critical part of any winning ENDA coalition,” Almeida concluded.

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Congress

EXCLUSIVE: Outgoing Rep. Cicilline on future of LGBTQ rights and life after Congress

Gay congressman departs office this week; led major LGBTQ legislative victories

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Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)

Speaking with the Washington Blade by phone on Tuesday from Rhode Island, U.S. Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) was optimistic about the outcome of the debt ceiling negotiations that have roiled Capitol Hill, the White House, and Wall Street for weeks.

ā€œMy sense of it is there are enough Democratic and Republican votes to get it to the president’s desk,ā€ said the congressman, who would fly back to Washington in the evening with the expectation that a vote would be held the following day.  

Even amid the chaos and back-and-forth travel this week, Cicilline was ready to look back on the landmark legislative accomplishments of his distinguished career in politics, which have included groundbreaking advancements for LGBTQ rights.

And despite the ascendancy of anti-LGBTQ attacks from the right, including from much of the Republican caucus, he told the Blade there is ample reason to be optimistic that the chamber’s pro-equality work will continue in his absence.

As announced back in February and effective on Thursday, Cicilline will retire from Congress to lead his state’s largest philanthropic organization, the Rhode Island Foundation, having represented its 1st Congressional District in the U.S. House since 2011.

A former attorney, Cicilline was tapped to lead the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law as well as the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on the Middle East, North Africa, and Global Counterterrorism.

Particularly in recent years, the congressman became one of the most powerful House Democrats, elected to leadership in 2017 as a co-chair of the House Democratic Policy and Communications Committee and picked in 2021 by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to serve as one of the nine members tasked with managing the House’s second impeachment of former President Donald Trump.

Among other legislative achievements, Cicilline is widely credited with leading the House’s passage, twice, of the biggest civil rights bill since the 1964 Civil Rights Act – the Equality Act, which would prohibit anti-LGBTQ discrimination in areas from education and housing to employment and public accommodations.

While the Senate failed to pass the Equality Act, Cicilline said, ā€œI’m handing that work off to [U.S. Rep.] Mark Takano [D-Calif.], who I know will take it over the finish lineā€ once Democrats win control of the House again.

The congressman told the Blade that he hopes his leadership on this bill will be remembered as a key part of his legacy – and was adamant that its passage through both chambers is now a question of ā€œwhenā€ rather than ā€œif.ā€

ā€œThe majority of Americans support the Equality Act, and a majority of voters in every single state support nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people,ā€ so ā€œthis is about the Republican conference in Congress catching up with the American people,ā€ Cicilline said.

Congress is beginning to look more like America in at least one respect, though. After his first election to the House, Cicilline was one of only three openly LGBTQ members serving in Congress (having already made history in 2003 as the first openly gay mayor of a state capital, Providence, R.I.).

Today, ā€œI’m leaving with 10 colleagues in the House and two in the Senate,ā€ he said, ā€œso that’s great progress.ā€

ā€œThe calvary has arrivedā€ with ā€œyoung new members who are going to lead the next wave of this fightā€ such as openly LGBTQ U.S. Reps. Robert Garcia (Calif.), Becca Balint (Vt.), Eric Sorensen (Ill.), and Ritchie Torres (N.Y.), Cicilline said.

Echoing comments from his final speech on the House floor last week, the congressman also expressed his faith and confidence in party leaders with whom he has worked closely, including Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.)

Hopes and expectations for the current Democratic conference’s ability to deliver on behalf of LGBTQ Americans were buttressed late last year by passage of the Respect for Marriage Act, legislation co-led by Cicilline that codified fundamental rights for same-sex couples that might otherwise be erased if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns or weakens its constitutional protections for marriage equality.

How to combat the rightwing crusade against LGBTQ and especially trans Americans

However prepared Cicilline believes his colleagues are to meet the moment, the congressman is also up to speed on the unprecedented challenges presented by the current political climate with respect to LGBTQ rights.

This year, state legislatures have introduced hundreds of bills targeting trans Americans, which endeavor to restrict their access to everything from lifesaving healthcare to public bathrooms. At the same time, anti-trans rhetoric has escalated to such an extent that a rightwing pundit speaking at CPAC said “transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely,” which some interpreted as a call for genocide against the community.

Legislatively, Cicilline said it is all part of a cynical political strategy adopted by Republicans. Having concluded that their crusade against same-sex marriage was no longer winnable, the party sought another way to fight against LGBTQ rights, eventually polling anti-trans positions and messaging that successfully motivates ā€œthe most extreme parts of their political base,ā€ he said.

ā€œOur Republican colleagues have weaponized the trans community in such a way that they think it’s politically advantageous to attack even trans kids,ā€ which is ā€œreally horrificā€ especially considering the potential for tragic real-world consequences, including targeted violence against the trans community, Cicilline said.

ā€œI hope people who are seeking public office will be conscious of that and will be responsible, but unfortunately, I think there are some who are so driven by their desire for power, that they’re prepared to do almost anything to get there,ā€ the congressman added.

Some conservatives hope their polarization of and fear mongering about trans issues will drive a wedge, providing sufficient incentive or a permission structure for LGB Americans to turn their backs on the trans community, Cicilline said, but ā€œThat’s not gonna happen.ā€

ā€œWe are standing in lockstep with our trans brothers and sisters, and we’re just not going to allow them to be attacked in this way,ā€ he said.

Broadly speaking, Cicilline said elected Democrats must ā€œstand up for the queer community, speak out, condemn this kind of [anti-LGBTQ/anti-trans] legislation, and let the American people see the contrastā€ between the Democratic Party, which ā€œstands for inclusion and has fought for LGBTQ+ equalityā€ and the GOP, which is pushing ā€œthese very toxic and dangerous and un-American attacks on the LGBTQ community.ā€

The congressman noted that working against the interests of LGBTQ Americans is nothing new for congressional Republicans. ā€œWith just a couple of exceptions,ā€ he said, the House GOP caucus voted against the Equality Act’s nondiscrimination protections, which stem directly from America’s most basic foundational values of fairness and equality.

ā€œSo that means I have colleagues in the Congress of the United States on the Republican side who fundamentally rejected the legislation that would grant me and others in my community full equality as citizens of this country, [colleagues who would] allow discrimination to continue against our community,ā€ Cicilline said.

When it comes to navigating interpersonal working relationships with anti-LGBTQ Republicans in the chamber, though, ā€œI frankly don’t really care how they feel about us,ā€ the congressman said. ā€œThat’s irrelevant to me.ā€  

Cicilline to continue advocating for LGBTQ Americans after Congress

In addition to the Equality Act, Cicilline said that if Democrats recapture control of the House, he expects to see renewed momentum for a bill that he authored, the Global Respect Act, and another for which he was an original cosponsor, the LGBTQI+ Data Inclusion Act. Both were passed by the House but not by the Senate and therefore remain ā€œunfinished business,ā€ he said.

The Global Respect Act, Cicilline said, ā€œwill allow the U.S. to impose visa sanctions on anyone who commits gross human rights violations against the LGBTQ community,ā€ while the latter bill would mandate that federal surveys must include data collection on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Other legislative efforts that Cicilline has led, in areas from antitrust to foreign policy to gun violence, also include some ā€œunfinished businessā€ – bills that might see movement in the next Congress that carry the potential, in many cases, to measurably impact the lives of all Americans.

For instance, Cicilline, who has been at the vanguard of Congress’s work modernizing and strengthening antitrust law, remains hopeful about the eventual passage of six bills that he introduced in 2021, all designed to increase competition in digital markets.

These would curb the monopolistic power of dominant tech platform companies whose business models center engagement as the primary mechanism to drive advertising revenue – even though, as these firms are aware, content that tends to earn more engagement tends to be that which is incendiary, offensive, hateful, false, or misleading, violent or otherwise outrageous.

Looking beyond Congress, Cicilline said he is eager to continue advancing ā€œequality and justice for our communityā€ at the Rhode Island Foundation, building upon the organization’s existing work ā€œsupporting the organizations that are doing really important work to support the LGBTQ community.ā€

Cicilline acknowledged that leading an ā€œexplicitly non-partisan organizationā€ will be a departure from his work in Washington – though perhaps not to the extent one might imagine.

ā€œYou know, our community remains, in this country, a marginalized community,ā€ the congressman said. ā€œIn fact, it’s the only community, still, in America, that it’s legal to discriminate against.ā€

At this point, rather than pivoting back to discussing the need for passage of the Equality Act, Cicilline instead explained that because of the lack of national nondiscrimination protections, he is even more eager to include the LGBTQ community in the foundation’s work advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion.

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DeSantis stumbles into 2024 race with chaotic, disorganized announcement

Fla. governor defended the state’s anti-LGBTQ policies

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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (Photo courtesy of DeSantis' office)

More than 300,000 Twitter users were logged in at 6 p.m. ET on Wednesday to hear Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis begin his 2024 presidential campaign in an announcement address featuring the social media platform’s owner, Elon Musk.

Moments after moderator David Sacks kicked off their conversation, however, the audio cut out due to technical glitches that persisted for nearly half an hour as the event was steadily hemorrhaging listeners.

Those who joined or rejoined the event at various times after about 6:30 p.m. ET might be forgiven for thinking the topic was Musk rather than DeSantis, who is widely considered the candidate likeliest to unseat former President Donald Trump as the Republican Party’s frontrunner for the nomination.

At one point, for instance, U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) entered the chat to tell the polarizing billionaire tech entrepreneur, “I’m one of your biggest fans” and brag, “I’m one of the first members of Congress to own a Tesla,” the electric carmaker founded by Musk.

Following reports on Tuesday of DeSantis’ unorthodox plans to announce his run for president, pundits saw a golden opportunity for the Florida governor to generate buzz around his campaign, which seemed to lose momentum leading up to its official launch.

Responding to questions from Sacks, DeSantis defended Florida’s spate of anti-LGBTQ policies, like last year’s “Don’t Say Gay” law, which criminalizes classroom discussion of LGBTQ subjects and, earlier this month, was broadened to cover more grade levels.

LGBTQ groups, Democratic Florida lawmakers, and other critics argue the law was written with discriminatory intent, to create a chilling effect that will discourage educators from creating welcoming environments for LGBTQ students.

Disney came out against the measure, kicking off an ongoing spat with DeSantis, who said on Wednesday that the company “obviously supported injecting gender ideology in elementary school.”

The governor also objected to what he characterized as the media’s misleading coverage of Florida’s adoption of policies restricting the educational materials made available in schools.

LGBTQ groups air objections to DeSantis’ presidential run

In advance of Wednesday’s conversation with Musk, DeSantis filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission formally declaring his plans to enter the race as LGBTQ and other civil rights advocacy groups registered their objections to his candidacy as well as to Florida’s policies under his leadership.

ā€œDangerously out of step with average Americans’ views on freedom and equality, DeSantis has weaponized his position as governor to target and punish anyone he considers his political enemy, including LGBTQ+ families,ā€ Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson said in a statement Wednesday.

Following Tuesday’s statement from the LGBTQ Victory Fund, which called DeSantis a ā€œtransphobic bigotā€ who has ā€œno place in government — let alone the White House,ā€ the LGBTQ Victory Institute on Wednesday said his entry into the race is ā€œbad news for America — and even worse for anyone who’s part of a community he’s targeted while in office as governor.ā€

Over the weekend, the NAACP issued a travel advisory for Florida because of ā€œDeSantis’ aggressive attempts to erase Black history and to restrict diversity, equity and inclusion programs in Florida schools.ā€

HRC and Equality Florida followed suit on Tuesday with a jointly issued travel notice that cites the potential impact of the state legislature’s recent passage of six anti-LGBTQ bills, several of which have already been signed into law.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to specifically address the travel advisories during Tuesday’s press conference, but said Florida Republicans ā€œhave attacked diversity. They’ve attacked inclusion efforts. They’ve limited the teaching of Black history. And they’ve launched attacks on the LGBT youth, immigrants, educators and women’s reproductive freedom.ā€

ā€œThat’s what you have seen from lawmakers in Florida,ā€ Jean-Pierre said, adding that the Biden-Harris administration will ā€œcontinue to speak out against discriminatory policies.ā€

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DeSantis to announce presidential bid in a live conversation Wednesday with Elon Musk

Victory Fund denounces Florida guv as ‘transphobic bigot’

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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) (Screenshot/YouTube)

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) will reportedly announce plans to run for president in 2024 during a live conversation with Elon Musk Wednesday evening on Twitter Spaces.

The unorthodox move might generate renewed interest in DeSantis, who was long expected to enter the primary race against former President Donald Trump, the Republican frontrunner, but seemed to lose momentum as the official launch of his campaign drew nearer.

It also comes on the heels of DeSantis signing last week a slate of anti-LGBTQ bills including an expansion of Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law, which criminalizes classroom discussion of LGBTQ subjects.

Musk, who has a trans daughter from whom he has been estranged, has expressed his affinity for DeSantis in the past while also courting other public figures known for expressing transphobic views, such as the comedian Dave Chappelle.

The polarizing and often pugilistic billionaire was widely blamed for allowing anti-LGBTQ and especially transphobic abuse to proliferate on Twitter since he purchased the social media platform last year.

On Twitter, Musk has occasionally complained about or mocked the use of personal pronouns by trans and nonbinary people, and he was widely criticized last year for promoting a false and baseless anti-LGBTQ conspiracy about the violent attack on Paul Pelosi.

The LGBTQ Victory Fund denounced DeSantis’s candidacy on Tuesday ahead of his announcement, writing, ā€œTransphobic bigots like Ron DeSantis have no place in government, let alone the White House,” the LGBTQ Victory Fund wrote in a statement issued Tuesday.

“Not only does Governor DeSantis’ appalling record against LGBTQ+ people and communities of color disqualify him from the Presidency, the rhetoric he will spew on the campaign trail as he and Donald Trump race to the bottom will have long-term consequences for our community and LGBTQ+ kids in particular.

“LGBTQ+ leaders are our best defense against hate, which is why his announcement is a rallying cry to the LGBTQ+ community and our allies that we must redouble our efforts to elect pro-choice LGBTQ+ candidates in 2023 and 2024. On Election Day, our message must be resounding: we are not going back.ā€

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