Politics
Biden renews call to pass LGBTQ Equality Act in State of the Union speech
Pledge to have the backs of trans kids echoed in speech
In a State of the Union address front-loaded with calls to challenge Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, President Biden on Tuesday called for assistance from Congress in enacting his domestic agenda — and renewed his call for passage of the Equality Act to advance LGBTQ rights.
“And for our LGBTQ+ Americans, let’s finally get the bipartisan Equality Act to my desk,” Biden said, making his strongest push yet for legislation that has been pending in the U.S. Senate for nearly a year despite Biden’s campaign promise to sign it into law within his first 100 days in office.
Echoing remarks he made in his speech to Congress last year in support of transgender youth, Biden also denounced anti-transgender bills in state legislatures, many of which seek to restrict access to transition-related care for youth and to keep transgender kids out of school sports.
“The onslaught of state laws targeting transgender Americans and their families is wrong,” Biden said. “As I said last year, especially to our younger transgender Americans, I will always have your back as your president, so you can be yourself and reach your God-given potential.”
Despite Biden’s renewed call to pass the Equality Act, the legislation is all but dead after the U.S. House passed it in March of last year as opponents have twisted the measure as a threat to sex-segregated spaces for women and the biological definition of gender. Biden’s words, however, coincide with a recently launched campaign from the Human Rights Campaign highlighting the patchwork of legal protections for LGBTQ people in different states.
Biden incorporated the Equality Act in a speech where he included numerous items from his domestic agenda, such as elements of his Build Back Better plan. Among the items Biden ticked off were the ability of Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices and expansion of the child care tax credit. The Build Back Better legislation is also dead in Congress, but supporters have held out hope that some components of the package still have a shot.
Also highlighted in Biden’s speech were measures already signed into law, including the bipartisan infrastructure package, which Biden cited as evidence of working across the aisle, and the American Rescue Plan, which Biden credited with boosting the economic recovery amid the coronavirus pandemic. Not everyone in Biden’s audience in the joint session of Congress agreed with him on the latter bill, however, as evidenced by Republicans booing the measure.
Critics have said Biden’s moves have worsened the economy and instigated the continued rise in inflation that has increased the cost of goods from gasoline to groceries. Biden, however, made a point to include inflation in his speech, saying enacting his domestic agenda could alleviate rising prices.
“But with all the bright spots in our economy, record job growth and higher wages, too many families are struggling to keep up with the bills,” Biden said. “Inflation is robbing them of the gains they might otherwise feel. I get it. That’s why my top priority is getting prices under control.”
The most prominent component of Biden’s speech, as Russia continues to assault Ukraine, was efforts to contain Russia through economic sanctions, including an announcement the United States would join other countries in refusing to let Russian aircraft enter the United States. Biden also made clear the United States would stick to its obligation to defend allied nations in NATO, pledging to “defend every inch of territory of NATO countries with the full force of our collective power.”
“In the battle between democracy and autocracy, democracies are rising to the moment, and the world is clearly choosing the side of peace and security,” Biden said. “This is a real test. It’s going to take time. So let us continue to draw inspiration from the iron will of the Ukrainian people.”
Seated with Jill Biden in the first lady’s box above the floor of the House was Oksana Markarova, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, who waved a small blue-and-yellow striped flag of her country when President Biden mentioned her in his address. Many others present in the House chamber brought Ukrainian flags to wave and had pins of Ukraine’s colors on their lapels to show American solidarity with the country under onslaught by Putin.
Sarah Kate Ellis, CEO of the LGBTQ group GLAAD, said in a statement after Biden’s speech his words in support of LGBTQ people come at critical time as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott declared in a recent memo parents who provide transition-related care for their kids would be prosecuted for child abuse.
“President Biden has delivered on commitments to include LGBTQ citizens in the promise of America,” Ellis said. “Every lawmaker at every level of government must commit to do the same, especially for LGBTQ families and children under attack. The state of our union is only as strong as our action and commitment to ensure no marginalized person is left behind. LGBTQ voters are more motivated than ever to hold elected officials accountable in the midterms.”
Congress
51 lawmakers sign letter to Rubio about Andry Hernández Romero
U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) spoke about gay Venezuelan asylum seeker
Forty nine members of Congress and two U.S. senators, all Democrats, signed a letter Monday to Secretary of State Marco Rubio demanding information about Andry Hernández Romero, a gay Venezuelan national who was deported to El Salvador and imprisoned in the country’s notorious Terrorism Confinement Center, a maximum-security prison known by the Spanish acronym CECOT
“We are deeply concerned about the health and wellbeing of Mr. Hernández Romero, who left
Venezuela after experiencing discriminatory treatment because of his sexual orientation and
opposition to Venezuela’s authoritarian government,” the lawmakers wrote. They urged the State Department to facilitate his access to legal counsel and take steps to return him.
After passing a credible fear interview and while awaiting a court hearing in March, agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement reportedly transported Hernández out of the U.S. without due process or providing evidence that he had committed any crime.
In the months since, pressure has been mounting. This past WorldPride weekend in Washington was kicked off with a rally in front of the U.S. Supreme Court and a fundraiser, both supporting Hernández and attended by high profile figures including members of Congress, like U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.)
U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) was among the four members who wrote to Rubio about Hernández in April. On Friday, he spoke with the Washington Blade before he and his colleagues, many more of them this time, sent the second letter to Rubio.
“There’s a lot of obviously horrible things that are happening with the asylum process and visas and international students and just the whole of our value system as it relates to immigration,” he said, which “obviously, is under attack.”
“Andry’s case, I think, is very unique and different,” the congressman continued. “There is, right now, public support that is building. I think he has captured people’s attention. And it’s growing — this is a movement that is not slowing down. He’s going to be a focal point for Pride this year. I mean, I think people around the world are interested in the story.”
Garcia said he hopes the momentum will translate to progress on requests for proof of life, adding that he was optimistic after meeting with Hernández’s legal team earlier on Friday.
“I mean, the president, Kristi Noem, Marco Rubio — any of these folks could could ask to see if just he’s alive,” the congressman said, referring to the secretary of Homeland Security, whom he grilled during a hearing last month. ICE is housed under the DHS.
“People need to remember, the most important part of this that people need to remember, this isn’t just an immigration issue,” Garcia noted. “This is a due process issue. This is an asylum case. We gave him this appointment. The United States government told him to come to his appointment, and then we sent him to another country, not his own, and locked him up with no due process. That’s the issue.”
Garcia said that so far neither he nor his colleagues nor Hernández’s legal team were able to get “any answers from the administration, which is why we’re continuing to advocate, which is why we’re continuing to reach out to Secretary Rubio.”
“A lot more Democrats are now engaged on this issue,” he said. U.S. Sens. Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla, both from California, joined Monday’s letter. “The more that we can get folks to understand how critical this is, the better. The momentum matters here. And I think Pride does provide an opportunity to share his story.”
Asked what the next steps might be, Garcia said “we’re letting his legal team really take the lead on strategy,” noting that Hernández’s attorneys have “already engaged with the ACLU” and adding, “It’s very possible that the Supreme Court could take this on.”
In the meantime, the congressman said “part of our job is to make sure that that people don’t forget Andry and that there is awareness about him, and I think there’s a responsibility, particularly during WorldPride, and during Pride, all throughout the month — like, this is a story that people should know. People should know his name and and people should be aware of what’s going on.”
Congress
Wasserman Schultz: Allies must do more to support LGBTQ Jews
A Wider Bridge honored Fla. congresswoman at Capital Jewish Museum on Thursday
Florida Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz on Thursday said allies need to do more to support LGBTQ Jewish people in the wake of Oct. 7.
“Since Oct. 7, what has been appalling to me is that LGBTQ+ Jewish organizations and efforts to march in parades, to be allies, to give voice to other causes have faced rejection,” said the Florida Democrat at the Capital Jewish Museum in D.C. after A Wider Bridge honored her at its Pride event.
Wasserman Schultz, a Jewish Democrat who represents Florida’s 25th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives, added the “silence of our allies … has been disappointing.”
“It makes your heart feel hollow and it makes me feel alone and isolated, which is why making sure that we have spaces that we can organize in every possible way in every sector of our society as Jews is so incredibly important,” she said.
The Israeli government says Hamas militants on Oct. 7, 2023, killed roughly 1,200 people, including upwards of 360 partygoers at the Nova Music Festival, when it launched a surprise attack on the country. The militants also kidnapped more than 200 people on that day.
The Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry says Israeli forces have killed nearly 55,000 people in the enclave since Oct. 7. Karim Khan, the International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor, has said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who the Israel Defense Forces killed last October, are among those who have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza and Israel.
A Wider Bridge is a group that “advocates for justice, counters LGBTQphobia, and fights antisemitism and other forms of hatred.”
Thursday’s event took place 15 days after a gunman killed two Israeli Embassy employees — Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim — as they were leaving an event at the Capital Jewish Museum.
Police say a man who injured more than a dozen people on June 1 in Boulder, Colo., when he threw Molotov cocktails into a group of demonstrators who were calling for the release of the remaining Israeli hostages was yelling “Free Palestine.” The Associated Press notes that authorities said the man who has been charged in connection with the attack spent more than a year planning it.
Congress
Sen. Schiff proposes resolution urging DOD not to rename U.S. Naval Ship Harvey Milk
Pentagon reportedly plans to change the name of ship named for gay rights icon
U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) on Thursday introduced a resolution urging the U.S. Department of Defense not to rename ships that bear the names of civil rights leaders like gay rights pioneer Harvey Milk.
The move comes just after reports on Tuesday that U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had ordered U.S. Navy Secretary John Phelan to rename the U.S. Naval Ship Harvey Milk, with an announcement deliberately planned for Pride month on June 14.
The vessel, a replenishment oiler, is part of the John Lewis class fleet. The Pentagon is also considering renaming other ships in the fleet including the USNS Thurgood Marshall, USNS Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and USNS Harriet Tubman, according to CBS News.
“By naming these ships,” Schiff wrote in his resolution, “the United States Navy has appropriately celebrated notable civil rights leaders and their legacy in promoting a more equal and just United States.”
Milk was assassinated in 1978 while serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Prior to his election to the Senate last year, Schiff represented California districts in the U.S. House since 2001.
Part one of his resolution “strongly supports the naming of John Lewis-class fleet replacement oilers after the aforementioned civil rights leaders as a fitting tribute to honor their contributions to the advancement of civil rights,” while part two “strongly encourages the Department of Defense not to take any action to change the names.”
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