National
Frank calls Romney ‘despicable’ for anti-gay views
Says GOP frontrunner lying about opposition to discrimination
Rep. Barney Frank speaks at National Stonewall Democrats' 2012 Capital Champions event (Blade photo by Michael Key)
Rep. Barney Frank tore into Mitt Romney for his anti-gay positions Tuesday night, calling the presumptive Republican presidential nominee “despicable.”
The gay lawmaker, who late last year announced his retirement after serving 31 years in Congress, made the comments about Romney during an interview with the Washington Blade following his keynote speech at the National Stonewall Democrats’ Capital Champions reception in D.C.
Frank took issue with what he said was Romney’s “willingness … to switch and become very anti-gay” after pledging in 1994 to be better on LGBT issues than the late Sen. Edward Kennedy. He also criticized Romney for statements that Frank said “trivialize our marriages.” During a speech in February, Romney said he “fought hard and prevented Massachusetts from becoming the Las Vegas of gay marriage.”
“That’s saying our marriages were a trick, were a sham,” Frank said. “He’s clearly prepared to embrace the most — oh, and supporting a constitutional amendment. What that says is that existing marriages are abolished. That’s just outrageous.”
Frank criticized Romney on the same night that the candidate swept five Republican primaries in Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, Pennsylvania and New York. Following Romney’s wins, multiple media outlets reported that former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich would suspend his campaign next week. Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, Romney’s main challenger in the primary contests, exited the race earlier this month.
While widely viewed as more moderate than his primary opponents, Romney signed a pledge from the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage committing himself to back a U.S. constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, defend the Defense of Marriage Act in court and set up a commission on religious liberty to investigate the alleged harassment of same-sex marriage opponents. NOM has also endorsed Romney.
Although Romney has said he opposes discrimination, Frank claimed he’s being disingenuous because Romney hasn’t articulated any ways in which he would work to bar discrimination against LGBT people. In 1994, Romney said he supported the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, but he has since disavowed that support, saying in 2006 that he sees no need for it, then in 2007 that employment non-discrimination should be a state issue.
“He’s lying,” Frank said. “What does that mean? How does he oppose discrimination? He’s not for any legislation that would make it illegal. So how does he oppose it? He is for a discrimination that would dissolve all the existing marriages. So what does that mean when he says that?”
Frank also said Romney doesn’t deserve credit from the LGBT community for last week hiring Richard Grenell, an openly gay man, as his spokesperson for national security and foreign affairs issues.
“He’s got one openly gay person,” Frank said. “How many people is he going to hire? He had some openly gay people work for him when he was in Massachusetts. We’re beyond giving people credit for not overtly discriminating.”
Frank refrained from criticizing President Obama for his decision not to issue an executive order at this time barring LGBT workplace discrimination among federal contractors.
Asked if he was disappointed Obama chose not to issue the executive order, Frank replied, “Not a great deal.” Frank said he wanted the president to issue the directive, but “was mixed on that” and said “there are other more important things we could be doing.”
“I understand there’s a lot on the plate politically,” Frank said. “And there are concerns now — not about LGBT issues — but there’s a whole developing argument about his being too much unilateral. I don’t know if you saw the article in the New York Times about too much unilateral executive order, and I think that had more to do with it than the LGBT specifics.”
Frank is planning to marry his partner Jim Ready in the summer. Obama continues to say he could “evolve” on the issue of marriage equality without announcing support for it. Frank got angry when asked about Obama’s position on marriage and said he should be commended for no longer defending DOMA in court.
“I don’t need the president’s permission to get married,” Frank said. “He’s doing a great thing against DOMA. I think you make a great mistake by focusing only on negative things. … I think that’s a mistake politically. I think we ought to be celebrating the gains as well as pushing further. And I think focusing only on some of the concerns. The president did an enormous thing for us when he not only said that DOMA was unconstitutional but said that any gay and lesbian issues had to be decided with that higher standard. I’m very happy with that. I’m not going to criticize him for not going further on that.”
Frank also expressed support for the idea of including a marriage equality plank in the Democratic Party platform, saying he “would like it.” He noted that it would satisfy him more to see explicit language in the document reaffirming opposition to DOMA.
“The only federal question is DOMA,” Frank said. “The federal government doesn’t have a rule about marriage or not, so I would want there to be a plank that says, ‘We respect the right of states to make this decision.’ I think what’s important from the federal standpoint is to go out against DOMA.”
Frank also commented on the decision by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to protect transgender workers from discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, saying he was “pleased” with the ruling, although he hasn’t fully read it.
He also pressed the need for ENDA passage, in part because the EEOC decision doesn’t cover gay or lesbian workers.
“I still want to see a transgender-inclusive ENDA because [the EEOC ruling] could be overturned in court,” Frank said. “That’ll be challenged, and they could take it back. On the other hand, it does mean, for now, transgender workers are more protected than gay, lesbian and bisexual workers. But we still need the bill.”
The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
Congratulations to Gil Pontes III on his recent appointment to the Financial Advisory Board for the City of Wilton Manors, Fla. Upon being appointed he said, “I’m honored to join the Financial Advisory Board for the City of Wilton Manors at such an important moment for our community. In my role as Executive Director of the NextGen Chamber of Commerce, I spend much of my time focused on economic growth, fiscal sustainability, and the long-term competitiveness of emerging business leaders. I look forward to bringing that perspective to Wilton Manors — helping ensure responsible stewardship of public resources while supporting a vibrant, inclusive local economy.”
Pontes is a nonprofit executive with years of development, operations, budget, management, and strategic planning experience in 501(c)(3), 501(c)(4), and political organizations. Pontes is currently executive director of NextGen, Chamber of Commerce. NextGen Chamber’s mission is to “empower emerging business leaders by generating insights, encouraging engagement, and nurturing leadership development to shape the future economy.” Prior to that he served as managing director of The Nora Project, and director of development also at The Nora Project. He has held a number of other positions including Major Gifts Officer, Thundermist Health Center, and has worked in both real estate and banking including as Business Solutions Adviser, Ironwood Financial. For three years he was a Selectman, Town of Berkley, Mass. In that role, he managed HR and general governance for town government. There were 200+ staff and 6,500 constituents. He balanced a $20,000,000 budget annually, established an Economic Development Committee, and hired the first town administrator.
Pontes earned his bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth.
Kansas
ACLU sues Kansas over law invalidating trans residents’ IDs
A new Kansas bill requires transgender residents to have their driver’s licenses reflect their sex assigned at birth, invalidating current licenses.
Transgender people across Kansas received letters in the mail on Wednesday demanding the immediate surrender of their driver’s licenses following passage of one of the harshest transgender bathroom bans in the nation. Now the American Civil Liberties Union is filing a lawsuit to block the ban and protect transgender residents from what advocates describe as “sweeping” and “punitive” consequences.
Independent journalist Erin Reed broke the story Wednesday after lawmakers approved House Substitute for Senate Bill 244. In her reporting, Reed included a photo of the letter sent to transgender Kansans, requiring them to obtain a driver’s license that reflects their sex assigned at birth rather than the gender with which they identify.
According to the reporting, transgender Kansans must surrender their driver’s licenses and that their current credentials — regardless of expiration date — will be considered invalid upon the law’s publication. The move effectively nullifies previously issued identification documents, creating immediate uncertainty for those impacted.
House Substitute for Senate Bill 244 also stipulates that any transgender person caught driving without a valid license could face a class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine. That potential penalty adds a criminal dimension to what began as an administrative action. It also compounds the legal risks for transgender Kansans, as the state already requires county jails to house inmates according to sex assigned at birth — a policy that advocates say can place transgender detainees at heightened risk.
Beyond identification issues, SB 244 not only bans transgender people from using restrooms that match their gender identity in government buildings — including libraries, courthouses, state parks, hospitals, and interstate rest stops — with the possibility for criminal penalties, but also allows for what critics have described as a “bathroom bounty hunter” provision. The measure permits anyone who encounters a transgender person in a restroom — including potentially in private businesses — to sue them for large sums of money, dramatically expanding the scope of enforcement beyond government authorities.
The lawsuit challenging SB 244 was filed today in the District Court of Douglas County on behalf of anonymous plaintiffs Daniel Doe and Matthew Moe by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Kansas, and Ballard Spahr LLP. The complaint argues that SB 244 violates the Kansas Constitution’s protections for personal autonomy, privacy, equality under the law, due process, and freedom of speech.
Additionally, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a temporary restraining order on behalf of the anonymous plaintiffs, arguing that the order — followed by a temporary injunction — is necessary to prevent the “irreparable harm” that would result from SB 244.
State Rep. Abi Boatman, a Wichita Democrat and the only transgender member of the Kansas Legislature, told the Kansas City Star on Wednesday that “persecution is the point.”
“This legislation is a direct attack on the dignity and humanity of transgender Kansans,” said Monica Bennett, legal director of the ACLU of Kansas. “It undermines our state’s strong constitutional protections against government overreach and persecution.”
“SB 244 is a cruel and craven threat to public safety all in the name of fostering fear, division, and paranoia,” said Harper Seldin, senior staff attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Rights Project. “The invalidation of state-issued IDs threatens to out transgender people against their will every time they apply for a job, rent an apartment, or interact with police. Taken as a whole, SB 244 is a transparent attempt to deny transgender people autonomy over their own identities and push them out of public life altogether.”
“SB 244 presents a state-sanctioned attack on transgender people aimed at silencing, dehumanizing, and alienating Kansans whose gender identity does not conform to the state legislature’s preferences,” said Heather St. Clair, a Ballard Spahr litigator working on the case. “Ballard Spahr is committed to standing with the ACLU and the plaintiffs in fighting on behalf of transgender Kansans for a remedy against the injustices presented by SB 244, and is dedicated to protecting the constitutional rights jeopardized by this new law.”
National
After layoffs at Advocate, parent company acquires ‘Them’ from Conde Nast
Top editorial staff let go last week
Former staff members at the Advocate and Out magazines revealed that parent company Equalpride laid off a number of employees late last week.
Those let go included Advocate editor-in-chief Alex Cooper, Pride.com editor-in-chief Rachel Shatto, brand partnerships manager Erin Manley, community editor Marie-Adélina de la Ferriére, and Out magazine staff writers Moises Mendez and Bernardo Sim, according to a report in Hollywood Reporter.
Cooper, who joined the company in 2021, posted to social media that, “Few people have had the privilege of leading this legendary LGBTQ+ news outlet, and I’m deeply honored to have been one of them. To my team: thank you for the last four years. You’ve been the best. For those also affected today, please let me know how I can support you.”
The Advocate’s PR firm when reached by the Blade said it no longer represents the company. Emails to the Advocate went unanswered.
Equalpride on Friday announced it acquired “Them,” a digital LGBTQ outlet founded in 2017 by Conde Nast.
“Equalpride exists to elevate, celebrate and protect LGBTQ+ storytelling at scale,” Equalpride CEO Mark Berryhill said according to Hollywood Reporter. “By combining the strengths of our brands with this respected digital platform, we’re creating a unified ecosystem that delivers even more impact for our audiences, advertisers, and community partners.”
It’s not clear if “Them” staff would take over editorial responsibilities for the Advocate and Out.
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