The Log Cabin Republicans thanked Donald Trump for “standing up for family” in a bizarre Presidents’ Day video littered with falsehoods.
The gay Republican group, which claims to represent “LGBT conservative and allies” but rarely challenges rampant homophobia within the GOP, put out an odd love letter to Donald Trump to mark Presidents’ Day.
Trump is praised for “standing up for our American ideals of family, freedom and liberty” by one participant, while others resort to gaslighting as they peddle a number of abject falsehoods.
The video claims that “one of the best things that he did was launch a global campaign to decriminalise homosexuality”, though there is no evidence to suggest any such campaign ever actually existed beyond a press release, while Trump left the position of international LGBT+ envoy sitting empty for his entire term.
The group suggests that Trump was the “the first pro-gay president when entering office”, a bizarre claim given he made no pledges on LGBT+ rights at all in 2016 or 2020 aside from his pledge to sign a proposed law to permit anti-LGBT+ discrimination on the grounds of religion.
Trump is also described as the “first Republican President in American history to enter office as a supporter of marriage equality”. In reality, ahead of the 2016 election Trump said he would “strongly consider” appointing Supreme Court justices to overturn equal marriage, before committing to picking justices from a list vetted by anti-LGBT+ groups.
Indeed, several of these points were made succinctly in 2016 by none other than the Log Cabin Republicans, when the group pointedly declined to endorse Trump’s presidential bid, citing his anti-LGBT+ policies.
Internet not impressed with the Log Cabin Republicans.
Suffice to say, the clip has not gone down well outside of the increasingly-small circle of gay Trump firebrands.
A Twitter user quipped: “Just when you think LCR can’t be any more ridiculous, they never let you down.”
Another pointed out: “Less than two hours after Trump and his virulently anti-LGBTQ activist vice president Mike Pence were sworn into office, all mentions of LGBTQ issues were removed from the official White House webpage.”
One respondent said: “To me, Log Cabin Republicans are like Women for Trump. They take pleasure in remaining second-class citizens as long as they think they’re slightly elevated above other groups who are being treated like second-class citizens.”
Rush Limbaugh, a talk radio pioneer who saturated America’s airwaves with cruel bigotries, lies and conspiracy theories for over three decades, amassing a loyal audience of millions and transforming the Republican Party in the process, has died, his wife revealed at the beginning of his show on Wednesday. He was 70 years old.
Limbaugh announced in February 2020 that he had been diagnosed with advanced stage 4 lung cancer.
Former President Donald Trump awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom during the 2020 State of the Union, calling Limbaugh “the greatest fighter and winner you will ever meet.”
Perhaps no moment better encapsulated Limbaugh’s legacy, nor demonstrated the immense influence he came to wield in Washington.
The medal was a just reward: Trump’s ascension to the presidency couldn’t have happened without Limbaugh’s brand of right-wing media.
The modern Republican party often functioned with Limbaugh as a fulcrum. President Barack Obama’s former chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, once called Limbaugh “the voice and intellectual force of the Republican Party.” Limbaugh would at times massage the failures of the party and its leaders, dismissing obvious policy or political failures as simply part of liberal conspiracies.
But he also helped set the agenda. When a Republican politician promoting racist and sexist policies could only use a dog whistle, Limbaugh provided a bull horn — he was, for example, an early progenitor of the racist birther conspiracy theory about Obama that Trump would later use to fuel his political career.
For decades, Limbaugh was associated with the far-right fringes of the Republican Party. In 1995, only days after Timothy McVeigh bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City, President Bill Clinton issued a blistering attack at a speech in Minneapolis in which he said the “nation’s airwaves … spread hate, they leave the impression that, by their very words, that violence is acceptable. … It is time we all stood up and spoke against that kind of reckless speech and behavior.”
Limbaugh vehemently protested the characterization, assuming that it was about him — which in all likelihood it was. “Make no mistake about it: Liberals intend to use this tragedy for their own political gain,” he said on the radio afterward.
People did take up Clinton’s charge to speak against Limbaugh’s style of “reckless speech and behavior,” but without much success. While remaining a controversial figure and at times suffering advertising boycotts and derision from the mainstream media, less than 25 years, rather than be condemned by another American president, Limbaugh was given a medal.
Decades Of Hate
A full accounting of Limbaugh’s lies and exaggerations; his racism and his misogyny; his homophobia and his Islamophobia; and his sheer cruelty could fill books — and have — but even a cursory overview of his lowlights makes his prejudice clear.
In 2003, he was forced to resign from ESPN after stating that Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb was only receiving praise because the media was “very desirous that a Black quarterback do well.” In 2004, Limbaugh said the NBA should be renamed the T.B.A. —“the Thug Basketball Association.” He then added: “Stop calling them teams. Call ’em gangs.” He similarly whined that watching the NFL was like watching “a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons.”
Once, after arguing with a Black man who called into his show, he told the caller to “take that bone out of your nose and call me back.“ Another time, Limbaugh asked his audience, “Have you ever noticed how all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson?” while discussing the Black civil rights activist and politician. Limbaugh once ludicrously asserted that “if any race of people should not have guilt about slavery, it’s Caucasians.” He invited a guest on air who sang “Barack, the Magic Negro” to the tune of “Puff, the Magic Dragon.” In 2016, he read an essay on air that had been penned by a well-known white supremacist.
Limbaugh’s radio career was also one long exercise in misogyny, perhaps best summed up by his thesis that “feminism was established so as to allow unattractive women easier access to the mainstream of society.”
In one of his most infamous episodes, he called Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke a “slut” and a “prostitute” in 2012 after she testified in Congress about the importance of women having access to birth control.
Nearly every marginalized group or minority bore the brunt of Limbaugh’s bigotry. Once, while speaking about the genocide of America’s indigenous peoples, Limbaugh said, “Holocaust 90 million Indians? Only 4 million left? They all have casinos, what’s to complain about?”
Limbaugh frequently mirrored white nationalist talking points when discussing Latino immigrants, whom he described as lazy and dependent on the government. He called migrants at America’s southern border an “invasion.”
An opponent of marriage equality — which he suggested was “perverted” and “depraved” — Limbaugh argued in 2016 that legalizing gay marriage would lead to bestiality. “What happens if you love your dog?” he said. He once referred to transgender people as being mentally ill.
Throughout the 1980s and ’90s, Limbaugh also frequently denigrated those who were HIV positive, saying the best way to stop the spread of the virus was to “not ask another man to bend over and make love at the exit point.” He spoke out against federal funding to fight the virus too, calling it the “only federally protected virus.”
His Father’s Son
Limbaugh’s journey to becoming one of America’s foremost bigots began in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, where he was born to a prominent local political family on January 12, 1951. His father, a lawyer and Republican activist, would sternly lecture about politics in the home and rant against communism. Limbaugh later called his father “the smartest man I ever met.”
At age 14, Limbaugh says his parents bought him a Remco Carevelle radio set, which enabled him to broadcast on AM channels within a few hundred square feet of his house. In high school, Limbaugh worked as a DJ at KGMO, a local radio station co-owned by his father.
“Even when I was a little boy, I dreamed of being on the radio,” Limbaugh told biographer Ze’ev Chafetts. “In the mornings getting ready for school I’d hear the guy on the radio, and he just sounded free and happy, like he was having a wonderful time. That’s what I wanted, too.”
Limbaugh enrolled at Southeast Missouri State University but dropped out after a year to pursue a career in radio. Throughout the 1970s, he worked at different radio stations in Missouri and Pennsylvania but was often fired after clashing with management. He eventually landed a steady on-air gig in Sacramento, California, before getting hired to host his own show at WABC in New York, which remained his flagship station throughout much of his career. Subscribe to the Politics email.From Washington to the campaign trail, get the latest politics news.
As his fame rose, Limbaugh liked to explain his success by claiming he had “talent on loan from God,” but it was a Reagan-era Federal Communications Commission policy shift that allowed Limbaugh to reach national infamy and create the mold for modern right-wing media stardom. In 1987, the FCC abolished the decades-old Fairness Doctrine which mandated that TV and radio broadcasters present both sides of controversial issues. This meant that stations were no longer required to feature opposing views, and instead radio hosts like Limbaugh could spend hours spouting off right-wing fallacies without challenge.
Decades before online extremists and pro-Trump trolls used memes and ironic detachment to make their far-right beliefs seem less repugnant, Limbaugh’s employed the same strategy. He popularized cartoonish terms such as “Commie-Libs” and “Feminazi,” while also claiming that abortion represented a “modern day Holocaust.” He used mocking voices and affectations as he belittled women’s rights, Black activists and the gay community. His persona as an absurd blowhard gave audiences an excuse to brush off Limbaugh’s mainstreaming of far-right views as part of an act — just Rush being Rush, or El Rushbo, as he was often called.
Becoming A National Star
The end of the Fairness Doctrine allowed for Limbaugh’s brand of unhinged right-wing rhetoric and shock jock persona to become a media phenomenon. By 1990, his nationally syndicated show aired on 300 stations ― a number that more than doubled over the next four years.
Limbaugh’s rise turned him into a ubiquitous cultural figure in the 1990s. Limbaugh’s voice echoed for hours a day on syndicated radio stations around the country; he appeared on magazine covers and in newspaper profiles. His success made him into a curiosity for the mainstream media, but little of the coverage properly grappled with what Limbaugh was doing to radicalize his listeners.
As his radio audience grew, Limbaugh got his own half-hour television show on Fox in 1992 and created a prototype for prime time opinion shows hosted by right wing pundits like Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson. The show’s executive producer was Limbaugh’s longtime friend Roger Ailes, who would go on to launch Fox News in 1996 and run it for two decades until he was fired for widespread sexual harassment.
Limbaugh’s political influence made him beloved among Republican Party elites. When the GOP won the House for the first time in 40 years in 1994, Republicans called him the “majority maker.” At then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s victory party, they sold “Rush Limbaugh for President!” T-shirts.
But Limbaugh never fully tied his fate to any one politician, always staying focused on his own success above all else. “I don’t define my success by who wins elections, because politicians are going to come and go, and I’m going to be around as long as I choose to be,” Limbaugh told Time Magazine in 2008.
Like any successful right wing media star, Limbaugh had a financial angle behind his vitriol and an appetite to center himself in controversies. He turned his infamy into extreme wealth: In 2008, he signed an an eight-year deal for his show worth around $400 million. He bought a private jet and a fleet of luxury cars to usher him from place to place.
“I wanted to be the reason people listened,” Limbaugh told The New York Times in 1990. “That’s how you pad your pocket.”
While he claimed to represent the views of the average American, Limbaugh lived for years as a caricature of an East Coast elite in his luxury condo overlooking Central Park in New York City. He sold the property in 2010 for $11.5 million, moving primarily to a sprawling mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, where he lived until his death.
Meanwhile, Limbaugh used his platform to condemn policies designed to actually help working class Americans. He fervently opposed the expansion of public health care and said an Obama-era health insurance program for low-income children “ought to die.” He condemned taxes against the ultra-rich, such as himself, and fled New York after the proposal of increased taxes on millionaires.
In 2006, Limbaugh — despite once saying that all drug addicts should be convicted and “sent up the river” — struck a plea deal with prosecutors in Florida after being charged with prescription fraud. Limbaugh, who admitted to being an oxycodone addict, was accused of “doctor shopping,” the act of deliberately deceiving physicians in order to receive multiple prescriptions. Although Limbaugh had previously told his listeners that “too many whites are getting away with drug use” and should all be sent to prison, Limbaugh avoided time behind bars himself, paying a $30,000 fine and agreeing to stay clean.
The President’s Ear
Limbaugh was still the most popular radio host in America by the time of the 2016 election. Although initially supportive of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tx.) during the Republican primary, he became a staunch supporter of the eventual nominee, Donald Trump. Limbaugh could be counted on to support the president during some of the most disgraceful episodes of Trump’s sole term in the White House.
In 2017 white supremacists, emboldened by Trump’s presidency, gathered in Charlottesville, Virginia, for the “Unite The Right” rally, the largest such gathering in a generation. A neo-Nazi rammed his car into counter-protesters at the rally, killing one person. Trump initially refused to condemn the white supremacists, and Limbaugh swiftly came to the president’s defense, blaming anti-racist activists for the violence.
It was part of a pattern for Limbaugh, who repeatedly tried to downplay white supremacists during Trump’s four years in the White House, a period of rising far-right terror across the globe. After an avowed white supremacist massacred 51 Muslims inside two New Zealand mosques in 2019, Limbaugh speculated on air that the shooter “may in fact be a leftist” who shot Muslims “to smear” those on the right.
A day after a mob of Trump supporters — among them white supremacists and militia members — stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, ransacking the seat of American democracy, Limbaugh falsely told his listeners no looting had occurred and that the protesters only “took selfies.”
Limbaugh then endorsed the political violence, saying he disagreed with those “who say that any violence or aggression at all is unacceptable,” before invoking America’s Founding Fathers. “I am glad Sam Adams, Thomas Paine, the actual Tea Party guys, the men at Lexington and Concord didn’t feel that way,” he said.
It’s no surprise that Limbaugh sought to downplay the historic insurrection, which Trump incited. Limbaugh was a close confidant of the president, and he and Trump often went golfing together in Florida. The president sometimes called into Limbaugh’s radio show, and Limbaugh claimed they spoke on the phone weekly.
Their relationship culminated with Trump awarding Limbaugh the Presidential Medal of Freedom during the State of the Union address in February 2020. In his speech, Trump heralded Limbaugh as “a special man” who has inspired millions of Americans through his “decades of tireless devotion to our country.” Limbaugh had announced the day before that he had lung cancer.
The next month, when the coronavirus pandemic began sweeping across the U.S., Limbaugh promoted conspiracy theories about the virus and its death toll. Despite that, Vice President Mike Pence, the head of the White House coronavirus task force, appeared on his show multiple times during this period.
Limbaugh spent his final months on air downplaying the historic pandemic and spreading dangerous medical misinformation, including calling coronavirus “the common cold” and telling listeners “we have to remember that people die every day in America.”
On the day Limbaugh died, the coronavirus had killed more than 488,000Americans.
Congress is heading full steam ahead with the Equality Act, legislation to expand LGBTQ civil rights protections President Biden campaigned on signing within his first 100 days in office, with introduction of the bill expected imminently and a House floor vote now scheduled for next week, the Washington Blade has learned.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who manages the floor proceedings in the House, affirmed in a “Dear Colleague” letter on Tuesday the Equality Act would be one of two pieces of legislation the chamber will take up next week in the aftermath of consideration of the American Rescue Plan to address coronavirus relief.
“Other legislation coming to the floor next week are two bills that passed through the House last Congress: a wilderness package and the Equality Act, which will end legal discrimination against LGBTQ Americans,” Hoyer writes.
Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) are set to introduce the Equality Act in their respective chambers of Congress as they have in years past.
Although the Supreme Court decision last year in Bostock v. Clayton County extended vast protections for LGBTQ people under federal law, securing a prohibition against anti-LGBTQ discrimination in the workplace sought for decades by movement leaders as well as all areas of civil rights law where sex discrimination is prohibited, the Equality Act would take things a step further.
In addition to the explicit declaration that anti-LGBTQ discrimination is a form of sex discrimination in employment, education, housing, jury service and credit, the Equality Act would amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex and LGBTQ status in public accommodations and federal programs.
Further, the Equality Act would expand the definition of public accommodations under federal civil rights law to include retail stores, banks, transportation services, and health care services. The legislation would also establish that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act — a 1994 law aimed at protecting religious liberty — can’t be used to enable anti-LGBTQ discrimination.
The Equality Act was the cornerstone of President Biden’s campaign promises to LGBTQ people. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told the Washington Blade at the start of the month Biden “stands by” his campaign promise to sign the legislation within 100 days, but added Congress has to take the initial steps.
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) signaled late Tuesday he would oppose the Equality Act, legislation to expand the prohibition on anti-LGBTQ discrimination under federal law, throwing a massive wrench into plans of the bill’s supporters to guide it into law.
“Sen. Romney believes that strong religious liberty protections are essential to any legislation on this issue, and since those provisions are absent from this particular bill, he is not able to support it,” said Arielle Mueller, a Romney spokesperson, via email to the Washington Blade in response to an inquiry on the Equality Act.
Romney’s office didn’t immediately respond to a follow-up email on whether Romney would be open to negotiations on religious liberty language that could lead him to support the legislation.
The Utah senator’s declared opposition to the Equality Act, which would amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to expand the prohibition on discrimination against LGBTQ people, comes shortly after news emerged House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) would hold a vote on the legislation in the U.S. House next week.
Although the Equality Act, sponsored by Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) in the House and Sen. Jeff Merkeley (D-Ore.) in the Senate, would likely have no trouble passing in the Democratic-controlled House, the Senate is a different story. With the makeup of that chamber a 50-50 party split, support from 10 Republicans would be needed to reach the 60 votes to end a filibuster on the legislation.
LGBTQ rights supporters were counting on Romney to contribute Republican support to get the Equality Act across the finish line. With his vote off the table, it’s hard to see how the legislation’s proponents would be able to find the 10 votes in the Republican caucus to end a filibuster.
President Biden had campaigned on signing the legislation in his first 100 days in office. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said last week Biden “stands by” his promise, but noted Congress has to take some additional steps.
Romney’s opposition to the Equality Act is consistent with remarks he made earlier this month in which he associated himself with Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-Ky.) attack on transgender kids in sports during Education Secretary-designate’s Miguel Cardona’s confirmation. To the condemnation of LGBTQ rights supporters, Paul said transgender participation in sports amounts to allowing boys in girls events and was a “bizarre” idea.
Romney echoed those comments during the same confirmation hearing, saying he would “associate” himself with Paul.
“That’s not something I say very frequently, but he made a very, very good point,” Romney said. ““I’ve got pictures of my eight granddaughters, amongst some grandsons, behind me. They shouldn’t be competing with people who are physiologically in an entirely different category.”
The Equality Act doesn’t explicitly address school sports, but it would affirm discrimination against transgender kids is prohibited in education and federal programs and suggest barring transgender kids from school sports is prohibited. Major sports associations, including the Olympics and the NCAA, have established internal rules based on sex characteristics, such as hormone levels, to govern allowing transgender athletes to compete based in those leagues on their gender identity.
If 10 Republicans aren’t present in the Senate to vote to end a filibuster on the Equality Act, one alternative would be for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to junk the legislative proceeding altogether. However, that would require a majority vote and support from the entire Democratic caucus, and Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), the only out bisexual in Congress, have said they won’t vote to scrap the filibuster.
The Blade couldn’t reach Sinema or Manchin’s office by press time Tuesday to comment on the Equality Act and whether the senators would reconsider their positions on the filibuster if the legislation is unable to advance in the Senate.
Romney’s opposition to the Equality Act stands in contrast to his statement in 1994 to Log Cabin Republicans, when he challenged the late Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) for his seat representing Massachusetts in the Senate. At the time, Romney said he would not only back the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, legislation to ban anti-gay discrimination in employment, but “if possible broaden [it] to include housing and credit.” Romney ended up losing in his challenge to Kennedy, much like he lost the 2012 presidential election against then-President Obama.
Pennsylvania lawmaker Brian Sims made headlines back in 2012 when he became the first openly gay man elected to the Pennsylvania state legislature. Now he’s looking to make history again by announcing his run for lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania.
“I have a lot of hope when I look at the people across the country that decided over these last number of years that they’d had enough. That they looked at a lack of leadership and thought that they could do better and oftentimes they’re right,” said Sims in his announcement video.
Even though it’s been more than five years since the Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges that same-sex couples have the right to marry “on the same terms and conditions as opposite-sex couples,” dozens of states still have constitutional amendments on the books that ban gay marriage.
Virginia is one of those states, and its first openly LGBTQ legislator is leading the charge to ax the outdated law.
Democratic state Sen. Adam Ebbin is sponsoring SJ 270, which would replace language in the state Constitution defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman with an affirmative statement that the right to marry is fundamental “regardless of the sex or gender of the parties to the marriage.”
“For young LGBTQ people, or even those who aren’t married or don’t want to get married, removing this language is an important step … It tells them that they matter, that they are equal to everyone else in the state.”
FRAN HUTCHINS, EQUALITY FEDERATION
On Feb. 5, SJ 270 cleared the Senate by a margin of 24 to 12. One day earlier, HJ 582, the House version, passed 60 to 33.
In Virginia, though, overturning a constitutional amendment is a two-year process — one that requires two separate General Assembly sessions separated by a general election to pass identical bills before a measure is put on the ballot for a public vote.
Since the landmark Obergefell ruling, at least eight states have tried to remove similarly unenforceable marriage bans, according to the Equality Federation. In November, Nevada became the first to do so, with 62 percent of voters backing the measure.
But 30 states still have such prohibitions written into their constitutions, according to the Movement Advancement Project. Sixteen of them also ban civil unions, and two, including Virginia’s, prohibit any legal recognition of gay relationships.
“For young LGBTQ people, or even those who aren’t married or don’t want to get married, removing this language is an important step,” Equality Federation Executive Director Fran Hutchins said. “It tells them that they matter, that they are equal to everyone else in the state.”
But homophobic laws can have a long shelf life in Virginia. Although the Supreme Court ruled that sodomy bans were unconstitutional in 2003’s Lawrence vs. Texas decision, it took a full decade for Virginia’s to be struck down — and even then it was by a federal appeals court, not by legislators.
The Code of Virginia first restricted marriage to different-sex couples in 1975, the same year clerks in Arizona and Colorado issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples. In 1997, the General Assembly passed a statute denying recognition of gay marriages performed in other states.
Then, in 2006 — three years after Massachusetts became the first state to allow same-sex marriage — lawmakers sponsored the Virginia Marriage Amendment, a ballot initiative reserving the institution for one man and one woman. Also known as the Marshall-Newman Amendment, the measure further barred any recognition of unmarried couples “that intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance, or effects of marriage.” Voters approved the resolution 57 to 43, and it was implemented as Article I, Section 15-A of the Virginia Constitution.
Civil rights advocates argued its broad language could be used to invalidate living wills, powers of attorney and even property agreements between same-sex partners. In an opinion piece in The Washington Post, gay conservative Jonathan Rauch branded the amendment a “Jim Crow” law for the 21st century.
“It disenfranchises gay people as individuals,” he wrote. “It makes us nonpersons, subcitizens. By stripping us of our bonds to each other, it strips us even of ownership of ourselves.” In January 2014, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring announced his office would not defend the amendment in federal court.
“I believe the freedom to marry is a fundamental right,” Herring told reporters at the time, “and I intend to ensure that Virginia is on the right side of history and the right side of the law.”
Less than a month later, U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen for the Eastern District of Virginia found the Virginia Marriage Amendment unconstitutional in Bostic v. Rainey, paving the way for same-sex marriage in Virginia later that year.
Then, in June 2015, the Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges guaranteed the freedom to marry on the federal level.
Last March, the Virginia General Assembly repealed two laws banning same-sex marriage. But neither that nor the Obergefell ruling can remove what Ebbin calls “a stain” on the Virginia Constitution.
“All citizens deserve the dignity to know they won’t be targeted and denied their rights, and an affirmative statute does that,” he told NBC News. “It’s not about personal opinion; it’s about the law. You can keep your marriage between a man and a woman, but the law says it’s a right for everyone to enjoy.”
He and state Delegate Mark Sickles, who is also gay, have been introducing bills to update the state Constitution since 2015. Before now, they had always been defeated. This time, they received support from 11 Republicans, including state Senate Minority Leader Tommy Norment, R-James City, who supported the original 2006 marriage ban amendment.
This session, lawmakers are also working to repeal Virginia’s HIV criminalization law and strike down religion-conscious exemptions for foster care and adoption agencies.
Danica Roem, the first transgender member of the Virginia General Assembly, is also introducing legislation to ban the so-called panic defense, which has been used to excuse or mitigate violent crimes against gay and transgender people.
Ebbin said the General Assembly has become increasingly supportive of gay rights since he started as a delegate in 2004. The LGBTQ caucus now has five members, including Roem.
“We’ve moved from being on the defensive to where we as a governing body affirm the rights and equality of all Virginians,” he said. “It was a bipartisan vote, and there wasn’t an active opposition on the floor.”
There’s also support among voters: In 2014, 50 percent of Virginians supported same-sex marriage, according to the Public Religion Research Institute. By 2017, the last year the group polled on the question, that had jumped to 60 percent.
In 2020, a national polI by the group found a record 70 percent of Americans supported same-sex marriage, including about half of Republicans.
“They realize gay people can get married and the sky won’t fall,” Ebbin said. “So unless the Legislature goes through some drastic change, I predict that we’ll pass it.”
Still, efforts to repeal the marriage amendment have been met with resistance.
In an email to members, Victoria Cobb, president of the conservative Family Foundation of Virginia, warned that Ebbin and Sickles were trying to redefine marriage “outside of what God has designed for human flourishing.”
“As expected, all of society, including those whose deeply held convictions have not moved with secular society, are uniformly expected to not only abide those with differing views on marriage but embrace them in their speech and celebrate them in their business life,” she wrote, the Tennessee Star reported.
State Sen. Amanda Chase, a Trump loyalist running for governor, told the Virginia Mercury she voted against Ebbin’s measure to take “a stand for traditional values.”
“I personally believe that marriage is between a man and a woman,” said Chase, who has been formally censured for supporting the Capitol rioters and is suing her own party for holding a nominating convention in lieu of a primary. “If other people choose differently, that’s their choice, but I do not believe that this should be a constitutional amendment.”
Delegate Kirk Cox, the other Republican lawmaker running for governor, opposed Sickle’s bill in the House. Though the proposal includes a provision allowing clergy to refuse to perform any wedding, a spokesperson for the lawmaker told the Mercury that “Delegate Cox’s faith informs his views of the nature of marriage.”
“In the competition to demonstrate who is the most extreme and out of touch, Cox and Chase are neck and neck,” Anna Scholl, executive director of Progress Virginia, said in a statement. “This vote against marriage equality is just the latest example.”
On the national level, the Republican Party’s national platform — which hasn’t changed since 2016 — defends “natural marriage, the union of one man and one woman” as the cornerstone of the American family, and affirms that “every child deserves a married mom and dad.”
The GOP headquarters did not respond to a request for comment about Virginia’s proposals.
‘A tale of two states’
Carol Schall, a plaintiff in Virginia’s 2014 gay marriage case, said it is well past time Virginia’s Constitution reflect the will of the people. And there’d be a sort of historic symmetry, too: It was Virginia’s anti-miscegenation law, after all, that spurred Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court decision outlawing bans on interracial marriage.
“Virginia has long been on the wrong side of history when it comes to civil rights,” Schall said. “But we finally got this one right. This amendment doesn’t reflect the reality anymore.”
An associate professor at Virginia Commonwealth University, Schall has been with her wife, Mary Townley, for 36 years. The two were legally married in San Francisco in 2008, during the brief window when California recognized same-sex marriages before the passage of Proposition 8.
Schall said leaving your rights to a court decision “is kind of naive,” especially considering how the Trump administration appointed more than 50 circuit court judges and three Supreme Court justices in just four years. LGBTQ civil rights group Lambda Legal issued a report last month that found nearly 40 percent of Trump’s confirmed federal appellate judges have a “demonstrated history of anti-LGBTQ+ bias.”
Following the high court’s rejection of an appeal from former Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis last year, conservative Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito (neither of whom was a Trump appointee) issued a scathing dissent that said the Obergefell ruling “will continue to have ruinous consequences for religious liberty.”
“If the courts change their minds — which they do — as long as we have that amendment, the state would have to enforce it,” Schall, 60, said. “I don’t want that hanging over my family’s head.”
Schall lived in Virginia in 2006 and was canvassing outside a polling station when voters passed the Virginia Marriage Amendment. She recalled having flyers opposing the measure shoved back in her hands.
“It was terrible,” she said. “It felt very personal — like all of Virginia voted and I lost.”
Since then, she said, there’s been a seismic shift. Virginia has gone from a Republican stronghold to a solidly blue state that went for Joe Biden in November.
“We used to be the state of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, of Ralph Reed. It didn’t feel safe to be out at work, to be out to my neighbors,” she said. “It’s different now. Virginia has done this mindfully, the work of educating our neighbors, and at some point the zeitgeist here shifted.”
Well, maybe not entirely, she added.
“Virginia is really a tale of two states,” she said. “In the east, you have the ‘golden crescent’ that’s pretty progressive. But to the west, we still have Liberty University. We still have people who think I’m living a life of sin.”
After officiating a same-sex wedding for two friends in 2019, Republican Delegate Denver Riggleman was censured by the state GOP for “abandoning party principles,” according to The Hill. The following summer, he was defeated in a drive-thru party convention by primary challenger Bob Good, a former athletics director at Liberty University.
And thanks to gerrymandering, Schall said, the state is more splintered than ever.
“I live in Chesterfield County near Richmond, but because of the way the Republicans have carved things up, Amanda Chase is my state senator,” she said.
Schall is confident about the new amendment’s chances but admits “the work is never done.”
“We passed it this year, but we have to keep a Democratic majority in the Assembly and a Democratic governor when it comes up for a vote again,” she said.
A former Vermont woman, accused of kidnapping when she fled the country more than a decade ago, is now behind bars. Lisa Miller had fled the United States in a child custody dispute with her former civil union partner, Janet Jenkins.
After more than 10 years, Miller turned herself in to authorities in Nicaragua, and was listed Monday afternoon as an inmate at a federal detention center in Miami.
A federal judge in Florida ordered that she stay in jail until her case can be transferred to a federal court in the western district of New York, where the kidnapping charges were brought.
Jenkins v. Miller is a federal case in Vermont brought by a lesbian woman, Janet Jenkins, against her former civil union partner, Lisa Miller, who “renounced” homosexuality and kidnapped their then 7-year-old daughter, Isabella, in 2009 to avoid shared visitation and custody with Jenkins.
After breaking off their Vermont civil union, Lisa, the child’s biological mother, took their daughter to Virginia in 2004. Lisa converted to fundamentalist Christianity and began withholding Isabella from Janet.
A custody battle ensued in both the Vermont and Virginia courts. The Vermont courts awarded visitation rights to Janet and the Virginia courts upheld the Vermont decision. SPLC-designated hate group Liberty Counsel represented Lisa in the custody litigations.
A longtime JMG readers will recall, I’ve been reporting on this case since the early years of JMG. The links below are in reverse chronological order going back to 2009.
Social-distancing measures and lockdowns have disproportionately increased alcohol use in the LGBTQ community, studies find.
Abigail Mazzarella, 26, often went to gay bars in Baltimore before Covid-19 stay-at-home measures were introduced.
“I don’t live anywhere near my family, so I did depend on that community and friendships to get by and have a type of family here,” she said.
When bars in the state closed, this physical community disappeared as Mazzarella needed its support the most. But the liquor store across her street remained open. Around the same time Covid-19 infection rates were increasing early last March, Mazzarella’s mother unexpectedly died, and exactly one week later she lost her job because of the impact of pandemic restrictions.
“I started drinking pretty much immediately after all that happened, and didn’t really stop for months,” she told NBC News. “I wasn’t drinking socially; I was just doing it by myself in my house and spending a ridiculous amount of money on it for no reason other than just to get drunk, go to sleep and do it again the next day. I wasn’t functioning for a good half of 2020.”
Mazzarella has not had a drink in more than four months, but her experience with alcohol during the pandemic is far from isolated. Several recent studies investigating how both social-distancing and lockdowns affected LGBTQ people found alcohol use sharply increased.
One study discovered around one-third of men who have sex with men (MSM) reported their substance use or binge-drinking had increased during the Covid-19 lockdown, with another survey of LGBTQ university students in the U.S. by the University of Maryland Prevention Research Center revealing 32 percent were drinking more since the outbreak.
Drinking increased among the wider population during the pandemic, too, but at a lower rate compared to the LGBTQ community. Research published in September found that the frequency of alcohol consumption in the general population since the pandemic started grew by 14 percent above pre-pandemic levels. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also reported that 13 percent of U.S. adults said they had started or increased substance use, defined as use of “alcohol, legal or illegal drugs, or prescription drugs that are taken in a way not recommended by your doctor,” to cope with pandemic-related stress or emotions, in late June last year.
At-risk groups
Boredom, isolation and loneliness have been experienced by many Americans amid the pandemic. LGBTQ people, however, also face additional challenges, including increased stress from social prejudice and discriminatory laws, as well as family rejection due to their sexuality or gender identity, which can play a role in using damaging substance-based coping mechanisms.
Some parts of the LGBTQ community have seen particularly sharp rises in drinking over the past 11 months. According to research from John Salerno, who co-wrote the University of Maryland Prevention Research Center study of LGBTQ university students, 46 percent of transgender female students and 35 percent of queer-identifying students reported increased alcohol use since the start of the Covid-19 crisis.
“We found that those that reported an increase in alcohol use were more likely to suffer from greater psychological distress compared to those that did not report an increase in alcohol use,” Salerno, a Ph.D. candidate in behavioral and community health at the University of Maryland, said.
The breaking of social bonds among young LGBTQ adults who are exploring their identity can be especially traumatic. A studypublished in the Emerging Adulthood journal found that after social-distancing guidelines went into effect, LGBTQ people aged 18-29 had “lower levels of hope for the future, higher levels of alcohol use, a lower sense of connection to and pride regarding the LGBTQ community.”
Some LGBTQ students who moved back home as the pandemic spread had to isolate with families who don’t accept their sexuality or gender identity, according to Barrett Scroggs, an assistant professor of human development and family studies at Pennsylvania State University Mont Alto and co-author of the Emerging Adulthood report.
“These emerging adults are folks who might be leaving their college dorm where they’re very comfortable, open and out. Then they return home to a house where they have to go back in the closet or maybe have to be with somebody who is homophobic, biphobic or transphobic,” Scroggs said.
Dianna Sandoval, chief clinical officer of AspenRidge Recovery, a network of rehab centers that offers LGBTQ-specific addiction treatment, explains that LGBTQ people are at a greater risk of being victims of violence and harassment, which can lead to more frequent cycles of distress and depression resulting in addictive behaviors.
“We’re already seeing higher levels of mental health challenges in the LGBT community being compounded with isolation,” Sandoval said. “Because it’s so difficult for folks to connect even to the small communities they’ve built for themselves, due to social distancing, there’s an even greater distance between people in the LGBT community. Some people just don’t feel that same sense of connection over Zoom.”
‘Perfect storm’
Christian Cerna-Parker, CEO of the New York-based nonprofit Gay and Sober, said he has seen the age of people reaching out to his organization dropping since the pandemic hit.
“I’ve seen people as young as 19 come in recently. Normally, people who reach out for help are in their 40s or 50s,” he said.
He added that the number of people seeking help from his organization with their substance misuse and addiction issues has rapidly shot up, too.
“From March until now, we’ve had a 40 percent increase in people wanting our services,” Cerna-Parker said.
He said for many people the combination of job losses, not being to partake in typical everyday activities and social isolation was “a perfect storm for an increase of alcohol and drugs.”
“Before they knew it, some of them found they were predisposed to addiction and things got out of hand,” Cerna-Parker said. “There’s only so much that people can take. If they think: ‘I don’t have a job, I don’t have income, and the government is not sending me unemployment,’ there is lack of hope. That’s a really dangerous place to be because the only thing they need to self-medicate is alcohol.”
Manny Minnie, 36, has experienced first-hand how the isolation and lack of social contact caused by Covid-19 restrictions can contribute to problematic drinking behavior.
“My thing with alcohol is that I drink a lot more when I’m bored,” Minnie, who lives in Los Angeles, said.
He had recently been diagnosed with AIDS and low immunity levels made it essential for him to enter quarantine. Minnie usually drank only on the weekends, but once lockdown was introduced, he said his drinking spiraled out of control.
“I was drinking every day. I’d start with a box of wine, then have a regular sized bottle of vodka and open a 12-pack of beer,” he said. “When I would wake up, I’d have maybe three beers left. It was a 24-hour thing.”
A check-up visit to his doctor was the catalyst for Minnie to stop drinking.
“Before I even thought about quitting drinking, I was drinking a lot. Then my doctor said: ‘I don’t know what you’re doing to your body. Your immunity is getting lower and lower; you have to stop doing whatever you’re doing.’”
Anxiety, stress and physical withdrawal symptoms — mainly shaking and sweating — made the journey to sobriety a challenge, but Minnie said through painting, he found a way to channel his energy into a positive output, rather than turning to alcohol.
Now, Minnie is using his experience with alcoholism to help newcomers to 1,000 Hours Dry LGBTQIA, an Instagram community for queer people who are on a journey to sobriety or are “sober curious.”
“When I was drinking, it was like my energy source was this broken Bic lighter that would just have a spark,” Minnie said. “When I stopped drinking, the light just grew and grew.”
Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday announced the U.S. will “reengage” with the U.N. Human Rights Council.
The U.S. in 2018 withdrew from the council, which in recent years has emerged as a vocal champion of LGBTQ rights around the world.
Then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley during a press conference that announced the withdrawal noted countries “with unambiguous and abhorrent human rights records” are members of the council. Haley also accused it having a “chronic bias against” Israel.
Russia, Cuba and Venezuela are among the 47 countries that are currently members of the council.
“The Biden administration has recommitted the United States to a foreign policy centered on democracy, human rights and equality,” said Blinken in a statement the State Department released. “Effective use of multilateral tools is an important element of that vision, and in that regard the president has instructed the Department of State to reengage immediately and robustly with the U.N. Human Rights Council.”
“We recognize that the Human Rights Council is a flawed body, in need of reform to its agenda, membership, and focus, including its disproportionate focus on Israel,” he added. “However, our withdrawal in June 2018 did nothing to encourage meaningful change, but instead created a vacuum of U.S. leadership, which countries with authoritarian agendas have used to their advantage.”
The decision to “reengage” with the council comes days after President Biden issued a memorandum that commits the U.S. to promoting LGBTQ rights abroad. Blinken in his statement notes the council’s efforts to expand LGBTQ rights around the world.
“When it works well, the Human Rights Council shines a spotlight on countries with the worst human rights records and can serve as an important forum for those fighting injustice and tyranny,” said Blinken. “The council can help to promote fundamental freedoms around the globe, including freedoms of expression, association and assembly, and religion or belief as well as the fundamental rights of women, girls, LGBTQI+ persons, and other marginalized communities. To address the council’s deficiencies and ensure it lives up to its mandate, the United States must be at the table using the full weight of our diplomatic leadership.”
“In the immediate term, the United States will engage with the council as an observer, and in that capacity will have the opportunity to speak in the council, participate in negotiations, and partner with others to introduce resolutions,” he added. “It is our view that the best way to improve the council is to engage with it and its members in a principled fashion. We strongly believe that when the United States engages constructively with the council, in concert with our allies and friends, positive change is within reach.”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday, amid coronavirus and impeachment crises, President Biden “stands by” his campaign pledge to sign the Equality Act to expand the ban on anti-LGBTQ discrimination under the law within 100 days — although she indicated Congress has to take initial steps with the legislation.
“He stands by it,” Psaki said, responding to a question during the White House news briefing from the Washington Blade. “I would say that there’s some actions that need to be taken by Congress, of course.”
Psaki half-jokingly pointed out the Biden administration started days ago, 15 or so, which she implied she leaves plenty of time for Biden to fulfill his campaign promise to the sign the Equality Act within 100 days.
“So we have 85 days to go,” Psaki said.
With Biden making four crises of the economy, coronavirus, climate and racial inequity his top priorities, as well as the forthcoming impeachment trial of former President Trump, fears had persisted in the LGBTQ community Biden wouldn’t be able to fulfill his campaign pledge on the Equality Act. Additionally, 10 Republican votes would be needed for the 60 votes to end a filibuster on the legislation in the Senate.
Psaki, however, said she had no information when asked when Biden would speak out in support of the legislation, which would be key in his role as chief legislator in advancing the Equality Act.
“I think the President has been out speaking out about a range of issues he’s committed to, including many on LGBTQ rights, over the course of the last two weeks of his presidency, and he will continue to be,” Psaki said. “But I don’t have any scheduling updates for you at this point in time.”
A senior Democratic aide told the Blade that Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) are looking at the week of Feb. 22 to introduce the Equality Act with a vote expected as early as March.