Mark Takano Re-Introduced The Equality Act This Week

House GOP Is Busy With Hunter Biden & Assorted Nonsense

On Wednesday, when House Republicans were wasting everyone’s time with a disgraceful censure of Adam Schiff and while Marjorie Traitor Greene and Lauren Boebert were cursing each other out on the House floor and threatening to beat each other up, there was little oxygen left for Mark Takano’s reintroduction of the Equality Act. Takano, a co-chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, said “The promise of democracy means a great deal to me personally because I have felt the sting of its denial. As the first openly gay person of color to serve in Congress, I am acutely aware of the impacts lawful discrimination has on our marginalized communities in the United States, and the LGBTQI+ community have been subject to discrimination, violence, and the denial of their full personhood under the law for far too long. I’m proud to reintroduce the Equality Act as a long-overdue guarantee to all members of our community that we, too, benefit from explicit civil rights protections and the full promise of American democracy.”

Takano’s legislation, which has passed the House twice before— and then died in the GOP-controlled Senate— has broad public support, across party lines, geographies and religious affiliations. According to PRRI, 8 in 10 Americans favor comprehensive non-discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people, including 90% of Democrats, 82% of Independents and even 66% of Republicans. And even the U.S. Chamber of Commerce supports it. Remember, Republicans have passed bills banning gender-affirming care in 20 states, while 21 have banned transgender youth playing in gender-appropriate school sports. 9 states have passed transphobic bathroom bills.

What Takano is trying to do is amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, economic status, sex and national origin, to further prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation. On introducing it, he said “We cannot allow extremists in our country to once again normalize homophobia and attacks on LGBTQ people. We can’t turn away from the discrimination that still exists for so many LGBTQ people today.”

When the bill passed in 2021, it was opposed by the GOP and just 3 Republicans backed it, John Katko and Tom Reed, both now retired plus Brian Fitzpatrick, who might be the lonely GOP vote in favor— were McCarthy and Scalise even to allow the House to vote on it, which is unlikely. Notorious GOP closet cases like Patrick McHenry (NC), Jason Smith (MO) and Adrian Smith (NE) plus polymorphous pervert Matt Gaetz all voted against it.

Takano’s bill comes right as Adam Gabbatt reported that a well-funded but shadowy homophobic, far right legal organization, Alliance Defending Freedom, has been behind many efforts to roll back abortion rights, to demonize trans people, and to peel back the protections afforded to gay and queer Americans. “Since it was formed in 1994,” wrote Gabbatt, “Alliance Defending Freedom has been at the center of a nationwide effort to limit the rights of women and LGBTQ+ people, all in the name of Christianity. The Southern Poverty Law Center has termed it an ‘anti-LGBTQ hate group’ that has extended its tentacles into nearly every area of the culture wars. In the process, it has won the ear of some of the most influential people in the US, and become ‘a danger to every American who values their freedoms,’ according to GLAAD, the LGBTQ+ advocacy organization.

Through “model legislation” and lawsuits filed across the country, ADF aims to overturn same-sex marriage, enact a total ban on abortion, and strip away the already minimal rights that trans people are afforded in the US.

Under the Trump administration, the group found its way into the highest echelons of power, advising Jeff Sessions, the then attorney general, before he announced sweeping guidance to protect “religious liberty” which chipped away at LGBTQ+ protections.

The organization counts among its sometime associates Amy Coney Barrett, the supreme court justice who the Washington Post reported spoke five times at an ADF training program established to push a “distinctly Christian worldview in every area of law”.

ADF is engaged in “a very strong campaign to put a certain type of religious view at the center of American life”, said Rabia Muqaddam, senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights.

…[ADF’s] leaders remain involved in niche interpretations of Christianity. Kristen Waggoner, the ADF chief executive, also serves as legal counsel to Assemblies of God, a church which encourages worshippers to speak in tongues and believes in “divine healing”— the power of prayer— as a medical tool.

Over the past two decades, ADF has been a main driver in dozens of pieces of rightwing legislation and lawsuits.

The organization is currently behind the lawsuit 303 Creative, Inc v Elenis, which the supreme court is expected to decide this month, and which could chip away at LGBTQ+ rights. It’s a case that is classic ADF— a seemingly manufactured issue which the group has managed to chase all the way through the American legal system.

The plaintiff, 303 Creative, is a website design company. 303 Creative has never made wedding websites, but its owner, Lorie Smith, claims her first amendment rights are being impinged because, if she were to start making wedding websites, she would not want to make them for same-sex couples— which would violate Colorado’s anti-discrimination laws.

…Emerson Hodges, a research analyst at the SPLC, said what ADF is really doing is attempting to “undo LGBTQ social and legislative progress.”

“They go under the guise of religious liberty, and religious freedom. What that means, though, is this religious liberty to discriminate and the religious freedom to invalidate LGBTQ individuals,” Hodges said.

Worryingly, there are signs that ADF, and other groups like it, are growing in influence. As Republican politicians and rightwing media fan the flames of an extremist culture war, NBC reported that donations to ADF, which is a registered non-profit, more than doubled from 2011 to 2021.

As it has grown in influence, ADF’s “model legislation” has found its way into state legislatures across the country, as the group attempts to strip away LGBTQ+ rights, and the rights of trans people in particular.

“Just about every anti-LGBT legislation that you’ve seen probably in the past decade was probably copied or paraphrased off of a model legislation built by Alliance Defending Freedom,” Hodges said.

“They provide legal advocacy support, litigation and policy models for government officials.”

An article on ADF’s website states that it is a “biblical truth” that “men and women are physically different”, and the organization has duly worked to prevent trans people taking part in women’s sports.

The group sued a school district in Minnesota in 2016, and in 2021 a judge in Connecticut dismissed an ADF lawsuit which sought to prevent transgender athletes competing in high school sports. The same year, ADF backed a lawsuit brought by a teacher in Virginia who had said he would not use a transgender child’s preferred pronouns because that would amount to “sinning against our God.”

In April, ADF, which did not respond to a Guardian request for comment, filed in Oregon on behalf of a Christian woman who wanted to foster children, but said she would not agree to “respect, accept, and support … the sexual orientation, gender identity, [and] gender expression” of a child placed with her, the Statesman Journal reported.

“[ADF’s] obsession with targeting LGBTQ people is unhinged and drastically out of touch with supermajorities of Americans who support LGBTQ people and laws to protect us from discrimination,” said Sarah Kate Ellis, the president and chief executive of GLAAD.

“Everyone should understand the truth: the ADF is simply an anti-LGBTQ group trying to abuse levers of government to push discrimination and keep their warped sense of control.

“They’ve also worked to ban the right to choose, and are in cahoots with other extremist groups to oppress marginalized people. ADF is a danger to every American who values their freedoms— to be ourselves, live freely, and be welcome to contribute and to succeed in every area of society.”