Rep. Nadler to introduce DOMA repeal: "The time for dumping DOMA is long overdue."

Sometimes, I think the best LGBT member of Congress is Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY). He's not LGB or T, but he always goes the extra mile to support the LGBT agenda. During the controversy over the DOMA brief, Nadler vowed to introduce legislation to repeal DOMA:

For my part, I have long objected to DOMA as unfair and unconstitutional, and I am working toward a legislative solution that will ensure security and equality for all American families. I urge my colleagues to contact me and join the effort toward equality for LGBT Americans.

Obama made that promise, too, but we're far from ever seeing him act on DOMA (besides supporting it in court.) The Congressman from NY, however, is getting closer to keeping that promise. Matthew Bajko at Bay Area Reporter has the scoop on Nadler's bill:

The effort to repeal the federal ban against same-sex marriages will not include extending rights to LGBT couples in domestic partnerships or civil unions, the Bay Area Reporter has learned. But it will include a "certainty provision" requiring states to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states.

Congressman Jerry Nadler (D-New York), in an exclusive interview with the B.A.R. while attending the annual Human Rights Campaign gala in San Francisco Saturday, July 25, ruled out including anything other than legally recognized marriages in the legislation he plans to introduce either this week or once Congress returns from its August recess.

"No, it will not include domestic partnerships or civil unions. It is going to be just marriage," said Nadler, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, and therefore, will be the lead sponsor of legislation aimed at repealing the federal Defense of Marriage Act.

Under DOMA's Section 3 the federal government is forbidden from recognizing LGBT couples married in the six states where same-sex marriage is legal. Section 2 of the law says those states that outlaw same-sex marriages do not have to recognize legal same-sex marriages from other states. Nadler said his bill would repeal both sections of DOMA.

"We have got to repeal DOMA and have got to make sure it accomplishes for federal purposes allowing the federal government to recognize same-sex marriages," said Nadler, who led the fight to defeat a Federal Marriage Amendment that would have enshrined the same-sex marriage ban in the U.S. Constitution. "The time for dumping DOMA is long overdue."

This legislation will show us who are friends in Congress are and whether Obama will finally keep his promise to repeal the "abhorrent" law. As John noted below, this is where the LGBT community is. We're ready to repeal DADT and DOMA. We need our leaders -- at the White House, in Congress and in the groups -- to follow.

Nadler has been around Congress for a long time. He gets how to work the system. He's got a very powerful position on the House Judiciary Committee as Chair of the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Subcommittee. He's a powerful ally and I'm looking forward to reading the bill. This will get interesting -- and, we'll probably get push-back and over-heated analyses from the same gay critics who defended Obama's DOMA brief (most of whom had been working connections to get jobs in the Obama administration.) Read More...

Anglican bigots unite, you have nothing to lose but your humanity

The archbishop of Canterbury is again lambasting the US episcopal church for refusing to be as bigoted as he is. He warns that this could lead to a two-tiered church (presumably, one tier is for bigots, the other for everyone). At some point, it's worth asking what the point of your faith is if its basic tenets are so diametrically opposed to your own beliefs, morality, and common decency. Bigotry is one hell of a way to unite a church, Mr. Archbishop (and I use the word hell intentionally). Read More...

HRC holds DADT rally in Philly

The event got great attention from the media. It's clear that Don't Ask Don't Tell has become one of THE top issues for the community - not that it ever wasn't, but something has changed in the gay public. DADT and marriage have become even more important than they were before. And the media is listening. Read More...

Armed Forces celebrates diversity with gay serviceman in Soldier magazine

Clearly not a civilized country. Do US politicians think American service members are more bigoted, or less able to follow orders, than their British counterparts? From the Telegraph:

Trooper Wharton has served in The Household Cavalry Regiment for the past six years and came out after his initial training was over.

"I came out to the Army before I told my parents, so that says a lot for the Armed Forces," said the 22-year-old.

"I have always known I was gay but it wasn't until then that I told anyone."

Based at Combermere Barracks in Windsor, the Liverpool FC fan met his boyfriend Ryan during last year's London Gay Pride march.
He admits he is occasionally a target for teasing and banter, particularly for attending the concerts of acts such as Britney Spears and Pink, but insists his contemporaries have no problem with his sexuality.

He is soon to be promoted to lance corporal and he has already proved himself as a soldier, having deployed to Iraq on Operation Telic 10 in 2007 on long-range desert patrols.

Read More...

Senate to hold hearings on repeal of DADT. House bill now at 164 cosponsors.

Jason Bellini has the scoop from Senator Kirsten Gillibrand's office that there will be hearings on the repeal of DADT in the fall:

After determining she didn’t have enough votes in support of a temporary suspension of the ban on gays in the military, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand tells The Daily Beast she has secured the commitment of Senate Armed Services Committee to hold hearings on “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” this fall. It would be the first formal re-assessment of the policy since Congress passed it into law in 1993.

A statement from the Gillibrand’s office, shared exclusively with The Daily Beast, notes that “265 men and women have been unfairly dismissed from the Armed Forces since President Barack Obama took office.”

Gillibrand’s fast-track proposal for halting DADT, an amendment to the Military Reauthorization Act that would have ordered the Defense secretary to stop investigating gay service members, was never introduced. Even with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid expressing his support, Gillibrand couldn’t gather the 60 votes needed to avoid a filibuster, according to a spokesperson.

“I thought it was a long shot from the very beginning,” says Aubrey Sarvis, executive director the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, an organization fighting for the end of DADT.

“Clearly one of the positive things that came out of the Gillibrand amendment was that it served as a catalyst for hearings,” he added.

Okay, one other thing we inferred from the decision not to introduce a DADT repeal amendment is that we don't have the votes in the Senate. A whip list would be helpful. Someone must have done the count. Who is with us and who isn't in the Senate? There still isn't a bill in the Senate.

In the House, Rep. Patrick Murphy's bill to repeal DADT, HR 1283: the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2009, has 164 cosponsors. (And, to show how progress is being made, in the last Congress, our new Senate champion, Gillibrand, didn't even cosponsor the repeal bill.) Read More...

Backers of Gay Marriage Rethink California Push

NYT:

Discouraged by stubborn poll numbers and pessimistic political consultants, major financial backers of same-sex marriage are cautioning gay rights groups to delay a campaign to overturn California’s ban on such unions until at least 2012.

Earlier this year, many supporters of same-sex marriage seemed eager to mount a 2010 campaign to overturn Proposition 8, which was passed by California voters in November and defined marriage as “between a man and a woman.”

But the timing of another campaign has since been questioned by several of the movement’s big donors, including David Bohnett, a millionaire philanthropist and technology entrepreneur who gave more than $1 million to the unsuccessful campaign to defeat Proposition 8.

I think it's good that the donors are stepping in and saying, let's not do this unless we're going to win. As I've mentioned before in the legislative context, trying and losing can set you back. Read More...