Civil Rights for LGBT People, Immigrants and Women Intersect
A tweet that I saw posted on Facebook this Sunday afternoon hours before the Second Presidential debate:
“Make no mistake, Ladies. Trump may be the face of your rapist, but Pence is every judge who made sure he got away with it”.
These words remind us as LGBTQ people, as transgender people, what is at stake not only in this Presidential election, but also in down ballot races and especially in the US Senate races where the makeup of the Supreme Court will be determined based on winning back a Democratic majority or not!
So, what are the possible consequences of this election?
Why and how are transgender rights, LGBT rights, women’s rights and immigration rights . . . all civil rights, all connected?
Governor Mike Pence has a long history of opposing the rights of LGBT people. During his time in Congress, Pence co-sponsored a constitutional amendment opposing the rights of same-sex couples to marry, and voted against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), hate crimes legislation protecting LGBT people and repeal of the military’s discriminatory “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
In March 2015, Governor Pence enthusiastically signed a bill into law permitting business owners in Indiana to refuse service to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender customers due to their religious beliefs. The bill was widely condemned by athletes, business owners and corporate America, leading to public condemnation and business pulling out projects in the state because of the bill’s discriminatory nature.
According to an interview in the Christian Post. Mike Pence confirmed that a Trump/Pence White House would rescind the Obama administration’s guidance protecting transgender students from discrimination.
“Pence explains that both he and Donald Trump believe that concerns about which bathrooms transgender students should use can be “resolved” at the local level. He added that children’s “safety” and “privacy” should be priorities in these decisions? — ?dog whistle terms referring to the myth that trans students are somehow a threat to other students and should be kept out of restrooms that match their gender identity.”
“Washington has no business intruding on the operation of our local schools,” Pence insists.
Pence also confirmed that a President Trump would either eliminate the contraceptive mandate in Obamacare or provide a religious exemption for all ministries and businesses.
“The Trump/Pence administration will be dedicated to preserving the liberties of our people, including the freedom of religion that’s enshrined in our Bill of Rights.”
This is the latest evidence that Trump, despite his claims of being LGBT-friendly, will cater to social conservatives’ anti-LGBT demands. Over the course of his campaign, he has taken just about every anti-LGBT position he can. He has promised to appoint Supreme Court justices who would overturn marriage equality, he’s backslid on protecting trans people from discrimination, and he has also said he would sign the First Amendment Defense Act, a federal bill that would legalize various forms of anti-LGBT discrimination. Trump’s only offering to the LGBT community? — ?granting the premise? — ?has been a post-Orlando homonationalist promise to defeat “radical Islam.”
Trump has refused to endorse the fully inclusive and comprehensive Equality Act which Hillary Clinton has championed.
The Freedom to discriminate, to deny equality and societal respect is what to expect.
Intersectionality of Immigration rights and Transgender Rights
Last month the Transgender Law Center joined MALDEF to file a lawsuit The Wall Street Journal described as “bringing together two of the country’s hottest political issues” — transgender rights and immigration.
“It’s true that much of the heated rhetoric, discriminatory legislation, and violence that has marked this year has centered on questions of gender and citizenship. “No men in women’s restrooms” and “build that wall” are currently battling it out for bigoted catchphrase of the year.”
The plaintiff, a husband and a father, must live daily with fears of his existence — stamped large on an Indiana State ID that uses his female birth name and thus outs him as transgender person every time he presents it.
The Indiana law that prevents all non-citizens in the state, from changing their name was passed in 2010, a year of sweeping legislative attacks on immigrants. It was the same year Arizona passed its infamous Senate Bill 1070, which has since largely been struck down by the Supreme Court. “Even though our client received asylum and before that benefited from the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, he is blocked from changing his name to match his identity because of a law that stereotyped immigrants as fraudsters and criminals — much as, in passing House Bill 2 this year, North Carolina legislators stereotyped transgender people as imposters and predators.”
“Humanity, dignity, and equal treatment under the law is not a zero-sum game, where to grant it to some requires denying it to others. You might say the opposite is true: Denying humanity to some is to deny it to all.”
The Indiana law, though perhaps designed to “just” target immigrants, in effect harms transgender immigrants most of all. It denies yet another trans person the dignity and respect of being able to go about his day safely and without being questioned.
Gender doesn’t end where xenophobia and racism begin
LGBT activists have argued that Trump’s selection of Pence as his running mate was also a huge overture to the religious right, given his extreme anti-LGBT record. Pence’s interview with Dobson, the founder of some of the biggest anti-LGBT organizations in the country (Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council), about all the anti-LGBT actions a Trump/Pence administration would take is the ultimate confirmation that he’s part of an anti-LGBT ticket.
Mike Pence’s views on abortion rights are heavily influenced by his religion as a born-again evangelical Catholic. During the vice presidential debate of the 2016 election Tuesday night, he said, “For me, my faith informs my life.” What he did not articulate, but is expressed in his actions is that his faith must “trump yours,” his religion must take precedence over yours in determining civil rights.
Pence is one of the most extreme anti-abortion legislators in the country. “It all, for me, begins with cherishing the dignity, the worth, the value, of every human life,” he said.
“Earlier this year, Pence signed a controversial anti-abortion law that would have banned abortions of fetuses sought over gender, race, ancestry, or diagnosis of a genetic disorder. The law also criminalized fetal tissue collection or transferring, a practice that is vital to life-saving fetal tissue donation and research (including for understanding of the Zika virus), and required women to view the fetal ultrasound hours before receiving an abortion. The law was so far-reaching that women in Indiana began calling Pence’s office to tell him about their periods — you know, since he seems to care about women’s reproductive health so much.”
Fortunately, A federal judge blocked the law in June. Imagine a Trump/Pence Supreme Court!
As a member of Congress and later as governor, Pence also gutted Planned Parenthood funding in his state, which resulted in the closure of multiple clinics. In 2015, this “inadvertently created” an HIV outbreak in one Indiana town, Media Matters reported, “by shutting down access to the only HIV testing centers available to many residents.”
Though there is little doubt how extreme Pence’s anti-abortion stance is, he made it explicitly clear on the campaign trail. “I’m pro-life and I don’t apologize for it,” he said during a town hall in July. Of a Trump/Pence administration, he said, “We’ll see Roe v. Wade consigned to the ash heap of history where it belongs.”
Oh, and for an extra kick in the pants: While in Congress, Pence voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act — which calls for equal pay for women — three times.
Vote and get out the vote as if your life depended upon it!
Category: Transgender Community News, Transgender Opinion, Transgender Politics
About the Author (Author Profile)
Babs at 76 passed away in 2019. She was a member of the Executive Committee of the Democratic National Committee, Deputy Vice Chair of the NJ Democratic State Committee and Political Director of the Gender Rights Advocacy Association of NJ. She served on the Executive Committee of Trans United 4 Obama. She has served as Vice Chair of the DNC Eastern Caucus, was President of NJ Stonewall Democrats, Co-Chair of National Stonewall Democrats Federal PAC Board, Vice-Chair of Garden State Equality, Executive Board member of National Stonewall Democrats as Chair of the DNC Relations Committee and a member of the NJ Civil Unions Review Commission.Subscribe
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Ironic that the very first sentence of the article conflates the ‘words’ of one candidate with the ‘act’ of rape, when the other candidate’s spouse stands accused of ‘actual’ rape and other ‘real’ sexual abuse by multiple victims.