Anti-Gay House of Delegates Speaker Cox to Be Targeted in November Elections

Anti-gay Speaker Kirkland Cox

The Washington Post is reporting that the, in my view, utterly toothless Equality Virginia ("EV"), is planning on targeting House Speaker Kirk Cox (R-Colonial Heights) and Majority Leader Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah) for defeat in November after Virginia Republicans yet again killed all non-discrimination protections for LGBT Virginians.  Yes, Cox and Gilbert need to be defeated, but don't hold your breath waiting for EV to pull it off, especially if the Democrats do not field top quality candidates to oppose them.  Meanwhile, if EV had placed more focus on securing passage of these bills and less time attacking Governor Northam, the strongest ally EV has ever had in the governor's mansion, and riling up its own donor base in the process, perhaps the bills might have succeeded this legislative session. EV also needs to grasp that with Republicans, bipartisanship doesn't work.  They only understand the threat of electoral defeat,  

Democrats will be headed into the November elections suffering from self-inflicted wounds, thanks to national Democrats who butted into Virginia's affairs and self-aggrandizing organizations like the Human Rights Campaign which I suspect talked EV into attacking Northam.  Personally, I've had enough and I have stopped my monthly donations to EV and will likely end up going to the Commonwealth Dinner in April - we had already bought tickets before EV's attacks on Northam - solely so the husband and I can give the EV board members and Democrat elected officials in attendance a piece of our minds face to face.  Here are excerpts from the Post story:

Gay and transgender activists, fed up with four consecutive defeats in trying to ban discrimination in housing and government employment, say they will now turn to the ballot box, targeting GOP leaders who have failed to support them. “No one has taken a more bipartisan approach than we have,” said James Parrish, executive director of Equality Virginia, which lobbied for the bills that passed the Senate but died in a House subcommittee. . . . The only solution we see now is new leadership.”

State Republicans hold a two-seat majority in the Senate and a three-seat majority in the House, with one seat open for a special election in a district previously held by a Democrat. A federal court approved a new redistricting map Thursday that is expected to favor Democrats.

Equality Virginia says it will work to unseat House Speaker Kirk Cox (R-Colonial Heights) and Majority Leader Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah) because it blames those leaders for blocking a full committee hearing of the bills.

The bills would have prohibited discrimination in all state and local government jobs on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity, and barred housing discrimination against people in those same groups, with exceptions for rentals in single-family homes, property owned by religious organizations or private clubs.

Advocates thought they had a better-than-average chance for passage this year given the Republicans’ determination to try to win back seats in November and attract suburban swing voters, who are more open to supporting gay and transgender people than some constituencies within the Republican Party.

“We don’t live in 1980 anymore, and it’s time for us to get past this and not discriminate against a community when most people don’t have a problem with this community,” Del. Roxann L. Robinson (R-Chesterfield), who sponsored the legislation, said earlier this year.

Conservative groups, including the Virginia Catholic Conference and the Family Foundation [Virginia's leading hate group], opposed the effort. . . . “Once again, the speaker and majority leader said ‘nope, under our watch this is not going to happen,’ ” Parrish said.

Cox “is only the speaker because his name was drawn out of a bowl,” he said, referring to how state officials broke a tied legislative race and handed control of the House of Delegates to Republicans. “He did not have a mandate . . . Now we will pivot, look at the new maps. Speaker Cox is in a very different district this year. That will be a priority of ours.”