Exxon Mobil Finaslly Adds Employment Protections for Gays

Before it was acquired by Exxon, Mobil Oil had a full compliment of pro-LGBT polices.  All of those went away after Exxon took control and for years Exxon resisted reinstituting the policies.  Now, perhaps pushed by Barack Obama's non-discrimination executive order applying to all federal contractors, Exxon-Mobil has at last restored LGBT employment protections.  Think Progress has details.  Here are highlights:

For over a decade, ExxonMobil shareholders and company officials have repeatedly voted against extending corporate policy to protect LGBT people from discrimination, earning it the Human Rights Campaign’s lowest ranking for LGBT inclusion among the country’s largest businesses. That reputation just came to an end, as the company has officially added “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to its officially protected classes.

The company’s newly updated Standards of Business Conduct confirm that the inclusive language is now present. Both sexual orientation and gender identity are explicitly included as protected statuses for both its Equal Employment Opportunity Policy and Harassment in the Workplace Policy.

An ExxonMobil spokesperson confirmed to ThinkProgress that the policies had been updated, adding, “ExxonMobil’s policies prohibit all forms of discrimination in any company workplace, anywhere in the world. ExxonMobil supports a work environment that values diversity and inclusion, and has numerous inclusive programs and policies that help make ExxonMobil a great place to work.”

The policies indicate that they have been “modified for application in the United States.” This suggests that ExxonMobil made the change specifically because of President Obama’s executive order last summer requiring that all contractors of the federal government must have policies protecting their LGBT employees. ExxonMobil was undoubtedly the largest such contractor without a policy.

A suit accusing ExxonMobil of discriminating against gay candidates for job openings in Illinois is ongoing.

LGBT workplace protections are but one factor that the Human Rights Campaign considers on its corporate scorecard, which means ExxonMobil’s rating will not immediately be salvaged by the change.

Transgender Federal Employee Wins Major Discrimination Case

Tamara Lusardi

Here in Virginia, gays and transgender Virginians have ZERO non-discrimination protections under state law.  While we can now legally marry, we can nonetheless be fired from our jobs at will and face discrimination in housing and other realms.   At the federal level things aren't much better except now federal employees and employees of federal contractors are being held to non-discrimination requirements.  Today, a major victory was won by a transgender federal employee who had faced discrimination and harassment.  It goes without saying that the Christofascists will be hyperventilating and let out spittle flecked rants that they have now lost the right to discriminate in federal employment situations.  Here are details on the case from the Washington Post:

The U.S. Office of Special Counsel on Thursday announced a landmark determination that the Department of the Army engaged in “frequent, pervasive and humiliating,” gender-identity discrimination against Tamara Lusardi, a veteran and civilian Army software specialist who transitioned from male to female.

Lusardi was working in the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center (“AMRDEC”) in Redstone, Ala., when she transitioned from male to female in 2010. During that time, the Army improperly restricted her restroom usage, referred to her with male pronouns and by her birth name and stopped giving her work, the OSC said in a report released Thursday.

In a telephone interview from Alabama, Lusardi, 49, who served in the Army from 1986 to 1993, including in Desert Storm, said she was called “sir” and “it” by co-workers and management after she legally changed her name, driver’s license and security clearance and began dressing as a woman.   Lusardi was also required to use a single-user, gender-neutral restroom, out of concerns that other employees might feel “uncomfortable” sharing a restroom with her.

The OSC, a federal investigative and prosecutorial agency, said that coworker preferences alone “cannot justify discriminatory working conditions,” since it could reinforce the very stereotypes and biases that nondiscrimination laws are intended to protect against. According to the report, Lusardi should be able to use bathrooms designated for her gender identity.

The case is part of a broader push by the federal government and the OSC to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees in the government.

In July, Obama signed an executive order banning workplace discrimination against millions of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees of federal contractors and the federal government. The executive order prohibits firing or harassment of federal contractors based on sexual orientation or gender identity, and it bans discrimination against transgender employees of the federal government.
 
In response, the Army agreed to provide training to correct and prevent future discrimination, the OSC said. It also now permits Lusardi to use the restroom associated with her gender identity.

The Army did not respond to further requests for comment, but it agreed to the OSC’s recommendation to provide workplace diversity and sensitivity training, with a specific focus on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues.

Republicans Have Zero Reaction To Obama's ENDA Executive Order

The Christofascists and professional Christian/hate group leadership crowd have been going berserk and engaging in spittle flecked rants over Barack Obama's signing of an ENDA executive order barring federal contractors (and their subcontractors) from discriminating against LGBT employees in the workplace.  Meanwhile, the leadership of the Republican Party has been remarkably silent on the issue.  One does have to wonder why given the usual willingness of GOP politicians to shamelessly prostitute themselves to anti-gay Christofascists.  Perhaps it is because survey after survey shows that high majorities of the public support such employment protections.  A piece in the Huffington Post looks at the GOP's strange silence on this issue that has portions of its base having apoplexy.  Here are highlights:

When President Barack Obama signed an executive order Monday making it illegal for federal contractors to fire or harass employees based on their sexual orientation or gender identity, civil rights advocates hailed the move as one of the most important actions ever taken by a president to stem discrimination.

Democratic lawmakers raced to issue statements celebrating the advancement for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. In addition to offering new protections for transgender federal employees, the executive order covers the broad federal contracting community -- some 24,000 companies employing 28 million workers, or about one-fifth of the nation's workforce.

But in Republican quarters on Capitol Hill, it's as if nothing happened. GOP leaders have been silent. Socially conservative members have gone quiet.

The Huffington Post searched the websites of the 18 congressional Republican backers of the proposed Employment Non-Discrimination Act -- a companion bill to the executive order -- to see if any of them put out a statement. Only one did: Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), who said he supports the policy behind the executive order because "employees shouldn’t face unjust discrimination in the workplace simply because of their sexual orientation," though he raised concerns about the rights of religious employers.

Perhaps nobody better illustrated this point than House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio). HuffPost asked him Thursday if he had any reaction to Obama's LGBT executive order.  "Nope," Boehner said at his weekly briefing. "The president signs a lot of executive orders."

Asked if he supports the principle of workplace protections being extended to LGBT employees, he punted again.  "Listen, the president is going to make his decisions. He can," Boehner said.

Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.), one of the eight House GOP co-sponsors of ENDA, said Thursday that he didn't know about Obama's executive order. But he emphasized that if it has the same goal as ENDA -- which it does, except that ENDA has far broader implications -- he supports it.

"I co-sponsored ENDA because I think that should be the law for everyone," Grimm said.

The Republican lawmaker shrugged when asked if he thinks it's hurting his party that so many are sitting on the sidelines amid a revolution in LGBT rights. He said he thinks his colleagues are coming around. Slowly.

"Generally, I think our party is in transition," Grimm added. "More people are starting to pay attention."

Will Christofascists Seek to Circumvent the new ENDA Executive Order?

While the ENDA executive order signed by President Obama on Monday did not include a broad "religious exemption" like the one contained in the Senate version of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, it did leave intact a much narrower exemption from a prior executive order.  The question now is whether Christofascists will seek to use the hold over exemption as a loop hole to continue to place themselves above the law and discriminate against LGBT individuals at will.  One should never under estimate the Christianist belief that the rule of law does not apply to them.  A piece in Think Progress looks at this issue.  Here are excerpts:

The order has been lauded for not including any exemptions that might have allowed religious organizations to continue discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, but it could put LGBT people of faith in a new challenging position to defend their intersecting identities.

The new executive order does leave intact a specific religious exemption created in an executive order by President George W. Bush. That exemption specifically allows faith-based organizations that contract with the federal government to make employment decisions on the basis of workers’ religious identity, mirroring a similar exemption found in the Civil Rights Act. For example, a Catholic-run organization could choose not to hire non-Catholic employees. The new order has no impact on the many religious organizations that received federal funding in the form of grants.

Hypothetically, this exemption is narrow and does not allow for any other forms of discrimination, but this has yet to be tested against LGBT protections. Unlike other protected classes like race and national origin, sexual orientation and gender identity are often invisible identities, and some religious traditions reject the existence of these identities altogether, framing them instead as sinful behaviors that violate religious tenets.

This framing is already apparent in conservative responses to the executive order. The Family Research Council’s Peter Sprigg described the order as “nothing less than viewpoint blackmail that bullies into silence every contractor and subcontractor who has moral objections to homosexual behavior.” He went on to claim that respecting a religious organization means allowing it to “require its employees to conduct their lives in a way consistent with the teachings of their faith is an organization.” Ryan T. Anderson of the Heritage Foundation more bluntly asserted that sexual orientation and gender identity are “not like race,” but are “unclear, ambiguous terms” that can refer to “voluntary behaviors as well as thoughts and inclinations.”

If religious organizations that are bound by the executive order refuse to abide it, it could put LGBT people of faith in a position to have to justify their identities. For example, an evangelical church-run organization could try to claim that a lesbian employee is by default not a Christian and attempt to use the Bush-era exemption to justify firing her. This is despite the fact that there are many LGBT-affirming churches . . . The employee would be faced with defending both her religious identity and her sexual orientation simply to retain her job, which may not even have any responsibilities related to ministry work.

 

An administration official told Metro Weekly earlier this month that religion would not justify any employment decision “unless they fall within the ministerial exception.” Similarly, Maggie Garrett, Legislative Director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, told ThinkProgress that while she does expect religious organizations will attempt religious justifications for LGBT firings, she thinks it’s a “losing” argument.

The new executive order suggests that a Catholic organization that wants to continue providing services to the federal government must not only retain employees in same-sex marriages, but also provide them equal marriage benefits as well. If Catholic Charities refuse, they may have to sacrifice the federal contracts altogether, but if they try fight the order on religious grounds, they might also have to then justify why employees who violate other Catholic tenets addressing divorce or birth control are not similarly refused employment.

Illinois Lawsuit Against Exxon-Mobil for Anti-Gay Bias to Move Forward

Year after year the Board of Directors of Exxon-Mobil refuses to enact workplace non-discrimination policies protecting LGBT employees (ironically, Mobil had such protections until it was acquired by Exxon).  Now, because of its failure to protect LGBT employees from discriminatory workplace practices, Exxon-Moil has found itself facing a lawsuit under the State of Illinois' non-discrimination laws.  While claiming that the lawsuit is "baseless" - yeah, just like I'm Queen Victoria - has refused to admit liability.  Now, the Illinois Human Rights Commission has ruled that the lawsuit can move forward. Here are highlights from The Washington Blade:

A complaint alleging anti-gay bias in hiring practices at oil-and-gas giant ExxonMobil can move forward now that the Illinois Human Rights Commission overturned a lower body’s decision to dismiss the case.

In a decision dated July 14 and obtained Tuesday by the Washington Blade, the Illinois Human Rights Commission — a 13-member body that determines whether unlawful discrimination has occurred under Illinois state civil rights law — remanded the case back to the Illinois Department of Human Rights, which had thrown out the case in January on the basis of lack of jurisdiction.

“The Respondent’s dismissal of Freedom to Work’s charge is VACATED and Freedom to Work’s charge is REINSTATED and REMANDED to the Respondent for FURTHER INVESTIGATION and other proceedings to consistent with this Order and the Act,” states the order, which was signed by Illinois Human Rights Commission Executive Director N. Keith Chambers.

The relief sought by Freedom to Work includes a change in ExxonMobil’s equal employment opportunity policy to enumerate protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity as well as attorney’s fees.

Although the Illinois Department of Human Rights dismissed the case on the basis of no employer-employee relationship between Freedom to Work and ExxonMobil, the order indicates that both Freedom to Work and the department later petitioned the Illinois Human Rights Commission to remand the case so a thorough investigation could proceed.

Peter Romer-Friedman, counsel at Freedom to Work and attorney at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, say now that the case has been remanded, ExxonMobil will have to explain why it elected to hire the less-qualified straight candidate.

“We are relieved but not surprised by the state agency’s decision that Freedom to Work and other civil rights groups have the right to challenge unlawful discrimination, including Exxon’s sexual orientation discrimination,” Romer-Friedman said. “This decision means that Exxon will have to answer tough questions about why it treated a well-qualified LGBT applicant far worse than a straight applicant who had lesser qualifications. The decision also paves the way for other non-profit groups to enforce civil rights laws.”

Tico Almeida, president of Freedom to Work, predicted ExxonMobil will be “dragged kicking and screaming” this year into adopting workplace protections for its LGBT employees — either because of his organization’s complaint or Obama’s executive order.

“This oil giant has a lot to lose here, and it should be clear that the clock is ticking and it’s now time to update Exxon’s policies to give LGBT Americans a fair shot on the job,” Almeida said.

In the interest of full disclosure, I inherited a chunk of Exxon-Mobil stock from my late parents who had owned Mobil stock for 40 years before the Exxon takeover and reversal of Mobil's enlightened polices.  Since they had a minimal basis, they never sold the stock to avoid getting hit with a large tax bill.  With my stepped up basis, I was able to unload the stock  without tax impact rather than be involved with an anti-gay company.

Religious Right Anger At Obama For ENDA Order Reaches New Extremes

As noted in an earlier post, the "godly folk" are going absolutely berserk in response to Barack Obama's signing of a presidential executive order barring that bans federal government contractors from discrimination based on sexual orientation and/or gender identity.  The volumes of spittle flying from the flapping jaws of the professional Christian class and hate group leaders is off the charts.  All of the reaction stems from the Christofascists' desire to be above the law and free to harm and discriminate against LGBT individuals without restriction.  The New Civil Rights Movement looks at the batshitery that both depicts "godly Christians" as victims of "persecution" and encourages violence against gays.  Here are highlights:

Calling today's signing "a path toward a new thought-policing state where those who hold traditional values about marriage and family are to be marginalized," National Organization For Marriage president Brian Brown claimed the "fact is that non-discrimination rules like the order issued by President Obama can become a weapon used to punish and harass individuals and groups who support marriage as the union of one man and one woman."

The irony of course is that NOM is crusading for laws, like DOMA, that would enable them and their fellow believers to discriminate against LGBT people.

Fox News religion reporter Todd Starnes writes that Obama's new executive orders amount to "the federal government bullying religious groups that hold viewpoints it deems inappropriate." 

Of course, that's false. The religious right wants to have its cake and eat it too. They want the legal right to fire and harass LGBT people for being LGBT, and they want the federal government to use your tax dollars to support that harassment.

Starnes quotes the virulently anti-gay Pastor Robert Jeffress as well.

“The problem with this executive order is that it paves the way for the next one – which could withhold the tax-exempt status or broadcast licenses for religious organizations holding biblical beliefs with which the administration disagrees,” Jeffress told me.
The Obama administration seems hell-bent on forcing Christians to assimilate to the militant LGBT agenda. Resistance is futile.

And, of course, the Family Research Council's Peter Sprigg.

“If religious organizations cannot require that their employees conduct themselves in ways consistent with the teachings of their faith – then, essentially, those organizations are unable to operate in accordance with their faith,” Peter Sprigg, Senior Fellow for Policy Studies at the Family Research Council, told me.

“The mask is coming off of the homosexual movement’s agenda. They really do not believe in religious liberty. They want forced affirmation of homosexual and transgender conduct to trump every other consideration in the workplace – including religious liberty.”

An important reminder here -- at issue is a company's "right" to hire and fire someone for being LGBT. This is what they are fighting for. This is the "deeply-held Christian belief" that the anti-gay religious right is so desperate to retain.

In a separate statement, Sprigg -- who has called for gay people to be deported -- writes that "President Obama has ordered employers to put aside their principles, and practices in the name of political correctness. This level of coercion is nothing less than viewpoint blackmail that bullies into silence every contractor and subcontractor who has moral objections to homosexual behavior.
This order gives activists a license to challenge their employers and, expose those employers to threats of costly legal proceedings and the potential of jeopardizing future contracts." . . . People with deeply held convictions regarding the morality of certain types of sexual behavior should not be bound by the dictates of President Obama's agenda.

As for the credentials of bigots like Sprigg, it is always useful to note that they lack any legitimate credentials  that qualify them for setting social or legal regulations.  Despite the lofty titles they give to themselves, they are little more than far right crackpots who do not deserve to be given the time of day by legitimate journalists.  Her are Sprigg's "qualifications":

Mr. Sprigg is an ordained Baptist minister. Before coming to FRC, he served as pastor of Clifton Park Center Baptist Church in Clifton Park, N.Y. Mr. Sprigg previously served for ten years as a professional actor and unit leader in Covenant Players, an international Christian drama ministry. . . . Mr. Sprigg received the Master of Divinity degree cum laude from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (Mass.).

 Only in Christofascist circles would someone like Sprigg be deemed qualified to pontificate on the cause of sexual orientation, child rearing, and constitutional law.  

President Obama Signs Executive Order on LGBT Workplace Discrimination

Following through on promises made last week and request from LGBT groups long before that, President Barack Obama signed an executive order that bars federal contractors from discrimination against employees based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.  Of equal significance is the fact that the executive order does not contain a religious exemption.  That's right, no special rights for Christofascists.  As will be noted in additional blogs posts, the Christofascists are beyond livid.  Obama has had the audacity to reject their demands for special rights to discriminate at will.  Here are highlights from the President's comments prior to the signing of the executive order:

Many of you have worked for a long time to see this day coming. You organized, you spoke up, you signed petitions, you sent letters -- I know because I got a lot of them. (Laughter.) And now, thanks to your passionate advocacy and the irrefutable rightness of your cause, our government -- government of the people, by the people, and for the people -- will become just a little bit fairer.

It doesn't make much sense, but today in America, millions of our fellow citizens wake up and go to work with the awareness that they could lose their job, not because of anything they do or fail to do, but because of who they are -- lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender.  And that's wrong. We're here to do what we can to make it right -- to bend that arc of justice just a little bit in a better direction.

In a few moments, I will sign an executive order that does two things. First, the federal government already prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Once I sign this order, the same will be explicitly true for gender identity. (Applause.)

And second, we're going to prohibit all companies that receive a contract from the federal government from discriminating against their LGBT employees. (Applause.) America's federal contracts should not subsidize discrimination against the American people.

Now, this executive order is part of a long bipartisan tradition. President Roosevelt signed an order prohibiting racial discrimination in the national defense industry. President Eisenhower strengthened it. President Johnson expanded it. Today, I'm going to expand it again.

Currently, 18 states have already banned workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. And over 200 cities and localities have done the same. Governor Terry McAuliffe is here; his first act as governor was to prohibit discrimination against LGBT employees of the Commonwealth of Virginia. (Applause.) Where did Terry go?  Right back here.

Equality in the workplace is not only the right thing to do, it turns out to be good business. That's why a majority of Fortune 500 companies already have nondiscrimination policies in place. It is not just about doing the right thing -- it's also about attracting and retaining the best talent. And there are several business leaders who are here today who will attest to that.

And yet, despite all that, in too many states and in too many workplaces, simply being gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender can still be a fireable offense. There are people here today who've lost their jobs for that reason. This is not speculative, this is not a matter of political correctness -- people lose their jobs as a consequence of this. Their livelihoods are threatened, their families are threatened. In fact, more states now allow same-sex marriage than prohibit discrimination against LGBT workers. So I firmly believe that it's time to address this injustice for every American.

While the executive order would not have saved me from being fired from a law firm for being gay, it will send a strong message to  members of the business community who will now see federal contractors hiring based on who is the best and brightest, not on the basis of outmoded religious beliefs and outright bigotry.  Here are some excerpts from the Executive Order itself:

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including 40 U.S.C. 121, and in order to provide for a uniform policy for the Federal Government to prohibit discrimination and take further steps to promote economy and efficiency in Federal Government procurement by prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, it is hereby ordered as follows: 

Section 1. Amending Executive Order 11478. The first sentence of section 1 of Executive Order 11478 of August 8, 1969, as amended, is revised by substituting "sexual orientation, gender identity" for "sexual orientation".  

Sec. 2. Amending Executive Order 11246. Executive Order 11246 of September 24, 1965, as amended, is hereby further amended as follows: 

(a) The first sentence of numbered paragraph (1) of section 202 is revised by substituting "sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin" for "sex, or national origin". 
(b) The second sentence of numbered paragraph (1) of section 202 is revised by substituting "sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin" for "sex or national origin". 
(c) Numbered paragraph (2) of section 202 is revised by substituting "sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin" for "sex or national origin". 
(d) Paragraph (d) of section 203 is revised by substituting "sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin" for "sex or national origin".

Sec. 5. Effective Date. This order shall become effective immediately, and section 2 of this order shall apply to contracts entered into on or after the effective date of the rules promulgated by the Department of Labor under section 3 of this order.

Law Professors Urges Obama to Deny Religious Exemption in ENDA Order

Even as the Christofascists and their political whores in the Republican Party push for special rights to discriminate for religious extremist (.i.e., evangelical and fundamentalist Christians), more people are coming to recognize the danger of writing a license to discriminate and trample on the rights of others both into the law and Barack Obama's promised ENDA executive order.  Joining the opposition to special rights to select religious groups are a group of law professors who have urged Obama to not give in to pressure for a deceptively called "religious exemption" to the order's effectiveness.  If one bothers to do a cursory reading of the First Amendment and the history surrounding it, the Founding Fathers never intended to grant broad rights to discriminate to a the few.  Freedom of religion meant freedom to worship as one chose and to not have to give tax support to an established church.  Here are highlights from a piece in the New York Times:

More than 50 constitutional law professors urged President Obama on Monday not to include a religious exemption in an expected order barring federal contractors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Conservative religious leaders want the rule, still being drafted, to exempt religious groups that object to homosexual behavior.

But legal experts, organized by Katherine M. Franke of the Columbia University Law School, said in an open letter that church groups are already allowed to favor members of their faith in hiring, and that a new exception would allow employers to discriminate using taxpayer dollars and enshrine a second-class legal status for gay, lesbian and transgender workers.

The letter can be found here.

LGBT Rights Groups Drop Support for ENDA

Rea Carey

In the wake of the ruling in Hobby Lobby which radically expanded religious based rights to discriminate, leading LGBT Rights groups have dropped their support for the Senate passed version of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act ("ENDA") which includes an expansive religious exemption.  The fear is that if the Hobby Lobby rational is applied to the exemption, ENDA could become a license to discriminate against LGBT employees - the total opposite of the Act's objective.  Rea Carey of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force has an op-ed in The Advocate that lays out why the NGLTF has dropped its support for ENDA.  Here are highlights:

The morning the sun rose after the Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby ruling, we all woke up in a changed and intensified landscape of religious exemptions being used as an excuse to discriminate. The reality is that while politics is about compromise, some compromises are too great.

After much soul searching, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Action Fund has decided to withdraw its support for the current version of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. As one of the lead advocates on this bill for 20 years, we do not take this move lightly but we do take it unequivocally — we now oppose this version of ENDA because of its too-broad religious exemption.

Frankly, it is becoming harder and harder for me, for us, to tolerate our own moral and political inconsistencies by protesting the Hobby Lobby decision, then advocating for the current ENDA with its broad religious exemption, and then insisting that the president not include a broad exemption in the upcoming executive order protecting LGBT people working for federal contractors. How can we demand that a woman have coverage for reproductive healthcare at a company but support a bill that allows a lesbian cafeteria worker in the religiously affiliated hospital next door to be fired from her job?

In the last year alone, we have seen a wave of attempted and successful efforts at imposing religious exemptions on issues of reproductive health and LGBT equality on the local, state, and federal level. And it is crystal clear in the week following the Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby decision that the momentum is building on religious exemptions. Not 48 hours after the decision, Pastor Rick Warren joined other faith leaders in a letter to the president asking that he include a broad religious exemption in the contractor executive order. We cannot be complicit in writing such exemptions into federal law.

There is a better alternative: federal nondiscrimination legislation that contains a reasonable religious accommodation. LGBT people should have the same protections as those contained in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Legal equality is legal equality. 

The campaign to create broad religious exemptions for employment protections repeats a pattern we’ve seen before in methodically undermining voting rights, women’s access to reproductive health, and affirmative action.

We are also deeply concerned that ENDA’s broad religious exemption will serve as a template — a new floor, not a ceiling — not only for our work on LGBT nondiscrimination across the country, but also for other issues that affect our community deeply including marriage, access to HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention, and access to other reproductive health services. We are well aware that there are many states with zero protections for LGBT people. This weighs on us heavily, as does the fact that many LGBT people would be at risk of having no protections with this broad religious exemption. We will all need to double down to move forward on nondiscrimination laws in the states where none exist as we push for federal protections with a fair and equal religious accommodation.

There is nothing inherently inconsistent between religion and living our lives freely as LGBT people. We do not need to settle for a law that has a loophole this large, that will embolden our opposition and that has the potential to curb our progress on other federal, state, and local laws protecting LGBT people and their families.

Carey is 100% on the money in her analysis.  We cannot afford to see passage of a law that could perversely become a vehicle for anti-gay discrimination.

Supreme Court Broadens Hobby Lobby Ruling - Are Gay Rights Next?

Showing the utter lie of the majority's "narrow" ruling in the Hobby Lobby case, the same all male majority expanded that ruling's scope by ordering lower courts to rehear any cases where companies had sought to deny coverage for any type of contraception, not just the specific types Hobby Lobby was opposed to.  As stated before, the thrust of the majority ruling in Hobby Lobby is the granting of special rights to Christofascists and granting one set of religious beliefs above all others.  The ruling is a desecration of the concept of religious freedom set forth in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  Mother Jones looks at the out right lie contained in Justice Alito's majority opinion.  A quote at Joe My God lays out how the Christofascist will be gunning for LGBT anti-discrimination laws next.  First these highlights from Mother Jones:

Less than a day after the United States Supreme Court issued its divisive ruling on Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, it has already begun to toss aside the supposedly narrow interpretation of the decision. On Tuesday, the Supremes ordered lower courts to rehear any cases where companies had sought to deny coverage for any type of contraception, not just the specific types Hobby Lobby was opposed to.

 The science was against Hobby Lobby—these contraceptives do not prevent implantation of a fertilized egg and are not considered abortifacients in the medical world—but the conservative majority bought Hobby Lobby's argument that it should be exempted from the law.

Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote the the 5-4 opinion, used numerous qualifiers in an attempt to limit its scope, but a series of orders released by the court Tuesday contradict any narrow interpretation of the ruling.

The court vacated two decisions by the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit—Autocam Corp. v. Burwell and Eden Foods v. Burwell—and commanded the appeals court to rehear the cases in light of the Hobby Lobby decision. In both instances the Sixth Circuit had rejected requests from Catholic-owned businesses that sought to exempt the companies from offering insurance that covered any of the 20 mandated forms of birth control. The Supreme Court also compelled the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to reopen a similar case, Gilardi v. Department of Health & Human Services. "With Tuesday's orders," wrote The Nation's Zoë Carpenter, "the conservative majority has effectively endorsed the idea that religious objections to insurance that covers any form of preventative healthcare for women have merit."

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg predicted this outcome in her dissent, noting that the logic of Alito's decision went far beyond the limited scope he initially claimed. "The court, I fear, has ventured into a minefield," Ginsburg wrote.

What could these rulings mean for LGBT non-discrimination protections?  Matt Foreman makes a frightening prediction via Joe My God:

"Hobby Lobby dramatically escalates the harm that will be caused if President Obama succumbs to growing pressure from religious and anti-gay forces and (with implicit or explicit approval from HRC) puts an ENDA-like religious exemption in the promised Executive Order (EO) to prohibit anti-LGBT discrimination by federal contractors. While largely under the radar, this is, in fact, a crisis situation.

"Such an exemption would have been bad enough before Hobby Lobby, but the decision makes it even more deadly. The Hobby Lobby majority said the decision shouldn't be read to undermine employment nondiscrimination laws. BUT if the EO contains the ENDA exemption, there's nothing to stop the reasoning in Hobby Lobby from having full force and effect in justifying anti-LGBT discrimination by federal contractors - pushing the door even more widely open for discrimination against our people for essentially any reason whatsoever.

"The only acceptable religious exemption is the one long-contained in Title VII. Anything else can spell disaster for years to come, including profoundly weakening the impact of future federal nondiscrimination laws and our hopes to secure meaningful civil rights protections in the 29 states that still lack them. There is no moral or political justification for President Obama to cave and endorse LGBT people having less protections from discrimination than other Americans. This issue is not a side show; it is core to our equality."

The Christofascists are a pervasive force of evil that seek to do violence to the rights of others and secure for themselves special privileges shared by no one else.   Their power and influence needs to be destroyed once and for all. They deserve absolutely no special rights.