Texas Republicans Seek to Nullify All LGBT Non-discrimination Ordinances

Proving once again that no LGBT individual with a sound mind should ever vote for a Republican, a powerful GOP controlled committee in the Texas legislature that would rescind every LGBT non-discrimination ordinance passed by local municipalities and bar localities from adding LGBT protections to current non-discrimination laws and ordinances.  Given the 1996 Supreme Court ruling in Romer v. Evans, it is questionable whether the state law, if enacted, would survive appellate court scrutiny.  In the interim, of course, years of litigation would be required to undo the damage to LGBT individuals during the lengthy court process.  All so that Republicans can prostitute themselves to their Christofascist masters.  Here are highlights from the Houston Chronicle on this anti-LGBT effort:

Entering the fray over where transgender Texans can use public bathrooms, a far-reaching bill that a powerful House committee is scheduled to hear next week would rescind several local ordinances aimed at protecting LGBT people from discrimination.

The one-page proposal, House Bill 2899, would prohibit cities and counties from passing non-discrimination ordinances and would not allow them to add or subtract to the classes of people already protected under state law. Authored by Republican Rep. Ron Simmons of Carrollton, the bill also would nullify all local non-discrimination measures across Texas that do not conform to the state's standards.

Current Texas law includes only race, color, disability, religion, sex, national origin and age as protected classes.

Simmons' chief of staff said Thursday that the lawmaker was not available to discuss his bill because he had already left Austin for the Easter holiday. His legislation is scheduled for a hearing Wednesday in the House State Affairs Committee.

 

While Simmons' bill does not mention bathrooms, it would replace non-discrimination criteria approved by city officials with those approved by state lawmakers. In effect, localities no longer could allow transgender people to use public bathrooms that match their gender identity in government-owned buildings because they would not be considered a protected class under state statute.

The initial bill, which Simmons told The Dallas Morning News he intended to amend before Wednesday's hearing, drew sharp rebukes from big-city officials, LGBT rights organizations and the state's largest business group. They have staunchly opposed attempts by some Republican lawmakers to restrict local elected officials' authority to pass their own measures against discrimination, which often include provisions to protect members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities.

Jeff Coyle, San Antonio's director of government and public affairs, said the bill, as written currently, would gut the non-discrimination ordinance that city council members approved in 2013.

 

Dallas City Councilman Lee Kleinman said  . . . . "We're against it because we have a non-discrimination ordinance, and we certainly don't want it preempted by the state," he said. "This is yet another one of these legislative sessions where they're just so adverse to municipalities; it's unfortunate, and I don't understand it."

 

Chris Wallace, president of the Texas Association of Business, also hinted at the group's opposition.  "We remain focused on stopping discriminatory legislation and keeping Texas open for business and inviting for all," he told the Morning News, adding that the association was still looking at Simmons' bill.

 Seemingly, Texas Republicans have learned nothing from the experience of North Carolina. 

Will Cities Turn Texas Purple?

Houston Skyline

Here in Virginia, while horrific gerrymandering has protected the Republicans in the Virginia General Assembly, in statewide elections it is seemingly becoming impossible for the GOP to win (this trend hopefully will continue and see Ed Gillespie go down to much deserved defeat).  Why?  The cities and urban areas no longer accept the GOP Kool-Aid and voodoo economics.   Some think a similar trend may be about to show itself in Texas where the progressive, modern cities are less and less friendly territory for the Christofascist and greed driven policies of the Texas Republican Party.  A column in the New York Times looks at the phenomenon which I hope will continue to play out. Here are highlights:

[A]s summer has turned to fall, Ms. Wendy Davis has entered new territory: Last week a poll by the Texas Lyceum, a nonpartisan, nonprofit educational institution, showed that Ms. Davis has narrowed that gap to just nine points, and pundits around the state are talking about a new momentum behind her. What happened?

The short answer is tactics. Ms. Davis’s campaign hasn’t been perfect, but she is dogged on the stump, and has stood up well to Mr. Abbott’s attacks.

Of course, Ms. Davis is still nine points back, and she has just five weeks to catch up. Which is why the longer explanation for her turnaround is more important, not just for Texas, but the country.

Many hoping to see Texas go purple point to the growth of its Hispanic community. And that’s part of it, but not everything. Population growth, soaring diversity and dense urbanization are also transforming Texas, much as they have done in Virginia and North Carolina.

Texas’ economy has been booming almost nonstop since 2000, and the state added 4.3 million people between 2000 and 2010. Americans came from every point on the map. Once a minority, the Hispanic population swelled, too, and will be the largest ethnic group in Texas this year (some say they could be the majority by 2020).

Yet there is far more to political change in Texas than the emerging Hispanic majority. Take greater Houston. The suburbs that once determined its voting patterns have become just one part of a megalopolis. Covering nearly as much territory as Maryland, the Houston area is the most diverse in America — even more so than New York or Los Angeles.  

Houston is not merely more Hispanic; the fastest-growing ethnic group is Asian. . . . And 98 percent of the population growth in the first 10 years of this century has been nonwhite.

The same trends are found in the Texas Triangle, an increasingly dense region bounded by Houston, San Antonio and Dallas-Fort Worth. It includes less than 20 percent of the state’s land but all its biggest cities. Conservative politicians do poorly in these settings.

The political shift is unmistakable. In Houston, 83 percent of residents favor a legal path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. Six in 10 say abortion is morally wrong but oppose making it harder for women to get one. In August, an effort to repeal Houston’s new equal protection ordinance for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transsexual people failed.

Republican strength is on the wane in some of those key suburbs, too. The Republican margin in Fort Bend County shrank in 2012 from double digits to just six points.

None of this is to say that Ms. Davis will win — but she might. And four years from now, she, or another candidate, will have an even easier time. No, that dusky sky up there is not blue. It is still burnt orange — but with quite a bit of purple.

11-Year-OldHispanic BoySings National Anthem, And GOP Racists Go Berserk

I am frequently attacked by former GOP colleagues from my years as a GOP City Committee member and accused of being a "single issue" voter - i. e., gay issues - so that my former friends who are drinking Kool-Aid by the gallon can ignore the utter racist and religious extremist nastiness that has become the norm for the Republican Party base.   The blatant racism and homophobia that go hand in glove with today's GOP is to me sickening and are displays of neither patriotism nor the Christian values that the GOP claims to worship.  The recent NBA playoff in San Antonio, Texas - a city that was part of Mexico long before American immigrants rebelled against Mexico - where an 11 year old Hispanic boy gave an amazing rendition of the Star Spangled Banner sent the GOP base into convulsions and spittle eruptions.  The video of the boy's performance is above.  The  GOP and "godly Christian" tweets are set out below via Liberals Unite are set out below.

Click image to enlarge

Yes, the comments are ugly.  But that's the reality of today's Republican Party.  The party of our parents  or even of just 20 years ago is gone and its current incarnation is horrific.