VA Senate: Ban Conversion Therapy, Set Transgender Policy, Repeal Gay Marriage Ban

For twenty six years, the Virginia GOP - pushed by the hate merchants at The Family Foundation - sought to make life hell for LGBT Virginians and blocked every effort to end anti-gays laws.  Indeed, between 2004 and 2006, the Virginia GOP pushed an aggressively anti-gay agenda culminating in the now unconstitutional ban on same sex marriage.  The newly Democrat controlled Virginia General Assembly is moving to reverse all of this discriminatory legislation as well as ban fraudulent "conversion therapy" so loved by charlatans among the professional Christian crowd and knuckle dragging evangelicals. It is truly the eve of a new day in Virginia when the state will at last move out of the 1950's, if not the 1800's.  Numerous news outlets are reporting on votes in the Virginia Senate that will end the Virginia GOP's horrible policies of licensing hate and bigotry. The queen of hate, Victoria Cobb, president of The Family Foundation must be beside herself that LGBT Virginians will soon have equality under the state's laws. Both the Virginia Mercury and the Washington Post have stories.  Passage in the House of Delegates is expected and Governor Northam will sign them measures into law. Here are highlights from the Mercury:

A suite of LGBT-friendly legislation cleared the Virginia Senate on Tuesday.

Lawmakers voted to:

• ban health professionals like counselors and psychologists from performing conversion therapy on anyone under age 18,
• create uniform policies for transgender students attending public schools,
• make it easier for transgender people to change the gender on their birth certificates and
• remove language from the state code banning gay marriage.

The gay marriage ban has already been invalidated by a 2015 Supreme Court ruling and advocates said the state code should reflect that.

“Right now same-gender marriage is legal in Virginia as it is throughout the country, and the code of Virginia needs to have legal ambiguity removed,” said Sen. Adam Ebbin, D-Alexandria, who sponsored the measure and is the first openly gay person elected to the Virginia General Assembly.

The measure passed 25-13, with only Republican members opposing.

The ban on conversion therapy saw the most opposition among Republicans, with 18 members opposing and one, Sen. Jill Vogel, not voting.

The ban would only apply to minors and does not apply to non-health professionals such as religious leaders. It specifically excludes “counseling that provides acceptance, support and understanding of a person or facilitates a person’s coping, social support and identity exploration and development.”

Sen. Jennifer Boysko, D-Fairfax, proposed the legislation addressing birth certificates and school board policies.

Under her proposal, a person who transitioned genders would be able to get a new birth certificate reflecting their new identity. She said during a committee hearing last week that the change aims to address problems transgender residents sometimes face when key documents like drivers licenses and birth certificates don’t match.

The legislation requires “an affidavit provided by a health care provider from whom the person has received treatment stating that the person has undergone clinically appropriate treatment for the purpose of gender transition.”

The bill addressing school policies for transgender students directs the Board of Education to develop a model policy covering issues ranging from how students are identified and dress codes to prevention and responses to bullying and harassment.

School Boards around the state would be required to adopt “policies that are consistent with but may be more comprehensive than” the model policies by the beginning of the 2021-2022 school year.

All four pieces of legislation must now be adopted by the House of Delegates to make it to Gov. Ralph Northam’s desk.

As the Post piece notes, another measure would eliminate "husband and wife" language in the Virginia Code and substitute "parties to marriage" to make Code provisions reflect the existence of same sex marriage.  Republicans had blocked this change since 2015 when Virginia's gay marriage ban was declared unconstitutional.  Here are excerpts from the Post:

The chamber also voted to replace “husband and wife” with gender-neutral “parties to the marriage” language in divorce law and make it easier for transgender people to change how their sex is listed on their birth certificates.

The bills now move to the Democratic-controlled House of Delegates, where they are expected to get a warm reception.

Advocates for expanded LGBT rights have long been stymied by the General Assembly, where Republicans have controlled at least one chamber for the past quarter-century.

Democrats Take Control of Virginia General Assembly

In what will hopefully be a prelude to the 2020 federal elections, Democrats in Virginia have won control of both the Virginia Senate and the House of Delegates for the first time since 1993.  Both House Delegates candidates that the husband and I backed financially - Martha Mugler and Shelly Simonds - were victorious.  As Governor Ralph Northam - a good friend  - noted, this will usher in a much needed sea change in Virginia:

“Tonight, the ground has shifted in Virginia government. The voters have spoken, and they have elected landmark Democratic majorities in both the Senate and the House of Delegates. I am proud of my fellow Democrats and inspired by our shared victory.

“Since I took office two years ago, we have made historic progress as a Commonwealth. Tonight, Virginians made it clear they want us to continue building on that progress.

“They want us to defend the rights of women, LGBTQ Virginians, immigrant communities, and communities of color. They want us to increase access to a world-class education for every child, and make sure no one is forced to go bankrupt because they or a family member gets sick. They want us to invest in clean energy and take bold action to combat climate change. And they want us to finally pass commonsense gun safety legislation, so no one has to fear being hurt or killed while at school, at work, or at their place of worship.

No doubt there is much gnashing of teeth among white supremacist circles and among Christofascist zealots who for the last two decades have sought to inflict their hate and fear driven version of religion on all Virginians.  Tonight, a majority of Virginians said "no more." and sent those who coddle the gun lobby and haters of all stripes into retirement.   The Virginian Pilot reports in part as follows:

Democratic victories in two senate districts in suburban Richmond and one in Loudoun County gave them a 21 seat majority, while the GOP held narrow leads in two Virginia Beach districts targeted by by million-dollar-plus efforts to flip to blue.

A new 55-or-more-seat Democratic majority in the House came in part from gains in two House districts on the Peninsula, including the Newport News one where a tie vote and a drawing of a lot gave the GOP a 51-49 majority in 2017. Republicans held slight leads in two Beach seats Democrats had targeted with the final precincts still to count.

House Appropriations Committee chairman Chris Jones, R-Suffolk, [who lied extensively in his campaign ads and used racist dog whistling messaging] was defeated by Democrat Clinton Jenkins in a district federal judges drastically changed to undo the General Assembly’s illegal 2011 gerrymandering.

Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Norment Jr., R-James City, was re-elected. But like Cox, he will lose most of his power to steer or block legislation with the new Democratic majority.

Throughout the election, Democrats sought to tie Republican candidates to President Donald Trump, warning them that a vote for Republicans would mean siding with the gun lobby and reducing access to affordable health care, including birth control.

On the Peninsula, Democrat Martha Mugler flipped a reconfigured Hampton and Poquoson 91st House district, after the retirement of one of the most loved Generaly Assembly members, Del. Gordon Helsel, R-Poquoson. Democrat Shelly Simonds defeated Del. David Yancey, R-Newport News. He was returned to Richmond after a tie vote in 2017 after he won a lot drawing. Democrat victories in the last GOP-held seat in Fairfax county, and a victory in the Frederickburg suburbs secured House majority.

Democrats held on to the 15 House seats they won in the 2017 blue wave election. . . . Turnout was higher than expected in the usually sleepy off-off year elections.

House Democrats out raised Republicans by nearly $10 million this election cycle, according to the Virginia Public Access project. On the Senate side, Democrats out raised Republicans by $5 million.

We celebrated at both the Mugler and Simonds victory parties.  It was a wonderful night to celebrate democracy and seeing the forces of hate, bigotry and obstruction go down to defeat.

The Democrat Blitz in Virginia

In 2017 blog readers from around the country followed the Virginia elections, many seeking a ray of hope in an otherwise demoralized political world disgusted by the foul and corrupt individual in the White House.  Fortunately, Democrats created a political earthquake, won the governorship and both other state wide offices and came within a name drawing from taking control of the House of Delegates.  Next Tuesday, Democrats hope to finish the work left from 2017 and take control of both the Virginia Senate and Virginia House of Delegates.  Should this happen, not only would decades of Republican obstructionism and efforts at voter disenfranchisement fall away, but the Democrats would also control the 2020 redistricting maps. In addition, for LGBT Virginians we might at last see state law non-discrimination protections and see a statutory ban on voodoo like "conversion therapy" which should more properly be called a form of torture.  A piece in Politico looks at the Democrat effort in Virginia which many hope can be a precursor to a 2020 rout for self-prostituting Trump boot lickers.   Here are article excerpts:

National Democratic groups are spending unprecedented sums in the race for control of Virginia’s state legislature — the first test in a yearlong campaign to maximize the party’s influence in the states before the next round of redistricting begins in 2021.

After winning the governor's mansion in 2017, Democrats are shooting for total control in Richmond. And they see next week's elections as an early chance at redemption after a 2010 drubbing that left them boxed out of the map-making process in nearly every key state.

“I was in New York yesterday for a pitch to national donors — everybody wants to play in Virginia. They understand the significance,” former Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a long-time national party power-broker, said last week. “Virginia’s future for the next decade is going to be determined this November.”

Cash-flush Democratic power players have flooded the commonwealth with upwards of $10 million, according to an analysis of outside spending. Among the top spenders: Everytown for Gun Safety, a Michael Bloomberg-aligned group, with $2.5 million; the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the party's state-level campaign arm, with $1.3 million; the League of Conservation Voters with $1.5 million; and EMILY’s List with $2.1 million, its single largest investment ever in a state’s legislative races.

Virginia’s unique campaign-finance laws allow these groups, and major liberal donors like George Soros, to contribute unlimited amounts directly to individual campaigns, giving Democrats a formidable financial advantage.

Democratic candidates raised a collective $31.8 million by the end of last month, according to the analysis of financial filings by the nonpartisan Virginia Public Access Project. That's more than twice as much as they raised in 2015, the last time both chambers of the legislature were on the ballot.

In comparison, Republican candidates have raised a collective $21 million so far this cycle, trailing their Democratic counterparts by over $10 million.

Over the next 12 months, Democrats are seeking to make major inroads in state legislatures, which have the power to affect policy at the state level, in addition to election rules like district lines and ballot access. Republicans control the legislatures of 30 states, . . . 

In Virginia, Democrats have not had majorities in either chamber since before 2012, when Republicans took control of the map-drawing process — but they have a strong chance next week to flip both, particularly the state Senate. In 2017, control of the state House memorably came down to one race in Newport News when the Republican incumbent kept his seat after a tiebreaker in which his name was drawn from a bowl. The impact of the Democratic cash influx is abundantly clear in a northern Virginia state delegate district where Democrat Hala Ayala, a cybersecurity specialist who is one of the first two Hispanic women elected to the state’s lower chamber, faces a rematch with Rich Anderson, the Republican she beat in 2017.

Anderson pulled in over $280,000 by late October. Ayala, buoyed by a six-figure donation from EMILY’s List, has raised over $1.2 million so far. That investment has allowed her to spread her message wide.

Her ads have become so prominent on cable and digital platforms that Ayala said neighborhood children have referred to her as "that lady on my Twitter." Some approach her to recite the script of her spot that details her time working at a gas station while on Medicaid. "I'm ready to be a meme," she joked.

"Never before have Democrats had this kind of money," Ayala said. "Republicans have been well-funded, mostly by the NRA and all of these special interest groups that never served us any positive benefit."

Democratic presidential candidates have also shown interest in the Virginia elections. . . . And there's some indication that the grass-roots have also taken an increased interest in Virgina. ActBlue reported that donors in the third quarter of 2019 doubled their contributions compared to the third quarter of 2017.

Virginia is the only state with competitive off-year state legislative elections. Democratic strategists will have to likely work harder to keep a focus on down-ballot races in 2020, when the party will attempt to take the White House and Senate while defending its House majority.

In the past few years, some of the biggest names in Democratic politics have waged a nationwide campaign to prevent a 2010 redux.

Ahead of the post-2020 redistricting, Democrats are eager to break GOP trifectas in Florida, Texas, Ohio and Georgia. Another top target this cycle is North Carolina — where Republicans control both chambers, and Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper would have no veto power over the map if he wins reelection next year.

SCOTUS Kills Off Virginia’s Racial Gerrymander

Earlier this week the United States Supreme Court rejected the appeal by House of Delegates Republicans to the judicial striking down of the Virginia GOP's carefully drawn voting districts.  These districts were aimed at minimizing the strength of minority voters and thereby protecting the Virginia GOP from the reality that increasingly Virginians do not want what the Virginia GOP is peddling, namely racism, homophobia, slavish prostitution to the gun lobby and a general opposition to anything progressive in nature. While SCOTUS used the issue of standing as a means to reject the appeal, the result is nonetheless the same and the odds of Democrats winning control of both the Virginia Senate and the House of Delegates has increased.  Many would argue that the Virginia GOP's solution is to update its agenda to reflect 21st century concerns, a task made impossible by the GOP's increasingly hideous base of racist, white supremacists, religious extremists and general misogynists.  One can only hope November, 2019, deals the Virginia GOP a blow that will send it into minority party status for years to come.  A piece in Slate looks at the SCOTUS ruling: 

The Virginia House of Delegates’ racial gerrymander is officially dead—killed off by a 5–4 Supreme Court ruling on Monday that seems to clear the way for a potential Democratic sweep of the Virginia Legislature in November.

Although Monday’s decision in Virginia House of Delegates v. Bethune-Hill slays a gerrymander, it revolves around a more mundane issue: Who has the ability to defend that gerrymander in federal court? When Virginia voters first filed a lawsuit alleging that multiple House districts were drawn illegally along racial lines, the state attorney general defended the map. Eventually, a federal court found “overwhelming evidence” that the state had “sorted voters into districts based on the color of their skin,” violating “the guarantees of the Equal Protection Clause.” It appointed a special master to redraw 11 House districts and adopted his proposals, ordering the House to adopt his new map for the 2019 election.

Throughout these proceedings, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring, a Democrat, defended the House’s unconstitutional districts. He did so because a Virginia law tasks the attorney general, and him alone, with the job of defending the state’s interests in court. After the federal court struck down the old map, Herring decided his job was done: He had defended the gerrymander since 2014, when the case began, and didn’t want to appeal the latest ruling to SCOTUS. But the House (and, specifically, its Republican speaker) had intervened in the case and did want to appeal. So it asked SCOTUS to reverse the district court and restore its old map.

On Monday, the Supreme Court held that the House lacked standing to appeal the ruling against its gerrymandered districts. Practically speaking, that means the 2019 election will take place under the new maps—a relief, since Virginia just held primary elections under these maps last week. Writing for the majority, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg first cited the Virginia statute giving the state attorney general (and not the House) the ability to “represent the state’s interests.”

Ginsburg then wrote that the new maps inflict no concrete injury on the House, depriving it of the right to appeal the district court’s decision. The court-imposed plan, she wrote, merely changes the House’s composition. But House districts already “change frequently”—after each census, at a minimum—and any ensuing electoral difficulties “are suffered by individual legislators or candidates, not by the House as a body.”

[U]nder Virginia law, redistricting authority resides in the full General Assembly; the House and Senate must both vote to adopt any redistricting plan. Because the House “constitutes only a part” of the General Assembly, it does not have standing, on its own, to appeal the decision invalidating its districts. In other words, “a single House of a bicameral legislature lacks capacity to assert interests belonging to the legislature as a whole.”

Ginsburg’s opinion was joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch.

All 11 districts invalidated by Monday’s decision were flagrantly gerrymandered to capture minority communities, trapping a huge number of black voters in a few non-competitive districts. The new map creates more diverse and competitive districts, handing Democrats a major victory. Right now, Republicans hold a 51–49 majority in the House; under the new, fairer map, Democrats seem likely to seize the chamber in November. They’re also favored to take the Senate—and since the state has a progressive . . . . governor, a legislative sweep would create a Democratic trifecta. That would give Virginia Democrats control over the 2020 redistricting process, preventing Republicans from drawing another round of gerrymanders to last another decade.

Virginians who want to move Virginia forward need to make sure they are registered to vote and go to the polls come November.  We have the potential for a new day in Virginia that we cannot afford to lose. 

Virginia Could Soon Place the Equal Rights Amendment in the U.S. Constitution

As the Washington Post is reporting, the Virginia Senate today voted to pass the federal Equal Rights Amendment with seven Republicans joining Democrats on a 26-to-14 vote.  Now the vote goes to the far more reactionary House of Delegates where Republicans hold a one vote majority - at least until the 2019 Virginia elections in November.   The Washington Post looks at the vote:

The GOP-led state Senate voted Tuesday to make Virginia the 38th and final state to ratify the federal Equal Rights Amendment.

The measure passed with bipartisan support, with seven Republicans joining Democrats on a 26-to-14 vote. The measure faces tougher odds in the House of Delegates and beyond, including hurdles related to long-expired deadlines for passage. . . . . The Senate resolution now heads to the House, where comparable House legislation remains in committee.

Advocates hope they have more momentum this year with Republican sponsorship of the Senate resolution. Sen. Glen H. Sturtevant Jr. (R-Chesterfield) sponsored the legislation and joined a bus tour promoting it last year.

A piece in New York Magazine looks at the bigger picture should the House of Delegates likewise pass the ERA amendment.  Here are article excerpts:

For those of us who came of age at a time when the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment seemed as inevitable as it was overdue, the ERA’s sudden revival in the Trump era has been a marvelous development. Today the Virginia Senate ratified the amendment, which means the Old Dominion is halfway through the process of becoming the crucial 38th state — three-fourths of the 50 states — to get onboard since Congress passed the ERA in 1972.

The amendment’s language is extremely simple:

Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.

Its practical implications may depend on what Congress does to implement it, but in effect, it would serve as a constitutional backdrop to more specific protections of gender equality, and as an ongoing basis for challenging discrimination in the courts.

The ERA was long thought to be comatose, if not dead, after only 35 states ratified it prior to the expiration of a 1982 ratification deadline set by Congress. But inspired by doubts about the constitutionality of ratification deadlines, and perhaps some defiance toward the manifest pigginess of the 45th president, momentum for the ERA resumed, with Nevada ratifying it in 2017 and Illinois in 2018.

Perhaps the big shift toward Democrats in 2017 House elections in Virginia, and the strong possibility that Democrats could take control of that chamber this November, could motivate Republicans to stop their obstruction of the ERA. It’s certainly a good sign that seven Republican senators joined all 19 Democrats in voting for the ratification in the upper chamber.

If Virginia does ratify the amendment, the legal maneuvering will begin, as the New York Times noted last year:

Expect a legal showdown, intense lobbying and constitutional fireworks …

[T]he debate would be interesting, and would offer the Grand Old Party yet another opportunity to recant its abandonment, under the influence of the conservative movement, of an ancient party tradition of supporting an ERA, as Katie Kilkenny observed in 2015:

Republicans installed the first woman in Congress and shepherded the 19th Amendment through a Republican-dominated Congress in 1919. . . . .

And Republicans began putting the ERA into party platforms in 1944, and didn’t definitively begin rejecting the amendment until Ronald Reagan’s ascent to the leadership of the party in 1980.

At a time when women are repudiating Republicans at the polls to a remarkable extent, it would be a good time for the GOP to wake up and embrace equality as sufficiently central to American principles to merit inclusion in the Constitution.

Who would lead the opposition?  Christofascists who want to be able to subordinate women and angry white men fearful of losing even more patriarchy based privilege. 

VA Senate Republican Seek to Nominate Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli to Virginia Supreme Court

As an attorney for over 35 years I can think of few people less suited for the Virginia Supreme Court than gay hating religious zealot, anti-immigrant bigot and climate change denier, Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli.  Yet that is exactly who a Republican controlled committee nominated to the Virginia Supreme Court in an apparent effort to make Virginia a national and international laughing stock akin to Alabama. Moreover, Cuccinelli strikes me as totally incapable of meeting the standards of the Canons of Judicial Conduct which require a judge or justice to be unbiased towards issues and litigants before their court.  No gay Virginian, no environmentalist, and many others could not possible expect to be treated in an unbiased way by Kookinelli.  Multiple organizations are mobilizing to facilitate sane Virginians in sending a message to their state Senators that Cuccinelli is absolutely unacceptable.  Equality Virginia has a page here to send a message, to state senators but many others have similar links to stop this travesty.  The Virginian Pilot has details on this utterly insane and inappropriate nomination.  Here are highlights:

Some Republicans in the General Assembly are discussing the idea of electing former Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli to the Supreme Court of Virginia.

House and Senate Republican leaders have said they want to elect Appeals Court Judge Rossie Alston to the high court. There are plenty of votes to do that in the GOP-dominated House, but Republicans are one vote shy in the Senate, leading to an impasse.

Should they be unable to elect Alston, two lawmakers said, Republicans would discuss other candidates and Cuccinelli’s name is in the mix. Also among those that have been mentioned: Court of Appeals Judges Stephen R. McCullough and Mary Grace O’Brien. 

Most lawmakers are staying quiet about the situation because reaching 21 votes on the judicial election in the Senate has been a challenge and there’s uncertainty over what will happen.

The drama stems from a recess interim appointment last year by Gov. Terry McAuliffe, who appointed former Fairfax County Circuit Court Judge Jane Marum Roush to the Supreme Court to replace Justice LeRoy F. Millette, Jr. after his retirement.

House and Senate Republican leaders later said McAuliffe did not properly consult them, and since it was the duty of the General Assembly to elect judges, they preferred Alston and would elect him.

Cuccinelli is an ardent foe of abortion and gay marriage, and as attorney general questioned the science behind global warming.

I find Cuccinelli nothing short of frightening.  In addition, in my opinion, he is also a closeted self-loathing gay man who clings to strident religious dogma and lashing out at other gays as a way to deal with his own raging internalized homophobia.   The man needs a mental health intervention, not an appointment to the Virginia Supreme Court.   PLEASE contact you state Senator and urge them to vote "No" to Cuccinelli.

In Partisan Vote, Virginia Senate Passes License to Discriminate Bill

Yesterday, the members of the Virginia GOP in the Virginia Senate confirmed that they are truly the tawdry political whores of the Christofascists and the hate merchants at The Family Foundation, by passing SB 41, a bill that would grant Virginia government employees and judges to discriminate based on their alleged religious beliefs.  Senator Adam P. Ebbin rightly went off on the GOP supported bigotry.  Here are details via Joe My God:   

By a 20-19 vote, today the Virginia Senate approved a bill which allows government employees to refuse to officiate same-sex marriages because Jesus. The bill was sponsored by GOP state Sen. Charles Carrico, who has introduced a slew of other anti-LGBT bills.

Democratic Virginia state Sen. Adam Ebbin reacts via press release:

Senator Adam P. Ebbin (D-Alexandria) expressed deep concern following the party-line vote to pass SB41, legislation that would allow marriage celebrants to refuse to solemnize a marriage if doing so would violate their “sincerely held religious beliefs.”

Speaking on the Senate floor, Ebbin said, “This bill is thoroughly unnecessary. It sanctions discrimination by government employees. We are the birthplace of the Statute for Religious Freedom. We enjoy one of the richest histories of any state when it comes to that freedom. Proposals like these — licenses to discriminate — desecrate the very things they claim to protect. This bill carves out a space for bigotry cloaked under the guise of religious freedom.”

If SB41 were to become law, it would allow all persons authorized to perform marriage ceremonies in Virginia, including judges and public officiants, to refuse to conduct marriages that violate a “sincerely held religious belief.”

Ebbin continued, “The legislation would allow judges to turn away certain couples at the courthouse door. Government officials should not be allowed to pick and choose which of their duties they will fulfill or which services they will provide and to whom, especially when the result would be blatant discrimination and the service to be denied involves a fundamental human right. Nor should government employees be allowed to impose their personal religious beliefs on those whom they serve.”

The bill now heads to the House of Delegates where Republicans hold a 2-1 majority.

Thankfully, Gov. McAuliffe has vowed to veto this foul bill when it passes the GOP controlled House of Delegates.

Virginia, Like Indiana Still Hasn’t Learned Its Lesson

As detailed in my upcoming February column in VEER Magazine, this year's General Assembly session has seen a raft of anti-gay, anti-transgender bills introduced by Republicans.  As is the norm with Republicans, the misogyny is cloaked as protecting "religious freedom."  Thankfully, Gov. McAuliffe has promised to veto the bills should they make it out of the legislature.  Pro-gay bills were introduced by Democrats and two have actually passed the Virginia Senate with 6 Republicans supporting them.  Sadly, the bills will likely be killed in the Republican controlled House of Delegates.  As a piece in The Advocate argues, Indiana hasn't learned from its religious freedom bill debacle last year.  The same argument applies to Virginia Republicans.  Here are article excerpts:

In one, foul sweeping gesture of rejection, the Indiana legislature this week killed our best chance of securing equal protections for LGBT Hoosiers this year. The bill, SB 344, was a measure that, while flawed in its current incarnation — with amendments advocates were working to insert — would have prohibited discrimination at the state level.  Indiana lawmakers’ unwillingness to move this bill through the legislative process reflects a special kind of stubbornness. They have not learned from last year, when the prospect of a law that would open the door to discrimination against LGBT Hoosiers unleashed backlash that the state is still feeling today.

Last year, the fight played out in plain sight of the entire nation. Governor Mike Pence and the Indiana legislature passed a Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) bill, which would allow someone to claim that their religion gives them a right to undermine nondiscrimination laws. Prominent allies like Salesforce, the NCAA, Angie’s List, Gen Con, and others spoke up and said that discrimination against LGBT people was not only wrong but bad for business. Some even said they would stop investment in Indiana. 

The national pressure forced lawmakers’ hands into adding a welcomed (though incomplete) “fix” that said the RFRA couldn’t be used to discriminate against LGBT Hoosiers in housing, employment, and public accommodations.

The climate was tense but a victory of sorts was won. For the first time, the majority of the country, including the business community, was united in saying that discrimination against LGBT people is wrong and we must put a stop to it. Better yet, the country was vocally on our side.

[C]ome the 2016 legislative session, lawmakers were angry they had lost both on the RFRA and marriage equality fronts. Perhaps they thought the country wasn’t watching this time. Whatever the reason, rather than moving forward in the direction of the nation and in line with the majority of their constituents and businesses, they introduced “non-discrimination” bills riddled with carve-outs, . . .

There was renewed hope that perhaps an affirmative non-discrimination bill would at long last prevail. SB 344 passed out of committee hours later. Unfortunately, it didn’t go far.

To the rest of the country, may they heed the lessons learned from Indiana and know that we’re watching and assuming ready position. At the end of the day, all we’re fighting for is a fair playing field, one in which everyone can pursue a life of their choosing free from discrimination.  

 Here in Virginia expect a reprise of Indiana's preference for hate and bigotry rather than equality for all citizens.

Anti-Gay Republicans Advance Virginia Gay Marriage Opt-Out Bill

Anti-gay Sen. Tommy Norment

One thing that one can always count on is that if the Virginia general Assembly is in session, Virginia Republicans in the legislature will be striving to make life Hell for LGBT Virginians while working to grant special rights to extremist Christians.  The 2016 session of the Virginia General Assembly is keeping up this tradition as Republicans advance anti-gay bills while killing gay friendly bills.  Some of the usual crackpots and extremist have introduced anti-gay bills, and the rest of the GOP members with few exceptions, are supporting them so as to not run afoul of Victoria Cobb, the queen of hate and president of The Family Foundation, Virginia's leading hate group. One has to wonder how the GOP House member caught on Grindr - some believe his identity has been confirmed - will vote if the bills reach the floor of the House of Delegates.  Local Senator, Tommy Norment, cast his vote with the hate merchants.   Here are highlights from the Daily Press on the GOP support of special rights for Christofascists:

Senate Bill 40 is heading for the Senate floor. If it passes the full General Assembly, it's a lock for a gubernatorial veto.  Gov. Terry McAuliffe's administration sent someone to Wednesday's committee meeting to note his disapproval, a step the governor doesn't typically take on pending legislation.

Sponsoring state Sen. Bill Carrico, R-Galax, said the bill is a response to the arrest of Kim Davis, the Kentucky clerk who refused to issue licenses to gay couples in the wake of last year's U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage. She spent five days in jail.

Carrico's bill would have the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles issue marriage licenses whenever a local clerk objects on "personal, ethical, moral or religious grounds."

The legislation passed the Senate Courts of Justice Committee 8-7. Committee Democrats voted against the bill. Freshman Republican state Sen. Glen Sturtevant, R-Richmond, was the only Republican to join them.

State Sen. Thomas K. "Tommy" Norment Jr., the only Peninsula senator on the committee, voted for the bill.

A number of religious groups supported the bill, including The Family Foundation. Spokesman Chris Freund called the bill "a win-win," because marriage licenses will be available even if clerks don't want to issue them.

The American Civil Liberties Union and Equality Virginia opposed the bill. ACLU lobbyist Claire Guthrie Gastañaga said clerks have a duty "to serve all members of the public equally."  "It's any personal whim you're authorizing people to discriminate on," she said.

The committee also dealt Wednesday with Senate Bill 10, which would strip various gay marriage prohibitions from Virginia state code, comporting Virginia law with the Supreme Court's ruling and current practice.  The committee's Republican majority declined to approve the bill, with Chairman Mark Obenshain, R-Harrisonburg, saying it's better to leave those changes to a more comprehensive editing being undertaken by the Virginia Code Commission.

A Silver Lining in Virginia's Election Results

While Republicans maintained their hold on the Virginia Senate and thus will likely block Medicaid expansion and other progressive measures proposed by Governor McAuliffe, they did not increase their overall seat count and saw loses in the House of Delegates and in other lower tier elections.  It also must be noted that since 2015 is an off year with low voter turnout, the GOP's ability to largely hold back losses does not mean that things will be rosy in the GOP bubble come next year, especially of the GOP nominates a lunatic as its standard bearer.  Over at Bearing Drift, Brian Schoeneman, one of the few sane Republicans left looks at the dark spots - that Democrats need to capitalize on - in the GOP's election results.  Here are highlights:

One of the reasons why your average voter has a tendency to hate politicians is that we often do our best to bring out the silver lining in even the darkest of storm clouds.  We will find the one or two good outcomes in a sea of bad ones and focus on those rather than on the big picture.  That’s a human tendency, especially when anybody’s job is on the line.

On the other hand, I’ve always been of the opinion that the truth is better than spin, and that as adults we should be willing to accept the bad with the good, because an unwillingness to confront things that didn’t go so well is an inherent obstacle to fixing those things the next time around.  Given that we’ve got a presidential cycle just around the corner, we need to look objectively at what happened last night in Virginia and have a long conversation about what it actually means.  So let’s throw away the posturing and be honest.

By any objective measurement, the GOP had a bad night  The only news story that most of America saw last night – the one that was blasted out by Politico, CNN and the non-Virginia news outlets – was that we held the State Senate, which threw a wrench into Governor McAuliffe’s long-term legislative plans.  Medicaid expansion is dead, as are his misguided attempts at turning guns into a political issue in a staunchly pro-gun Commonwealth. 

But what did the wins in the State Senate mean?  We maintained the status quo.  That’s it.

Maintaining the status quo in the Senate was a must win, and we won it.  But we gained no ground, and the millions poured into the Commonwealth by outside groups didn’t have an overall impact on the final outcome.  In the two races they targeted, they went 1-1.  The only people really pleased with that outcome should be the TV stations in Richmond and Northern Virginia.  On the House of Delegates side, we lost ground overall. 

Northern Virginia, however, should be concerned – our power in the House just dropped considerably.  We lost control of the House Transportation Committee and we lost two Republican seats that are now in Democratic hands, and thus marginalized.  And losing GOP incumbents in Northern Virginia before a presidential election is a bad thing – we lose the network, the lists, the activist contact with an incumbent.  All those things matter.  And now they’re gone.  

On the local level, the constant in-fighting and back-biting among different sectors of the Republican Party tore up areas that had previously been considered Republican strongholds.  . . .  Despite the feeling that this was a Republican year on the ground in Fairfax, all of our challenger candidates for Board of Supervisors lost and the open seat race in my home Sully District was a GOP loss, flipping that seat to the Democrats. 

The biggest loser of the night – by far – was the Republican Party of Virginia.  Early this morning, RPV sent out a self-congratulatory email that was long on self-praise but short on facts.  It was, if anything, an obvious attempt (and clearly pre-election results written) at turd polishing by Chairman John Whitbeck, going into this reelection campaign next year.  Despite the fact that we maintained the status quo and our messaging didn’t really work  . . . .

Whatever GOP momentum we may have built up was just released last night with a resounding “meh,” after losing a lot of races that folks thought we would do well in.  Let’s be honest – not flipping a single Senate seat Blue to Red is not momentum. As for RPV’s vaunted “Faces of the GOP” campaign – straight out of 2007’s Corporate Public Relations playbook – it was a disaster.  Of the 20 Republican races profiled, 14 of the candidates lost. 

Last night must be viewed by every Republican in Virginia as a wake up call.  The idea that we can win “base,” low-turnout off-year elections just by turning out Republicans should have died last night.  Wherever we nominated a candidate who didn’t reflect their district, we lost.  We lost two critical seats in Northern Virginia that will make next year’s presidential race harder to run.  And, most important, we saw obvious examples in Loudoun that the constant in-fighting between sections of the GOP has real world implications – and those implications are bad.  Bottom line – we had a bad night and we have a lot of work to do.

Will the Virginia GOP accept this message?  I doubt it since the Party more and more lives in an alternate universe dominated by the Christofascists, white supremacists and ignorance embracing elements  of the party base.

The Importance of Voting Tomorrow

Tomorrow is election day in Virginia and the results of tomorrow's election will have a profound impact on Virginia's future.  If one lives in one of the contested Senate districts in particular, it is crucial that you get out and vote.  The following is a reprint of my October, 2015, VEER Magazine column that makes the case why one needs to vote and preferably vote Democrat.  Here's the full column:

By many accounts, the race for the Virginia Senate is just weeks away and it’s still a complete toss.  Republicans hold a two-seat (21-19) lead in the Virginia Senate, but since Lt. Governor Ralph Northam, a Democrat, presides over the Senate and can break the tie on most issues, Democrats only need a net gain of one seat in the general election to take control of the state Senate.  And, if the Democrats retake control of the Virginia Senate, they can control the Senate committee appointments and chairmanships and kill divisive legislation that gives the Commonwealth a bad name.  Similarly, they can provide a bulwark against some of the most extreme measures that may secure passage of in the Republican controlled House of Delegates. 

Sadly, in half of the 40 Senate districts up for election in 2015, are uncontested. And in the other races, many are not seriously contested.  As a result, a few key races may determine Virginia’s future. Out of the handful of races that will determine who controls the Virginia Senate, three critical Senate districts are located right here in Hampton Roads.  These districts and their respective candidates are as follows:

• District 1: In this district, incumbent John Miller (D) will face attorney Mark Matney (R).

• District 6: Incumbent Lynwood Lewis (D) will face challenger Richard Ottinger (R) in the general election. Lewis won this seat last January in a special election by only 11 votes.

• District 7: Incumbent Frank Wagner (R) and Gary McCollum (D) will face off in the general election.

John Miller and Lynnwood Lewis are personal friends and even though my husband and I do not live in their districts we have supported them financially because we fear the reactionary agenda of their opponents and/or the Republican Party of Virginia.  My concern is that a vote for either of the Republican challengers - not withstanding Richard Ottinger disavowal of being motivated by so-called social issues - would be a vote to drag Virginia backwards in time.  Like it or not, both Ottinger and Matney, if elected, would be under great pressure to vote in accordance with the religious extremist, anti-gay, anti-tax (no matter the consequences to the Commonwealth's infrastructure), and anti-Medicaid expansion agenda of the Republican Party of Virginia.  Indeed, Matney’s campaign website discloses that he has embraced the Virginia GOP’s reactionary social issues agenda.

The District 7 race is the more difficult for me personally since Frank Wagner has been a friend for over 20 years and is one of the few Republicans in the General Assembly who is not rabidly anti-gay.  That said, he has until recently historically voted with the anti-gay, anti-women, and anti-minority members of the Republican caucus in the General Assembly.  To my surprise, he has voted to enact employment non-discrimination protections for state employees (the measures were killed in the GOP controlled House of Delegates) and in 2014 he was a patron of resolution commending Equality Virginia, the 25-year-old nonprofit that advocates for equal treatment of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Virginians.  The issue is, therefore, whether or not Frank has truly seen the light and will now work for equality for all Virginians.  Between now and election day, Frank Wagner would need to go to great lengths to disavow more of the extreme positions of the Virginia GOP to ensure my vote if I lived in his district.  

Turning to the situation in the House of Delegates, the Republicans hold a strong majority.  This is unlikely to change after the November 3, 2015, Virginia elections.  Perhaps even more disturbing is the fact that in 71 of the 100 House of Delegates districts up for election in 2015, there is no contested election.  Only 29 of the 100 district seats up for election will have a contested race.  Why is this the case?  Largely due to gerrymandering which the Virginia GOP has admitted - in court pleadings in pending cases challenging the constitutionality of Virginia's voting districts - was done to protect Republican incumbents and aid in holding a Republican majority.  The dictates of the Virginia Constitution that voting districts must be compact and contiguous meant little compared to the quest for partisan advantage.

But back to why is this November's election so important.  Because these elections, especially in the Virginia Senate, will determine whether or not Virginia moves forward into the future or tries, as it has so often in the past, to retreat backwards in time.  A number of critical issues will face the General Assembly in the 2016 session. Two of the most important are as follows:

Medicaid Expansion: As I shared in a column earlier this year, my husband I have experienced firsthand the nightmare that is Virginia's Medicaid program in connection with securing placement for my adopted brother-in-law who suffers from intellectual disabilities.  To listen to Republicans - including statements on Richard Ottinger's campaign website and Mark Matney’s campaign site- Medicaid is some out of control program where free loaders predominate and money is squandered.  The reality, of course, is something far different than what Republicans would have one believe, especially when it comes to disability services.   The Commonwealth of Virginia ranks either 5th or 7th in the nation in per capita income depending on the income ranking utilized. But despite it "wealthy state" status, in terms of its spending on the needs of those suffering from intellectual and developmental disabilities, Virginia ranks 49th in the county.  Only Mississippi spends less on those with intellectual and developmental disabilities.  Virginia’s Medicaid system needs a huge infusion of money.

Making matters even worse, as the Virginian Pilot recently emphasized, Republican obstructionism to Medicaid expansion hurts the Commonwealth's economic viability but it also seriously threatens the viability of many Virginia hospitals. Here is a brief quote:

REPUBLICAN state lawmakers' refusal to accept billions in Virginians' federal taxes to subsidize insurance for some 400,000 uninsured people has repeatedly been exposed as the partisan political ploy that it is.

The expansion of Virginia's managed-care Medicaid program, the most efficient of two divisions of Medicaid in Virginia, is a prime objective of Democratic President Barack Obama's signature domestic achievement, the Affordable Care Act.

Republicans have chosen to bleed hospitals in their own districts of necessary revenue, diminishing access to quality health care while undermining local and statewide economic development efforts. All so they can politically oppose a lame duck president over a law twice declared constitutional and which the GOP doesn't have the votes in Washington to overturn.

The analysis is harsh, but sadly accurate from all of the data that I have reviewed to date.  Republican candidates who merely mouth the anti-Medicaid talking points of the Virginia GOP prove that, in reality, they are clueless on the issues on which they are campaigning.

Job Creation and Economic Growth.  All of the candidates regardless of political party talk about wanting to create jobs and build Virginia’s economy.  Most of the Republican proposals boil down to cutting taxes, repealing safety regulations, and pushing the same strategies that have fails to yield results over the years.  Electing representatives that understand that the state and global economies have changed is critical to Hampton Roads.  As recently reported, the Hampton Roads economic has remained static and in the doldrums even as other parts of the country have seen their economies grow.  This needs to change.  Private sector job growth is also critical because Virginia is the No. 1 recipient of Department of Defense spending and has seen a $9.8 billion decrease in defense spending from 2010 through 2012.  One way to counter balance this economic threat is to boost private industry growth to generate new jobs to replace those lost to decreases in federal government spending in the coming years, especially if a new round of sequestration cuts take effect.

As I and others have argued before, to attract new businesses, Virginia needs to ensure that it is welcoming to all would be private business and their employees whether these employees are black, white, Hispanic, Hindu, Christian, foreign born, gay or straight.  Equality is a powerful key to recruiting top employees and retaining others.  Yet, in contrast to this vision of a Virginia where all are welcome, the Republican controlled House of Delegates has consistently blocked every effort to enact employment non-discrimination protections for LGBT employees, pushed through voter ID laws to disenfranchise minorities under the ruse of protecting against nonexistent “voter fraud,” and made all kinds of anti-immigrant statements that impact not just Hispanics but also Asian-Americans.  Just as frightening is the fact that  Virginia Republicans have pledged to make the 2016 General Assembly session all about protecting "religious liberty" through what I call “license to discriminate laws” that enable anti-gay and other religious based discrimination.   If enacted, such laws will make it painfully obvious to potentially relocating businesses that not everyone is welcome in Virginia.

How do we protect Virginia's future and move its economy forward?  Get out and vote come the November elections.  We have elected officials who are working to generate new private industry jobs, seeking to make Virginia a welcoming state for businesses and their employees, and pushing to expand Virginia's health care system (and in the process recapture Virginians' own money sent to Washington).   But these elected officials from the Governor on down need your help: get out vote, especially if you live in the 1^st, 6^th or 7^th Senate districts, and vote for Democrat candidates who want to end Republicans’ failed, irresponsible policies that threaten Virginia's economy and future.