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Donald Rumsfeld endorses ‘Don’t Ask’ repeal

Former defense chief says ‘time has come’ for open service

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The former defense chief who served under President George W. Bush hasĀ endorsed repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and said open service in the U.S. military is “an idea whose time has come.”

Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, whoĀ also headedĀ the Pentagon under President Ford,Ā made remarks in favor of ending the military’s gay ban to ABC RadioĀ on Friday.

ā€œFirst of all, we know that gays and lesbians have been serving in the military for decades with honorable service,ā€ Rumsfeld said.Ā  ā€œWe know that [repeal of a ban on gays serving openly] is an idea whose time has come.ā€

Rumsfeld has been making media appearances and spokeĀ on ThursdayĀ at the 2011 Conservative Political Action Conference in D.C. to promote his new book, “Known and Unknown.” CPAC organizers gave Rumsfeld gave the “Defender of the Constitution” award for leadership at the Pentagon.

According to ABC Radio, Rumsfeld said Congress expressed the will of the American people by passing the repeal law late last year. Still, Rumsfeld said he has ā€œenormous respectā€ for the military leaders who have expressed concern aboutĀ “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal andĀ urged theĀ Pentagon leadersĀ to implement the new law ā€œwith care.ā€

Rumsfeld endorsement of open service in the U.S. military makes him the third defense secretary to support repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Current Defense Secretary Robert Gates and former Defense Secretary William Cohen, who headed the Pentagon under President Clinton, have also called for an end to the law.

Aaron Belkin, director of the Palm Center, said Rumsfeld’s endorsement of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal shows support for ending the law is “unambiguous and transcends party lines.”

“We have now entered the next phase of the repeal process in which certification and implementation should be completed swiftly in keeping with the practices that have been proven to minimize any disruption to the military,” Belkin added.

On Dec. 22, President Obama signed the law allowing for “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal, but the measure won’t take effect until the president, the defense secretary and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff certify the U.S. military is ready. Additionally, after certification takes place, an additional 60-day waiting period must pass before gays can serve openly in the military.

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Politics

HRC slams White House over position opposing gender affirming surgeries for minors

ā€˜Biden administration is flat wrong on thisā€™

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Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson issued a strong rebuke on Tuesday of the Biden-Harris administration’s position opposing gender affirming surgeries for minors.

The New York Times reported on June 28 that the White House, which broadly supports making medical interventions available for transgender youth, had expressed opposition to surgeries for patients under 18, having previously declined to take a specific position on the question.

ā€œHealth care decisions for young people belong between a patient, their family, and their health care provider. Trans youth are no exception,” Robinson responded. 

ā€œThe Biden administration is flat wrong on this. Itā€™s wrong on the science and wrong on the substance. Itā€™s also inconsistent with other steps the administration has taken to support transgender youth. The Biden administration, and every elected official, need to leave these decisions to families, doctors and patientsā€”where they belong,” she added. “Although transgender young people make up an extremely small percentage of youth in this country, the care they receive is based on decades of clinical research and is backed by every major medical association in the U.S. representing over 1.3 million doctors.”

Robinson said the “administration has committed to fight any ban on healthcare for transgender youth and must continue this without hesitationā€”the entire community is watching.” 

ā€œNo parent should ever be put in the position where they and their doctor agree on one course of action, supported by the overwhelming majority of medical experts, but the government forbids it,ā€ she added.

HRC is a prominent backer of Biden’s 2024 reelection campaign, having pledged $15 million to support efforts in six battleground states. The organization has a strong relationship with the White House, with the president and first lady headlining last year’s National Dinner.

A White House spokesperson declined to respond to Robinson’s statement.

Campaign for Southern Equality President Allison Scott also issued a statement.

ā€œThis is a cowardly statement from an administration that promised to support transgender people. It is a troubling concession to the right-wing assault on transgender Americans, falling for their false narratives about surgical care and betraying a commitment to equality and trust in the medical community,ā€ said Scott.

ā€œLetā€™s be very, very clear: Government has no business inserting itself into private medical decisions that should be exclusively between patients, their providers, and the patientsā€™ parent or guardian,” Scott added.

“It is dangerous to begin endorsing categorical bans or limits on healthcare, and there is no justification for restricting transgender youthā€™s access to the very same care that many cisgender youth receive every year ā€” thatā€™s literally the definition of discrimination,” Scott concluded. “We demand the Biden administration retract this thoughtless statement and work to undo its damage.ā€ 

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Members of Congress introduce resolution to condemn Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act

U.S. Reps. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) and Joyce Beatty spearheaded condemnation

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U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

More than 20 members of Congress on Thursday introduced a resolution that condemns Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act.

Gay California Congressman Mark Takano and U.S. Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) spearheaded the resolution that U.S. Reps. Becca Balint (D-Vt.), Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), Adriano Espaillat (D-N.Y.), Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas), Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), RaĆŗl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), Gwen Moore (D-Wis.), Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), Mark Pocan (D-Wash.), Delia Ramirez (D-Ill), Linda SĆ”nchez (D-Calif.), Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Brad Sherman (D-Calif.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.), and Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) co-sponsored.

“The House of Representatives condemns the government of Ugandaā€™s criminalization and draconian punishments regarding consensual same-sex sexual conduct and so-called ā€˜’promotion of homosexuality,ā€™” reads the resolution.

The resolution, among other things, also calls upon the Ugandan government to repeal the law.

ā€œIt is difficult to overstate the gross inhumanity of Ugandaā€™s Anti-Homosexuality Act,ā€ said Takano in a press release.

President Yoweri Museveni in May 2023 signed the law, which contains a death penalty provision for ā€œaggravated homosexuality.ā€

The U.S. subsequently imposed visa restrictions on Ugandan officials and removed the country from a program that allows sub-Saharan African countries to trade duty-free with the U.S. The World Bank Group also announced the suspension of new loans to Uganda.

The Ugandan Constitutional Court in April refused to ā€œnullify the Anti-Homosexuality Act in its totality.ā€ A group of Ugandan LGBTQ activists appealed the ruling.

ā€œInstead of focusing on rooting out corruption or ending extrajudicial killings, the Ugandan Parliament, president, and Constitutional Court have chosen to mark LGBTQ+ Ugandans as less than human,” said Takano. “Congress must not be silent in the face of such systematic, state-sponsored discrimination.”

“To all those LGBTQ+ people and your allies in Uganda ā€” we see you,” added the California Democrat. “We and the Biden administration will not allow this terrible violation of basic dignity to go unchallenged.ā€ 

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LGBTQ issues absent from Trump-Biden debate

Advocacy groups hoped candidates would address queer topics

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Former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden debate on CNN on Jun 27, 2024. (Screen captures via CNN)

At their televised debate in Atlanta on June 27, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump traded barbs on issues from abortion and election integrity to immigration and foreign policy. The 81 and 78-year-old candidates even argued over who is a better golfer.

Absent from the discussion, however, were matters of LGBTQ rights that have animated national politics in this election cycle with the presumptive Republican nominee promising to weaponize the federal government against queer and trans Americans as the president pledges to build on his record of expanding their freedoms and protections.

CNN hosted Thursday’s debate, with the network’s anchors Dana Bash and Jake Tapper moderating. ABC News will run the second debate scheduled for September 10.

The president’s performance was widely criticized as halting and shaky, with White House reporter Peter Baker of The New York Times writing that Democratic Party leaders are calling for him to be replaced at the top of the ticket.

Also setting the tone early into the program was Trump’s repetition of the lie that Democrats are so “radical” on matters of abortion that they “will take the life of a child in the eighth month, the ninth month, and even after birth.”

Biden, meanwhile, laid the blame at his opponent’s feet for appointing three U.S. Supreme Court justices during his term in office who overturned Roe v. Wade’s 51-year-old constitutional protections for abortion.

He also referenced the fallout from that ruling and the extreme restrictions passed by conservative legislators in its wake, arguing that Trump would not veto a federal abortion ban if Republican majorities in Congress were to pass one.

Trump also repeated falsehoods about the 2020 presidential election.

“Will you pledge tonight that once all legal challenges have been exhausted, that you will accept the results of this election,” Bash asked him, “regardless of who wins, and you will say right now that political violence in any form is unacceptable?”

The Republican frontrunner first responded by denying he was responsible for his supporters’ violent ransacking of the U.S. Capitol Building on Jan. 6 2021.

After the CNN anchor pressed him twice to answer the first part of her question, Trump said, “if it’s a fair and legal and good election, absolutely” but “the fraud and everything else was ridiculous.”

“You appealed and appealed to courts all across the country,” Biden responded. “Not one single court in America said any of your claims had any merit, state or local, none. But you continue to provoke this lie about somehow, there’s all this misrepresentation, all this stealing ā€” there is no evidence of that at all.”

The president continued, “And I tell you what, I doubt whether you’ll accept it, because you’re such a whiner.”

Advocacy groups hoped the debate would address LGBTQ issues

Leading up to the debate, advocacy groups urged the candidates to defend their records on and policy proposals concerning LGBTQ rights, with some arguing the discussion would advantage President Joe Biden’s campaign, as reported by The Hill’s Brooke Migdon.

As the community celebrated Pride this month, the Biden-Harris 2024 team made significant investments in paid media and the Out for Biden national organizing effort to court LGBTQ voters, who are expected to comprise a larger share of the electorate than ever before.

ā€œThis will be an enormous slight to our community if LGBTQ questions are not asked during this debate,ā€ GLAAD President Sarah Kate Ellis said. ā€œOur community is deeply affected by where these candidates stand.ā€Ā 

ā€œThe safety and freedom of LGBTQ people depends on your engagement with the candidates and ability to inform voters about their records and proposals,ā€ she said.

Annise Parker, the outgoing president and CEO of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, said ā€œI certainly hope that the moderators bring up the LGBTQ community and LGBTQ issues, because there is a stark contrast between the two candidates.”

ā€œI hope we see a substantive conversation on the records of these two men for the fight for a more equal society,ā€ said Brandon Wolf, national press secretary at the Human Rights Campaign.

ā€œA vast majority of people in this country support an America that treats people with dignity and respect; they support an America that prevents people from experiencing discrimination and harm simply because of who they are,ā€ he said.

ā€œThat is where the American people largely are, and I hope we get an opportunity on that stage to see the contrast between these two candidates.ā€Ā 

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