While the nation’s top LGBT organizations were dismayed at the election of Donald Trump as president, the National Organization for Marriage is ecstatic. In an open letter to supporters posted on the organization’s blog, NOM President Brian Brown hailed Trump’s victory and committed to working with the new administration to advance the organization’s top priorities.
“We are confident that our voice and our views will be important in a Trump administration,” Brown wrote in the post, which was titled “The Plan.” “This is a bright and exciting time for NOM, and we are committed to taking full advantage of the opportunity we have.”
Specifically, Brown outlines four major priorities that NOM hopes to achieve under Trump:
nominating conservative justices to the U.S. Supreme Court who will reverse the marriage equality decision in Obergefell v. Hodges;
the repeal of any pro-transgender executive orders or directives, such as the Department of Education’s guidance on allowing transgender students to access the restroom matching their gender identity;
reversing policies that “coerce” countries receiving foreign aid to improve their records on LGBT rights; and
passing the First Amendment Defense Act, which would allow people to deny service to LGBT people based on personally held religious or moral objections.
“We’re excited about the future, and we are looking forward to work with the Trump administration to restore marriage, uphold gender, protect religious liberty and promote families,” Brown concluded.
Brown’s post was picked up by gay blogs, who ran screeching headlines warning of a possible reversal of LGBT rights under a Trump administration. But LGBT Republicans who are either supporting Trump or cautiously optimistic about a Trump presidency say there’s no evidence that he intends to roll back LGBT rights or that he supports any of NOM’s desired policies. Gregory T. Angelo, president of the Log Cabin Republicans, has said it would be hard for any individual to achieve the standing necessary to bring a lawsuit against marriage equality, let alone overturn the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell.
Angelo also says that the First Amendment Defense Act is highly unlikely to pass through a Republican Congress, let alone make it to Trump’s desk to be signed into law.
“Log Cabin Republicans have lobbied against that, because it, much like the Equality Act, interestingly enough, is overly broad and could lead to unintended consequences,” says Angelo. He points to the fact that the National Organization for Marriage is the only organization still supporting the bill, as several other socially conservative groups, including the Family Research Council and the American Family Association, have pulled their support for FADA because of its overly broad language.
“I think a lot of the talk about religious liberty and the screaming from the Left about how Donald Trump was going to allow institutionalized discrimination is going to turn out to be another example of crying wolf,” adds Republican activist Christopher Barron.
At 56, I've seen plenty. Never, of course, have I seen the federal government so batshit bonkers, so desperate to assert itself into every nook and cranny of American life, from the critical to the comical. Take that, Colbert and Kimmel! Gotcha, plaque mentioning Transgender participation at the Stonewall Inn! We're gonna get you, sandwich guy!! We're deporting Bad Bunny! To… ahem… Puerto Rico?
What do you call this clinical level of desperation? Stephen Miller.
We've got masked federal goons playing tough in cities far and wide. Are these Proud Boys? Oath Keepers? Three Percenters? Quite likely, but who the hell knows? Aside from Kristi "Canine Killer" Noem, Tom (sub)Homan, and their colleagues, presumably.
Down in the polls and seeking to drag down rival Zohran Mamdani's favorables, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said he will push the Department of Education to roll back the city's policy allowing transgender students to use bathrooms aligned with their gender identity.
At a campaign stop in Harlem on September 17, standing outside a mosque, Adams launched into a rambling broadside against Mamdani, his Democratic Socialist allies, and left-leaning voters -- whom Adams, echoing House Speaker Hakeem Jeffries, derided as gentrifiers and transplants.
President Donald Trump has commuted the 87-month prison sentence of former U.S. Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), the openly gay congressman who pleaded guilty in August 2024 to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
By commuting his sentence, Trump allows the 37-year-old former congressman to walk free and resume his life. Before his imprisonment, Santos had been earning money on Cameo, charging up to $350 for personalized video messages -- from birthday greetings to shout-outs for special occasions.
Elected in 2022 amid a Republican "wave" in New York, the one-term congressman admitted to deceiving donors and stealing the identities of nearly a dozen people -- including relatives -- to fund his campaign.
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