Posted on 02/03/2017 11:45:29 AM PST by drewh
Members of the religious right with ties to the Trump administration say they have been lead to believe that some changes will still be coming.
Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump helped lead the charge to scuttle a draft executive order that would have overturned Obama-era enforcements of LGBT rights in the workplace, ultiple sources with knowledge of the situation said.
A draft executive order on LGBT rights — which outlines how to roll back former president Barack Obama’s protections and expand legal exemptions based on religious beliefs — has been circulating among journalists and worried progressive groups this week.
But two sources close to Kushner and Ivanka Trump, who have in the past been supporters of gay rights, said the young couple were both in favor of putting out a clear statement from the president, promising to uphold the 2014 Obama executive order and stopping the momentum for the turnaround in its tracks.
On Tuesday night, the White House released a statement noting that “President Donald J. Trump is determined to protect the rights of all Americans, including the LGBTQ community. President Trump continues to be respectful and supportive of LGBTQ rights, just as he was throughout the election.”
“The executive order signed in 2014, which protects employees from anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination while working for federal contractors, will remain intact at the direction of President Donald J. Trump,” the statement continued.
White House officials downplayed the turnaround, suggesting that the draft LGBT executive order was never going to reach Trump’s desk for his signature. They described it as one of some 200 executive orders that were contemplated during the transition — some by outside groups, some by transition officials — and that it was never intended to become law, even without Kushner or anyone else pushing back on it.
“Some are real, some are drafts of things people like and some are ideas people from outside have suggested,” a White House official said, describing the executive orders that have been written.
But the statement did not quash the chatter completely. Members of the religious right with ties to the Trump administration said they have been lead to believe that some changes will still be coming. “I think they’re going to address the conflict that exists currently, which would preclude religious organizations from contracting with the federal government,” Tony Perkins, CEO of the Family Research Council, said in an interview. “I feel confident that they have an appreciation of religious freedom, and I’m pretty certain they’re going to address it. I’m talking to people in the Trump administration, and I know they understand the importance of this.”
Perkins said that Vice President Mike Pence has been involved and is “clearly sensitive to this.” If so, the fight over LGBT rights could reveal a fault line between Pence, an evangelical Catholic who as governor of Indiana signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in 2015; and Kushner, who is Jewish and whose social circle includes socially progressive New Yorkers.
“There are some in Trump’s family that have some views on these things,” said a source close to the discussions. “That’s where the decision is ultimately being made.”
Democratic groups like the nonprofit Center for American Progress are also continuing to fight against changes they expect could still be coming. “If accurate, this executive order would sanction sweeping taxpayer-funded discrimination against LGBT people, women, and their families in blatant violation of Trump’s promise to ‘protect our LGBT citizens,’” said Winnie Stachelberg, executive vice president for external affairs at CAP. Stachelberg said the White House statement left open a channel to broaden religious exemptions that prevent gay and transgender individuals from getting health care, or fostering a child.
“There are a lot of ideas that are being floated out,” White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said at the briefing on Thursday when asked about the LGBT executive order. “Part of it is, the president does all the time, he asks for input, he asks for ideas, and on a variety of subjects there are staffing procedures that go on where people have a thought or an idea and it goes through the process.”
Some of the confusion stems from how the executive orders have been written. “It wouldn’t be surprising to me if there were lots of documents floating around that people wrote, where they thought the administration might go,” said James Carafano, a vice president at the Heritage Foundation, who advised the Trump transition on foreign policy issues.
“This president’s number one priority is demonstrating to the people that got him elected that he is doing the people’s business,” said Carafano.
But Carafano warned that an LGBT executive order would not make sense right now, because it’s not in line with any campaign promise made by Trump — the first Republican nominee to feature an openly gay speaker at his convention. “For them to put out an executive order that didn’t try and match up with the priorities that he campaigned on would be an unforced error,” said Carafano.
Which rinos are you talking about
This is quite interesting:
https://twitter.com/anniekarni
She doesn’t seem to like the Trump family.
These stupid "non-discrimination" edicts are always solutions in desperate search of the non-existent problem. There is probably no significant number of people who identify as "gay" who weren't hired or served until this order was made. If people are valuable to a company, having the skills and knowledge a company needs, they'll get hired for economic reasons despite any unobtrusive quirk of "gayness" or femininity/butchness.
If they are NOT unobtrusive, then there is good reason not to hire them.
Social Policy bogymen are just cheerleaders for perpetual degeneracy. There is a time for strategy and tactics, but eventually policies need to be addressed and not excused.
Well put. I didn’t vote for Trump to fight a LGBTQ war. He had the best reply to Target’s trans restroom policy which to paraphrase was: ‘What do I care what Target’s bathroom policy is?”.
Two things: 1. Immigration and border control 2. SC pick.
All else is gravy.
There is no "spending" involved. Seriously, what's the cost? Just sign the damn order and it's good.
Rather, there is substantial cost SAVINGS through butting out a very expensive bureaucracy tasked with enforcement.
From what Sean Spicer said yesterday the drafts circulating are drafts that have been submitted by various people outside the administration for review. They were not Trump administration drafts. But the press is acting as if they are Trump administration drafts.
The press did the same thing with the agency internal memos limiting social media commentary, they acted as if they were White House memos and they weren’t.
Easy to throw words around, isn’t it?
Trump never claimed he was going to strip this executive order in the campaign. This had nothing to do with religious freedom and what may be coming in that regard. Why should we believe this?
She covered The Beast's campaign for Politico.
I’m so sick and tired of people discriminating against LGBT people for whatever they do in their personal lives. What they do in their bedrooms is their business with themselves, God, and their religious leaders. If we allow government to control their bedrooms or tolerate them being bullied then we are no better than the Taliban.
Did you see Rove attacking Bannon on Fox News? he knows that his time is up...
What happened to the hundreds of lawmakers we elected in, if they are not too busy?
Me too. Fine with the rights of people to live however they want.
However, if I asked a
Local
Mexican bakery to bake me a Trump cake it would
Not happen. And the libs wouldn’t fight for
Me.
Uh, I think those two should go back to New York. Hopefully President Trump will get the message from the voters who put him there and not the leftist leanings of some in his family....
That doesn’t stop the leftists hysteria. Putting a small bakery out of business because the owners don’t believe in gay marriage when there are ten other bakeries in town that would be glad to so (except Muslim bakeries who have mysteriously avoided lawsuits) should be stopped for freedom of religious convictions of the owners, but other than that I’ve never heard Trump say anything negative about LGBT rights. It’s completely made up.
For instance: If the Word of Faith Christian Academy employs two males who announce their intent to get married to each other, Word of Faith should have the right to fire them for noncompliance with "maintaining the Academy's Christian identity and standards"---- if they knew that was part of the job description --- or to not hire them to begin with.
I would define workplace rights as equal rules and treatment for all workers. In your example, co-workers committing heterosexual adultery would also be subject to termination.
Right. I think we’re on the same page o’ music here.
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