The Republican Party as a whole is not supportive of gay equality. You might think that would lead LGBT political groups to try to increase the number of pro-gay (and openly gay) Republican office holders, who once elected would be in a position to change the party. Alas, that’s not the case.
Take the Victory Fund. Its stated mission is “To change the face and voice of America’s politics and achieve equality for LGBT Americans by increasing the number of openly LGBT officials at all levels of government.” But the group has long had a virtual litmus test against pro-life gay candidates, which (with rare exception) has excluded endorsements for gay Republicans. Robert Turner, president of the D.C. chapter of Log Cabin Republicans, argues “being pro-life is not bad for the gay cause” and is urging the Victory Fund to “Get rid of the pro-abortion plank in your vetting process and move on.”
Another case in point; Just this week Equality California (EQCA) endorsed Democrat Debra Bowen for Congress. She’s a pro-gay liberal, but also running for the seat is popular Republican Redondo Beach mayor Mike Gin, who is openly gay and married (yes, to a man).
You’d think sending him to Congress would convey a powerful message to the GOP and be a significant step toward changing the party’s anti-gay stance. But fealty to the Democratic Party remains the top priority of a great many LGBT activists, whose worst fundraising nightmare is a GOP that isn’t adamantly anti-gay.
More. Log Cabin Republicans are “Proud to Support One of Our Own, Mike Gin, For Congress.”
34 Comments for “Do LGBT Activists Prefer an Anti-Gay GOP?”
posted by Wilberforce on
Being pro life is too bad for the gay cause because it alienates our allies. So is electing gay quislings. I notice you don’t mention Mike Gin’s actual policies. Are they pro gay? Electing someone on the basis of sexual orientation, or race, or any other one dimensional trait is hopelessly ignorant.
But I’m starting to see that this site is all about making excuses for the GOP and soft pedalling their heartless policies. Hence the title Independent Gay forum. It’s an old trick of the right to call themselves independent. They’re not independent of the GOP’s authoritarian dogma, hence the praise for pro life policy.
If you want to be Republicans, darlings, say it out loud. Don’t hide with weasel words.
posted by Jon on
Just for the record… Mike Gin has a 100% rating from Equality California and he is pro-choice… There is no excuse for EQCA on this one.. it is a political decision, not a pro-LGBT decision.
posted by BobN on
There’s no “excuse”. There’s a reason. Gin wouldn’t become the first or only GOP rep in Congress. There are others and, with very few exceptions, they nevertheless voted with their block against us.
It is a political decision — one of pragmatism.
posted by Jimmy on
“But fealty to the Democratic Party remains the top priority of a great many LGBT activists,..”
Not just activists, but most LGBT in general are Democrats, or vote Democrat. Do you think gays and lesbians are one issue voters? You act as of party platforms are meaningless. Most LGBT are center-left, politically, especially those in urban areas.
Making YOUR party better is not our concern.
posted by Dan on
That’s pretty short sighted of you, wouldn’t you say? Considering the Democratic party has rarely been able to secure both houses of Congress and the White House simultaneously, and even when they did in the last Congress they were barely able to squeak DADT ‘repeal’ and hate crimes through, doesn’t it seem like a good idea to start getting more equality-minded candidates elected on both sides of the aisle?
posted by Houndentenor on
Fair enough. But then any Republican who is even moderate on gay rights is labeled a RINO and likely to face a primary challenger. Changing the minds of Republicans would seem to be the job of GOProud and LCR, not liberal gay activists. The failure of gay Republicans to make any substantive progress is hardly the fault of Democrats.
posted by esurience on
Well… you can’t just consider the individual candidate, you have to consider the outcome it will have in the balance of power.
It is better for gay people to not have Republicans in control of either chamber of Congress… so doesn’t that mean the only pro-gay thing to do is to support Democrats in their election?
posted by Alan on
No; Change is made by the individual, not by the masses.
posted by Tom on
Well, Stephen, with respect to the Equality California endorsement, the answer is right in front of our faces: “Equality California PAC only endorses candidates who support full equality for the entire lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community …”
I searched Mike Gin’s website from top to bottom and couldn’t find any mention of current federal LGBT issues — ENDA, DOMA repeal and so on — at all.
In contrast. Debra Bowen’s campaign website discusses, at length, her long record of support for gays and lesbians and her support of ENDA, DOMA repeal and similar issues.
What are Mike Gin’s positions on DOMA and ENDA, for starters? Do you know? I don’t.
posted by Wilberforce on
I suppose one could give him the benefit of the doubt. But in voting, that’s a dangerous game, and the fact that he doesn’t mention gay rights says plenty.
posted by Jon on
For the record….Mike Gin has a 100% rating from EQCA and has publicly supported ENDA, Repeal of DOMA, opposed Propositions 22 and 8… all while an openly gay councilman and mayor of Redondo Beach. He is 100% for his own and our equality… the excuse EQCA gave to Mike for endorsing Debra (who I also know and respect, by the way) was that they “need to reward candidates for their past support”…. that’s the criteria? What about moving the equality movement by supporting lesser known, but equally qualified candidates regardless of their political party.
posted by Tom on
Well, Jon, if Mike Gin’s support continues — and no doubt it does, despite the silence on his web site — EQCA should also have endorsed him as well as Debra Bowen if the group were true to its stated principle: “Equality California PAC only endorses candidates who support full equality for the entire lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community …”
There’s nothing wrong with endorsing several candidates in a race.
That’s the practice, anyway of one of the gay advocacy groups in Wisconsin, which endorses all candidates with strong records, and it is similar to the practice of the NRA, which is one of the most effective voter turnout groups around.
My view is that gay advocacy groups should be just that — single-issue advocacy groups, as focused and relentless as the NRA is about 2nd Amendment rights.
I don’t think that gay advocacy groups should align with a political party, although I recognize that until Republican gays and lesbians get to work and blunt the dominance of social conservatives within their own party, most of the gay supportive candidates will wear the Democratic or Libertarian label.
I don’t think that gay advocacy groups should concern themselves with any issues other than support for “equal means equal”.
posted by JimG on
“the fact that he doesn’t mention gay rights says plenty”. And what also speaks volumes is that here is a “pro-choice independant Republican” listing as nonchalantly as possible the fact that he was named “as a…..fellow of the Gay & Lesbian Leadership Institue…” while listing a number of other accomplisments….and then finishing up his statment about himself with the other non trumpeted bit of information that he is “married to his husband of 16 years”.
And this is a Republic? This is major. I have been on this earth long enought to remember a time when something like this would never have even been considered. From a Republican?
These are the type of people that we need to advance in the Republican Party. And I agree that Mr. Gin must be more forthcoming with his views on specific gay issues, like ENDA, etc. And I hope he will soon. Who knows, Mr. Gin just might be that combination of fiscal conservative and open minded tolerant person that many of us have hoped for for a long time.
posted by Wilberforce on
I’d love to see a fiscal conservative get in. I’m one myself, as was Bill C, and we all know what your party did to him.
I think I also know what Republican fiscal conservative means. They spend a blue streak in order to cripple government and collect interest on the national debt. And they use the fiscal conservative label to shift spending from the poor and middle class to the rich and corporations. It’s happening right now in the States, and would be in nationally if they had control of the House.
posted by Tom on
These are the type of people that we need to advance in the Republican Party. And I agree that Mr. Gin must be more forthcoming with his views on specific gay issues, like ENDA, etc. And I hope he will soon.
Assuming that Mike Gin’s view on “equal means equal” is “Yes, that’s right …”, I agree. But there is the question of the “we” — as in “Who are we?”
Stephen takes after EQCA for choosing to endorse Debra Brown out of a field of four (three Democrats and a Republican), rather than endorsing Mike Gin, even though to endorse Mike Gin at this point (in the face of his silence) would not be consistent with EQCA’s stated endorsement policy: ““Equality California PAC only endorses candidates who support full equality for the entire lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community …”
That’s backwards.
EQCA is, obviously, not going to endorse a politician who is silent on LGBT issues, when there is a politician who is not, has a long history of fighting for “equal means equal”, and has clearly stated positions on current federal issues affecting gays and lesbians.
Nor should it be expected, as Stephen seems to be expecting, that it do so.
To paraphrase Jimmy, “Making YOUR party better is not EQCA’s concern.” It is YOUR concern, as gay and lesbian Republicans.
Dale Carpenter recently published a mea culpa acknowledging that the Democratic Party is supportive (albeit falteringly and imperfectly) of “equal means equal” because those of us who are Democrats have put in thirty years of hard work to make is so. We continue to work at it, and will do so in the future.
WE have not been sitting on our hands complaining that the so-called “LGBT leadership” — the gay advocacy groups — were not doing enough to change OUR party. We went out and did the work to make it happen, getting involved at the county and state levels, working in campaigns of supportive candidates, contributing to supportive candidates, and doing all the other hard ground-level work that was entailed in turning the party around.
Our task is not finished, not by a long shot. But YOUR task needs to get started. Those of us who are not Republicans are not going to hand you a gay-supportive Republican party on a platter, and say, “Here it is, boys …”
If you want to turn the Republican Party around, stop putting all your focus on the failings of the Democratic Party and the “LGBT leadership” and START focusing on the work that YOU need to do to counter the unrelenting anti-gay crusade being run within the Republican Party by far-right conservative Christians and other social conservatives.
Let me ask you a blunt question: If you think that Mike Gin should elected, what have you done to make that happen? Have you contributed to his campaign? Have you volunteered any time to his campaign, phone banking or in person? Have you called friends in his district and tried to get them involved? Have you done anything?
It is a fair question, I think. Fair or not, it is the same question, in reverse, that I ask liberal gays and lesbians in my area (Wisconsin’s 2nd CD, 14th SD, 42nd AD) when they complain about the Republican political dominance, particularly at the state and county level. I tell them that they have no business complaining about what the Republicans do if they aren’t willing to go to work to help Democrats get elected.
Gays and lesbians are not a special class, dependent on politicians or gay-advocacy groups. We will get what we make happen, and nothing more or less. That’s as true for those of you who are Republicans as it is for us who are Democrats.
The Republican Party has a problem with respect to gays and lesbians, and that problem has been growing since asleep-at-the-switch fiscal conservatives let the so-called “values voters” take over the party’s political machinery.
The Republican Party is now at the point where a Presidential candidate cannot get through the primary process without pandering, and the national party is being forced to act against common sense and its own principles to defend DADT and DOMA.
YOU — gay and lesbian Republicans — are thirty years behind gay and lesbian Democrats and gay and lesbian Libertarians in getting your work started and moving your party along. You are paying the price for trying to reap what you never sowed.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Stephen, nice job. You proved the point beautifully, inasmuch as not a single person in this thread could a) support Mike Gin or b) keep from pushing some variant of the ubiquitous “Republicans are all evil so we must mindlessly support the Obama Party” ideology of the gay and lesbian community that you are calling out as such.
Not a single person in this thread could discuss Gin’s qualifications. Not a single person in this thread could support anything that he’s done. Instead, they demand standards of Gin that they would never apply to their own candidates and then insist that, because he doesn’t meet their arbitrary standards, that he’s not qualified and should be tossed aside in favor of the Obama Party candidate.
That’s what the bulk of the commenters to this site will never understand. Gin and other gay Republicans have made their case based on character and performance. Gin should be elected and should be supported because he’s demonstrated that he can do a good job.
In contrast, the gay and lesbian community is demanding that Bowen be elected because she panders to them based on their minority status.
It’s a simple question: content of character and record of performance versus minority status and pandering. For the gay and lesbian community, the former is irrelevant and the latter is all that matters.
posted by Jorge on
Let me ask you a blunt question: If you think that Mike Gin should elected, what have you done to make that happen?
I gave $25 this week to one of the three House Republicans who voted for the repeal DADT bill. Took her five fund-raising letters to get it.
It looks like Mr. Miller’s post is right on target if it stirred up this much of a hornet’s nest.
posted by Tom on
Good for you, Jorge. Stay involved and you will change your party for the better.
I support Republicans who are trying to change their party. My beef is with Republicans who sit on their hands in their own party and complain that those of us who are Democrats aren’t doing enough for them.
posted by Houndentenor on
I get this tired old song from Republican acquaintances and realitves all the time. Rather than do something to move the GOP on gay rights, they complain to me for being anti-Republican because of their anti-gay agenda. If you really think the GOP is wrong on gay issues, tell the party, not your gay friends.
posted by BobN on
“the other non trumpeted bit of information that he is “married to his husband of 16 years”.
He is married to his partner of 16 years, not his husband of 16 years.
Just to be clear.
posted by Tim on
I moved to New York in the late ’90s, around the time HRC endorsed Al D’Amato for Senate over Charles Schumer. The strategy was just what you suggest — electing fair-minded Republicans. As I recall, HRC had brokered a deal with D’Amato — his support for a pro-LGBT bill, or pro-LGBT legislation generally, in exchange for the endorsement. The backlash was intense. To their credit, the HRC leadership came to New York City and faced the music after the election. You make a good point about electing more LGBT and pro-LGBT Republicans, but as the comments here suggest, many LGBT voters are not single-issue voters. So when you have two LGBT-supportive candidates, perhaps the “activists” would be better served by making no endorsement at all, and funneling their resources toward races where the choice between pro- and anti-LGBT is more clearly defined.
posted by Houndentenor on
I remember that endorsement well. The problem is that a vote for D’Amato was a vote for the GOP majority which blocked any gay-friendly legislation, so I voted for Schumer.
Also, you fail to mention that HRC’s policy at the time (and perhaps continues to be?) was to endorse incumbents over challengers if things were equal. (Also, D’Amato had a number of ethical problems that were well known at the time.)
Sadly, all HRC did with that endorsement was show that they couldn’t rally the gay vote for a candidate. It’s always been a problem with HRC that the organization is not grass-roots and thinks it can dictate to gay people what their agenda ought to be rather than listen to gay people and take those concerns to Washington. As a result HRC has accomplished nothing in all these years in spite of burning through millions of dollars.
posted by Tom on
Did anyone else notice the logical stretch from the post (discussing the Victory Fund’s and EQCA’s seeming preference for endorsement of Democratic candidates rather than Republican candidates) to the post’s headline (“Do LGBT Activists Prefer an Anti-Gay GOP?“), and think about the implications of the disconnect?
The headline would be directly related to the post only if the post related endorsements of an ant-gay Republican over a pro-gay Republican.
The logical connection that Stephen appears to be drawing is indirect at best, suggesting that any failure to endorse a (one hopes) gay-supportive Republican over a clearly gay-supportive Democrat somehow keeps the Republican Party anti-gay. That strikes me as the same sort of logical slide that the anti-marriage folks are so fond of using — the argument that prohibiting gays and lesbians from marrying somehow increases the likelihood that straights will marry and stay married. I don’t see the logic of either position.
But notice the implications of Stephens apparent logical connection — the logic suggests that gay and lesbian Republicans are powerless to change the anti-gay lock on the Republican Party, and dependent upon outside groups to do so.
Not so. A problem in the Republican Party is that gay and lesbian Republicans continue to vote for and support anti-gay Republicans.
posted by Wilberforce on
Not to be snarkles, and thanks for pointing this out, but it looks to me more like a logical gulf, implying that by not endorsing out Republicans we are forcing the party into the hands of the far right. They’re already in the grip, proof of which is that there are no pro gay Republican queers we can support. It’s the usual blame the victim tactic, and I for one am tired of it.
BTW, did anyone else enjoy Tom’s beautifully argued piece?
Finally, JimG points out as an endorsement that Gin is a fellow of the Gay and Lesbian Leadership Institute. Please. Talk about grasping at straws. All they do is help get queers elected. If that is his only qualification, it’s weak to the point of herbal tea. He might have joined out of pure self interest, which, come to think of it, is typical of the breed.
But I’m not too sure about this site. It seems that we argue endlessly over Republican talking points disguised with ever more subtle phraseology. And it’s getting tired.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
Actually, that’s incorrect, Tom.
The whole point of the Obama Party activists like yourself of painting the GOP as “antigay” and claiming that any gay Republicans are “quislings” is nothing more than basic social control.
You see, if gay and lesbian people are not terrified into subservience of the Obama Party, they might ask why they need to support abortion mills like Kermit Gosnell’s with Federal tax dollars. They might ask why on earth they would want to support the Obama Party operatives in Wisconsin like you who are sending death threats to Republican legislators and their families and threatening to bomb public buildings, or why gays and lesbians should automatically endorse the union thugs, especially the police, who are threatening to damage and vandalize businesses that don’t immediately endorse and support the union.
So all your constant screaming of, “bigots, bigots” and “quislings, quislings” is about is keeping gays safely infantilized and on the plantation — and, on a meta level, keeping you from having to present rational explanations for your position, instead of just invoking the usual antireligious and anti-Republican bigotry.
posted by Houndentenor on
No one has to paint the GOP as anti-gay. It’s in the platform.
posted by Jorge on
Well, yes, but from this thread I get the impression that people here prefer an (imaginary) anti-gay GOP.
Not willing to argue it. I’m just saying.
posted by BobN on
Miller is, as usual, more interested in stirring up strife than shining light.
posted by CommonSense on
Then leave. (In other words if he’s no good, why spend your time here?)
posted by TommmyBoi on
Yes, as long as the United States remains a two-party cartel, it is a good idea — in theory — to support Democrats and Republicans who support “us”. Yet, many differences of opinion come into play as what is and is not a ‘gay issue’.
posted by TommyBoi on
Case in point; if you believe that gay rights is a human rights issue and you believe reproductive rights or labor rights are also human rights issues, then you may connect them together.
posted by Greg on
I just wanted to ask this, but have there been many pro-life gay candidates for public office.
posted by Tom on
If by “pro-life” you mean favoring criminalization of abortion, I doubt it.
Whatever our personal views on abortion, most of us have had enough experience with sodomy and similar laws designed to impose private morality through criminalization to know better than to get into that boat.
On a related note, I’ve been quietly involved in the “adoption alternative” movement for years, working mostly with gays and lesbians who want to adopt, and it heartens me to know the large numbers of gay and lesbian couples who adopt unwanted children. I’ve never understood social conservative resistance to gay/lesbian adoption. It strikes me as just nuts.
It is an interesting question you raise about gay and lesbian politicians, though, and I don’t know the answer.
The Victory Fund lists just under a thousand gay and lesbian public officials in this county, so I imagine that there is a range of views.
posted by another steve on
Yes, several gay GOP candidates. Last year Matthew Berry ran in Arlington, Vir. — openly gay, pro-life (leave it to the states) — no Victory Fund endorsement. Many other examples.