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| Fighting for Full Equality |
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Dear Neighbor,
Recently, our country has made tremendous strides in the march toward full and meaningful equality for LGBTQ Americans. In the time I’ve been in Congress, I voted to end “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” cheered when the Defense of Marriage Act was struck down, and, like so many other Northern Virginians, was overjoyed when the lights illuminating the White House turned rainbow to celebrate the Supreme Court’s landmark adoption of nationwide marriage equality. That moment, the culmination of decades of work by activists, policymakers, and the LGBTQ community writ large, was hard-won and historic.
But it was not the end of the road, as LGBTQ Americans today remain vulnerable to discrimination on a daily basis, often with far too little recourse. That’s why, this morning, I stood with every House Democrat and proudly voted to pass the Equality Act, legislation to ensure that LGBTQ Americans are guaranteed the full protections of federal civil rights laws.
Today, 50% of the American LGBTQ community live in states where, despite having the right to marry, still have no explicit non-discrimination protections in other areas of daily life. Only 21 states have laws barring discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment, housing, and public accommodations, and only 20 states have such protections for gender identity. In most states, a same-sex couple can get married one day and be legally denied service at a restaurant, fired from a job, or evicted from an apartment the next – simply because of who they are or who they love. Finally, by passing the Equality Act, the House has taken action to right this glaring wrong.
The Equality Act ensures that the same protections we already extend to other minority populations are available to LGBTQ Americans. Federal law has long provided protections for individuals based on characteristics like race, sex, religion, and national origin. The Equality Act amends existing federal civil rights laws by adding sexual orientation and gender identity to that list, thereby explicitly prohibiting discrimination against LGBTQ Americans in the areas of education, employment, housing, credit, federal jury service, public accommodations, and the use of federal funds.
The progress we have made over the past decade has been swift and broad-based. But, as the current administration proves to us each day, bigotry and discrimination are not yet relics in America. We must never stop trying to make them so. Please know I will continue to fight for the full equality of all Americans.
Sincerely,
Member of Congress
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