Log Cabin Republicans ignore the facts and beg gays to back Trump
Log Cabin chairman Robert Kabel argues that the GOP under Trump is the "true party of equality."
The nation’s largest conservative LGBTQ organization is inexplicably urging gay people to vote for Donald Trump, arguing that his administration, which has attacked equality dozens of times, has been a “boon to the gay community.”
Robert Kabel, chairman of Log Cabin Republicans, made the claims in an op-ed for USA Today, which also touts the Republican Party as the “true party of equality.”
He argues that Democrats have “taken for granted the lesbian and gay community,” whereas the Republican Party — which includes opposition to same-sex marriage and support for conversion therapy in its 2020 party platform — is “delivering real results and leadership for our community.”
Kabel says that the GOP “generally stood against the inclusion of gay and lesbian conservatives,” but that he has worked “tirelessly alongside many friends and colleagues to pull the party into the future.” (Six months ago, the Log Cabin Republicans were refused a booth at the Texas GOP’s state convention because they promote “immoral and perverted sexual proclivities.”)
As such, Kabel argues, “thanks in large part to the leadership of President Donald Trump, the party has delivered meaningful policy victories for gays and lesbians.” As evidence he points to the few pro-LGBTQ things the Trump administration has thus far achieved.
They include a plan for ending the HIV epidemic in the USA by 2030, with aims for a 75% reduction in new infections by 2025, increasing to 90% reduction by 2030.
Kabel also touted Trump’s heavily advertised — and, subsequently, seemingly forgotten about — campaign to decriminalize homosexuality globally. The plan, which Trump was seemingly unaware of shortly after its launch last year, aims to use America’s global clout to influence nations to remove laws criminalizing same-sex sexual relations.
The campaign was pushed by former Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, who is touted by Kabel as proof of Trump’s support for gay people, given Grenell’s subsequent elevation to acting director of national intelligence, making him the first ever openly person to hold a cabinet-level position.
Kabel also notes that Trump has appointed two openly LGBTQ federal judges — a fact perhaps overshadowed by at least a third of Trump’s federal circuit court nominees having a history of anti-LGBTQ bias.
“These accomplishments should not suggest the president’s work is finished,” Kabel says, though some might argue his work on LGBTQ equality has really yet to begin.
Kabel then notes that the Trump administration fought against a recent Supreme Court decision ruling that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects LGBTQ people against workplace discrimination, a stance Kabel calls “disappointing.” (The Trump administration has also previously argued that it should be legal to fire gay and transgender people.)
“I’d also encourage the president to reconsider his stance on transgender men and women serving in the military,” Kabel says.
Kabel urges Trump, should he win a second term, to “work to resolve the ongoing tension between LGBT Americans’ justified demands for equality and the concerns of religious conservatives.” (Not that Trump needed to wait until a second term — the Democratic-controlled House passed the Equality Act, which enshrines discrimination protections for LGBTQ people into federal law, last year. The Republican-controlled Senate refuses to consider it.)
He also asks Trump to “work with Congress to correct the gaps in access to (and quality of) care faced by LGBT Americans.” (Ignoring that Trump stripped health care protections from trans Americans during a global health pandemic.)
Kabel also, conveniently, sidesteps the dozens of ways in which the Trump administration has sought to undermine or outright attack LGBTQ rights and equality during his almost four years in office.
GLAAD has tracked 168 attacks on LGBTQ people in Trump’s 1,309 days in office, including pushing ahead with plans to allow shelters to deny access to trans people, defending an Idaho law that bars trans female athletes from competing in women’s sports, arguing that foster care agencies should be allowed to discriminate against same-sex couples, rescinding Obama-era guidance protecting transgender students, attempting to forcibly discharge HIV-positive members of the military, and fighting to revoke the citizenship of one gay couple’s child and refusing to recognize the citizenship of another.
Plus, Trump has hired anti-LGBTQ figures to his cabinet (including his vice president), and surrounded himself with anti-LGBTQ advisers.
His administration’s actions have been so blatantly anti-LGBTQ that in November last year, the bipartisan U.S. Commission on Civil Rights declared that Trump had “blatantly and deliberately” targeted LGBTQ people during his presidency. One member of the commission stated that Trump was “undoing decades of civil and human rights progress.”
Oh, and Trump’s own niece, out lesbian Mary Trump, said that LGBTQ make the president “uncomfortable.”
But clearly all of the above is lost on Kabel, who writes that “America has come a long way in accepting the gay community…[but] there is still more work to be done.”
“As November approaches, it’s vital to elect someone who will continue this progress,” he continues, before inexplicably arguing that the person who will do that is Trump, rather than the person with an extensive plan to protect and expand LGBTQ rights (former Vice President Joe Biden).
“As Democrats spend the week declaring themselves the party of inclusivity, remember that actions speak louder than words,” Kabel concludes, before delivering his boldest line of all: “Today, the GOP has proved itself to be the true party of equality.”
Related:
Virginia Republican adopts anti-LGBTQ messaging in campaign for Congress
GOP Senate candidate slammed for ‘homophobic’ ad calling people ‘pansies’
Three Kansas Republicans resort to anti-transgender attacks in U.S. Senate race
GOP sheriff candidate joked about shooting gay couple in leaked family texts
Amid pandemic, Tennessee Republicans prioritize anti-trans legislation
Trump advisors urging him to use transgender rights as election wedge issue
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