Windy City Media Group Frontpage News

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

home search facebook twitter join
Gay News Sponsor Windy City Times 2023-12-13
DOWNLOAD ISSUE
Donate

Sponsor
Sponsor
Sponsor

  WINDY CITY TIMES

SOUND THE ALARMS Supreme Court pick could dismantle LGBTQ rights
by Camilla B. Taylor, Special Guest Essay
2018-07-18

This article shared 1350 times since Wed Jul 18, 2018
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email


The nomination of Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court should alarm every member of the LGBT community. His record demonstrates that if he is confirmed to the seat recently vacated by Justice Kennedy, who often played the role of swing justice and authored the most significant landmark rulings over the past 20 years vindicating the rights and equal dignity of lesbian, bisexual and gay people, Judge Kavanaugh will threaten every advance this community has made, and set back our progress by decades.

Lambda Legal's Fair Courts Project ( www.lambdalegal.org/blog/20180709_brett-kavanaugh-record ) has comprehensively reviewed his record and identified many ways in which Judge Kavanaugh's extremist views endanger LGBT people. First, he believes presidents should enjoy almost unfettered authority, which is particularly worrying at a time when the Trump administration ( www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/cases/karnoski-v-trump ) has targeted LGBT people in its cross-hairs. Our community relies upon courts to provide a check on presidential power. To name just one example, President Trump last summer tweeted out a ban on transgender military service members. In multiple lawsuits challenging this ban, the Trump administration now argues that courts must defer broadly to the president and his discretion on military matters. The administration further claims that the service members challenging the policy have no right even to seek access to documents likely to show that the ban was tweeted out on impulse, reflecting little to no deliberation or rational decision-making whatsoever. Judge Kavanaugh's views on presidential power suggest that he may agree that courts may not meaningfully review such executive actions, regardless of how animus-driven and discriminatory they may be.

Second, Judge Kavanaugh sided ( caselaw.findlaw.com/us-dc-circuit/1714435.html ) with religious employers objecting to the federal government providing their employees with contraceptive coverage pursuant to the Affordable Care Act ( "ACA" ). Judge Kavanaugh's view that the ACA burdened these employers' religious beliefs simply by requiring them to notify the government of their objection to contraception suggests that Judge Kavanaugh also may: 1 ) side with religious health care providers that take federal taxpayer funds but refuse to treat LGBT people; 2 ) rule in favor of discriminatory child welfare providers that take taxpayer funds but refuse to respect the sexual orientation and gender identity of foster youth in their care, or that refuse ( www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/cases/marouf-v-azar ) to license LGBT people as foster parents, citing religious objections; and 3 ) favor discriminatory businesses ( www.lambdalegal.org/blog/20180625_arlenes-flowers-decision ) that justify withholding service to serve LGBT people in the marketplace on religious grounds. Cases concerning these questions are likely to reach the Court in the not-too-distant future.

But what should be most worrying for members of the LGBT community is Judge Kavanaugh's views on abortion. He dissented ( www.cadc.uscourts.gov/internet/opinions.nsf/C81A5EDEADAE82F2852581C30068AF6E/$file/17-5236-1701167.pdf ) from a decision of the full D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals allowing an undocumented 17-year-old girl in detention to obtain an abortion, and in various writings has expressed hostility to Roe v. Wade, the foundational abortion-rights decision. If courts retreat from protecting women's equality and autonomy in making reproductive choices free of governmental interference, including with respect to abortion, then the rights of all LGBT people, which are deeply intertwined and share a common body of law, are necessarily diminished.

Indeed, the landmark victories that guard the LGBT community's right to marry and that decriminalized LGBT peoples' very existence, depend explicitly on precedents shielding reproductive autonomy. Thus, Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down laws criminalizing intimacy between people of the same sex, and Obergefell v. Hodges, which upheld the fundamental right to marry for same-sex couples, expressly relied upon prior due process cases protecting women's access to contraception, such as Griswold v. Connecticut and Eisenstadt v. Baird. The Supreme Court recognized that, just like procreative decision-making, the right to choose whom to love and to marry and how to structure one's family can be self-defining, and central to a person's dignity and identity. Recently, lower courts have recognized that the due process guarantee, built as it is upon a body of law protecting reproductive autonomy and bodily integrity, similarly protects a transgender person's right to live consistently with their gender identity ( www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/legal-docs/pr_arroyo_20180420_opinion-and-order ), requiring issuance of accurate identity documents to transgender applicants, and respect for transgender service members' right to serve ( www.lambdalegal.org/sites/default/files/legal-docs/downloads/karnoski_pi_order.pdf ) in the military as the men and women they are. To chip away at the body of law protecting women's reproductive autonomy would be to chip away at the precedents protecting LGBT peoples' equal dignity, moral agency, and ability to participate in public life.

Additionally, reproductive autonomy matters to LGBT people for more practical reasons. Many members of the community need access to such health care for themselves. Women often take contraceptives for medical reasons unrelated to preventing pregnancy, such as to treat endometriosis or reduce the risk for ovarian and uterine cancers. Indeed, at least one study suggests that more than 50 percent of lesbian women have used oral contraceptives at some point in their lives. Of course, lesbians and bisexual women may seek contraceptives or abortion care after having consensual sex with men as well. Transgender men need abortion care and contraceptives, too. Abortion and contraceptives are simply vital health care needs regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. Lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender men already face unique barriers ( www.lambdalegal.org/publications/when-health-care-isnt-caring ) to care that would be compounded by the imposition of additional restrictions on reproductive healthcare.

These aspects of Judge Kavanaugh's record have direct relevance to LGBT people, but it bears noting www.democracyinitiative.org/latest-news/di-statement-re-kavanaugh-nomination that a vast range of civil liberties organizations have voiced opposition ( civilrights.org/trump-supreme-court-pick-unfit-to-serve/ ) to his nomination for additional reasons—because his record also betrays hostility to voting rights ( www.nytimes.com/2018/07/13/opinion/sunday/voting-rights-voter-id-kavanaugh.html ), affirmative action ( www.politico.com/story/2018/07/09/brett-kavanaugh-track-record-675294 ), workers' rightsm (cases.justia.com/federal/appellate-courts/cadc/15-1312/15-1312-2017-08-18.pdf ), immigrants' rights, consumer protections ( www.cadc.uscourts.gov/internet/opinions.nsf/B7623651686D60D585258226005405AC/$file/15-1177.pdf ) , and other protections for vulnerable communities. The LGBT community in all of its proud diversity has a stake in all of these issues, too.

In short, Judge Kavanaugh's record suggests disdain for anyone who requires court intervention for protection against governmental discrimination and excess, and that should worry all of us. Now is the time to speak up against Judge Kavanaugh's nomination. Decades of progress for the LGBT community are in danger of being rolled back. Please call your senators and ask them to vote against this nomination ( www.lambdalegal.org/call-your-senator ).

Camilla B. Taylor is the Director of Constitutional Litigation for Lambda Legal, the oldest and largest national legal organization committed to achieving full recognition of the civil rights of all lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and people with HIV. She spearheads Lambda Legal's litigation challenging the Trump/Pence administration's assault on LGBT rights.

Most recently, Taylor has worked on Karnoski v. Trump ( www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/cases/karnoski-v-trump ), challenging the constitutionality of the Trump administration's ban on military service by transgender people; and Marouf v. Azar ( www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/cases/marouf-v-azar ), a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ( HHS ) on behalf of a lesbian couple denied an opportunity to apply to foster a refugee child in a federal program exclusively funded by HHS and administered by a faith-based agency on the ground that the couple does "not mirror the Holy Family."


This article shared 1350 times since Wed Jul 18, 2018
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email

Out and Aging
Presented By

  ARTICLES YOU MIGHT LIKE

Gay News

Chicago's LGBTQ+ Advisory Council sets a new course
2024-03-18
Chicago's LGBTQ+ Advisory Council held its first meeting of the calendar year on Feb. 28 at City Hall in the Loop under the leadership of the recently appointed chair Jin-Soo Huh. The LGBTQ+ Advisory Council is ...


Gay News

NATIONAL Missouri measure, HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, judge, Texas schools
2024-03-15
In Missouri, a newly proposed law could charge teachers and counselors with a felony and require them to register as sex offenders if they're found guilty of supporting transgender students who are socially transitioning, CNN noted. ...


Gay News

PASSAGES: Former Chicago Commission on Human Relations chair Clarence Wood
2024-03-13
LGBTQ ally and former Chicago Commission on Human Relations (CCHR) Chair and Commissioner Clarence N. Wood died March 5. He was 83. Wood was born April 14, 1940, in Alabama. While primarily raised in Alabama, Wood ...


Gay News

Longtime LGBTQ+-rights activist David Mixner dies at 77
2024-03-12
On March 11, longtime LGBTQ+ and HIV/AIDS activist David Mixner—known for working on Bill Clinton's presidential campaign but then splitting from him over "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT)—died at age 77, The Advocate reported. ...


Gay News

LGBTQ+ Victory Fund remembers co-founder David Mixner
2024-03-12
--From a press release - Today, LGBTQ+ Victory Fund President & CEO Mayor Annise Parker released the following statement on the passing of LGBTQ+ civil rights activist and LGBTQ+ Victory Fund co-founder David Mixner: "Today, we lost David Mixner, a founding ...


Gay News

Florida settles 'Don't Say Gay' lawsuit
2024-03-11
On March 11, the state of Florida settled a multi-year lawsuit against the so-called "Don't Say Gay" law, which limits how LGBTQ+ topics can be discussed and presented in schools, The Hill reported. The settlement agreement ...


Gay News

ELECTIONS 2024 Precious Brady-Davis says climate change is top issue as she runs to finish appointed MWRD term
2024-03-08
Precious Brady-Davis, commissioner for the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District (MWRD), is one of several candidates running to fill three seats on the board in the March 19 election. Brady-Davis was appointed to the role last summer ...


Gay News

ELECTIONS 2024 MWRD's Marcelino Garcia discusses flooding, land use and LGBTQ+ inclusion
2024-03-08
Marcelina Garcia, commissioner for the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District (MWRD), is one of several candidates in the running to fill three seats on the board in the March 19 election. Garcia, who chair's the MWRD's Finance ...


Gay News

NATIONAL Altercation, mpox research, Univ. of Fla., George Santos, tech battle
2024-03-08
Video footage uploaded to Facebook showed an altercation between a state trooper and two prominent Philadelphia LGBTQ+ leaders, the Washington Blade reported, republishing an article from Philadelphia Gay News. Celena ...


Gay News

LPAC celebrates historic wins for LGBTQ+ candidates in Super Tuesday primaries
2024-03-06
From a press release: Washington, DC—Today, LPAC,the nation's leading organization dedicated to electing LGBTQ+ women and nonbinary candidates to public office, proudly announces the outstanding victories of 67% of endorsed candidates ...


Gay News

Illinois's first openly gay elected official voices support for Cunningham
2024-03-05
Judge Thomas Chiola, who served in the Illinois Circuit Court of Cook County from 1994-2009, has officially endorsed Justice Joy Cunningham for reelection to the Illinois Supreme Court. Chiola is the first gay man to be ...


Gay News

Sinema retiring from the U.S. Senate
2024-03-05
Kyrsten Sinema—the bisexual U.S. senator from Arizona who recently switched from being a Democrat to an independent—announced that she will not run for re-election this year, ...


Gay News

WORLD Canadian politics, Australian murders, Finnish study, 'Anatomy'
2024-03-01
Canadian conservatives are divided over an anti-trans policy that Alberta Premier Danielle Smith handed down in her province, The Guardian reported. The policy includes a ban on hormonal treatment, puberty ...


Gay News

Ghana parliament passes harsh anti-LGBTQ+ bill
2024-02-29
On Feb. 28, Ghana's parliament unanimously passed a controversial anti-LGBTQ+ bill that has been condemned globally. The so-called Human Sexual Rights and Family Values Act, which was introduced in the parliament in 2021, not only criminalizes ...


Gay News

Anti-LGBTQ+ Republican McConnell to step down from leading U.S. Senate
2024-02-29
U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) will step down from Senate leadership in November, having served in that capacity longer than any senator in history, The Advocate noted. McConnell has been a senator since 1985 and has ...


 


Copyright © 2024 Windy City Media Group. All rights reserved.
Reprint by permission only. PDFs for back issues are downloadable from
our online archives.

Return postage must accompany all manuscripts, drawings, and
photographs submitted if they are to be returned, and no
responsibility may be assumed for unsolicited materials.

All rights to letters, art and photos sent to Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago
Gay and Lesbian News and Feature Publication) will be treated
as unconditionally assigned for publication purposes and as such,
subject to editing and comment. The opinions expressed by the
columnists, cartoonists, letter writers, and commentators are
their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay,
Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature Publication).

The appearance of a name, image or photo of a person or group in
Nightspots (Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times
(a Chicago Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature
Publication) does not indicate the sexual orientation of such
individuals or groups. While we encourage readers to support the
advertisers who make this newspaper possible, Nightspots (Chicago
GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay, Lesbian
News and Feature Publication) cannot accept responsibility for
any advertising claims or promotions.

 
 

TRENDINGBREAKINGPHOTOS







Sponsor


 



Donate


About WCMG      Contact Us      Online Front  Page      Windy City  Times      Nightspots
Identity      BLACKlines      En La Vida      Archives      Advanced Search     
Windy City Queercast      Queercast Archives     
Press  Releases      Join WCMG  Email List      Email Blast      Blogs     
Upcoming Events      Todays Events      Ongoing Events      Bar Guide      Community Groups      In Memoriam     
Privacy Policy     

Windy City Media Group publishes Windy City Times,
The Bi-Weekly Voice of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans Community.
5315 N. Clark St. #192, Chicago, IL 60640-2113 • PH (773) 871-7610 • FAX (773) 871-7609.