The Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender civil rights organization, strongly criticized the House Republican leadership on Friday for taking steps to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in court, violating their pledge to focus only on economic issues.
DOMA is a policy which discriminates against the LGBT community since the act refuses to recognize gay marriage as a federally legal union.
“House Republican leadership has now shown they’re more interested in scoring cheap political points on the backs of same-sex couples than tackling real problems,” said HRC President Joe Solmonese. “As families across the country continue to struggle, the House Republican leadership’s prescription is to keep families they don’t like from accessing needed protections.”
Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor have repeatedly promised Americans in public statements that they will only focus on jobs and the economy, not necessarily DOMA.
“The decision to mount an all-out defense of DOMA is particularly hypocritical given the Speaker’s contention that the President was distracted from focusing on the economy by DOMA,” said Solmonese.
In order to defend the constitutionality of Section 3 of DOMA in court, Congress would likely have to make arguments that gays and lesbians have not faced a history of discrimination, that one’s sexual orientation is in fact relevant to a person’s ability to contribute to society, and that, contrary to the opinion of experts, sexual orientation is something that can be changed.
“What should never be lost in this debate is that every day, DOMA denies fundamental protections like social security benefits to legally married couples and their families,” said Solmonese. “If Congress wants to make the lives of Americans better, they should be repealing DOMA, not wasting time and resources defending it.”
