Doug Mainwaring

The National Organization for Marriage believes its arguments against marriage equality if they come from people who are actually gay, which is why it is more often highlight “gays against gay marriage.” Today, NOM highlights just such a story from Doug Mainwaring, who believes it’s “possible to oppose same-sex marriage based on reason and experience.” Of course, NOM doesn’t bother to mention any of the details that distinguish Mainwaring’s experience from people who actually identify with the LGBT community, nor the fact that he’s sung this tune plenty of times before.

Mainwaring’s narrative echoes many ex-gay testimonials, particularly in his abstention from gay sex, choosing instead to have non-sexual philia love friendships with men. In fact, he married a woman with whom, despite a temporary divorce, he still lives and raises a family. He has repeatedly written and testified against marriage equality for same-sex couples, but not just because of his trite “kids need a mother and a father” argument — Mainwaring believes the “liberal intelligentsia” is trying to dismantle marriage altogether. Such paranoid perceptions of liberal views are perhaps unsurprising; Mainwaring is co-founder of the National Capital Tea Party Patriots in Maryland.

His own words demonstrate just how far removed he is from the reality of LGBT  families. Here’s how he describes his despair at the thought of raising his kids with another man:

Over the last couple of years, I’ve found our decision to rebuild our family ratified time after time. One day as I turned to climb the stairs I saw my sixteen-year-old son walk past his mom as she sat reading in the living room. As he did, he paused and stooped down to kiss her and give her a hug, and then continued on. With two dads in the house, this little moment of warmth and tenderness would never have occurred. My varsity-track-and-football-playing son and I can give each other a bear hug or a pat on the back, but the kiss thing is never going to happen. To be fully formed, children need to be free to generously receive from and express affection to parents of both genders. Genderless marriages deny this fullness.

Mainwaring’s shallow perception of what constitutes intimacy, including what he is even capable of showing, demonstrates how unqualified he is to discuss same-sex marriage and families. He has clearly carried an anti-gay stigma with him throughout his entire life and has just as narrow an understanding of the lives of gays and lesbians as his fellow opponents of equality. NOM’s attempt to somehow drive a wedge within the gay community is pitiful, if only because Mainwaring in no way represents it.

Jose Antonio Vargas has very publicly come out as both gay and undocumented.

Today the Williams Institute at UCLA released estimates that, for the first time, provide an estimate of the number of adult undocumented immigrants that identify as LGBT living in the United States today. Specifically, Gary Gates of the Williams Institute estimates that there at least 267,000 LGBT undocumented immigrants living inside the U.S. Out of all 904,000 LGBT immigrants in the United States, approximately 30 percent (267,000) are undocumented, while 70 percent (637,000) are documented. Williams’ analysis further shows that LGBT undocumented immigrants are more likely to be male, more likely to be younger, less likely to be Hispanic, and more likely to be Asian compared to the general undocumented population.

It’s worth noting that Williams’ estimate provides a “floor” or lower-bound estimate of the LGBT undocumented population. Williams’ analysis only captures adult undocumented immigrants (those that are older than 18) and includes a conservative estimate that accounts for the reluctance of LGBT undocumented people to self-identify and disclose their sexual orientation and gender identity.

Building on Williams’ analysis, a new report from the Center for American Progress unpacks the demographic characteristics, disparities, and particular challenges facing LGBT immigrants. Specifically, LGBT people find themselves at the intersection of two marginalized populations — the LGBT population and the undocumented population — that make them among society’s most vulnerable. For example, looking specifically at income insecurities, the median income for undocumented immigrants is $14,000 less than the median household income for U.S. born residents. For their part, same-sex couples make $15,000 less per year than families headed by an opposite-sex couple. Statistics are even more dire for transgender workers, 15 percent of whom make less than $10,000 per year. Considering these statistics, it stands to reason that earnings disparities are even starker for someone who is both LGBT and undocumented.

CAP’s report also highlights a number of other challenges facing LGBT immigrants:

• Family Separation for binational same-sex couples: The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which denies federal benefits and protections to legally married same-sex couples, acts as a barrier to family reunification and an individual’s ability to sponsor a same-sex spouse or partner for residency.
• Detention Conditions: LGBT undocumented immigrants face a multitude of issues when faced with mandatory detention, ranging from discrimination, harassment and physical violence to segregation and denial of medically necessary services for HIV-positive and transgender detainees.
• Asylum Standards: Under current immigration law, immigrants seeking asylum must file within one year of entering the United States, otherwise, the threshold for gaining asylum is significantly higher. This arbitrary deadline belies the fact that many LGBT asylum seekers, who may come from countries where they have had to hide their sexual orientation or gender identity for risk of persecution, may not be prepared in that time span to come to terms with their LGBT identity.

Given the sheer number of undocumented immigrants that identify as LGBT and the complex issues they face, a path to earned citizenship is a critical component of advancing LGBT equality. The Obama Administration has already leveraged its administrative authority to give reprieve to LGBT immigrants and detainees. Now it’s Congress’ turn to act. In addition to passing immigration reform with a path to earned citizenship, there are other important policy recommendations that, if enacted, would alleviate many of the challenges facing LGBT undocumented immigrants:
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Our guest blogger is Christopher Frost, intern for the LGBT Research and Communications Project at the Center for American Progress.

The Colorado House Appropriations Committee just advanced the civil unions bill with a vote of 9-4, including a yes vote from Republican Rep. Cheri Gerou, co-sponsor of the bill. This was the final committee vote the bill required, meaning it will advance to the full House next week. The Senate already passed the bill, Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) has committed to signing it, and 70 percent of Colorado voters support it.

Donnie Collins, center, with two of his supportive fraternity brothers.

Some fraternity brothers at Emerson College decided to an amazing thing for one of their newest members: help raise money to pay for his breast reduction surgery as part of his gender transition. Their initial goal was $2,000, to cover just a quarter of Donnie Collins’ costs, but have so far raised not only the full $8,125 it would cost, but now over $20,000. The fraternity decided to donate the excess funds to the Jim Collins Foundation (no relation), which helps transgender people with financial assistance for gender-confirming surgeries. Now, it seems that there was a mistake, and Collins’ insurance has agreed to cover the costs.

After Collins’ initial rejection from Aetna, Emerson reached out for clarification, because its insurance policy is supposed to cover transgender benefits. In fact, it was among the first universities in the country to offer trans-inclusive coverage. According to a statement from the college, the language for the inclusive policy “had inadvertently not been updated by Aetna on their internal documents.” Now that it has been clarified, Collins’ surgery can proceed, requiring only that he pay an insurance copay. His hormone therapy, for which he has also paid hundreds of dollars out-of-pocket, will also now be covered. The brothers still plan to donate all the extra funding to the Jim Collins Foundation.

Collins’ story is a simple example of how transgender people still face legal and financial obstacles to simply arrive at an authentic identity. He is fortunate to have such loving fraternity brothers and a considerate university that appreciates his healthcare needs, but many trans people have no such advocates. Hopefully his happy ending can inspire others to do right by trans people and help them receive the care they deserve.

Here’s a clip Collins recorded explaining his transition and everything that’s transpired so far:

In an editorial published Thursday, President Bill Clinton explained that even though he signed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in 1996, he does not stand by it. Signing DOMA into law, he suggested, helped dissipate the more “draconian” momentum to pass a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. In fact, he now believes it to be not only constitutional, but blatantly discriminatory against gays and lesbians:

When I signed the bill, I included a statement with the admonition that “enactment of this legislation should not, despite the fierce and at times divisive rhetoric surrounding it, be understood to provide an excuse for discrimination.” Reading those words today, I know now that, even worse than providing an excuse for discrimination, the law is itself discriminatory. It should be overturned.

We are still a young country, and many of our landmark civil rights decisions are fresh enough that the voices of their champions still echo, even as the world that preceded them becomes less and less familiar. We have yet to celebrate the centennial of the 19th Amendment, but a society that denied women the vote would seem to us now not unusual or old-fashioned but alien. I believe that in 2013 DOMA and opposition to marriage equality are vestiges of just such an unfamiliar society.

Clinton joins 21 Senators and many other Congressional Democrats who previously supported DOMA but now stand opposed to it. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments challenging its constitutionality on March 27.