H.R. 2015 Would Force a Gender Confusion Revolution on U.S. Businesses

By Peter LaBarbera

For once we agreed with Barney Frank (sort of), at least before he sold out to the “transgender” lobby. 

“There are workplace situations — communal showers, for example — when the demands of the transgender community fly in the face of conventional norms and therefore would not pass in any Congress. I’ve talked with transgender activists and what they want — and what we will be forced to defend — is for people with penises who identify as women to be able to shower with other women.”

—Homosexual Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.), BEFORE he changed his mind and embraced including “transgenders” in the Employment NonDiscrimination Act (ENDA)  

“Technically, you cannot truly change one’s sex. That’s why the procedure is not really called ‘sex change surgery’ but ‘sex reassignment surgery.’ The idea is to alter the physical appearance of a person’s anatomy to approximate as nearly as possible the anatomic arrangement of the other sex.”

— Melanie, “Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS), the Nuts & Bolts,” a “Transgender Support Site” 

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Employment NonDiscrimination Act (H.R. 2015) Language: 

“EMPLOYER PRACTICES.—It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer—

(1) “to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise discriminate against any individual with respect to the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment of the individual, because of such individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity; or

(2) “to limit, segregate, or classify the employees or applicants for employment of the employer in any way that would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment or otherwise adversely affect the status of the individual as an employee, because of such individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.”

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TAKE ACTION:  Call the Congress (202-224-3121) or use e-mail to urge your Representative and Senators to reject ENDA (H.R. 2015) and the insanity of forcing business across the nation to accommodate and subsidize gender confusion in the name of “civil rights.” Also, call President Bush (202-456-1414) or e-mail him at comments@whitehouse.gov to urge him to veto the “trans”-affirming ENDA, along with the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1592) that his aides have indicated will likely be vetoed. 

Fast on the heels of the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1597, recently passed by the House) is the second of two top homosexual activist priorities: ENDA, the “Employment Nondiscrimination Act,” H.R. 2015, recently introduced by homosexual Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.). Please read at the bottom of this story the homosexual newspaper Washington Blade’s analysis of the “transgender” provision of this radical bill.

To read about ENDA’s dubious “religious exemption” provision, click HERE.

Veteran observers of the “gay” movement will recall that Frank himself once strongly criticized the idea of including transsexuals in the ENDA bill (see above quote). But like most “progressives,” Frank has seen the light, or maybe he just heard the shouts — from radical “trans” activists who have skillfully adapted militant “gay” tactics to their own misguided cause, including calling their outspoken critics “transphobes.”

Several giant corporations have already settled on pro-“transgender” bathroom and dress policies — probably the same companies who would subject their employees to biased, pro-homosexual “diversity” lectures — but can you imagine inflicting these “transgender” regulations on small and mid-level companies through federal law via ENDA?

This is one of the most perverse applications of “civil rights” to date — and it’s headed straight for your business if you have 15 or more employees. What female employee wants to share the company restroom with a big-boned man claiming to be “transitioning” to “womanhood”? Will companies have to build “transgender male” and “transgender female” restrooms (or “Designated GLBT Restrooms”) to accommodate the various “orientations” and avoid government prosecution?

 

Churches and religious-oriented groups are quasi-exempt under ENDA but secular businesses owned by Christians or religious Americans are not. ENDA is a “gay” and “trans” lawyer’s dream. What about jobs such as a teacher in which the employer might not want the “transitioning” employee to model his newfound “gender identity” to children? Or service jobs (say a maitre d’) in which the employer may not want the newly “gender variant” employee to be in such a public role?

Imagine a male employee, John, who since he became employed at XYZ Corp., about a decade ago, has used the men’s restroom. Then one day he informs his boss that in a week he will come to work in a dress as “Joanna” and begin his MTF (“male-to-female”) metamorphosis into “womanhood.” (According to widely accepted regulations within the “transgender” world, he must “live” full-time as Joanna, taking female hormones, for a full year before he becomes eligible for “sex-reassignment surgery,” which will turn his healthy sex organ into a makeshift female sex organ. If you have the stomach to read what is actually done to a man’s body in “sex reassignment surgery,” click HERE, but be warned: it’s horrifying stuff. We must pray for these poor souls who are so confused that they would destroy their healthy, God-given bodies to assuage their inner conflict.)

Isn’t it a bit much to expect of normal, female XYZ employees to all of the sudden welcome “Joanna’s” presence in the ladies’ restroom? In fact, as I read the Blade account below, under ENDA’s proposed regulations, John/Joanna would be able to use the female restroom BEFORE his “sex reassignment” surgery. Indeed, the website “e-transgender,” quoting the homosexual/transgender group Human Rights Campaign, advises corporate human resources managers as follows:

“Employers should grant restroom access according to an employee’s full-time gender presentation.”

Read: if John “lives” (identifies) as Joanna full-time, he should be able to use the female restroom. Biologically-born ladies, beware!

What about the privacy rights of John’s female co-workers? Don’t they have the right not to feel personally invaded as they go to the restroom at their job? Will businesses have to put out new bathroom policies and undergo company-wide bathroom-usage training to explain the new policies?

 

But the situation becomes a crisis when the federal government — aided by politically correct activist judges — forces businesses to advance this Gender Confusion Revolution in the name of “civil rights.”

Is this really an area in which the federal government should even be involved? It’s bad enough that big business is rolling over to the bizarre “T” (Transgender) agenda — with some even subsidizing horrifying “sex-reassignment surgeries” that destroy men’s and women’s healthy bodies. (I once attended a conference for FTM (“female to male”) “transgenders” in which young women proudly showed off their flat chests — the result of “chest surgery” operations in which their healthy breasts were removed to make them look like the “men” they wanted to be.)

Of course, the larger goal here — shared by the “gay” and “transgender” lobbies — is to change your mind and heart regarding gender-confused conduct. The law is merely a tool in their never-ending quest to overturn America’s Judeo-Christian norms regarding family, sex and marriage.

We predict that businesses will deal with this very sad and strange “transgender” issue by building special restrooms and/or shower facilities for their “transgender” or alternatively “gendered” employees — spending countless millions to subsidize mentally disordered, deviant behavior. (Gender Identity Disorder, or GID, is a recognized mental disorder.) This corporate spending would accelerate dramatically should ENDA become law, as businesses would fear lawsuits if they failed to honor “trans” rights.

Call Congress (202-224-3121) or use e-mail to urge your U.S. Representative and Senators to reject ENDA, H.R. 2015. Also, call President Bush (202-456-1414) or e-mail him at comments@whitehouse.gov and ask him to veto the pro-“trans” ENDA, along with the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1592) that his aides have already indicated will likely be vetoed.

By Peter LaBarbera 

TAKE ACTION:  Call the Congress (202-224-3121) or use e-mail to urge your Representative and Senators to reject ENDA (H.R. 2015) and the insanity of forcing business across the nation to accommodate and subsidize gender confusion in the name of “civil rights.” Also, call President Bush (202-456-1414) or e-mail him at comments@whitehouse.gov and urge him to veto the “trans”-affirming ENDA, along with the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1592) that his aides have indicated will likely be vetoed.  

At bottom is the religious exemption language for H.R. 2015, ENDA, the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, which would use federal government powers to ban “employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.” (Emphasis is added below.) ENDA would apply to businesses with 15 or more employees.

We at Americans For Truth generally oppose the concept of religious exemptions to pro-homosexual laws because religious people alone should not be able to exercise their freedoms to oppose aberrant sexual behavior. What about secular-minded citizens who also believe that homosexual acts are immoral and unhealthy and shouldn’t be promoted as OK to kids?

Regardless, note the careful circumscription of the religious “exemptions” under ENDA. According to paragraph “b” below, the law would not apply to employees in a religiously-oriented business whose job is linked to “doctrine.” So, then, can we assume that in “partially exempt” religious organizations, the law WOULD apply to employees (e.g., a secretary) whose jobs are NOT directly linked to teaching religion or doctrine?

In my state of Illinois, the ACLU used similar language to argue along these lines: a Bible-believing church would have full freedom to hire and fire its pastors but it COULD fall under the state’s “sexual orientation/gender identity” law (our state’s version of ENDA) if it fired a janitor who announced he was homosexual — because the janitor’s job does not deal with church “doctrine.”

Can you see the immense capacity for “gay” troublemaking and harassing lawsuits under this proposed legislation? Even the threat of federal lawsuits, especially in states like Illinois that have their own “sexual orientation” laws, could inhibit morality-based groups from acting on their belief that homosexuality is wrong.

 

I suppose that is precisely the goal of the homosexual and “transgender” lobbies with regard to ENDA.

And remember: the discussion above is only for explicitly religious organizations. Under ENDA, an orthodox Jew who owns his own secular-oriented business (with 15 or more employees) would be out of luck if he endeavored to not hire homosexuals or transsexuals based on his own personal religious beliefs. Once again, “gay” (and “trans”) rights would supersede religious freedoms.

The following is ENDA’s (H.R. 2015) language pertaining to religious exemptions:

SEC. 6. EXEMPTION FOR RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS.
(a) In general.—This Act shall not apply to any of the employment practices of a religious corporation, association, educational institution, or society which has as its primary purpose religious ritual or worship or the teaching or spreading of religious doctrine or belief.

 

(b) Certain employees.—For any religious corporation, association, educational institution, or society that is not wholly exempt under subsection (a), this Act shall not apply with respect to the employment of individuals whose primary duties consist of teaching or spreading religious doctrine or belief, religious governance, supervision of a religious order, supervision of persons teaching or spreading religious doctrine or belief, or supervision or participation in religious ritual or worship.

 

(c) Conformity to religious tenets.—Under this Act, a religious corporation, association, educational institution, or society may require that applicants for, and employees in, similar positions conform to those religious tenets that such corporation, association, institution, or society declares significant. Under this Act, such a declaration by a religious corporation, association, educational institution or society stating which of its religious tenets are significant shall not be subject to judicial or administrative review. Any such declaration made for purposes of this Act shall be admissible only for proceedings under this Act.

The following is reprinted with permission from the Howard Center’s “Family in America” newsletter (“New Research,” December 2006; emphasis added). The Howard Center is a wonderful organization, based in Rockford, Illinois, that is home to esteemed family scholar Allan Carlson — who founded the World Congress of Families, an annual event designed to build worldwide, intellectual support for the “natural family.” This year’s Congress convenes Friday in Warsaw, Poland; check out its website to read about the battle between old-line, anti-family European Unions forces and Eastern European nations like Poland that are fighting to preserve marriage and a “culture of life” (which does NOT include teaching homosexuality as normal to children). 

We encourage you to sign up for Howard Center’s e-publication and request a sample printed copy of the “Family in America” newsletter, which is loaded with important, scholarly research on family issues. (You can call Howard Center at 815-964-5819 or e-mail info@profam.org.)

Common sense dictates that unnatural homosexual unions are more volatile than traditional marriages, and the research backs that up. Here are the Demography study’s two key findings on “gay” unions in Norway and Sweden:

1. Few homosexuals choose to “marry” or register their union with the government;
2. Homosexual unions end in divorce much more often than heterosexual marriages.

Homosexual Unions: Rare and Fragile 

Progressive activists in the United States have argued strenuously in recent years that giving homosexuals the legal right to marry will improve life for homosexual couples and will consequently benefit society as a whole.  A new study of same-sex marriage in Scandinavia, however, casts serious doubt on such assertions.  For, as it turns out, relatively few homosexual couples avail themselves of this revolutionary right. And a surprisingly high percentage of those who do so end up in divorce court.

To analyze the demographics of homosexual [“marriages,”] a team of German and Norwegian scholars recently examined data collected in Norway and Sweden since these bellwether countries discarded centuries of legal tradition by authorizing homosexual unions (in 1993 in Norway and in 1995 in Sweden).  Both countries have thus now enacted laws granting homosexuals “the legal right to registered partnerships, a civil status that [the researchers believe], in practice does not deviate much from the concept of marriage.”  The legal equivalence of homosexual unions to heterosexual marriage indeed largely explains why the researchers use “the terms registered partnerships and same-sex marriage interchangeably.”   Similarly, the researchers “use the term divorce to refer to [homosexual] partnership dissolution because the divorce procedures of the marriage act [in both countries] apply to registered [homosexual] [“marriages”] as well.”

As the German and Norwegian scholars survey the available data for homosexual unions, they cannot avoid one obvious reality: “the incidence of same-sex [‘marriage’] in Norway and Sweden is not particularly impressive.”  Between 1993 and 2001, while Norway recorded 196,000 heterosexual marriages, the country witnessed the legal registration of only 1,293 homosexual partnerships.  Similarly, while Sweden recorded 280,000 heterosexual marriages between 1995-2002, the country saw the formation of only 1,526 registered homosexual partnerships.  The researchers accordingly calculate “a ratio of around 7 same-sex [‘marriages’] to every 1,000 new opposite-sex marriages” in Norway and a comparable “ratio of 5 new partnerships to every 1,000 new opposite-sex marriages” in Sweden.  The researchers remark that the numbers of same-sex [“marriages”] have run “considerably lower” than might have been expected by those relying on recent surveys of sexual behavior.  These surveys have indicated that “well over 1%” of women and between 1 and 3% of men have had a same-sex partner during the last year, with between 4 and 9% of men and approximately 4% of women reporting that they have had a same-sex partner at some time during their lives.  (The authors of the new study are too well informed to rehash the now discredited absurdity—promulgated by Alfred Kinsey—that fully ten percent of the adult male population is homosexual.) [Note: see Judith Reisman’s website for more good information on Kinsey and his fraudulent research.–Peter L.]

The data for same-sex unions in Norway and Sweden indicate, however, not only that such unions are relatively rare, but also that they are remarkably fragile, ending in divorce significantly more often than do the heterosexual marriages of peers.  The statistics indeed reveal “that the divorce risk for partnerships of men is 50% higher than the corresponding risk for heterosexual marriages and that the divorce risk for partnerships of women is about double (2.67) that for men (1.50).”  

 Apparently crusading for abortion “rights” (or should we say infanticide) is not enough of a challenge for New York’s maverick Democrat governor, Eliot Spitzer. Now he wants to pave the way for the embrace of full “same-sex marriage,” claiming this will “strengthen New York’s families.” We predicted that once liberals capitulated on giving government benefits to “same-sex couples” (read: domesticated homosexuality) beginning with “domestic partners” legislation, it would be only a matter of time before they embraced full “gay marriage.”

We hope we’re wrong, but we fear that Spitzer is the future of Democratic politics. (Are Republicans far behind with pro-homosexual politicians like Gov. Schwarzenegger?) Socially liberal politicians know that they have to talk about religion to con the gullible masses, but when it comes to applying the compassion and restraint of Christianity to moral issues like abortion and homosexuality, they want no part of it. The Democratic Party has sold out to the homosexual and radical feminist lobbies. If Republicans join them, the formation of a third, morality-based “culture of life” party is inevitable.– Peter LaBarbera

The following is reprinted from Family Research Council’s “Washington Update,” May 9:

In New York, Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D) has done more to trample family values in the last five months than most state leaders have done in five years. Sounding more and more like a mouthpiece for Planned Parenthood and the Human Rights Campaign, Spitzer has already rolled out bills that would end abortion regulations and legalize same-sex “marriage.” On April 27, he upheld a campaign promise and became the first governor to initiate a change in the definition of marriage. Just one week later, Spitzer is thumbing his nose at the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision by moving to protect late-term abortions in the state. His Reproductive Health and Privacy Protection Act also directs more taxpayer dollars to “reproductive health services” (i.e. abortion clinics), promotes contraception, and enshrines abortion on request. Incidentally, Spitzer was the only governor in the United States not to issue a proclamation supporting this year’s National Day of Prayer. Only after intense public pressure did Spitzer agree, joining the other 49 governors at the 11th hour. A staffer justified the delay by saying Spitzer “always intended to sign it” but cited the volume of office paperwork. Perhaps Spitzer should spend less time on producing “paperwork” that devalues human life and marriage.

 

In this link to an article in the New York Sun, Gov. Spitzer claims that homosexual “marriage” “will only strengthen New York’s families.”  

Ex-‘Gay’ Christian Singer Dennis Jernigan

In response to the recently proposed Hate Crimes Bill (H.R. 1592) currently before Congress, singer/songwriter/author and former homosexual, Dennis Jernigan, fears his right to openly talk about how he was able to overcome homosexuality would be compromised since H.R. 1592 seeks to prosecute criminals based on their thoughts.  “I was able to come to a level of freedom the homosexual community never told me was possible,” says Jernigan. “Yet, through faith in God, I successfully walked out of that way of thinking and have met thousands of other men and women who have done the same. What about our civil liberties? To pass such a bill as H.R. 1592 is to invoke fear that I could be prosecuted for my religious beliefs and speech.”
 
Jernigan goes on to say that he fears for his nine children and their families in the days ahead should such legislation pass. “To lose one of our most basic rights, that of free speech, is to strip away what it means to be an American. Homosexuals already enjoy the same rights as all other Americans when it concerns the punishment of criminal acts against them. This legislation seeks to bestow special treatment upon a very small portion of our society. If this bill passes, Congress is telling me that I and countless others who have discovered they don’t have to be homosexual are of less value now than when we were living as homosexuals.  If we look down the road of this slippery slope, this legislation would actually pave the way to make it a criminal offense to think differently than someone else or to have religious convictions that are opposed to this politically correct ideology.  Do we really want such thoughts to be illegal?

“I strongly support President Bush’s expected veto of this bill, and I implore the Congress to take a stand for what’s right and protect my freedom to not be homosexual – as well as my freedom to be able to talk about it openly.”
 
Dennis Jernigan is a husband and father who has been out of the homosexual lifestyle for over 25 years. His new CD entitled I CRY HOLY will be released nationwide in mid-July.  In a music career that extends over two decades, Jernigan has amassed dozens of hit songs to his credit, recorded over 30 projects, and written five books.  His songs have been used in churches of every denomination across the globe, and consistently rank in the top 100 of CCLI’s Most Performed Songs List.  His song “Sit With Me A While” is a featured selection at the grave of President Ronald Reagan.  He travels around the world telling his story of freedom from homosexuality.  For more about who Dennis Jernigan visit Dennis Jernigan’s website. 

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Source: Adams Group: Marketing to Christian Media. 

The world is turned upside-down. I challenge “Mike/Christine” to do a column describing, in detail, “sex-reassignment surgery” — whereby a penis is turned into a makeshift “vagina” — assuming he is one day going to go that route. (“Transitioning” people are required to live one year as the opposite sex before undergoing the horrifying operation.) Then we’ll see just how “natural” all of this is.

Transsexualism is perhaps one of the most extreme manifestations of the modern philosophy of “I feel, therefore I am.” Just because men (and women) caught up in gender confusion FEEL that society should “respect” their gender-twisting choices, doesn’t mean that it is healthy for society to do so. Nor should taxpayers and corporations be forced to subsidize the radical “sex-change” operations — another goal of many in the “trans” movement. Granting newfangled “civil rights” based on “transgender” identities has it completely backwards: a healthy society would discourage gender confusion as much as possible, rather than celebrate it. And we haven’t even started talking about supposed “transgender” children, the “T” in the “GLBTQ” (“Q” is for “Questioning”) acronym tossed around by pro-homosexual activists and educationists who work with youth. — Peter LaBarbera

FIRST PERSON
Old Mike, new Christine
By Mike Penner, Times Staff Writer
April 26, 2007
During my 23 years with The Times’ sports department, I have held a wide variety of roles and titles. Tennis writer. Angels beat reporter. Olympics writer. Essayist. Sports media critic. NFL columnist. Recent keeper of the Morning Briefing flame.

Today I leave for a few weeks’ vacation, and when I return, I will come back in yet another incarnation.

As Christine.

I am a transsexual sportswriter. It has taken more than 40 years, a million tears and hundreds of hours of soul-wrenching therapy for me to work up the courage to type those words. I realize many readers and colleagues and friends will be shocked to read them.

That’s OK. I understand that I am not the only one in transition as I move from Mike to Christine. Everyone who knows me and my work will be transitioning as well. That will take time. And that’s all right. To borrow a piece of well-worn sports parlance, we will take it one day at a time.

Transsexualism is a complicated and widely misunderstood medical condition. It is a natural occurrence — unusual, no question, but natural.

Recent studies have shown that such physiological factors as genetics and hormonal fluctuations during pregnancy can significantly affect how our brains are “wired” at birth.

As extensive therapy and testing have confirmed, my brain was wired female.

A transgender friend provided the best and simplest explanation I have heard: We are born with this, we fight it as long as we can, and in the end it wins.

To read the rest of the column in the L.A. Times, click HERE.

By Peter LaBarbera

Strange, very strange. You might even say queer. Obviously, in the minds of some homosexual activists, the gap between how much actual (violent) “hate” exists and what they BELIEVE exists is so great that they feel the need to manufacture “antigay hate crimes” against themselves. Now, you say, sure, there are fringy “gay” zealots who do this sort of thing, just like there are nutjobs in every movement. Agreed. But these phony “hate crimes” keep surfacing, again and again and again — to the point where they are no longer freak occurrences but rather a symptom of a bankrupt ideology built upon a counterfeit foundation of “gay” victimhood.

The serious side of this, as we’re debating federal “hate crimes” legislation, is that activists on the Left know they can get scads of police and media attention by crying “hate,” and blaming their manufactured “crimes” on — you guessed it — religious conservatives. In Detroit, a homosexual man allegedly claimed (before his death) that he was attacked by someone yelling anti-gay slogans — and immediately Matt Foreman of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force issued a vicious statement blaming pro-family Michigan advocate Gary Glenn for the “murder.” As it turned out, there was no “hate crime”; an autopsy revealed that the man, who had mental health problems, died of natural causes. (We’re still waiting for the Task Force to apologize to Glenn. Ditto for the homosexual groups that years ago tried to blame Matthew Shepard’s murder on pro-family groups that were running an ad campaign featuring “ex-gays.”)

The Left — engulfed in its own brand of hatred toward wholesome, pro-family positions on abortion and homosexuality — may be going overboard in its crude attempts to manipulate the politics of “hate.” Too bad that it will probably take a few dozen more phone “hate crimes” for the liberal media to catch on that most of this “antigay” victimization is manufactured hype.

Here’s the AP story on the fake “hate crime” at Minnesota State-Moorhead:

Gay rights march canceled after police say attack wasn’t hate crime
 

MOORHEAD, Minn. (AP) — A gay rights group is canceling a planned rally on the Minnesota State University Moorhead campus.

 

This after police say a previously reported assault was not a hate crime.

 

The Fargo-Moorhead Ten Percent Society says it supports the decision of Moorhead police and it will be canceling it’s march planned for Thursday night.

 

Edina native Paul Marquardt had reported that he was taunted for his sexual orientation and attacked by four men last week.

 

But Moorhead Deputy Police Chief Bob Larson says investigators heard a conflicting story.

 

So they interviewed Marquardt again and he said he didn’t hear any anti-gay remarks and believes he was pushed down and injured by unknown assailants.

Some bad news and some good news. The “Thought Crimes” bill, H.R. 1592, passed the House of Representatives yesterday 237-180, but the White House issued a strong statement against it indicating a likely presidential veto of the bill. Your calls to the White House made a difference! (AFTAH and then CWA led the way in publicly calling on President Bush to clarify his stance on Hate Crimes.)

Now we need to keep calling the White House to urge a similar promise to veto the “ENDA Our Freedom” bill (Employment Nondiscrimination Act) — which would force religious business owners with 15 or more employees to violate their conscience to accommodate homosexual and “transgender” agendas in the workplace. For talking points against ENDA, click HERE.

TAKE ACTION: Call the White House and thank the President for his clear statement (below, or on PDF on the White House website HERE) on “Hate Crimes,” and urge him to do the same against the freedom-crushing ENDA. Call the White House at 202-456-1414 or 202-456-1111, or write president@whitehouse.gov (the online comment page is HERE).

Also, call your U.S. Senators on the “Thought Crimes bill,” H.R. 1592, at 202-224-3121 or by going to http://www.congress.org/. Re: ENDA, you will need to call BOTH your Senators and your U.S. Representative, since ENDA hasn’t been voted on in either chamber.

Click HERE for a roll call of the House vote on H.R. 1592 (212 Democrats and 25 Republicans voted for it). The following is the White House statement on H.R. 1592 [emphasis in bold added]:

EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT
OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20503
May 3, 2007 (House)

STATEMENT OF ADMINISTRATION POLICY

 

H.R. 1592 – Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007
(Rep. Conyers (D) Michigan and 171 cosponsors)

 

The Administration favors strong criminal penalties for violent crime, including crime based on personal characteristics, such as race, color, religion, or national origin. However, the Administration believes that H.R. 1592 is unnecessary and constitutionally questionable. If H.R. 1592 were presented to the President, his senior advisors would recommend that he veto the bill.

 

State and local criminal laws already provide criminal penalties for the violence addressed by the new Federal crime defined in section 7 of H.R. 1592, and many of these laws carry stricter penalties (including mandatory minimums and the death penalty) than the proposed language in H.R. 1592. State and local law enforcement agencies and courts have the capability to enforce those penalties and are doing so effectively. There has been no persuasive demonstration of any need to federalize such a potentially large range of violent crime enforcement, and doing so is inconsistent with the proper allocation of criminal enforcement responsibilities between the different levels of government. In addition, almost every State in the country can actively prosecute hate crimes under the State’s own hate crimes law.

 

H.R. 1592 prohibits willfully causing or attempting to cause bodily injury to any person based upon the victim’s race, color, religion, or national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability. The Administration notes that the bill would leave other classes (such as the elderly, members of the military, police officers, and victims of prior crimes) without similar special status. The Administration believes that all violent crimes are unacceptable, regardless of the victims, and should be punished firmly.

 

Moreover, the bill’s proposed section 249(a)(1) of title 18 of the U.S. Code raises constitutional concerns. Federalization of criminal law concerning the violence prohibited by the bill would be constitutional only if done in the implementation of a power granted to the Federal government, such as the power to protect Federal personnel, to regulate interstate commerce, or to enforce equal protection of the laws. Section 249(a)(1) is not by its terms limited to the exercise of such a power, and it is not at all clear that sufficient factual or legal grounds exist to uphold this provision of H.R. 1592.