Bellows Announces Support for Executive Order Protecting LGBT Americans From Discrimination by Federal Contractors

Press Release

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Shenna Bellows today announced her support for President Obama's new executive order prohibiting discrimination by federal contractors on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. Bellows called on the White House to expand protection for all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Americans employed by federal contractors and to reject the religious exemption loophole created by the Senate Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), which has not become law.

The executive order was announced after Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner said he wouldn't hold a vote on ENDA this year. Bellows' opponent, Republican Susan Collins, supports ENDA's religious exemption, which, as Ian Thompson wrote for Slate in April, "opens the door for religiously affiliated organizations to engage in employment discrimination against LGBT people--for any reason. This exemption is so broad that it could leave a transgender doctor at a hospital or a gay food-services worker at a university without protection from workplace discrimination."

"Speaker Boehner's statement tells us everything we need to know about the chances for anti-discrimination bills in a Republican-controlled Congress," Bellows said. "I support the President's order because we need to make progress where we can and when we can. But we also need to see the big picture, and the big picture is that if Mitch McConnell becomes Senate Majority Leader after this year's election, we can say goodbye to anti-discrimination bills even getting a hearing from now on. There's no excuse for equivocating on full equal treatment under the law for all LGBT Americans."

As Steve Benen wrote in an online post for MSNBC earlier today, "For those who need a refresher on this debate, under federal law, employers can legally fire employees if they're gay, or even if they think the employees are gay. Some states prohibit this kind of discrimination, but most don't."

As head of the Maine Civil Liberties Union, Bellows was part of the coalition that won Maine Won't Discriminate non-discrimination protections on the ballot in Maine in 2005. Maine's non-discrimination laws do not contain a religious exemption.

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