The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) plans
to push President Barack Obama on an expanded gay rights agenda in
his second term.
HRC, the nation's largest gay rights
advocate, believes it can parlay its biggest election night ever into
concrete advances for the LGBT movement, including an executive order
which would extend LGBT workplace protections to federal contractors
and the appointment of an out cabinet secretary.
Obama declined to sign such an order in
April, saying he prefers passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination
Act (ENDA), which would outlaw workplace discrimination based on
sexual orientation and gender identity. But with a
Republican-controlled House, passage appears unlikely.
“Since my first conversations there,
it's something I've pushed for, I've urged, privately and publicly,”
HRC President Chad Griffin told BuzzFeed.com.
“We will continue to do that.”
Also backing the effort is the National
Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
“I think it's important for us to
move forward and show some momentum that there's protections for LGBT
workers,” Darlene Nipper, deputy executive director of the group,
told The
Hill. “This would be huge. You have to understand the
enormity of the impact it would have for so many people in our
community.”
On the appointment of an out cabinet
member, Griffin said he hopes the president will act.
“We made historic progress with
President Obama in terms of our openly LGBT appointments across the
board,” he said. “We now have the opportunity, and I hope this
president and this White House will seize the opportunity to have the
first openly LGBT cabinet secretary, the first openly LGBT G-8
ambassador, and across the board with administrative appointments and
judges as well.”