Gregory T. Angelo, president of the Log
Cabin Republicans, vowed on Thursday to protect LGBT rights as
President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office.
While Trump's rival, Democrat Hillary
Clinton, swept the LGBT vote (78%), 14 percent of the LGBT community
cast their votes for Trump, according to election data released by
The
New York Times. That's a lower percentage than in previous
election cycles. For example, Mitt Romney received 22 percent of the
LGBT vote in 2012.
LGBT Republicans who supported Trump
argued that he was the party's most inclusive candidate to date.
The LGBT GOP group withheld
its endorsement of Trump, saying that they weren't convinced that
a Trump administration would protect LGBT rights. (The national
group set aside their policy of not allowing local chapters to
endorse national candidates, resulting in a handful of endorsements
from local chapters.)
Angelo excoriated the LGBT Left for
“demonizing Donald Trump and fundraising off of bogeymen.”
“I can't say it's surprising – what
else can they do now? After working for decades against Republicans
rather than with them and putting all their faith into the failed
candidacy of Hillary Clinton, purportedly 'non-partisan' LGBT
advocacy groups now face GOP majorities in the House and Senate, and
a Republican in the White House for the next 4 – or perhaps even
EIGHT – years,” Angelo wrote in a fundraising letter to
supporters.
Angelo claimed that despite budgets in
the millions, such groups “don't have a single point of contact in
the incoming Trump administration” but Log Cabin Republicans does.
“Log Cabin Republicans will continue
to work for full equality on behalf of all LGBT Americans. That's my
vow, and it's why I'm writing to you tonight,” he
added.