The National Organization for Marriage
(NOM) has mounted a petition campaign asking Attorney General Jeff
Sessions for “robust” religious exemptions for opponents of LGBT
rights.
Social conservatives disappointed that
an executive order signed earlier this month by President Donald
Trump does not limit LGBT rights as expected are turning to Sessions
for relief. Language in the order directs Sessions – who scored a
zero in the Senate on a survey of LGBT support – to “issue
guidance interpreting religious liberty protections in Federal law.”
NOM President Brian Brown is demanding
that Sessions “draft comprehensive, robust rules that will fully
protect the right of people of faith to subscribe to traditional
moral principles without risk of governmental retribution.”
A leaked draft of the order reportedly
sought to protect persons and organizations that oppose marriage
equality and abortion rights and believe that a person's sex is
determined at or before birth. The order signed by Trump directs the
IRS to exercise “maximum enforcement discretion” in enforcing the
Johnson Amendment, which limits tax-exempt groups from endorsing or
actively opposing candidates for political office and allows private
employers who object on religious grounds to contraception to deny
reproductive health care to their employees.
Writing
at Right Wing Watch, Peter Montgomery noted: “Perhaps Trump
punted to Sessions as a way of deflecting criticism from those who
still want to believe Trump is committed to protecting the rights and
interests of LGBTQ Americans. If the administration’s vast and
vastly harmful expansion of the global gag rule is an indication of
what we can expect from Sessions, that illusion will become much
harder to sustain.”