During a recent appearance, Jerri Ann
Henry, the executive director of the Log Cabin Republicans, described
President Donald Trump as “vocally supportive” of the LGBT
community.
In November, Henry replaced outgoing
director Gregory Angelo, making her the first woman ever named to
lead the organization dedicated to representing the concerns of LGBT
Republicans.
Henry appeared Friday on Hill.TV's
current affairs program Rising.
When asked about Trump's impact on the
LGBT community, Henry answered that there have been “lots of ups
and downs.”
“I think there's a lot of ups and
downs in the last two years with some of the administration's
actions,” Henry said. “He has been more vocally supportive than
any Republican candidate or president, but there have been a few
things that I haven't loved that the administration has done, and
some things that I think we can do some work on.”
“I want to make sure that we have the
opportunity to improve on those things, not just fight over them.”
"Some of the issues where we can
make major improvements are just the nuances. You know, marriage has
only been legal for a short time, and we've seen a few hiccups here
and there how that's been rolled out with the military, with the
State Department, visas, and how they handle married LGBT partners
and non-married LGBT partners for diplomats. That's something we need
a lot of work on,” she
added.
The Trump administration has defended
in court its plan to bar transgender people from serving in the
military. It has also rolled back Obama-era protections for
transgender students. The administration is also reportedly
considering a plan to define gender by a person's genitalia at birth,
a move which would have the chilling effect of excluding transgender
people from protections in existing federal civil rights law.
(Related: Trump
proposed rule change would “define transgender out of existence.”)
In October, the administration
announced that it would deny visas to the partners of gay foreign
diplomats and United Nations employees unless they are married and
gave those already in the country three months to marry or lose their
visas. Gay and lesbian couples can marry in fewer than 15 percent of
countries, while straight couples can marry in most nations.
Henry also said that she was “not
nervous” about the Supreme Court's impact on LGBT rights following
the appointment of two conservatives justices by Trump.