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How does Obama the President compare to Obama the candidate on gay rights? It's no secret that GLBT advocates have expressed disappointment and frustration with decisions by the White House to avoid pressing for gay rights during the first year of the administration. No executive order to halt the discharges of gay troops; no bold leadership on passing non-discrimination legislation; no mention of a ballot initiative in Maine to reverse marriage equality that might have made a real difference in the loss there Tuesday. We helped elect him with our votes, money, and time because we were promised change. But in our lives as GLBT people, that's not what's being delivered.
And now we're in a pickle. Most are...

The State of Maine’s rejection of marriage equality at the ballot box yesterday is being heeded as a call for federal LGBT rights by activists and organizations around the US, including Out4Immigration.

The Maine vote was 53% in support of taking away civil marriage rights granted to gays and lesbians by approval of the state legislature and signed into law by the state’s governor 6 months ago. 47% of voters supported marriage equality. “Subjecting minority rights to majority vote repeatedly denies equality to LGBT families,” said Mickey Lim, vice president and co-founder of Out4Immigration, a grassroots organization that works closely with same-sex marriage groups for recognition of same-sex binational couple rights tied to federal immigration policies.

Out4Immigation advocates for same-sex binational couples, relationships in which one partner is American and
President Barack Obama has taken some heat not just from conservative critics, but from liberal ones too. To be sure, Obama's favorable rating among Democrats in general remains a stratospheric 89%, according to a Gallup Poll released last week.

But increasingly, noisy factions on the party's most liberal flank - among them gay rights proponents, pro-choice activists and immigration reformers who Obama courted last year - are incensed that their causes have taken a backseat to the White House's all-out push on health care reform. ...
LGBT rights supporters on Capitol Hill are looking to an Illinois congressman for inclusion in his upcoming immigration reform bill that's expected to appeal to more liberal members of the U.S. House.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) on Tuesday issued a statement of core principles for his planned comprehensive reform legislation, which includes a belief in family "as a cornerstone of our immigration system."

"Family is the bedrock of our society, and immigration reform must support strong, united families and treat all immigrant families fairly and equally," says the statement. "Right now, our broken immigration system keeps too many American families apart for years and even decades, when they have done everything legally."

The statement calls for immigration rules "predicated on family values" that keep family members together.
Congress has promised to begin the process of reforming America's broken immigration system later this year. There is widespread consensus that reform is urgently needed, and a growing insistence among lawmakers that any reform effort must adhere to our nation's long-standing commitment to family unification. Under current immigration law, millions of families remain separated because of inexcusable visa backlogs, unnecessary bureaucratic paper trails and discriminatory policies that do not recognize lesbian and gay families for the purposes of equal immigration rights.

For all of those families, time is of the essence. Every day, loved ones are forcibly separated from each other. For too many, the American dream is one that cannot yet be shared with their spouse, sibling or significant other.

As Congress begins to debate immigration reform, all of our families
The National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) today announced that the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club will honor NCLR Immigration Project Director. “Noemi is a fierce advocate for the rights of LGBT immigrants, some of the most invisible members of our community,” said NCLR Executive Director Kate Kendell. “Only a handful of years ago, the U.S. immigration authorities had never granted asylum based on actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. Noemi’s careful and meticulous work on behalf of our clients helped to change that. These victories are some of NCLR’s proudest moments—not only because each asylum case won strengthens sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes within immigration law—but even more importantly, because they often mean a person’s life has been saved.”
We must change the law to end the gratuitous cruelty being imposed on Greg, Jaime and the thousands of other couples just like them around the country. We urge Congress to incorporate UAFA into the forthcoming comprehensive immigration reform. No immigration reform we enact can be truly comprehensive unless it also addresses this deprivation of the civil rights of bi-national families. There is no rational reason to continue this discriminatory treatment. It is long past time that Congress did something about it....
President Obama gave a speech to the HRC last night, and, as usual, it was wonderfully crafted and moving.

However, that’s where the positive things I can say stop.

President Obama has promised everything he can to the LGBT community: a repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, ending Bush’s horrid HIV travel ban [Immigration and Nationality Act, Section 212(a)(1)(A)(i)], creating equality for gay couples, ending employment discrimination, etc.

He hasn’t done anything on any of those issues. Nothing at all. In fact, this paragraph is pretty much just filler, because there’s absolutely nothing to talk about with Obama’s track record (or lack thereof) of sticking to his word on matters that affect the gay community. He’s done nothing but give pretty speeches.

To top it all off, Joe Solmonese, president of the HRC, is all but fellating the Pre
Activists working to pass federal gay rights legislation should move now to take advantage of the current political climate, an Obama official said Friday.
“This is the best opportunity we will ever have as a community and shame on us if we don't succeed,” openly gay John Berry, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, said.
Berry made his remarks at the Out & Equal Workplace Advocates conference that ended Friday in Orlando, the AP reported. Michael Guest, the first openly gay ambassador to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate, and Malcolm Lazin, executive director of Equality Forum, also spoke at the four-day event.
“The clock is against us,” Berry said. “If we lose this, it could be years if not a decade before this opportunity comes around.”
President Obama, speaking to the nation’s largest gay rights organization, pledged tonight to end the law prohibiting openly gay and lesbian citizens from serving in the military.

“I will end ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’; that is my commitment,” said Obama, adding that he is also committed to ending the Defense of Marriage Act.Obama, speaking to nearly 3,000 gay and lesbian activists at a dinner-fundraiser hosted by the Human Rights Campaign, addressed the larger effort for equality. “I’m here with you in that fight,” he said. The president also said that there were “still laws to change and hearts to open.”

Obama’s address came amid growing concern in the LGBT community that he’s not acting fast enough on campaign pledges to more fully incorporate gays and lesbians into the fabric of American life.
thousands of fair-minded Americans congregating in our nation's capital for Equality Across America's "National Equality March 2009." The March serves as a call to action for a new generation of activists, gay and straight, to join the movement for LGBT equality. The event's goal is to reinvigorate the LGBT movement on a national level so participants can take their experiences home to their communities across America and convey the urgency behind their quest for demanding equal rights. Logo, a division of Viacom Inc.'s (NYSE: VIA - News and VIA.B - News) MTV Networks, announced today that it will support the March by participating in a number of events surrounding the weekend.
Not immigration/DOMA related but very interesting read: Basically support for Civil Union has grown ever so slightly (57% support, 37% oppose), whereas support for gay marriage continues on an up and down trend (53% oppose, 39% support), with little significant change over the past 6 years.
full equality for the LGBT community. The event, named the National Equality March, comes on the heels of growing calls for the federal government to pick up the pace on civil rights legislation, such as recognition for LGBT couples, repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and finally passing an inclusive employment non-discrimination act. Organizers say they are expecting tens of thousands – if not hundreds of thousands – of participants for the event.

Steve and Joe, however, will be notably absent.

The couple, who recently married in Connecticut and bought a home in Washington, D.C., will not be in the capital on Sunday. Instead, they will be packing Joe’s belongings. Under federal law, Steve and Joe are no longer allowed to live together in the country they call home.
Why cant bi-nationals stay in the United States legally until we pass the Uniting American Families Act, is there a difference. I find it amazing how living in the Un-Untied States of America the super power of the world with huge weapon capability and a fast computer know how, I find it extremely strange that the arm forces are so scared of homosexuality Strange.

I always thought that National Equality is just what it means; it appears that the Ununited States of America appears to have a schizophrenic attitude, I was reading a blog one day and it said that that all the politicians goes to different parties to raise money and put people in different positions just to peas different groups. But when gay people who are united with each other, which supports each other and ask for there rights yes there human rights are ignored. However that being said we do thank you for p
As one of 18,000 legally wed same-sex couples in California, Brad Levenson and Tony Sears file state income taxes as a married couple.

But they file their federal taxes as single individuals, paying hundreds of dollars more each year. That's because a law called the Defense of Marriage Act bars federal agencies from recognizing gay marriages.

Backers of gay rights are pushing to repeal the law, buoyed by a growing acceptance of same-sex marriage, which is now legal in six states.

But Republicans on Capitol Hill are ready to fight....

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Promoting public awareness of the need for fairness in immigration policy particularly as it relates to the rights of same-sex bi-national couples in the United States who seek equal immigration rights; Providing information regarding political issues relating to gay immigration equality issues, rights and policy.