Warner Delivers Parting Shot to GOP on Gay Rights
Virginia’s out-going governor – and emerging 2008 Democratic presidential candidate - Mark Warner has once again stirred up trouble for Virginia Republicans. With his record-high approval ratings and the Commonwealth’s GOP still smarting from the November victory of Warner’s heir-apparent, Gov-elect Tim Kaine, the Governor inserted a gay rights provision into his final budget barring discrimination by state agencies in hiring and promotion on the basis of sexual orientation. This action set off another round of heartburn for Republicans, who control both houses of the General Assembly. According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
“Warner's tactics on this hot-button issue are unconventional. Rather than seek a separate law that could be easily bottled up, he is including the safeguards in an omnibus spending measure -- larded with programs prized by legislators that supersedes other state laws.”
With the Gov-elect Kaine confirming his intention to sign executive orders codifying these protections, reaction from Republican leaders have been mixed. Warner and Kaine are appealing to economic development interests as part of their justification for such laws, and the state’s leading gay rights group, Equality Virginia notes that the GOP House Speaker is among the majority of state legislators who have previously supported such measures.
“The administration, anticipating a possible fight over the proposed protections, privately informed Speaker William J. Howell, R-Stafford, about the provision before Warner rolled out the budget Friday. One knowledgeable source said that Howell told the governor he would not lead a pitched battle against the ban. Howell is among 84 Republican and Democratic legislators who signed a pledge with Equality Virginia, a gay-rights lobbying organization that pressed Warner for the ban, to prohibit discrimination in their offices. According to Equality Virginia, 14 of 19 Fortune 500 companies in Virginia have workplace protections against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. At least eight of the state's largest private employers have sexual-orientation protections in their nondiscrimination policies.
If the provision holds, it could signal a shift in the politics of gay rights in Virginia, a cradle of Christian conservatism and home to giants of the Right, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson.
“Warner's tactics on this hot-button issue are unconventional. Rather than seek a separate law that could be easily bottled up, he is including the safeguards in an omnibus spending measure -- larded with programs prized by legislators that supersedes other state laws.”
With the Gov-elect Kaine confirming his intention to sign executive orders codifying these protections, reaction from Republican leaders have been mixed. Warner and Kaine are appealing to economic development interests as part of their justification for such laws, and the state’s leading gay rights group, Equality Virginia notes that the GOP House Speaker is among the majority of state legislators who have previously supported such measures.
“The administration, anticipating a possible fight over the proposed protections, privately informed Speaker William J. Howell, R-Stafford, about the provision before Warner rolled out the budget Friday. One knowledgeable source said that Howell told the governor he would not lead a pitched battle against the ban. Howell is among 84 Republican and Democratic legislators who signed a pledge with Equality Virginia, a gay-rights lobbying organization that pressed Warner for the ban, to prohibit discrimination in their offices. According to Equality Virginia, 14 of 19 Fortune 500 companies in Virginia have workplace protections against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. At least eight of the state's largest private employers have sexual-orientation protections in their nondiscrimination policies.
If the provision holds, it could signal a shift in the politics of gay rights in Virginia, a cradle of Christian conservatism and home to giants of the Right, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson.
posted by southofthejames @ 8:00 AM
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