ABOVE: White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, screenshot via Facebook.
White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, under questioning from the Washington Blade, responded on Wednesday to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling for LGBTQ rights by quoting a dissent from U.S. Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh — but a portion in which he said the decision was a victory for gay people.
Asked by the Washington Blade whether President Trump thinks the Supreme Court decision — written by another Trump appointee, U.S. Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch — was a win for civil rights, McEnany said she hasn’t him that question, but referred to the Kavanaugh dissent.
“There was some real concerns that this was a complete distortion of how we do statutory interpretation, and Kavanaugh lays that out very nicely,” McEnany said.
Kavanaugh had disagreed with Gorsuch’s determination anti-LGBTQ discrimination was in violation of Title VII of the Civil Right Act of 1964, but in one part conceded the importance of the decision to gay people.
“‘Notwithstanding my concern about the court’s transgression of the Constitution’s separation of powers,’ which was a grave concern, the separation of powers point that the DOJ argued in court, ‘it is important to acknowledge the very important achieved today by gay and lesbian Americans,’” McEnany said.
McEnany concluded with some thoughts of her own on the Kavanaugh dissent.
“I thought that was a very good quote from Justice Kavanaugh,” McEnany said, declining to mention anything about the achievements for transgender people as a result of the decision.
Also during the briefing, McEnany told the Washington Blade implementation of the Bostock decision would be left to an interagency effort led by the U.S. Justice Department.
“In terms of how it’s implemented, DOJ will lead the multi-agency effort to help provide certainty to the regulated parties,” McEnany said.
McEnany declined to offer Trump’s view on the appropriate scope of implementation Bostock decision and said she was unaware of any talks between Trump and Justice Department officials on implementation of the decision.
