On May 6, 2012, the nation’s sitting vice president made history. After advocating for LGBTQ equality in Congress for decades and for nearly four years beside former President Barack Obama in the White House, Joe Biden became the highest-ranking U.S. official to publicly support same-sex marriage.
He did so during an unscripted television interview more than three years before marriage equality would become the law of the land, a right determined by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2015. It was just six months before the Obama-Biden administration would win its second term, when only six states and Washington, D.C. legally recognized that love is love.
“I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and heterosexual men and women marrying one another are entitled to the same exact rights,” Biden asserted. “All the civil rights, all the civil liberties.”
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Biden for President National Press Secretary Jamal Brown discussed the former vice president’s words with Watermark ahead of Florida’s March 17 presidential primary, which Biden would overwhelmingly win, reiterating his longtime commitment to equality. “For Joe, this wasn’t playing politics,” he said.
“In fact, many said it was bad politics in an election year,” Brown continued. “This was about respect, dignity and standing up for what is right. Joe, throughout his career in public service, has made it his mission to lead with empathy, which is desperately needed to stand up to a bully like Donald Trump and reunify our country.”
It’s a country in which marriage equality’s legal precedent was questioned this month by a conservative-leaning Supreme Court, reshaped by Donald Trump’s Electoral College victory in the 2016 presidential election. Biden’s commitment to the LGBTQ community remains steadfast, however, which led the nation’s largest LGBTQ civil rights organization to endorse him for president May 6 – exactly eight years after his endorsement of same-sex marriage.
“Vice President Joe Biden is the leader our community and our country need at this moment,” Human Rights Campaign (HRC) President Alphonso David said. “His dedication to advancing LGBTQ equality, even when it was unpopular to do so, has pushed our country and our movement forward.
“This November, the stakes could not be higher,” he continued. “Far too many LGBTQ people, and particularly those who are most vulnerable, face discrimination, intimidation and violence simply because of who they are and who they love … Joe Biden will be a president who stands up for all of us.”
Biden’s plan to advance LGBTQ equality in America and abroad extensively details how he plans to do so. He’s promised to protect the LGBTQ community from discrimination by supporting youth; work to end the epidemic of violence against the transgender community, particularly transgender women of color; expand access to high-quality health care; ensure fair treatment in criminal justice and advance LGBTQ rights across the globe.
The campaign has also committed to specifics, calling the Equality Act a top legislative priority in a would-be President Biden’s first 100 days. Once signed into law, it would amend federal protections to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in employment, housing, public accommodations, public education and more.
The measure is similar to the Florida Competitive Workforce Act (FCWA), which has sought to do so statewide since 2009. While it has received widespread bipartisan support, the Republican-controlled Florida Legislature has failed to enact it.
The Equality Act passed in the Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives May 20, but has not been advanced by the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate. The Trump administration opposes it.
Should he win the presidency, Biden has also confirmed that he will reverse a number of specifically anti-transgender Trump policies on his first day in office.
He’s committed to reinstate federal guidance directing the Department of Education to assert transgender students require access to facilities that align with their gender identity. He’s also pledged to direct the Department of Defense to allow transgender service members to openly serve in the military, ending a discriminatory policy Trump enacted via Twitter in 2017.
For those reasons and more, the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) Action Fund made its first presidential endorsement this year: for Biden. The fund is affiliated with the NCTE, the nation’s leading transgender advocacy organization.
“Joe Biden is the advocate and president we need at this consequential moment,” NCTE Executive Director Mara Keisling said May 5. “He has the temperament, the experience and wisdom to lead our country.
“Throughout his career in public service, work as a private citizen through the Biden Foundation and now his campaign to lead our nation, Biden has demonstrated his commitment to transgender people and the LGBTQ community,” she continued. “Biden has a strong agenda for addressing the issues that face transgender Americans, a record of getting big ideas done during his time as vice president in the Obama-Biden administration and a history of ensuring that transgender people are protected.”
Keisling also pointed to Biden’s frequent remarks that “transgender equality is the civil rights issue of our time,” made as early as 2012 during an exchange with an Obama-Biden supporter in Sarasota. “With Joe Biden, we know we will be engaged, we will be seen and we will not be erased,” she said.
A number of high-profile endorsements from other national LGBTQ-focused organizations followed, including the leading association of LGBTQ small business owners. The National LGBT Chamber of Commerce shared Aug. 31 that “we need to elect a president with a commitment to LGBTQ equality, ending racism and racial violence, promoting small businesses and entrepreneurship and ensuring a safe and equitable society for every American.”
The National LGBT Media Association, which represents 12 of the nation’s oldest LGBTQ publications including Watermark, added their endorsement this month. Calling on readers to remain engaged, they noted that “this election will be decided in a small number of states, [where] LGBTQ activists and our progressive allies are on the ground working to elect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.”
That’s particularly true in Florida, which awards 29 of the 270 Electoral College votes required to win the presidency. The state has voted Democratic in 25 presidential elections and Republican in 16, aligning with the nationwide victor 31 times. That includes four years ago, when Trump received 48.60% of Florida’s vote to former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton’s 47.41%.
Margins like these are a part of what led Equality Florida, the state’s largest political advocacy group dedicated to securing full equality for LGBTQ Floridians, to make its first federal endorsement in 23 years. The organization has traditionally been focused on measures like the FCWA and advocated for equality-focused candidates who support it in local and state government.
“Our endorsement of a Biden-Harris ticket is a testament to the grave stakes of this election,” Equality Florida Executive Director Nadine Smith said Sept. 22. “The Trump-Pence Administration has been catastrophic for LGBTQ Americans, an onslaught of the brand of bigotry that Pence has become synonymous with.
“Giving them another four years in the Oval Office would put the most marginalized among us in danger and decimate the progress we’ve earned,” she continued. “The time is now to mobilize our community, turn out in record numbers and elect a president who will shepherd the fight for full equality instead of wage war on it. The time is now to elect Joe Biden and we are ready to deliver him a win in Florida.”
The endorsement followed the organization’s largest voter mobilization program to date, which continues to focus on contacting pro-equality voters in races up and down the ballot. Launched in June, it targets 500,000 Floridians in danger of not casting their ballot this year.
“In a state whose election outcomes live on a razor’s edge,” the organization explains, “LGBTQ voters in Florida and their allies will determine the results on election night – and the country’s course for generations to come.”
That’s why Watermark contacted more than 100 candidates who are vying for positions in the U.S. Congress or Florida Legislature in next month’s general election. If elected or re-elected, the victors will likely vote to enact either the Equality Act or FCWA.
We asked Democrats, Republicans and more five questions focused on LGBTQ equality: one open-ended and four yes (Y) or no (N), to help voters make an informed decision. Each candidate’s responses, or lack thereof after multiple attempts, can be found here.
Biden for President directly responded to 10 similar questions from Watermark earlier this year. In addition to reconfirming that as president he would restore federal protections for transgender students, rescind the transgender military ban and fight to pass the Equality Act, the campaign confirmed that Biden supports LGBTQ-inclusive public education and a nationwide ban on conversion therapy.
They also noted that he will seek members of the LGBTQ community for key roles within his administration and that he believes blood donation eligibility should not be determined by someone’s sexual orientation.
Neither Trump’s re-election campaign nor the Log Cabin Republicans responded to Watermark’s multiple requests for comment. The latter group bills itself as the nation’s largest Republican organization dedicated to representing LGBTQ conservatives and endorsed his 2020 race earlier this year.
Whomever equality-focused voters in Central Florida and Tampa Bay cast their ballots for on or before Nov. 3, they’ll have multiple ways to do so. Early, in-person voting runs daily now through Nov. 1, with hours and locations varying per county.
A valid photo ID that includes your signature is required to vote, most commonly a Florida-issued driver’s license. Gender discrepancies on these forms of identification are not a valid reason to deny someone from voting, advocates note, as federal law does not require that a voter’s gender identity or gender presentation match the name, photo or gender marker on their ID.
Vote-by-mail ballots can also be requested in person, by mail or online from each county’s local Supervisor of Elections until Oct. 24 at 5 p.m. Officials must receive the ballots no later than 7 p.m. on Nov. 3 to be counted, either by mail or in local drop boxes at each county’s local Supervisor of Elections branch and/or early voting locations, as determined by local officials.
Voters who requested to vote by mail but ultimately decide to vote in person may also do so by bringing their ballot to the polls where it can be canceled. For those who wish to vote in person Nov. 3, polls will be open from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. and any voter who is in line at 7 p.m. will be able to cast their ballot. It is illegal for anyone to try to stop someone from voting, which should be reported to Election Protection at 866-687-8683.
However you vote, equality-focused organizations throughout the nation and state agree that doing so is imperative. “The choice could not be clearer or the election more consequential,” Equality Florida’s Smith summarized.
“The country cannot withstand another four years of hate, bigotry and an assault on the rights of all Americans to live authentically without fear of violence,” she added. “In November, pro-equality voters in Florida will chart the path forward from this nightmare.”
View Watermark’s 2020 LGBTQ Voters’ Guide here.
For details about your polling location or to request your mail-in ballot, contact your local Supervisor of Elections. Find yours at DOS.Elections.MyFlorida.com/Supervisors or by calling 850-245-6200.
For more information about Equality Florida and to view its 2020 voter guide with endorsements for local candidates, information about Florida’s amendments and more, visit EQFL.org/2020ElectionsCenter. Read Joe Biden’s full commitment to LGBTQ equality at JoeBiden.com/LGBTQ.
