ABOVE: President Joe Biden. Photo via Washington Blade.
In a first for a U.S. president, President Biden met with lawmakers with the congressional LGBTQ Equality Caucus, which includes each of the openly gay and lesbian members in the U.S. House and serves as the face of the LGBTQ movement in Congress.
Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), chair of the LGBTQ Equality Caucus, announced the meeting had taken place in a statement after it happened on April 1 amid the passage of the anti-trans legislation in state legislatures, including measures restricting access by transgender youth to transition-related care and school sports.
“I am grateful to President Biden for inviting Equality Caucus leadership to meet with him at the White House today. President Biden has been the most vocal ally to the LGBTQ+ community we have ever had in the White House, and I thanked him for his unwavering support,” Cicilline said in a statement. “We had a productive conversation about the pressing need for the Equality Act and other legislative and administrative actions to protect vulnerable members of the LGBTQ+ community in the face of the onslaught of anti-LGBTQ+ attacks happening in state legislatures across the country.”
A White House official confirmed the meeting took place and was part of efforts by Biden to reach out to diversity caucuses in Congress.
Among the lawmakers present at the meeting were Cicilline as well as Reps. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.) and Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.), each of whom are openly gay, according to the LGBTQ Equality Caucus statement.
The meeting, the statement says, consisted of discussion on a variety of topics with Biden and senior administration officials, including the possible U.S. Senate action Equality Act, which would expand the prohibition on anti-LGBTQ discrimination under federal law. Despite the inclusion of the Equality Act, the bill is all but dead in the Senate and lacks even unanimous support within the Democratic caucus thanks to Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) refusing to support the bill.
A spokesperson for Torres, who along with Jones is one of the two openly gay Black members of Congress, said he brought up the Food & Drug Administration’s ban on blood donations from gay and bisexual men. Although the policy was relaxed in 2020, regulations still prohibited men from donating blood if they’ve had sex with another man in the past three months.
Although the LGBTQ Equality Caucus was formed in 2008, it had until this time never met with a U.S. president. Former President Obama never met with the caucus.
In a surprise first, the LGBTQ Equality Caucus was granted a meeting with former House Speaker John Boehner in 2013, when he essentially told members efforts to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to advance LGBTQ workplace protections would be unsuccessful.
