Weekly Political Roundup

There’s no ENDA news about ENDA, which means I still have lots of fodder for bad puns. The latest is that Lambda Legal has put out a statement (PDF link) in response to Representative Barney Frank’s (D-MA) criticism of Lambda’s analysis of the revised ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act). Among other things, they say Frank minimized a critical change in the revised bill, which not only removed the term “gender-related identity,” but also took out “appearance, or mannerisms or other gender-related characteristics of an individual.”

Lambda has also released a joint statement with four other LGBT legal organizations (the ACLU, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, and the Transgender Law Center) to further explain their concerns about the new version of ENDA.

Donna Rose, the only transgender member of the HRC board, stepped down in protest at what she sees as HRC’s lack of support for the original, gender-identity inclusive ENDA. HRC has begun to be more vocal in support of a fully inclusive ENDA, but for some, it is too little, too late.

Regardless of what one thinks of HRC, it is good to see so many other organizations and individuals coming together in support of the original ENDA, the trans community, and others who are in some way gender non-conforming.

In other news:

• The Arkansas Attorney General has approved the request of the conservative Arkansas Family Council to begin collecting signatures for a voter initiative that would ban gays and lesbians, as well as unmarried opposite-sex couples, from adopting children or serving as foster parents in Arkansas.
• A California Court of Appeal unanimously affirmed the validity of a state rule that protects domestic partners from increased property taxes when one of the partners dies and the other inherits the couple’s home. California law already provides this protection for surviving opposite-sex spouses.
• County Commissioners in Palm Beach, Florida voted 6-1 to include to amend the employment and housing laws to prohibit discrimination based on gender identity or expression. The Commissioners must vote two more times before the end of the year in order for the law to go into effect.
• A court has thrown out Idaho Senator Larry Craig’s request to rescind his guilty plea in a public-sex sting, but the senator says he will not resign.
• A lesbian member of the Massachusetts National Guard, Ciara Durkin, was shot and killed at Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan under mysterious circumstances, after hinting to her family that she had reason to fear for her safety. There is no evidence that her being a lesbian had anything to do with it, although her family has not ruled that out.
• A federal judge refused to issue a restraining order to prevent the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights from investigating two complaints against the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association for banning civil unions on the public boardwalk in Ocean Grove. (Garden State Equality e-mail to supporters.)

Around the world:

• Australia now has its first legally married lesbian couple. Fiona Power had in fact married Grace Abrams, who has a male birth certificate, in the fall of 2005, before Abrams had completed her MTF transition. Abrams applied for a passport indicating her female gender, but was told she would need to divorce in order to do so, since same-sex marriage was illegal. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) this week ruled that the passport should be issued, “effectively making her and Power the first legally-recognised same-sex couple in the country.” (Thanks, PageOneQ.)
• The Columbia Constitutional Court voted 7-2 in favor of allowing a person with social security benefits to provide those benefits, including health insurance, to a same-sex partner. They must simply register the partnership with a notary and then apply for the benefits.
• Several U.S. same-sex couples have traveled to the Mexican state of Coahuila for legal civil unions. No such couple has come back to the U.S. and sued for rights, but a lawyer with Lambda Legal says “The civil unions performed in a neighboring country are legally valid in at least 19 American states.” The Coahuila state Congress is also considering an amendment to give civil unions the legal status of marriage. (Via To Form a More Perfect Union.)
• Two men convicted of “homosexual acts” in Saudi Arabia have begun receiving 7,000 lashes each, under the country’s Shari’a law.
• Three opposition parties in Sweden put forward a motion in the Swedish Parliament to allow same-sex couples to marry.
• Gay Conservatives in the U.K. met during the party’s recent conference and listened to openly gay Shadow Justice Minister Nick Herbert and others defend the party’s stance on gay rights and criticize Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s record on the same. (Meanwhile, the U.S.’s Log Cabin Republicans point out Mitt Romney’s previous pro-choice, anti-gun stances.)