Tag: marriage equality

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Puerto Rican Government Considers No Longer Defending Same-Sex Marriage Ban

El Nuevo Día reported Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro García Padilla’s administration is “contemplating” a “change of posture and withdraw its support of the Puerto Rican statute that only recognizes marriage as a union between a man and a woman.”

The Governor’s office filed a brief today with the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals which will soon hear a lawsuit against the Puerto Rican marriage ban. In that filing, lawyers for the commonwealth admitted that the issue of marriage equality must be examined via “heightened scrutiny” and as such could not be defended.

From the brief:

“Although the main Defendant, the Governor of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, has defended the legal definition of marriage as the union between a man and a woman,” recent legal developments “have led the Commonwealth to recognize that Puerto Rico’s marriage ban must be examined through heightened scrutiny, whether it be under the Equal Protection Clause or the Due Process Clause.”

They continued: “Under said heightened standard, the Commonwealth cannot responsibly advance before this Court any interest sufficiently important or compelling to justify the differentiated treatment afforded so far to Plaintiffs.”

Omar Gonzalez-Pagan, a staff attorney for Lambda Legal, issued this statement:

“In declining to further defend the Commonwealth’s discriminatory marriage ban, Puerto Rico’s government finally recognizes that denying marriage to LGBT people is harmful and cannot be justified. The marriage ban’s sole purpose is to perpetuate discrimination, and it is just plain wrong.”

“Same-sex couples, LGBT people, and their families are part of Puerto Rico’s rich social and cultural fabric. Today’s actions fulfill the constitutional promises of justice and fairness for LGBT people in Puerto Rico. Simply put, discrimination is never in Puerto Rico’s best interests.”

Read the brief herehttps://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1690461/pr-1stcir.pdf.

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Poll: 59% Of Americans Support Same-Sex Marriage

According to a NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 59% of Americans support marriage equality, while only 33% oppose (8% said “Depends/Not sure”).

This marks a dramatic shift in the past ten years alone.

In 2004, only 30 percent of Americans said they supported same-sex marriage, while 62 percent disagreed. Half of those polled at the time said they strongly opposed allowing gays and lesbians to marry.

Democratic pollster Fred Yang noted how quickly public opinion has shifted on the issue, even compared to interracial marriage, which is now almost universally accepted.

“It took about 25 years for interracial marriage to get from 30 percent support to 60 percent,” he said. “It took same-sex marriage ten years.”

The share of the public backing same-sex marriage has even jumped from just two years ago, when 53 percent of Americans backed it and 42 percent did not.

The jump in the last two years comes, in part, from three segments of society: Republicans (13% increase), senior (7% increase) and Hispanics (18% increase)

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Marriage News Watch – March 9, 2015

From the American Foundation for Equal Rights:

The Alabama Supreme Court just went rogue on marriage, and that has George Takei pretty annoyed.

Hundreds of Republicans just asked the U.S. Supreme Court to enact full federal equality.

And the National Organization for Marriage’s losing streak continues with yet another slapdown in court.

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Sen. Rand Paul: Same-Sex Marriage “Offends Myself And A Lot Of People”

Appearing on Fox News yesterday, Republican Senator Rand Paul from Kentucky told Bret Baier that allowing gays and lesbians to marry “offends myself and a lot of people.”

“I’m for tradition marriage,” Paul said. “I think marriage is between a man and a woman. Ultimately, we could have fixed this a long time ago if we just allowed contracts between adults. We didn’t have to call it marriage, which offends myself and a lot of people.”

“I think having competing contracts that would have given them equivalency before the law would have solved a lot of these problems, and it may be where we’re still headed.”

Clearly, Sen. Paul (a probable candidate for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination) is of a mind that “separate but equal” would suit him better than true marriage equality. But, as everyone knows, “separate but equal” is never “equal.”

A spokesperson for the Democratic National Committee, Ian Sams, issued this statement:

“Saying marriage equality ‘offends’ him gives us yet another glimpse of Paul’s true colors — a restrictive, retro social agenda that sets back LGBT rights and questions longstanding gains in civil rights. Support for marriage equality is at record highs, and most Americans now live in states where it’s legal. What’s truly offensive is Rand Paul’s insistence on being stuck in the past and failing to support equal rights for LGBT Americans.”

(source)

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Same-Sex Marriage Support In America Reaches 56%

According to the General Social Survey, one of the most comprehensive and widest ranging surveys covering social attitudes in America for over 40 years, 56% of Americans support the rights of gays and lesbians to marry.

This shows an increase of 45 points since the question was first asked in 1988.

The biggest leap in support comes from Republicans, whose now stands at 45% – a 14 point increase since 2012 alone.

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Attorney General Eric Holder: “Nothing justifies excluding same-sex couples from the institution of marriage”

Attorney General Eric Holder

In an op-ed for USA Today, US Attorney General Eric Holder makes clear his – and the administration’s – support for marriage equality across the United States:

This week, the Justice Department will file a brief setting forth our position that state bans on same-sex marriage violate the fundamental constitutional guarantee of “equal protection of the laws.” It is clear that the time has come to recognize that gay and lesbian people deserve robust protection from discrimination.

Nothing justifies excluding same-sex couples from the institution of marriage. Denying them the right to marry serves only to demean them and their children, to degrade the dignity of their families and to deny them the full, free and equal participation in American life to which every citizen is entitled.

Marriage bans inflict concrete harms that touch nearly every aspect of daily life for gay and lesbian couples. The bans intersect with issues as varied as workers’ compensation, taxation and inheritance, posing challenges to basic financial security. Same-sex couples living in states with bans too often face obstacles to adopting and raising children together. And restrictions on medical decision-making and hospital visitation impose devastating burdens during the moments when a partner is needed most.

Read the entire essay at USA Today here.

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SCOTUS: 300 Prominent Republicans Sign Amicus Brief In Support Of Same-Sex Marriage

A “friend of the court” brief in support of marriage equality has been signed and filed at the U.S. Supreme Court by more than 300 high profile Republican lawmakers, operatives and consultants.

From Time:

The amicus brief, organized by former Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, was filed for the four same-sex marriage cases the Court will hear on April 28 that could legalize the unions nationwide. In 2013, Mehlman marshaled a similar effort for the case that overturned California’s Proposition 8, which had banned same-sex marriage in the state.

Among the signatories are 23 current and former Republicans members of the House of Representatives and Senate and seven current and former Governors. Sens. Susan Collins and Mark Kirk have signed onto the brief, as has Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman. Other notables include former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal and billionaire GOP mega-donor David Koch.

SCOTUS has scheduled oral arguments in the cases regarding same-sex marriage from the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals for April 28th.

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SCOTUS: Hundreds Of Major Corporations Sign Brief In Support Of Same-Sex Marriage

Bloomberg Business reports that almost 400 major corporations have signed on to a “friend of the court” brief in support of same-sex marriage urging the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down anti-gay marriage laws.

In a friend-of-the-court brief expected to be filed on Thursday, hundreds of banks and other corporations argue that states that still prohibit gay unions “hamper employer efforts to recruit and retain the most talented workforce possible in those states.”

Major companies and financial institutions previously have backed the campaign to recognize same-sex unions, so the brief isn’t a surprise. What’s impressive is that as of Wednesday night, 379 corporations and employer organizations had signed on to the amicus brief, representing industries from technology to financial services, transportation to consumer products, retail to restaurants to sports.

Among those that signed on: Aetna, Alcoa, Amazon.com, American Airlines, American Express, Apple, AT&T, Bank of America, Barclays, BlackRock, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Capital One, Cardinal Health, Chubb, Cigna, Cisco, Citigroup, Colgate-Palmolive, ConAgra, Corning, Credit Suisse Securities, CVS Health, Delta Air Lines, Deutsche Bank, Dow Chemical, EBay, Facebook, General Electric, General Mills, GlaxoSmithKline, Goldman Sachs, Google, Hartford Financial Services, Hilton, HSBC, Intuit, Johnson & Johnson, JPMorgan Chase, Kimberly-Clark, KPMG, Levi Strauss, Marriott, Marsh & McLennan, Massachusetts Mutual, McKinsey, Microsoft, MillerCoors, Morgan Stanley, Nationwide Mutual, the New England Patriots, New York Life, Nike, Northrop Grumman, Office Depot, Oracle, Orbitz, Pandora, PepsiCo, Pfizer, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Procter & Gamble, Prudential, Qualcomm, RBC Capital Markets, the San Francisco Giants, Staples, Symantec, the Tampa Bay Rays, Target, TD Bank, Twitter, UBS, United Airlines, Verizon, Walt Disney, Wells Fargo, and Zynga.

It was announced today that SCOTUS will hear the arguments for same-sex marriage cases from the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals on April 28th.

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Conservative Billionaire David Koch Joins Amicus Brief In Favor Of Marriage Equality

David Koch

David Koch, billionaire donor to Republican/conservative campaigns, has announced he will join an amicus brief in support of marriage equality at the U.S. Supreme Court:

The brief he will reportedly sign in DeBoer v. Snyder, a case that could afford same-sex couples a constitutional right to marry, will host a number of other prominent conservative signatories, including retired Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, former Reagan White House chief of staff Ken Duberstein and former Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman. News of the brief was first reported Tuesday by The Washington Post.

An attorney for Koch Industries told the Free Beacon that Koch will join the brief in a personal capacity, indicating his support for gay marriage does not necessarily indicate a larger message from the Koch network of donors.

In 2012, Koch, the Libertarian Party’s 1980 vice presidential candidate, told POLITICO that he supported gay marriage, despite backing Mitt Romney and a host of other conservative candidates who favored varieties of same-sex marriage bans.

The brief will argue that providing marriage licenses to same-sex couples ultimately strengthens the institution of marriage and that the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution should prohibit state bans on same-sex marriage.