Via the plumline
The Obama Justice Department has reached out to major gay rights organizations and scheduled a private meeting for next week with the groups, in an apparent effort to smooth over tensions in the wake of the controversy over the administration’s defense in court of the Defense of Marriage Act.
It remains to be seen, however, whether the meeting will achieve in a long term sense what gay rights lawyers told me they were and are looking for — an ongoing, less-confrontational interaction with the administration in the context of specific cases. It’s also an open question whether the meeting will resolve broader tensions in what has been an unexpectedly rocky relationship.
This is a 180 degree reversal from earlier when leading gay groups asked to meet with the DOJ to discuss ongoing litigation. Also from Plumline:
"We thought it would be a good idea to sit down with top folks at Justice to talk about this lawsuit and what it meant and to engage in more cooperative lawyering," Busic tells me. "They told us that they didn’t want to meet with us." The government’s response in the case is due later this month, and gay rights activists are watching closely to see if it’s similar to the one in the California case that’s generating so much controversy.
Over the past few days many gay rights activists have cancelled attendance at a bigwig DNC fundraiser, and thousands of the rest of us have notified the DNC that we would be closing our wallets. Coupled with the blog firestorm it seems to have reaped results.
We have to keep up the pressure!