The Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide has now left many couples—especially those in red states—with a dilemma: "If I get married and try to claim the associated benefits of marriage at my job, will I be fired?"
Despite popular perception, no federal laws explicitly prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity in employment, public accommodations, or housing. While 22 states provide some form of protections, 28 states have no protections whatsoever. Lydia Wheeler reports on the new effort:
“People do have to live in fear,” said Matt McTighe, campaign manager for Freedom for All Americans. “Now you can go get married, but to come to work and live openly as a married person means you are coming out and that could be a real problem for people who work in organizations that are not supportive.”
In the fight for nondiscrimination laws, Freedom for All Americans plans to follow the same general playbook that Freedom to Marry, the group it’s modeled after, used in the fight for marriage equality.
Though the new group has a separate leadership structure, it plans to tap many of the same donors that funded the push for legalized gay marriage.
The beauty of this new group—or "campaign" as FFAA calls itself—is that it's funded by both progressives and pro-LGBT conservatives and, in that sense, will draw lessons and hopefully support from both sides of the aisle. (Here's a piece I
reported about how the two groups of donors successfully collaborated to pass LGBT employment protections through the Senate in 2013, after which the legislation promptly died in the House.)
The challenge, naturally, is that this fight cannot be settled by the courts, as marriage equality was. It will eventually have to be solved by federal legislation, which means getting GOP to buy in to some extent. The first step in that process will be going into the red states and winning them over district by district. It will be interesting to watch. And if it sounds preposterous, Republican pollster Alex Lundry found that 56 percent of Republicans in 2013 supported federal nondiscrimination protections. FFAA has committed to a 5-year campaign and a projected $25 million budget. It's a substantial financial commitment, but also a fraction of what it cost to win marriage equality over the last decade-plus. So the effort will require another all-hands-on-deck moment for the movement.