Biden Signs Respect for Marriage Act – Georgia Voice – Gay & LGBT Atlanta News

President Joe Biden on Tuesday signed the Respect for Marriage Act into regulation.

“At the moment’s an excellent day,” mentioned Biden throughout a signing ceremony that passed off on the White Home’s South Garden. “At the moment America takes a giant step in the direction of equality.”

The ceremony passed off 5 days after the Respect for Marriage Act handed within the U.S. Home of Representatives with 39 Republicans voting in favor.

The invoice handed within the U.S. Senate on November 29 by a 61-39 vote margin. The Respect for Marriage Act first handed within the Home in July.

Biden in the course of the signing ceremony particularly thanked U.S. Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and different lawmakers who helped safe the invoice’s passage. Biden additionally reiterated requires Congress to move the Equality Act, which might add sexual orientation and gender id to federal civil rights regulation, and for an finish to anti-LGBTQ violence within the wake of final month’s bloodbath at Membership Q in Colorado Springs, Colo., and the proliferation of anti-trans payments throughout the nation.

“When an individual may be married within the morning and thrown out of a restaurant within the afternoon, that is nonetheless fallacious,” mentioned Biden. “We should cease the hate and violence.”

Vice President Kamala Harris was San Francisco’s district legal professional in 2004 when she turned one of many first public officers within the nation to officiate a same-sex wedding ceremony. Harris was California’s legal professional basic when she efficiently challenged the state’s Proposition 8 earlier than the U.S. Supreme Courtroom.

The Supreme Courtroom on June 26, 2013, struck down Prop 8 and the Protection of Marriage Act. The Supreme Courtroom on June 25, 2015, issued its landmark Obergefell choice that prolonged marriage rights to same-sex {couples} throughout the nation.

Harris famous Tuesday is “a day, when due to Democrats and Republicans, we lastly defend marriage rights in federal regulation.” Dozens of same-sex {couples} who sued for marriage rights throughout the nation and their households stood on the steps resulting in the Truman Balcony as she and Biden spoke.

“For thousands and thousands of LGBTQI+ Individuals and interracial {couples}, this can be a victory and half of a bigger struggle,” mentioned Harris.

Supreme Courtroom Justice Clarence Thomas in a concurring opinion he wrote within the choice that overturned Roe v. Wade advised the Supreme Courtroom also needs to rethink Obergefell and two different selections that assured the precise to personal, consensual intercourse and the flexibility of married {couples} to buy and use contraception.

The Home first handed the Respect for Marriage Act lower than a month after the Supreme Courtroom overturned Roe in Dobbs v. Jackson. California Congressman Mark Takano, who’s brazenly homosexual, earlier this month informed the Washington Blade that Congress was “reeling” from the ruling and Thomas’ opinion and lawmakers mentioned “we have to defend what we are able to.”

Harris mentioned the Dobbs choice is a reminder that “elementary rights are interconnected, together with the precise to marry who you like, the precise to entry contraception, and the precise to make selections about your individual physique.” Biden famous Congress handed the Respect for Marriage Act “due to an excessive Supreme Courtroom has stripped away the precise essential to thousands and thousands of Individuals that existed for half a century.”

Home Majority Chief Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.); Senate Majority Chief Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Gina and Heidi Nortonsmith, one of many plaintiff {couples} within the lawsuit that led Massachusetts to grow to be the primary state within the nation to increase marriage rights to same-sex {couples} in 2004, additionally spoke on the ceremony. Cyndi Lauper, Sam Smith and members of the Homosexual Males’s Refrain of Washington carried out.

Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg; Nationwide LGBTQ Activity Power Govt Director Kierra Johnson; Transgender Authorized Protection and Schooling Fund Govt Director Andy Marra; David Mixner; Robyn Ochs; Alabama state Rep. Neil Rafferty; Pennsylvania state Sen. Malcolm Kenyatta; Arizona state Rep. Daniel Hernández; former New York Metropolis Council Speaker Corey Johnson; Maryland state Del. Luke Clippinger (D-Baltimore Metropolis); GLAAD President Sarah Kate Ellis; Backyard State Equality (N.J.) Govt Director Christian Fuscarino; Equality Florida Communications Director Brandon Wolf; Wanda Alston Heart Govt Director June Crenshaw and Japer Bowles, director of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Workplace of LGBTQ Affairs, are amongst 5,300 individuals who attended the ceremony.

Sinema, Baldwin, Collins, U.S. Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and U.S. Reps. Jerrold Nadler (D.N.Y), Sharice Davids (D-Kan.) and David Cicilline (D-R.I.) have been additionally in attendance.

“At the moment is a historic day and a much-needed victory for our group,” mentioned Human Rights Marketing campaign President Kelley Robinson in a press launch. “It must be misplaced on nobody that this invoice signing comes lower than a month after a lethal assault on our group in Colorado Springs, and at a time when the group continues to face ongoing threats of on-line and offline violence, in addition to legislative assaults on our rights. In signing this invoice, President Biden has proven that LGBTQ+ peoples’ lives and love are legitimate and supported.”

GLBTQ Authorized Advocates and Defenders Janson Wu mentioned “thousands and thousands of {couples} and their youngsters throughout the nation now have the reassurance that their households will proceed to be revered by our state and federal governments as a result of President Biden has signed the Respect for Marriage Act into regulation.” Equality California Govt Director Tony Hoang echoed these sentiments.

“That is an historic milestone for our motion and an essential victory for a whole lot of hundreds of loving {couples} and their youngsters throughout the nation,” mentioned Hoang in an announcement. “All Individuals deserve the liberty to marry the particular person they love, and this invoice is a mirrored image of the truth that for almost all of Individuals — throughout all political events, backgrounds, and in each nook of the nation — the talk over marriage equality is settled.”