third and final presidential debate, Tr u m p s t a t e d h i s c o u r t appointments “will interpret the Constitution the way the founders wanted it interpreted.” The founders signed the Constitution on September 17, 1787, when black people were enslaved, women were disenfranchised, and LGBT people, when not invisible, were scorned or put to death. The founders knew a world where only white, Christian, heterosexual, cisgender men had power and rights.
Trump told Fox News he would “strongly consider” appointing judges to overturn marriage equality. Last spring Trump had a brief moment of enlightenment around LGBT issues. After the Republican governor of North Carolina signed an egregious bill banning LGBT civil rights protections, and further barring transgender people from using the bathroom corresponding to their gender identity, Trump voiced opposition to the legislation. He suggested that North Carolina should just “leave it the way it is,” and that people should have the right to use whichever bathroom “they feel appropriate.” In typical Trump fashion though, this position was short-lived. In less than 24 hours, he was agreeing with Fox News’ Sean Hannity that “local communities and states should make their own decision” as to whether they discriminate against LGBT Americans. As Jordan Weissman of Slate online magazine puts it, Trump tends not to have policy positions; he has “policy moods” that change easily. But Trump has energized conservatives with one policy that hasn’t changed: the Supreme Court must follow the original intent of the U.S. Constitution, enacted over 200 years ago. At the
At the final debate Hillar y Clinton said she envisions a Supreme Court as a body that "stands up on behalf of women's rights, on behalf of the rights of the LGBT community, and that will stand up and say no Citizen's United.” She said her nominees would be "in the great tradition of standing up to the powerful, standing up on behalf of our rights as Americans.”
Trump hopes a significant minority of LGBT voters will overlook his opposition to federal marriage equality, and his support for the right of state and local governments to enshrine discrimination against us into law, all because he uses the words “radical Islamic terrorism.” But in the United States, it is neither shariah law nor terrorism that poses the greatest threat to the LGBT community, and our very democracy. It is a Trump presidency. Marc Paige writes on LGBT and HIV/AIDS issues.