President Biden’s reelection campaign announced plans Monday to launch new organizing efforts and a paid media campaign aimed at reaching out to LGBTQ voters during Pride Month.
The campaign plans to be present at more than 200 Pride events in 23 states, including each of the swing states that will decide the November elections, according to a press release. The campaign’s LGBTQ voting initiative, Out for Biden-Harris, will work with LGBTQ clubs, caucuses, councils and grassroots networks across the country to mobilize voters and leverage the administration’s relationships with influential LGBTQ rights advocates.
Later in the month, Biden and first lady Jill Biden, who kicked off Pride Month with an appearance at the annual Pittsburgh Pride festival on Sunday, will host an LGBTQ fundraiser in New York City.
“Thanks to the tireless work of LGBTQ+ organizers, our community has made tremendous strides toward equality, and thanks to President Biden, we have not only undone the damage imposed by Trump, we have taken more action than ever before to expand rights and freedoms. for every American,” said Sam Alleman, national director of LGBTQ+ engagement for the Biden-Harris campaign. “All of this progress is at stake in November.”
Biden, who frequently calls himself and his administration the most pro-LGBTQ in history, during his first term expanded federal non-discrimination protections for LGBTQ people and condemned violence and threats made against the community. In 2022, Biden signed legislation safeguarding marriage equality.
But the president has failed to deliver on some promises he made to LGBTQ voters, including a pledge to safeguard access to gender-affirming health care as more Republican-led states move to ban treatment for minors.
On the other hand, former President Trump has promised to enact at least a dozen policies that target transgender rights if he is re-elected, including a nationwide ban on transgender student-athletes competing according to their gender identity and a federal law that recognizes only two genders. . He also promised to punish health care providers who administer gender-affirming medical care to minors and roll back new protections for transgender students “on day one” of his presidency.
Trump, as president, banned transgender individuals from serving openly in the military, gutted Obama-era anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ people, and rejected requests from U.S. embassies to fly rainbow flags during Pride Month. But he still managed to rally LGBTQ conservatives to his side: His 2020 candidacy was endorsed by the Log Cabin Republicans, a conservative LGBTQ advocacy group.
Recent polls suggest the former president leads Biden in key battleground states and maintains a slight 1.1 percentage point lead nationally, based on an average of 725 polls from The Hill/Decision Desk HQ that pit the two against each other . Nearly 70 percent of likely LGBTQ voters surveyed in January by the LGBTQ media advocacy group GLAAD said they preferred Biden to Trump.
In the same survey, more than half of voters said they would not vote for a candidate who supported restricting transgender rights.
LGBTQ voters played a key role in Biden’s 2020 victory, a Washington Post analysis found. More than 7 percent of U.S. adults in a March Gallup poll said they identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or “something other than heterosexual,” including more than 20% of Americans ages 18 to 25.
But while LGBTQ voters are more likely to support Democrats in the election, not everyone is set on voting for Biden this year. The Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group, in May committed $15 million to help re-elect the president, noting that about a third of “equality voters” — who prioritize rights LGBTQ at the polls – they are at risk of not voting.
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
