THE GUERRILLA ANGEL REPORT — Earlier today the U.S Senate passed the transgender/LGBT workplace anti-discrimination bill with 10 Republicans crossing the aisle to join the Democrats.
Earlier this week however, it wasn’t clear if the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA) would even reach the Senate floor for a final vote. It took Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon’s cornering of two GOP Senators in the Republican’s Senate cloakroom to hash out a deal that eventually lead to this outcome.
It was also Sen. Merkley the late Sen. Ted Kennedy asked to carry the torch for ENDA when it became apparent Kennedy was not going to live to see passage of a bill he long championed.
While at first glance it appears the bill is doomed to die in the House, however, nothing has gone quite right for the House Republicans recently. With all seats in the Republican-held House up for grab in less than a year from now, there likely are enough concerned moderates that’ll join with House Democrats and vote to pass the bill. But the question is whether House Speaker Boehner will let the bill reach the floor for a vote.
In the past few hours just prior to the writing of this article, Senators Tammy Baldwin and Al Franken have called Boehner and asked that he just let it go to the floor for a straight up or down vote.
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While I’ve no clue what Boehner will do, but I believe he’s long overdue to make a ‘what the heck, let’s do it’ move. I also know Sen. Kennedy is giving Merkley a tip of the hat from the ‘other side.’
Kennedy-Merkley: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/11/04/1253023/-OR-Sen-Jeff-Merkley-D-Takes-Up-Mantle-Of-LGBT-Equality-From-Ted-Kennedy
Sen. Al Franken on Boehner: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/al-franken/what-is-speaker-boehner-w_b_4235599.html
Sen Tammy Baldwin (video): http://www.advocate.com/politics/2013/11/07/watch-tammy-baldwin-tells-john-boehner-just-bring-enda-vote-0
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Here’s a transgender feature film that I’d be honored if you watched: “Lexie Cannes” http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0963781332 Or via PayPal: http://www.lexiecannes.com/id13.html
THE GUERRILLA ANGEL REPORT is associated with Wipe Out Transphobia: http://www.wipeouttransphobia.com/
Read Lexie Cannes in The Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/courtney-odonnell/
Categories: Discrimination, Equality, Civil Rights, Legislative, Transgender, Transsexual, Trans
LEXIE CANNES STATE OF TRANS 
http://www.nationaljournal.com/daily/transgender-witness-was-tipping-point-for-gay-rights-bill-20131107
NJ Daily
Transgender Witness Was Tipping Point for Gay-Rights Bill
Support from Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, helped bring others onto the nondiscrimination bill.(Chet Susslin)
Fawn Johnson
By Fawn Johnson
November 7, 2013
In July of last year, senators gathered in a wood-paneled hearing room and saw something they had likely never seen before: a black man at the witness table who, 20 years previously, had been a woman. He testified about how, before his sex-change surgery, he had been escorted by police out of women’s bathrooms and stripped to “prove” he could be there. He talked of how he was fired from one of his first jobs (in finance) six months after he announced that he was transitioning from woman to man.
But the most important part of Kaylar Broadus’s appearance before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee on that summer morning wasn’t anything he said. His mere presence at the witness table, at the invitation of committee Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, was the signal to the gay, lesbian, and transgender community that they could go all out in promoting the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, a bill that bars workplace discrimination against them. Various versions of the legislation have been around since 1974.
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Tip of the hat to Dana Ashleigh Goodyear
Cheers! I am hopeful that the House will vote on ENDA.
I read the letter from the National Journal earlier. As someone posted in a response, she had misspelled Kylar Broadus’s name.
I had the pleasure of meeting him this past June, in Washington, D.C., when I attended the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) Lobby Day event. He is a very warm, eloquent and outspoken advocate for trans people, particularly, Trans People of Color (TPOC), which he administers. I can only imagine that day in the Congressional committee meeting. We owe him a huge “Thank you, Kylar!”
I would like to second Judithe’s remarks. A huge thank you to Kylar Broadus for being there and also for being such an excellent representative of the trans community. Also thanks are in order for all the Senators who voted yes especially Senators Merkeley and Franken. They stood up for ENDA when it was needed the most. Governor Jerry Brown, although not a U.S.Senator, also deserves a note of thanks for helping to influence some others to vote yes. Now I just hope that soon the House will take up the bill so that our rights will be finally protected by Federal legislation in the workplace.
Thanks for the comments and additional information everyone!