Obama Makes the Case for Fairness 

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In his Tuesday evening State of the Union address before a
fractious Congress, President Obama made his economic case for “a return to the
American values of fair play and shared responsibility” — a theme pertinent for
an LGBT community facing disproportionate poverty rates and legal barriers to
equal rights.

“We can either settle for a country where a shrinking number
of people do really well, while a growing number of Americans barely get by,”
Obama said in the address, calling for an overhaul of the tax code to bridge
the widening gap between the rich and poor. “Or we can restore an economy where
everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays
by the same set of rules. What’s at stake are not Democratic values or
Republican values, but American values. We have to reclaim them.” 

The president’s address didn’t specifically mention the effect
of the economy on LGBT Americans and echoed his stump speech last month in
Osawatomie, Kansas, where Obama pushed for extensions in a payroll tax break
and assailed precipitous income gains by the country’s top earners even as
middle-class wages stagnate and unemployment remains high.

The evening’s Republican reply came from Indiana governor Mitch
Daniels, who slammed the central premise of Obama’s address as unfettered class
warfare — an attempt, he said, “to curry favor with some Americans by
castigating others.”

Despite lingering stereotypes of gays as affluent urbanites,
social science research has recently shown just how LGBT people are economically
disadvantaged. One 2011 report by LGBT and progressive groups illustrates in
stark terms how discriminatory laws, both state and federal, create barriers to
government programs and impose greater tax burdens on LGBT families. Children
raised by same-sex couples are twice as likely to live in poverty as those
raised in heterosexual households. The denial of marriage rights by the federal
government and a majority of states tells part of the story as to why this is
the case.

The president has not come out in full support of marriage
equality, though the White House has supported repeal of the federal Defense of
Marriage Act, has declined to defend the law in court, and has issued general
statements against antigay ballot measures to go before voters in several
states this year.

Responding to a legislative push to repeal marriage in New
Hampshire, the White House reissued a statement crafted from a 2008 position by
then-candidate Obama on California’s Proposition 8 that the administration has
frequently used to address state marriage battles.

“The record is clear that the president has long opposed
divisive and discriminatory efforts to deny rights and benefits to same-sex
couples,” said White House spokesman Shin Inouye. “The president believes
strongly in stopping laws designed to take rights away.”

The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force tied the lack of full marriage equality to economic unfairness in its reaction to
the president's speech.

“The fact is, the state of the union for LGBT people remains
largely one of inequality,” said Rea Carey, the group’s executive director. “In
many parts of the country, we can still be fired from or denied employment for
simply being who we are, and marriage inequality relegates our families to
second-class status.”

Obama did not make any revelatory, specific statements on
LGBT issues in Tuesday’s populist-charged address, nor was he expected to. But
the president’s third State of the Union address before a joint session of
Congress came during a frenzy of legislative action throughout the country on
marriage equality.

On Monday, the Washington state senate reached critical mass
of support for a marriage bill, one unveiled earlier this month by Gov.
Christine Gregoire and now expected to pass (though it may well face a voter
referendum, as threatened by antigay marriage forces). In New Jersey, marriage
legislation passed through a senate committee Tuesday but faces a veto showdown
from Republican Gov. Chris Christie, who floored state LGBT advocates Monday
with the nomination of an openly gay mayor to the state supreme court, yet said
Tuesday that he supports putting the marriage issue on the ballot.

One LGBT mention came toward the end of the speech as Obama
touted First Lady Michelle Obama’s and Dr. Jill Biden’s “Joining Forces”
military families initiative.

“Those of us who’ve been sent here to serve can learn from
the service of our troops,” Obama said. “When you put on that
uniform, it doesn’t matter if you’re black or white, Asian, Latino, Native
American, conservative, liberal, rich, poor, gay, straight. When you’re
marching into battle, you look out for the person next to you, or the mission
fails. When you’re in the thick of the fight, you rise or fall as one unit,
serving one nation, leaving no one behind.”

Republican presidential candidates angling to ensure that
Obama is a one-term president are split on whether open service by gay and
lesbian service members should continue. Mitt Romney has said that while he had
opposed repeal, he does not favor a return to DADT. Newt Gingrich has pledged an
“extensive review” of repeal, while Rick Santorum has supported a reinstatement
of a ban on openly gay service members — in theory a possibility, given that the bill
passed in 2010 merely provided for repeal of the 1993 law. “Their service is
not protected by federal statute,” Servicemembers Legal Defense Network
executive director Aubrey Sarvis said last week of gay service members. “I
think there’s a misconception among some folks that gays and lesbians are
serving today under a new law that permits their service.”

Mentions of LGBT-specific rights issues in previous Obama
State of the Union addresses focused on “don’t ask, don’t tell” — including a
pledge to forge a path for repealing the policy in 2010 and a pronouncement
in 2011 that “no American will be forbidden from serving the country they love
because of who they love.”

On Tuesday night, two lesbian women — one a military
officer, another a plaintiff in a sex discrimination case — were on Mrs. Obama's guest list.

Sitting
with the First Lady, Dr. Biden, and senior adviser Valerie Jarrett was Col.
Ginger Wallace, who as an Air Force intelligence officer had served in
the Iraq War and other operations. In December, when she was promoted to her
current rank, her partner, Kathy Knopf, attended the ceremony and participated
in the pinning of Wallace’s new rank on her uniform, becoming the first
same-sex partner to be involved in such a ceremony. Wallace is scheduled to be
deployed to Afghanistan in the spring.

Also a guest of the First Lady was Lorelei Kilker of
Colorado, who had sued the Western Sugar Cooperative, alleging that it denied
women training and promotions and barred them from certain jobs. She and other
women involved in the class-action suit last year received a financial
settlement that was negotiated between the company and the U.S. Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission, which will monitor Western Sugar’s personnel
practices. The company denies any
wrongdoing.       

Trudy Ring contributed reporting.