In a decisive commentary on the current Democratic leadership, Americans on Tuesday cast vote after vote for Republican candidates, who swept races from coast to coast.
The GOP gained a majority of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, although Democrats managed to hang on to control of the U.S. Senate. Republicans only needed to pick up 39 House seats but ended up with at least 60. In the Senate, the GOP was looking to unseat 10 Democrats but succeeded with just six.
Although, at press time, several races were headed for recounts, the current balance in Congress now stands at a 239-184 Republican-led House and 51-46 Democratic-led Senate.
Pennsylvania Senate hopeful Joe Sestak and incumbent Congressman Patrick Murphy, strong allies of the LGBT community, were among those who lost their bids on Tuesday.
Elsewhere in the nation, after a strong campaign from the antigay National Organization for Marriage, voters in Iowa ousted State Supreme Court Chief Justice Marsha Ternus and Justices David Baker and Michael Streit, who voted to legalize same-sex marriage there in 2009. While that vote was unanimous, the three justices were the only ones on the panel up for retention.
Pro-LGBT candidates weren’t completely shut out on Tuesday, however.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), both of whom have voted with the LGBT community, fended off challenges from Tea Party candidates Sharon Angle and Carly Fiorina, respectively.
Steve Pougnet, the openly gay mayor of Palm Springs, Calif., lost his bid for Congress Tuesday against Republican incumbent Mary Bono Mack, but Congress did gain one more out member: Providence, R.I., mayor David Cicilline.
Cicilline’s election brings the total number of LGBT members of the U.S. House of Representatives to four.
“On behalf of National Stonewall Democrats across the country, we welcome the newest out Congressman, David Cicilline,” said Michael Mitchell, National Stonewall Democrats PAC executive director. “We are looking forward to working with David in the next Congress to pass legislation that moves the LGBT community closer to full equality, as well as other issues that affect our lives, jobs and families.”
Despite Cicilline’s win, Human Rights Campaign president Joe Solmonese noted that LGBT Americans will need to work even harder to see victories on LGBT-rights legislation and to stave off efforts to backtrack any progress that has been made.
“We will be prepared to fight attempts to turn back the clock on equality, as well as highlight how far this new leadership is outside the stream of public opinion,” he said. “We need not look any further than their decade of House control that brought us attempts to pass a federal marriage amendment, strip courts of jurisdiction to hear LGBT-rights claims, cut HIV/AIDS funding and vilify openly LGBT appointees.”
Most recently, the LGBT community has seen movement on efforts to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” as Murphy earlier this year was able to garner House approval for a bill to repeal the military ban on gay servicemembers. An appeals court in California earlier this week ruled DADT would remain in place as the government continues its appeal of a court ruling that would have lifted the ban.
While the House approved the repeal measure, it failed in the Senate, and advocates are pressing to have it addressed in the next few weeks.
Jeff Brauer, an openly gay associate professor of political science at Keystone College, said he doubts the Senate will successfully take up the repeal during the lame-duck session, but added this election will change the game for pro-LGBT federal efforts.
“Certainly, the sweep of the House of Representatives probably isn’t going to bode too favorably for LGBT issues. But I think there a lot of opportunities in what happened,” Brauer said. “For things on the table like ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ and ENDA [Employment Nondiscrimination Act], the president now has an opportunity to actually lead on these issues. He’s been sitting back and allowing things to play out, asking Congress to deal with the issues. But he doesn’t have that luxury now. We’re going to have a Republican House of Representatives in January, so he’s going to actually have to stand up and push the issues himself if we have any chance of getting them passed.”
Brauer said one bright spot in Tuesday’s election was that very few races across the country tried to use LGBT animus as a campaign tool.
The Republican gains should force LGBT advocates, both in the public and in legislatures, to reach across the aisle and strive for creative solutions to advance pro-LGBT measures, he added.
“If the Republicans are going to show that they’re an inclusive party, they need to deal with these issues now that they’re in power and have a place at the table. So this is a chance for us to get more Republicans on board than before, because the reality is that we do need them,” said Brauer. “We need to work to get some of the more pro-equality Republicans on our side and convince some of the more Libertarian-type Republicans, who want less government in people’s lives, that ours are Libertarian issues. We don’t want people telling us who we should marry, if we can join the military, what we should be doing with our personal lives. This is now an opportunity for us to bring more Republicans into the fold on LGBT issues.”
Jen Colletta can be reached at [email protected].