The Obama campaign recently responded to a series of questions submitted by William R. Kapfer, co-president of Window Media, the Washington Blade’s parent company. In his answers to the questions, Obama committed to developing and implementing a comprehensive national AIDS strategy and emphasized his support for repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and the Defense of Marriage Act and for passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and hate crimes legislation.

Below is an excerpt from the interview. Read the entire interview at the Washington Blade.

Blade: Important gay rights legislation unrelated to marriage has been stalled in Congress for quite some time. The gay community has high expectations for an Obama administration. What are reasonable expectations for a first-term Obama administration: How aggressively would you push for Congress to pass ENDA, the hate crimes bill, repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and other gay-related bills in your first year in office, and would you mention those bills in your State of the Union address?

Obama: These bills are all important priorities for me. Senator Biden and I have long committed ourselves to supporting fundamental civil rights for all. In addition to the issues you mentioned, I also support full repeal of DOMA to provide equal federal rights and benefits to LGBT couples. America must live up to our founding principle of equality for all, and it’s wrong to have millions of LGBT Americans living as second‐class citizens in this nation.

I support these efforts because I know that equality is a moral imperative. Back when I was in the Illinois Senate, I co‐sponsored a fully inclusive bill that prohibited discrimination on the basis of both sexual orientation and gender identity, extending protection to the workplace, housing, and places of public accommodation. The non-discrimination bill has become law in Illinois. If I am honored to serve as your President, I will continue to do what I’ve done throughout my career and in this campaign: speak out on behalf of the cause for equal justice and opportunity for LGBT Americans.

Tags: Barack Obama, Democrats, LGBT rights, Washington Blade

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 11th, 2008 at 7:00 am and is filed under Barack Obama, Democrats, LGBT rights, Out and Proud. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.