As President-elect Trump assumes office, we challenge him to match his predecessor’s record in advancing respect and freedom for LGBT people around the world.
It’s a tough challenge, for President Obama’s leadership on this score has been nothing short of remarkable and inspiring.Out and Included
Eight years ago, global LGBT rights were off the map. At the UN, our government often minimized human rights issues while siding with countries that discriminate actively against their own LGBT populations. At our embassies and in Washington, administrations gave lip service, if that, to the plight of LGBT populations around the world. The State Department discriminated against families of its own LGBT diplomats, and senior out-gay foreign affairs appointees were few and far between.
President Obama’s first pro-LGBT step was to give LGBT Foreign Service families rights, privileges and responsibilities that were equal to those of straight diplomatic personnel – a step the Bush Administration had refused to take. In short order, he made six out-gay ambassadorial appointments – far exceeding the total of two such appointments from preceding administrations. Dozens of other gay, lesbian and, of note, transgender appointees have been invited to serve as well. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was repealed; our current Secretary of the Army is gay. And the President also authorized changes to passport policies, allowing passport applications and reports of birth abroad to reflect same-sex parents, and streamlining the process by which transgender Americans can receive passports reflecting their chosen gender.
These simple steps have opened new horizons for LGBT youths who, because of President Obama’s actions, have a different vision of what service to their country can be. They acknowledge us, as well as our families. They strengthen passport security (and thereby our borders), too. And they affirm to both the American people and the world what the face of LGBT equality looks like.
Public Clarity and America’s Promise
History will record the Obama Administration’s commitment to global LGBT rights and inclusion largely through highly visible statements by senior officials when LGBT-related crises erupted abroad. There were, of course, many.
Hillary Clinton with Global LGBTI Activists in GenevaPresident Obama and Secretary Clinton decrying the murder of Ugandan LGBT activist David Kato and, at the National Prayer Breakfast, calling on Ugandan President Museveni not to sign into law the so-called “Kill the Gays” bill. Susan Rice and Samantha Power, as successive UN Ambassadors, insisting that LGBT people be included in a resolution against extrajudicial killings. The President’s outspoken statements against Russia’s criminalization of LGBT relations and relationships, and his inclusion of out-gay personalities in America’s delegations to the Sochi Olympics. And, of course, Hillary Clinton’s groundbreaking December 2011 speech in Geneva, affirming that LGBT rights are human rights.
From Honduras to Cameroon, when gays, lesbians and transgender people were shot, stabbed or beaten, the United States threw a public red flag – and insisted that local governments do more to stop the violence. With U.S. leadership, resolutions affirming LGBT rights passed at the Human Rights Council, and a new Independent Expert position on LGBT-related violence was created at the UN. The Administration spoke publicly and privately against bills to criminalize homosexuality in Lithuania, Moldova and across Africa. Around the world, ambassadors have marched in Pride parades, while Pride flags flew over their own embassies. LGBT and intersex advocates have experienced support and inclusivity from U.S. embassies everywhere. In Washington, both the White House and the State Department offered statements commemorating the Transgender Day of Remembrance – making clear the connection between rights at home and rights abroad.
In these and other instances, the Obama Administration refused to accept foreign government claims that how LGBT people were treated was a matter of national prerogative, not universal right. And it affirmed the overarching values of inclusion, equality and compassion that we hold as a country, and that we call on others to adopt.
Using the Tools of Diplomacy
But President Obama’s greatest legacies build on his historic 2011 Presidential Memorandum, directing all foreign affairs agencies to open their programs to LGBT populations where appropriate. The resonance and on-the-ground impact of that memorandum has been clear:
- State Department human rights reports now include specific attention to LGBT human rights problems – often the most egregious human rights violations in many countries.
- Under the leadership of Global AIDS Coordinator Deborah Birx and her predecessor, Eric Goosby, PEPFAR’s laudable HIV prevention and programs now include MSM (men who have sex with men) patients – a key population whose prior exclusion had diminished the program’s effectiveness and impact.
- Funding streams for engaging and strengthening LGBT civil society organizations, and to protect LGBT human rights defenders fleeing violence, have been created at State and USAID and have reached LGBT organizations in every region of the world.
- The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) now looks at applicant countries’ treatment of marginalized populations in making its determination of where our developmental assistance dollars should flow.
- The White House has held three conferences to evaluate lessons learned from advances in LGBT fairness and programs abroad.
- An LGBT Coordinator position has been created at USAID, to ensure that the agency’s programs and priorities are LGBT-inclusive.
- Our country’s first Special Envoy for the Human Rights of LGBTI Persons has been active in helping countries understand their civil obligations toward SOGI (sexual orientation/gender identity) populations.
Randy Berry, Special Envoy for the Human Rights of LGBTI Persons. Photo: Washington BladeReferrals for LGBT refugees – often among the most endangered and persecuted sub-groups in a world of anguish – have been streamlined.- The Treasury Department has worked actively to integrate attention to LGBT populations in World Bank programs and appoint a new senior advisor to support this work.
- And USAID, MCC and the Department of Health and Human Services have issued guidance to ensure that those who deliver the services they provide abroad do not discriminate against LGBT people in that service provision.
New Beginnings?
For many who support fairness for LGBT people here and abroad, January 20 carries an end-of-an-era feeling. We confess to sharing that sentiment. It has been a remarkable eight years in many ways, not least in the sense that our country finally has begun to turn the page in how LGBT people are viewed and treated, even apologizing for the “Lavender Scare” that drove out and excluded LGBT diplomats in an earlier era.
That work at home is not finished, of course, and our community and its many allies – some within the incoming Administration – are ready to press forward. There’s even more to do abroad, in the name of fairness, human decency and respect.
But if the President-elect cares about human rights, and about America standing with integrity for what is right in the world, he’ll continue on the road that President Obama has laid out. The job has been made far easier by the maps and infrastructure that President Obama leaves behind.
We hope the President-elect will take up that challenge. But in the meantime we salute President Obama for the myriad milestones he leaves behind. And we wish him well. He has made our country and our world a better place.
The measure of the man we’ve come to know over eight years tells us we can count on his voice and ideas, as fellow citizen, as we press further for LGBT equality at home and abroad in the years ahead.
