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2.9 Million Orphans, Happy Father’s Day

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States Offering Full Marriage Equality Have Lowest Rates Of Child

Homelessness

Editor’s note: This piece originally ran on Father’s Day, 2009.

There are 2.9 million children in America living with no parents – and 1.6 million American children are homeless. 2.9 million is almost 1 percent of the entire U.S. population – and that figure is five years old. Half a million U.S. children live with foster parents.

Those half a million foster kids? Only half will graduate high school, only 2% will earn a Bachelor’s degree. The day they turn 18, 30% will have no health insurance and will be on public assistance.

Last November, voters in Arkansas decided that unmarried couples – same-sex couples, obviously – should not be allowed to adopt children. Voters in Florida came up with the same result, but at least a Florida court later that month rightly deemed Florida’s 30 year-old ban on homosexuals adopting children unconstitutional.

Now for some more hard facts. Arkansas ranks third worst in child homelessness in America, and its state’s planning and policy on child homelessness, unsurprisingly, is deemed “inadequate” by The National Center on Family Homelessness. (Florida is not much better: 43rd out of 50.) There are a quarter of a million children living in poverty in Arkansas, and almost 19,000 homeless children, 8,000 of whom are under six years old. And if you think this is an issue that affects minorities the most, well, in Arkansas, 54% of those poverty-stricken children are white.

Yet, despite all these statistics, and the pain, suffering, and severe emotional distress associated with child homelessness, Arkansas would rather let its children suffer than allow gay and lesbian couples – married or not – adopt. In addition to Arkansas (which, you’ll remember, ranks #48), Michigan (#29), Mississippi (#41), and Utah (#37) all prohibit same-sex couples to jointly petition for adoption. Nebraska (#34), according to The National Gay And Lesbian Task Force, “prohibits adoption by individuals ‘who are known by the agency to be homosexual or who are unmarried and living with another adult.'”

While there might be no direct correlation, right now, the states that offer full marriage equality are also among the states that rank lowest in child homelessness. Connecticut (#1), New Hampshire (#2), Massachusetts (#8), Maine (#9), Vermont (#10), and Iowa (#11). Hawaii, with a long-standing domestic partnership history, ranks #3. Utah, by comparison, which ranks #38, prohibits adoption by “a person who is cohabiting in a relationship that is not a legally valid and binding marriage.” Coincidence?

Is it possible that the states that truly care about children and families are the states that care about all children and all families?

Given the current economic crisis, there can be no doubt these numbers will dramatically worsen this year.

And speaking of all children, it is estimated that 40% of all homeless children are LGBTQ youth. These children – and they most certainly are children – are more likely, according to the Task Force, “to use drugs, participate in sex work, and attempt suicide.” What a shame that there are so many same-sex couples who would be thrilled to adopt children. What a shame they often are prohibited from doing so. What a shame that those same-sex couples who have adopted children are prohibited from marrying, further alienating the children from society.

In America, most gay and lesbian couples are not allowed to marry. In the six states that now support full marriage equality, these couples can marry but are still deprived the 1138 federal benefits their heterosexual married peers enjoy. In America, many gay and lesbian couples are not allowed to adopt as a family. One member often, although in some states not at all, may adopt, the other member, essentially, is forced to “pretend.” These couples face the additional burden of fear should a family member go to the hospital, and the additional burden of greater taxes than their heterosexual peers. Given all same-sex families have to do to ensure their relationships are recognized legally and socially, it’s a crime the government, which claims to have an interest in supporting the family, does not see an interest in supporting same-sex families.

Families in America, many families, are in crisis. Throughout America, there are groups chartered with the claimed mission of “protecting the family.” They work to do anything but. Take the National Organization For Marriage, for instance. Maggie Gallagher, its founder, reportedly takes an average one-third of all money her organization collects. On top of that, they claim they spent $1.5 million to produce and air a commercial which was designed to drum up fear and hatred of homosexuals and gay marriage. That means that people around the country donated more than two and a quarter million dollars to “protect the family,” and got for it a TV ad and a hefty salary for Mrs. Gallagher. $2.25 million dollars could have gone a long way in helping families learn to cope with the challenges this new economy is forcing them to face. Heck, $2.25 million dollars could have gone a long way to help those quarter of a million kids living in poverty in Arkansas.

What are we saying as a country that claims moral leadership of the free world, a country that claims to celebrate the family, and yet denies the very right to create and maintain a family to millions of its citizens? What are we saying to the half a million children in foster care who aren’t being adopted, when we deny gay and lesbian couples the right to marry or the right to adopt children as a family? What are we saying to the children of America when we celebrate holidays like Father’s Day and Mother’s Day and Christmas, spending billions of dollars to promote a fantasy, while their fantasy is merely to have two adults take care of them, feed them, clothe them, school them, protect them, spend time with them, love them? And what are we saying to the millions of homeless and orphaned children who hear ads on TV that say, “This Father’s Day, be sure to give Dad the very best”? Why don’t we have a Children’s Day, so we could remember our obligation to give children our very best, including homes with parents who love them.

To the hundreds of thousands of single gays and lesbians raising children, biologically yours or not, and to the hundreds of thousands of same-sex couples raising children, biologically one of yours or not, I say, thank you.

To the millions of people who ever voted to ban same-sex couples from adopting children, to the millions more who have voted against marriage equality or gay adoption, I say, shame on you. And to the millions of orphaned and homeless children, I say, there is hope.

(image: Pink Sherbet Photography)

See Also:

Out And Alone: Gay Homeless Youth (The New York Times Multimedia)

Young. Gay. Homeless. (YouTube video)

The National Center on Family Homelessness

Child Welfare Information Gateway

The Trevor Project

1-800-RUNAWAY

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News

CNN Smacks Down Trump Rant Courthouse So ‘Heavily Guarded’ MAGA Cannot Attend His Trial

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5 mins ago

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April 26, 2024

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Donald Trump’s Friday morning claim Manhattan’s Criminal Courts Building is “heavily guarded” so his supporters cannot attend his trial was torched by a top CNN anchor. The ex-president, facing 34 felony charges in New York, had been urging his followers to show up and protest on the courthouse steps, but few have.

“I’m at the heavily guarded Courthouse. Security is that of Fort Knox, all so that MAGA will not be able to attend this trial, presided over by a highly conflicted pawn of the Democrat Party. It is a sight to behold! Getting ready to do my Courthouse presser. Two minutes!” Trump wrote Friday morning on his Truth Social account.

CNN’s Kaitlan Collins supplied a different view.

“Again, the courthouse is open the public. The park outside, where a handful of his supporters have gathered on trials days, is easily accessible,” she wrote minutes after his post.

READ MORE: ‘Assassination of Political Rivals as an Official Act’: AOC Warns Take Trump ‘Seriously’

Trump has tried to rile up his followers to come out and make a strong showing.

On Monday Trump urged his supporters to “rally behind MAGA” and “go out and peacefully protest” at courthouses across the country, while complaining that “people who truly LOVE our Country, and want to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, are not allowed to ‘Peacefully Protest,’ and are rudely and systematically shut down and ushered off to far away ‘holding areas,’ essentially denying them their Constitutional Rights.”

On Wednesday Trump claimed, “The Courthouse area in Lower Manhattan is in a COMPLETE LOCKDOWN mode, not for reasons of safety, but because they don’t want any of the thousands of MAGA supporters to be present. If they did the same thing at Columbia, and other locations, there would be no problem with the protesters!”

After detailing several of his false claims about security measures prohibiting his followers from being able to show their support and protest, CNN published a fact-check on Wednesday:

“Trump’s claims are all false. The police have not turned away ‘thousands of people’ from the courthouse during his trial; only a handful of Trump supporters have shown up to demonstrate near the building,” CNN reported.

“And while there are various security measures in place in the area, including some street closures enforced by police officers and barricades, it’s not true that ‘for blocks you can’t get near this courthouse.’ In reality, the designated protest zone for the trial is at a park directly across the street from the courthouse – and, in addition, people are permitted to drive right up to the front of the courthouse and walk into the building, which remains open to the public. If people show up early enough in the morning, they can even get into the trial courtroom itself or the overflow room that shows near-live video of the proceedings.”

READ MORE: Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

 

 

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‘Assassination of Political Rivals as an Official Act’: AOC Warns Take Trump ‘Seriously’

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17 hours ago

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April 25, 2024

By

Democratic U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is responding to Thursday’s U.S. Supreme Court hearing on Donald Trump’s claim he has “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution because he was a U.S. president, and she delivered a strong warning in response.

Trump’s attorney argued before the nation’s highest court that the ex-president could have ordered the assassination of a political rival and not face criminal prosecution unless he was first impeached by the House of Representatives and then convicted by the Senate.

But even then, Trump attorney John Sauer argued, if assassinating his political rival were done as an “official act,” he would be automatically immune from all prosecution.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, presenting the hypothetical, expressed, “there are some things that are so fundamentally evil that they have to be protected against.”

RELATED: Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

“If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person, and he orders the military, or orders someone to assassinate him, is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?” she asked.

“It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act,” Trump attorney Sauer quickly replied.

Sauer later claimed that if a president ordered the U.S. military to wage a coup, he could also be immune from prosecution, again, if it were an “official act.”

The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols, a retired U.S. Naval War College professor and an expert on Russia, nuclear weapons, and national security affairs, was quick to poke a large hole in that hypothetical.

“If the president suspends the Senate, you can’t prosecute him because it’s not an official act until the Senate impeaches …. Uh oh,” he declared.

RELATED: Justices Slam Trump Lawyer: ‘Why Is It the President Would Not Be Required to Follow the Law?’

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez blasted the Trump team.

“The assassination of political rivals as an official act,” the New York Democrat wrote.

“Understand what the Trump team is arguing for here. Take it seriously and at face value,” she said, issuing a warning: “This is not a game.”

Marc Elias, who has been an attorney to top Democrats and the Democratic National Committee, remarked, “I am in shock that a lawyer stood in the U.S Supreme Court and said that a president could assassinate his political opponent and it would be immune as ‘an official act.’ I am in despair that several Justices seemed to think this answer made perfect sense.”

CNN legal analyst Norm Eisen, a former U.S. Ambassador and White House Special Counsel for Ethics and Government Reform under President Barack Obama, boiled it down: “Trump is seeking dictatorial powers.”

Watch the video above or at this link.

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Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

Published

20 hours ago

on

April 25, 2024

By

Legal experts appeared somewhat pleased during the first half of the Supreme Court’s historic hearing on Donald Trump’s claim he has “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution because he was the President of the United States, as the justice appeared unwilling to accept that claim, but were stunned later when the right-wing justices questioned the U.S. Dept. of Justice’s attorney. Many experts are suggesting the ex-president may have won at least a part of the day, and some are expressing concern about the future of American democracy.

“Former President Trump seems likely to win at least a partial victory from the Supreme Court in his effort to avoid prosecution for his role in Jan. 6,” Axios reports. “A definitive ruling against Trump — a clear rejection of his theory of immunity that would allow his Jan. 6 trial to promptly resume — seemed to be the least likely outcome.”

The most likely outcome “might be for the high court to punt, perhaps kicking the case back to lower courts for more nuanced hearings. That would still be a victory for Trump, who has sought first and foremost to delay a trial in the Jan. 6 case until after Inauguration Day in 2025.”

Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern, who covers the courts and the law, noted: “This did NOT go very well [for Special Counsel] Jack Smith’s team. Thomas, Alito, and Kavanaugh think Trump’s Jan. 6 prosecution is unconstitutional. Maybe Gorsuch too. Roberts is skeptical of the charges. Barrett is more amenable to Smith but still wants some immunity.”

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Civil rights attorney and Tufts University professor Matthew Segal, responding to Stern’s remarks, commented: “If this is true, and if Trump becomes president again, there is likely no limit to the harm he’d be willing to cause — to the country, and to specific individuals — under the aegis of this immunity.”

Noted foreign policy, national security and political affairs analyst and commentator David Rothkopf observed: “Feels like the court is leaning toward creating new immunity protections for a president. It’s amazing. We’re watching the Constitution be rewritten in front of our eyes in real time.”

“Frog in boiling water alert,” warned Ian Bassin, a former Associate White House Counsel under President Barack Obama. “Who could have imagined 8 years ago that in the Trump era the Supreme Court would be considering whether a president should be above the law for assassinating opponents or ordering a military coup and that *at least* four justices might agree.”

NYU professor of law Melissa Murray responded to Bassin: “We are normalizing authoritarianism.”

Trump’s attorney, John Sauer, argued before the Supreme Court justices that if Trump had a political rival assassinated, he could only be prosecuted if he had first been impeach by the U.S. House of Representatives then convicted by the U.S. Senate.

During oral arguments Thursday, MSNBC host Chris Hayes commented on social media, “Something that drives me a little insane, I’ll admit, is that Trump’s OWN LAWYERS at his impeachment told the Senators to vote not to convict him BECAUSE he could be prosecuted if it came to that. Now they’re arguing that the only way he could be prosecuted is if they convicted.”

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Attorney and former FBI agent Asha Rangappa warned, “It’s worth highlighting that Trump’s lawyers are setting up another argument for a second Trump presidency: Criminal laws don’t apply to the President unless they specifically say so…this lays the groundwork for saying (in the future) he can’t be impeached for conduct he can’t be prosecuted for.”

But NYU and Harvard professor of law Ryan Goodman shared a different perspective.

“Due to Trump attorney’s concessions in Supreme Court oral argument, there’s now a very clear path for DOJ’s case to go forward. It’d be a travesty for Justices to delay matters further. Justice Amy Coney Barrett got Trump attorney to concede core allegations are private acts.”

NYU professor of history Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert scholar on authoritarians, fascism, and democracy concluded, “Folks, whatever the Court does, having this case heard and the idea of having immunity for a military coup taken seriously by being debated is a big victory in the information war that MAGA and allies wage alongside legal battles. Authoritarians specialize in normalizing extreme ideas and and involves giving them a respected platform.”

The Nation’s justice correspondent Elie Mystal offered up a prediction: “Court doesn’t come back till May 9th which will be a decision day. But I think they won’t decide *this* case until July 3rd for max delay. And that decision will be 5-4 to remand the case back to DC, for additional delay.”

Watch the video above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Doesn’t Care if Pregnant Women Live or Die’: Alito Slammed Over Emergency Abortion Remarks

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