The Trump administration has been all but one-hundred percent silent on Monday’s Supreme Court ruling which found anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination is illegal and protected by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. On Tuesday President Donald Trump only mentioned the landmark decision when asked about it by a reporter, and even then merely lamented that “we live” with it.
Once again it was up to a reporter to get the White House to comment on the historic decision.
“Does the President think the Gorsuch decision is a win for civil rights?” a reporter asked White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany Wednesday afternoon.
McEnany was prepared, though offered a stumbling and disappointing response.
“So, one thing I would say, um, I haven’t not talked to the President about that personally,” she replied. It’s unclear if she meant she had or had not talked to President Trump. Also, the use of the word “personally” was telling, say, if she had reached out to him through an intermediary.
“One thing I want to read, um, was from the Kavanaugh dissent,” she continued, choosing to quote not Trump’s first Supreme Court appointment, Justice Neil Gorsuch – who wrote the majority opinion in the LGBTQ workplace discrimination decision – but from Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s second SCOTUS appointment.
“There were some real concerns, um, that this was a complete distortion of how we do statutory interpretation,” McEnany said, without bothering to define what she meant.
“Kavanaugh lays that out very nicely,” she added.
“But one thing Justice Kavanaugh did say, and I thought it was a very powerful quote, um, is, ‘Not withstanding my concern about the court’s transgression of the Constitution’s separation of powers,'” which was a “grave concern,” McEnany declared. She also noted the Trump Dept. of Justice had used that argument to lobby the Supreme Court, insisting it must decide it is legal to discriminate against LGBTQ Americans.
“‘It is important to acknowledge the important victory achieved today by gay and lesbian Americans,'” McEnany concluded, speaking Kavanaugh’s words. She made no reference to transgender Americans, whom President Trump has targeted even more severely.
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