Tag Archives: hate crimes

Senators Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Gordon Smith (R-OR) have attached the Senate hate crimes bill, the Matthew Shepard Act, to a Department of Defense reauthorization bill which may come to a vote as early as today. Call your Senators NOW and urge their support of S.1105. The right wing has been burying Senators with calls opposing the bill. Call them …

David Ritcheson, the Texas youth who at 16 was the victim of a brutal hate crime at the hands of neo-Nazi skinheads, leading to his becoming a passionate and articulate advocate for hate crimes laws, jumped to his death from a cruise ship on Sunday. He was 18. At a party in 2005, Ritcheson was beaten and sodomized with a …

Jerusalem’s Pride parade was this morning, where marchers encountered hundreds of Haredi, Israel’s bizarre Ultra Othodox sect, who arrived with eggs and bags of human excrement to hurl. Just before the parade kicked off, police arrested a 32-year old man carrying a bomb which he said he’d planned to detonate near the parade to “scare people away.” Two hundred Haredi …

Bishop Harry Jackson: “Gay activists around the country are getting nervous that they are about to experience an embarrassing political setback. Instead of amending the hate crimes legislation that protects churches in a substantive way, they are simply crying out in a louder, more threatening manner. Gay advocates are not looking for fairness; they are looking for an upper hand. …

Openly gay reps Tammy Baldwin and Barney Frank have written to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, demanding an inquiry into the abuse and murder of LGBT people in Iraq. The full text of the letter is here. Islamic militias continue to abuct Iraqis suspected of being gay, often leaving their battered corpses for their families to find. In April, the …

In an “open letter to the black community” televangelist Rev. Harry Jackson Jr. is calling on African-Americans to oppose the Matthew Shepard Act, the Senate version of the LGBT-inclusive hate crimes bill that recently passed in the House. Jackson: “As a pastor, I am concerned about the potential of being charged with a crime as the result of the actions …

Police have identified the man who broadcast anti-gay death threats over the Fort Lauderdale International airport intercom as Jethro Monestime, 23, a skycap for Superior Aircraft Services. The Broward County sheriff’s department has referred the case to the state to see if criminal charges are applicable. Monestime’s job is not under the jurisdiction of the airport authority and his employers …

A 2/3 majority would be needed in both the House and Senate to override Dubya’s possible veto of the Hate Crimes Act, which the bill’s backers do not think they can achieve. Although his senior advisors are recommending a veto, historically, the Decider has been very hesitant to use his veto privilege, so we might still have a chance. In …

Here is the result of the just completed House vote on the Hate Crimes Act, HR 1592: Democratic: Yes: 212 No: 14 Republican: Yes: 25 No: 166 Total: Yes: 237 No: 180 To applause and a few cheers, from the podium, Barney Frank exhulted, “The bill is passed!” Human Rights Campaign head Joe Solmonese: “This is a historic day that …

Today is the last day to call your representative and urge their support of the LGBT-inclusive hate crimes act. Late last night, the measure passed out of the House Judiciary Committee and now goes to a vote before the full House chamber tomorrow. As I mentioned yesterday, right-wingnuts are deluging Congress with calls and backers of the bill are becoming …

Calling it the “greatest threat to American freedom today”, some Christian activists are staging a campaign against the passage of the Matthew Shepard Act, a bill currently before Congress that would include LGBT people in hate crimes protections. The Christian group is Truthtellers, headed by Rev. Ted Pike, whom you may recall as being behind the 2004 protest of a …

This morning a bomb exploded near Jerusalem and investigating police found leaflets protesting the upcoming Jerusalem gay pride parade. Ultra-orthodox Jews are suspected to have planted the bomb, which slightly injured a farmer when his tractor rode over the device. Noah Sattah, executive director of Jerusalem Open House issued this statement: “Jerusalem Open House could not more strongly condemn this …

Hundreds of clergy from all faiths have gathered in Washington today to lobby for the passage of ENDA and the LGBT-inclusive hate crimes bill, which last week was renamed the Matthew Shepard Act when it was introduced in the Senate. HRC’s Joe Solmonese: “For too long, there has been a false perception in American politics that faith and religion stand …

The bill to include LGBT people for protection under the federal hate crimes law comes to a vote on Thursday. I know I nagged you good people to write your representative on this issue just a few weeks ago, but please do so again, particularly if your Congressperson has not yet signed on as co-sponsor. The Human Right Campaign has …