Salon – On LGBT rights, Trump seems willing to anger Christian right — but activists aren’t convinced

“Donald Trump campaigned promising to be a ‘real friend’ to the LGBT community, and now President Trump is delivering on that commitment,” said the president of the Log Cabin Republicans, Gregory T. Angelo. “Log Cabin Republicans is proud to have directly advocated for this important preservation of LGBT equality in the federal workforce.”

Despite Trump’s departures from Republican orthodoxy, however, many left-leaning LGBT activists remain unconvinced that Trump is a reliable ally. There is some evidence for that opinion. After initially saying he would oppose North Carolina’s anti-transgender bathroom bill, Trump reversed himself in July, claiming that he was “going with the state” instead. Since being elected, he has not mentioned the controversy.

Many of Trump’s top advisers have been staunch opponents of LGBT rights throughout their careers, including attorney general nominee Jeff Sessions and Tom Price, secretary-designate for the Department of Health and Human Services. Vice President Mike Pence is also infamous among activists for his long record of opposing LGBT equality and for signing a bill as governor of Indiana that allowed businesses to discriminate against LGBT customers on religious grounds.

Activists are also concerned about Trump’s nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, noting that his opinions on two cases indicate a willingness to let religious people be exempt from laws that they consider violate their faith.

“Judge Gorsuch gained national attention for his opinions in two federal cases supporting an employer’s right to refuse to pay for contraception as part of employee health coverage if doing so violates the employer’s religious beliefs,” said Equality California’s executive director, Rick Zbur, in a news release. “That bodes ill for LGBT people who are facing an onslaught of laws sanctioning discrimination in the name of religious liberty.”

That assessment was shared by Rachel Tiven, CEO of Lambda Legal, a gay rights advocacy group.

“The Hobby Lobby decision set a terrible and destructive standard for bosses being allowed to meddle in our sex lives and decide whether or not birth control is covered by the employer’s insurance plan,” she said in a public statement, referencing one of the cases that Gorsuch had heard concerning religious exemptions.

Tiven added:

In Judge Gorsuch’s decision, he calls the inclusion of health coverage that includes birth control  —  “complicity . . . in the wrongdoing of others.” Even the Supreme Court, affirming that case, acknowledged how dangerous this line of thinking is: it creates a nation in which some religions are obliged to follow the law and others are not. Troublingly, Judge Gorsuch does not even see this as a problem.

Gorsuch has not, however, directly ruled on any cases related to LGBT rights so there is no clarity or certainty about his attitudes on the subject.

Some religious conservatives, meanwhile, are incensed about the direction the GOP appears to be moving under President Trump.

“God isn’t smiling on this one,” wrote Free Republic member “Maudeen” in response to Trump’s failure to roll back Obama’s LGBT executive order. “Do you think the President earnestly prayed about this before making his announcement?”

“I don’t think President Trump has ever earnestly prayed about anything,” wrote member Drew68 in reply.