During his keynote address before the Human Rights Campaign’s annual dinner Saturday, President Obama made note of the number of gay and lesbian servicemembers who were able to attend the event IN UNIFORM.
The president emphasized the end of the ban on openly-gay military service during his 18-minute speech, which retired Lt. Colonel Victor Fehrenbach said he greatly appreciated.
FEHRENBACH: I was more than satisfied [about his speech]–I mean, he hit all the right notes, and especially his points on ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ just made me very proud that he’s my commander-in-chief.
The president also touched upon the country’s economic situation, spending about five minutes advocating for his controversial jobs bill while only referencing the Employment Non-Discrimination Act in passing. That legislation would prohibit anti-LGBT bias in the workplace.
Earlier in the night, U.S. Representative Tammy Baldwin told OutQ News that “there’s still a lot of progress” to be made, particularly in the area of employment.
BALDWIN: Facing employment discrimination, especially when so many people are out of work, is a very crucial task and hopefully one that we will take up very shortly.
But the openly-lesbian Senate candidate said we should celebrate the accomplishments of the Obama administration, noting they’ve “done more than any previous administration.”
