Anti-LGBTQ Rep. Tom Price confirmed to Secretary of Health and Human Services

by Rob Howard
Associate Editor

As expected, Representative Tom Price was confirmed early this morning as Secretary of Health and Human Services. Price, a medical doctor, was sworn into his new position hours after the narrow confirmation vote by Vice President Mike Pence.

The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) had opposed Price’s confirmation, and says that it is “putting the health and well-being of LGBTQ people in jeopardy."

“Tom Price has shown alarming disregard for LGBTQ people, and for the health challenges we face,” said Chad Griffin, President of the Human Rights Campaign. “The fact of the matter is that too many LGBTQ people are still denied care, denied visitation rights, and are treated unfairly by their providers.”

HRC has published a report called Tom Price: A History of Anti-LGBTQ Actions.

Among the findings in the report are:

“Representative Price has opposed critical nondiscrimination provision, like the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA) and worked with the Family Research Council (FRC), an anti-LGBTQ hate group, to stop the legislation from passage. Price was quoted by the FRC as saying, “If the homosexual Left succeeds and ENDA becomes law, you can ‘Just let your mind run wild and see the consequences: They are remarkably negative.”

Price has been a staunch opponent of marriage equality. He supported a Constitutional amendment prohibiting federal recognition of same-sex marriage and has refused to acknowledge the Constitutionality of both U.S. v. Windsor and Obergefell v. Hodges, both landmark marriage equality decisions.

He opposed the Matthew Shepard and James L. Byrd Hate Crimes Prevention Act in 2009, describing hate crimes laws as criminalizing mere “thought crimes.”

He opposed the repeal of the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, and described the policy change as making the military “a testing ground for social policy.”

He has expressed explicitly an opposition to Transgender people’s rights.                 

You can read the entire HRC report on the new Secretary of Health and Human Services here.

Copyright 2017 The Gayly – February 10, 2017 @ 2:05 p.m.