A lot of people - gays included - put undocumented Americans into two categories: the "innocent/good" and the "illegal/bad." The good category includes immigrants who are graduating from U.S. colleges with high-tech skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (the "STEM" students), young immigrants who were brought here at an early age by their parents or other relatives (the "Dreamers"), and foreign partners of U.S. citizens who are gay or lesbian.

The bad category is just about everyone else--or the overwhelming majority of the 11 million new Americans with whom we rub shoulders every day. They are frequently - and wrongly - castigated as people who snuck across the border to take good jobs away from real Americans, who don't pay taxes, and who are a drain on government-funded services. Just a few days ago, Alaska Rep. Don Young conjured up this demeaning stereotype by using the derogatory term "wetbacks" in talking about immigrant workers.

Back in the early days of the AIDS plague, there was a similar good/bad categorization of people with the disease; they were part of the "4H Club."

To many of our opponents and even to many allies, the LGBT movement is a cohesive force for change. But despite our undeniable successes, particularly at the state and local level, we are not as cohesive as we might appear. And we are certainly not as cohesive as we could be. The reality is that we are two separate movements: the Human Rights Campaign and everyone else.

Imagine if we could get past these divisions and present a truly united front in the fight for complete equality for LGBT people. There is a chance to do this right now, as the HRC Board of Directors works to name a successor to its president, Joe Solmonese, who will be stepping down in March.

Because HRC's budget accounts for half of all the policy advocacy dollars now flowing into the movement, the extent that the HRC board makes partnering with the larger community a priority for its new leader will have a huge impact on how quickly we achieve the changes that all of us want to see.

I need to start by saying that over the years I have had the privilege of working with some exceptional HRC staff, and I can point to numerous examples where HRC collaborated in a positive way with state partners on legislation, ballot measures and other activities. In addition, there's no denying HRC's remarkable prowess in branding and fundraising and its singular access to power brokers in our nation's capital.

That said, the cause of LGBT equality has suffered because of a deficit of trust and a surplus of ill will between HRC and the rest of the movement. Sure, a certain amount of conflict is to be expected whenever national organizations work with state and local ones or whenever organizations of widely varying sizes and with widely varying resources try and work side-by-side. Turf fights are part of institutional life, gay or straight.

But the divisions between HRC and others in the movement cannot be explained away as an unavoidable by-product of movement dynamics. Over 18 years, as executive director of a local, a statewide and a national organization, I saw firsthand how HRC had a tendency to undermine movement unity. They would undertake new initiatives or announce unhelpful positions in policy areas where they had little or no expertise; they were unnecessarily vague and secretive about meetings they were holding and about people and organizations they were working with; they would take credit for things in which they'd never even been involved.

As we celebrate the New York marriage vote and the 42nd anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, it's time to take real pride in the LGBT organizations that do us proud every day of the year. Working together, this valiant group of underfunded, overwhelmed and scrappy organizations and their leaders, staff and volunteers has delivered (and continues to deliver) historic gains for LGBT people across the country.

Let's start with some facts. By any objective measure, the LGBT movement has made extraordinary progress in a short period of time. In just the last 10 years:

Our side has responded with calm, rebutting the attacks with facts, statements from authoritative figures, and appeals to higher values. Sadly, that approach has been condemned by well-respected figures in our community, including Andrew Sullivan, Mike Tidmus, the Box Turtle Bulletin and the Bay Area Reporter.

The common thread in the complaints is the belief that we lost Prop 8 last year in large part because our side didn't respond to similar kids/school-based attacks with better, more aggressive ads countering the lies of our opponents. The commentators appear to believe there is some quick way to get out front on the kids/schools issue and our Maine campaign is again failing to do that.

There are several problems with this point of view.

I need to start by saying that I had nothing to do with the No on 8 Campaign. Because the Evelyn & Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, where I work, has been so deeply involved in public education work in support of marriage equality, the law literally precluded any contact or coordination with the electoral campaign. So, as a purely armchair quarterback it's pretty easy for me to catalog things I - in my infinite wisdom - would have done differently. But I also know that even if everything- every single thing - had gone our way, it still would have been incredibly hard to win by anything more than a tiny margin. Here's why.

As always, I cannot tell you how privileged and humbled I am to be here speaking to you — as I’ve said before, you are the heart, the soul, the brains and the brawn and the past, present and future of our movement for equality and liberation.

Let me preface my remarks by highlighting one piece of incontrovertible good news: No matter what, in 347 days we will have a new president and the most anti-LGBT, corrupt, lying, disastrous administration in history of our nation will come to an end.

One other thing I think we can all celebrate, no matter who you’re for, we can all take pride that for the first time we have a front-runner for president who’s a woman, a front-runner who’s African American, and until a couple of weeks ago a former front-runner who’s a bitter heterosexual crossdresser.

On the heels of a year that closed with Congress stripping transgender people out of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and pulling LGBT hate crimes protections from the Department of Defense authorization bill, this is an important and much-needed victory. New Jersey has long been a national leader on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues, but today rises to the top with two of the strongest hate crimes and safe schools laws in the country and unequivocal protections for transgender people.

Here in the United States, the attitude of so many within our own community is that there's not a lot more to be done. That anyone who acquires HIV today has no one to blame but himself. That HIV/AIDS is most certainly not a gay disease. That it's time to move on.

We must do everything possible to end these attitudes or we will be going through these same grim World AIDS Day motions year after year, year after year.

When confronted with the possibility of Congress moving forward with a bill that stripped out protections for transgender people, the activist and grassroots backbone of our movement responded almost instantaneously in unprecedented numbers with conviction, passion and political savvy. We are frustrated with this course of action, but it will not stop us from pressing forward toward our ultimate goal: nondiscrimination protections for everyone in our community.

When congressional leadership announced late last month that it planned to advance a version of ENDA that only contained protections on the basis of sexual orientation to the House floor, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, Inc., took a leading role in moving to block that strategy and move forward on the fully inclusive bill. A coalition called United ENDA was created with more than 360 national, state and local organizations joining the struggle.

In a reaffirmation that “[a]dult sexual conduct . . . is in fact constitutionally protected,” the court held that Section 2257 far overreaches the federal government’s goal of preventing child pornography. The court held that the First Amendment free expression rights implicated by Section 2257’s restrictions are so fundamental, and the restrictions and penalties imposed so severe, that they outweigh the government’s purported interest in preventing child pornography.

The Department of Justice recently proposed regulations to implement Section 2257, which would have effectively ended adult social networking Internet sites. The Task Force, Inc., set up an online action center informing the community of the threat and urging people to file formal objections to the regulations. The online action center was viewed by visitors more than 85,000 times, and the Department of Justice received thousands of objections as a result.

The last five days have been a grueling and defining moment in our movement’s history. When we learned that protections for transgender people would be stripped from ENDA, an unprecedented groundswell of anger, energy and determination rose up to reverse that decision.

The other day, a letter signed by more than 300 national and state advocacy organizations that work on behalf of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people was delivered to Congress, asking for more time to garner support for ENDA as it was originally introduced. Some 2,500 congregations were asked to activate their memberships to call Congress. Students are also calling and e-mailing Congress and launching Facebook accounts to build support, working from 120 LGBT campus resource centers. Action alerts, blog postings and opinion pieces supporting a trans-inclusive ENDA have been flying over the Internet.

Last week, thousands of LGBT people and their friends – just like you – delivered an uncompromising message to Congress: Vote for an ENDA that protects all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people (H.R. 2015), and don’t settle for a substitute bill that leaves some people behind (H.R. 3685).

Congress heard you, and postponed a vote on a substitute bill. But we expect a new vote to be scheduled soon – maybe as soon as next week. There is no time to waste!

We know why it’s so critical that transgender people be included in ENDA. One-third of transgender people report facing employment discrimination at some time in their life. And you can’t separate discrimination against transgender people from discrimination against the rest of the LGBT community. For example, many gay and bisexual men get taunted for “acting like a girl.” Many lesbians are criticized for “being too butch.” We all face anti-transgender bias, even if we don’t identify as transgender ourselves.

Over the last few days, we have heard rumors swirling around Capitol Hill about last-minute jitters some Democrats are having about the gender identity language in ENDA. These were expected, as the language was new to the bill this year. Rather than immediately abandoning gender identity at the first sign of nervousness among a few members, House leadership should have worked with the community to shore up the needed support, just as they did when they voted to pass transgender-inclusive hate crimes legislation in the spring.

Gender identity language has twice passed through the House in the hate crimes bill, and earlier this year there were similar last-minute concerns among new members. We were able to overcome them then, and should be given the chance to do so now. It is incredibly ironic that today, the same day news is breaking about the House removing gender identity protections from ENDA, the Senate just voted 60–39 to allow a voice vote on a transgender-inclusive hate crimes bill. The bill then immediately passed.

One is that for the first time ever, the version of ENDA now moving through Congress will cover all our people -- lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender. The other is that for the first time ever, we have every right to expect -- yes, demand -- that both houses of Congress pass ENDA and put it on the president's desk.

Let me start by saying ENDA is not the be-all and end-all of pro-LGBT legislation, but it's a start. By covering employment discrimination only -- and not including discrimination in housing, public accommodations, credit and education -- it is far less comprehensive than the first piece of pro-gay legislation introduced in Congress in 1974. Nonetheless, ENDA would provide legal recourse to victims of job discrimination based on sexual orientation to people living in the 31 states that don't have laws covering anti-gay discrimination and to people living in the 39 states that don't cover anti-transgender job bias. I also have to note how profoundly ironic it is that at a time when marriage equality is at the forefront of national discourse, Congress is only able to take up employment nondiscrimination protections -- which has had between 65 percent to 80 percent public support for years on end. But that's just the way things are -- public support leads, Congress follows (or not).

Why is the inclusion of transgender people in ENDA so monumental? Well, there's the obvious answer that because transgender people face tremendously intense discrimination in this country it would be unconscionable to leave them out. But as important, this week's hearing represents a watershed moment in the internal history of our movement and our collective relationship with Congress.

The Republican Party’s (choose one or all of the following)

1. abject capitulation to...
2. takeover by...
3. immoral shotgun marriage to...
4. politically expedient alliance with...