O’Rourke’s LGBTQ+ plan includes overturning Trump-era policies

Presidential candidate and former U.S. representative Beto O’Rourke has unveiled his plan for the LGBTQ+ community.

In a statement released this morning, O’Rourke’s campaign says, “[the] new proposal would ensure LGBTQ+ Americans can live openly without fear of discrimination or violence and would immediately reverse the Trump Administration’s discriminatory policies.”

O’Rourke’s campaign says the candidate launched this plan as he participated in a Pride Run in New York City. June is Pride Month, with celebratory activities taking place in cities nationwide.

The full plan – which you can view here – is made up of three parts.

Here is how the campaign statement breaks them down:

“Protect the LGBTQ+ community by using executive authority to reverse the Trump Administration’s discrimination against the LGBTQ+ community, protect transgender individuals—in particular transgender women of color—from violence, include LGBTQ+ immigrants fleeing persecution as a “vulnerable population” for purposes of immigration enforcement, protect LGBTQ+ youth from conversion therapy, and appoint judges and executive-branch officials, including openly LGBTQ+ appointees, who believe in the full civil rights of every single person.”
Ensure full equality by working with Congress to enact legislation such as the Equality Act to make sure LGBTQ+ Americans have full equality and opportunity in all 50 states, ensure that LGBTQ+ people have equal access to health insurance and health care, including critical treatments like PrEP, and reform our criminal justice system.”
Strengthen global safeguards for the LGBTQ+ community by working with allies to improve the process for LGBTQ+ refugees and asylum seekers, secure a global treaty explicitly protecting LGBTQ individuals from persecution, invest in the Global Equality Fund, and establish a Special Envoy for the Human Rights of LGBTQ+ people.” The full plan accuses the Trump Administration of rolling back the progress made towards equality, saying, President Trump’s administration is “barring transgender Americans from serving in the military and accessing vital services when they are most vulnerable to undermining discrimination protections in health care and nominating anti-LGBTQ+ judges and cabinet members.”

O’Rourke’s plan specifically mentions protecting transgender women of color and members of the LGBTQ+ community fleeing their home countries and seeking asylum in the U.S.

This is the fifth plan O’Rourke’s campaign has revealed; the others are – Climate Change, Immigration, Reproductive rights, Voting rights, and now, LGBTQ+ equality.

Poll-leading democratic candidate, former Vice President Joe Biden, previously announced that LGBTQ+ rights would be his No. 1 legislative priority.