How Anti-LGBTQ+ Is Newly Elected House Speaker Mike Johnson? Very.

Earlier DU threads:
• New speaker of the House Mike Johnson once wrote in support of the criminalization of gay sex
• Mike Johnson Wanted to Criminalize Gay Sex

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Source: The Advocate

How Anti-LGBTQ+ Is Newly Elected House Speaker Mike Johnson? Very.

Johnson has voted against major LGBTQ+ rights bills, led an anti-transgender hearing, and called LGBTQ+ people a "deviant group."

BY TRUDY RING
OCTOBER 25 2023 2:44 PM EST

Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson, the new speaker of the House, is little-known nationally, but he’s as anti-LGBTQ+ as any of the more prominent members of his party — perhaps even more so. The Human Rights Campaign calls him "the most anti-equality speaker in U.S. history."

Johnson was elected speaker Wednesday, winning 220 votes to Democrat Hakeem Jeffries’s 209. The speaker is usually drawn from the House’s majority party, although he or she does not have to be, and sets the agenda for the House, which can do no business without a speaker.

Johnson, in his fourth term representing a northwestern Louisiana district, has received a zero on HRC's Congressional Scorecard in every term. He voted against the Equality Act, the Respect for Marriage Act, and numerous other pro-equality bills. He has introduced legislation inspired by Florida's "don't say gay" law and led a hearing in opposition to gender-affirming care for minors.

Before entering politics, he was an attorney with the Alliance Defending Freedom, a nonprofit law firm dedicated to promoting causes championed by the religious right, especially opposition to LGBTQ+ equality and abortion rights. While at ADF in 2006, he touted the so-called Day of Truth, the far right's response to Day of Silence, which is a protest against bullying of LGBTQ+ youth. Day of Truth, he said, is "another perspective on the homosexual lifestyle, which many people believe is morally wrong and physically dangerous."

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Read more: https://www.advocate.com/politics/mike-johnson-speaker-anti-lgbtq