it's looking at what i see is fair or accurate media coverage about the candidate. i have spoken out frequently about that, including some of the washington post coverage. >> watch sunday night at 9:00 eastern on cspan 2 book tv. lesbians and gays talk about their personal experiences in the fight for marriage equality, transgender rights. a couple that led to the legalization of same-sex marriage in california are among those taking part. >> welcome to our fifth annual lbgt forum. this is a special one for us. we're doing a number of wonderful things, celebrating our fifth year of our program and i'll tell you about the program in a moment. not the least of which is this incredibly powerhouse panel we've put together on a topic that's fairly urgent right now. if you're not familiar with our

forum, this is our public outcry. every year, with the start of our annual summer residency which begins our program, during the residency, all of our students, who are in the new cohort are in town from all over the country and many times all over the world. this is our way of reaching out to the public and letting you know who we are and what we do. we are -- our program is a graduate certificate program. our mission is to train medical and mental health professionals, health professionals in the broader sense, to improve quality of care for lgbt people. that's our mission. we started this around 2011. we thought, hey, there might be something to do here. a number of key things happened and we started the wheels moving. and here we are five years

later. if you know anything about academia and what it takes to get a program launched and to keep it going, five years is pretty special. we're proud of it. i'm also proud of our new class and our alumni. i'm going to embarrass you for just one moment. our new class members, class of 2018, stand up. there we go, yes. [ applause ] i'm not going to exaggerate by saying this is one of the best group of students we've had yet. and it's not just blowing hot air. we also have some alumni in the house today, too, who are graduates of the program who are wonderful. can i ask you guys to stand up for a second? collin, adam, yeah. they're here. [ applause ] so for those of you who have

come to the forum before, you know we usually do this down the street. and because this is a special year, we added on another event this year. we moved the forum here and instead of this being our big fund raising event, we have very special performance by margaret cho. if you didn't notice she's kind of in the lobby out there. she has graciously agreed to do a benefit concert, performance, for our program. and that is thursday night at the auditorium two blocks away. you can certainly get your tickets here. there are a handful of v.i.p. tickets left and those include a meet and greet after the show. one of our good friends, good friends with many people, marty frank will be here and he's going to greet the crowd. he'll be there at the event as well. >> as your lawyer, i think you should remind people that

margaret cho work is not safe for work, but it's great. >> all right. as my lawyer, walter, tell me what you think about this. here's what she had to say. we asked her for her comment about her coming performance in washington, d.c. my performance in washington, d.c. will be the sickest show to date. it's all about the politics of disgust and what's disgusting about politics. so there you have it. should be good. thursday the 13th. our wonderful folks outside the door can help you get tickets here or you can go to gwtickets.com to pick them up. and the v.i.p. tickets are there. the topic for tonight's forum is in direct response to the events of last fall, november of 2016. that's what made me feel it was salient. we live in an environment that

is not only what we didn't expect to see but in very real ways potentially threatening to the progress we've made and to the very health of our population. tonight we'll revisit the successes of the lgbt community. and specifically in the domain of marriage where we clearly had the most success in terms of advancing rights. we, you know, need to acknowledge that the successes are not enough that we have a lot more work to do and that we could learn from things such as lawrence v texas or the marriage protection act in maryland. windsor versus united states. these are all cases that resulted in wins for what we would call wins for our side. and perhaps are informative to what we have to face moving forward. what we face moving forward is state bathroom laws in north carolina. i know candice will have a lot

to say about that. there are other threats to transgender people all over the country. we have the ca-- it's somethingy attention to. we need to think about not only advancing the rights into public accommodation and employment and housing but making sure to protect what we've already done. anyway. it's my pleasure to introduce very briefly each of the panelists you see here on stage. they're going to spend about three minutes each talking about, you know, what their relevance is to the conversation, their particular experiences. the cases they were involved in or the legislation they were involved in. then we'll -- i'll direct a few questions and we will leave plenty of time for q&a. we really want to do that. there will be a microphone right there. we'll ask at the given time you line up in front of that microphone. first of all to my left is

walter dillinger. he's the former actor solicitor general under the clinton administration and an assistant attorney general and author of many amicus briefs. luke clippinger, maryland house of delegates and was a co-sponsor for the marriage civil protection act that brought marriage by referendum, not by case to the state of maryland. chris and sandy perry were co-litigants in holings worth. and right next to them, well, excuse me, there's candice, i'm sorry. candice is from north carolina, a transgender educator and activist in north carolina and had the pleasure of meeting the former north carolina governor and having a conversation about hb 2.

and, of course, grafell, he was a lead plaintiff, which was the really culminating case that made marriage the law of the land in the united states. he, too, has a book called love wins. i believe there's a film they're working on about your experience, too. terrific. last but certainly not least, is marty rowes. he was involved in the efforts that got the very first state that had marriage up in massachusetts. this is our panel today. i want to welcome them first. [ applause ] all right. we'll go back to the very end here and spend about two, three minutes tops just telling us a

little bit more about your case and then we'll launch into more of a discussion. >> great, thank you. it's really wonderful to be here. it's hard to imagine that while we have marriage equality in the entire country, it was only 13 years ago when we didn't have marriage anywhere. when we think about the success of the lgbt civil rightsing movement, when we think about the struggles we're facing now at the federal and state level. we have to remember how far we really have come in a relatively short amount of time for civil rights movements in our country. ia i had the forchitune of working massachusetts. massachusetts ruled in favor of marriage equality and gave the legislature six months to do what it needed to do in order to enact marriage equality or possibly not in massachusetts in 2004. so the court ruling came down in 2003. and they gave the legislature six months. i was brought on board as the first person hired in massachusetts to help prepare

that state to defend that decision. because the legislature was going to do everything it could to have a conversation and perhaps amend their state constitution to stop marriages from going forward. so we had six months in massachusetts to defend that decision and ultimately another two years because in order to amend the constitution in massachusetts, you have to do it twice. once and then in the intervening election and do it again before you can amend the constitution. we had two and a half years to defend marriage equality in the first state. to think about back then and what it was like, it was a really tremendous battle for our movement. and most americans weren't paying attention. most lgbt people weren't paying attention. that was where ground zero was in massachusetts. and that was a battle. and what we learned there, the lessons learned and our successes and some of our failures there really led down the path for how we were going to proceed. focusing on winning in the

courts. focusing on passing legislation in the state legislatures or fighting against something in the state legislatures and getting involved to make sure we elect our friends and oppose our enemies. building the political muscle of the lgbt community and winning in the court of public opinion. bringing public stories and personal stories front and center to change the hearts and minds of americans. it really was in massachusetts where we really led the fight to begin with. where our first success was, but where we really didn't know if we were going to hold massachusetts or not. then miraculously look how quickly it spread through state legislative elections, through state victories, court victories. and also some ballot questions where we actually ultimately won on the ballot, especially in 2012 where four states won marriage at the ballot. maryland, minnesota, maine, and washington state. all in one year. miraculously. who would have thought it would have happened in one election year? we have come so far. we have learned a lot of lessons

and i was fortunate to be on the ground in many of the states where you had these battles. i look forward to having conversations about how we move the ball forward. >> thank you. >> i was never an activist. neither was my late husband john. for almost the entire 21 years we were together, we never thought we would marry. it just didn't seem like a possibility because we lived in ohio. ohio was one of the states that prevented same-sex marriage. things started to change for us really for not very good reason. that's when he was diagnosed with als in june of 2011. you know, when the person you love is diagnosed with a terminal disease, there's only one way this is going. it makes you start thinking about things a little bit more seriously than maybe you did previously. we had talked about marriage over the years, but for us, getting married and having it be only symbolic wasn't something we were willing to do.

we wanted it to mean something. we wanted it to be legal and have our government say yeah, you exist. so he was diagnosed with als in 2011. and by april of 2013, he was completely bedridden and i was his fulltime caregiver. we had at home hospice care for five hours a week. that's what you do when you love someone. june 26th of 2013, not only did chris and sandy's case come out, but that was also the supreme court decision on the winter case. which struck down part of the defensive marriage act. and an impromptu moment i hugged and kissed john and said let's get married. how do we get this dying man to another state? we eventually settled on maryland because they did not require both people to appear in person to apply for a marriage license. by virtue of chartering a medical jet and flying to

maryland with john's aunt, we got married inside that small jet on the tarmac at the airport. that was all we wanted to do. simply get married. five days after we got married we were introduced to a civil rights attorney. he said do you understand when john dies, his last official record as a person will be wrong. ohio will say he's unmarried and your name won't be the surviving spouse. we hadn't thought about that. we knew ohio wouldn't recognize our marriage in maryland. but that was an abstract concept. and that started our case, and our case was based on the argument that in ohio, ohio would not issue marriage licenses to first cousins or underage couples. but if first cousins got legally married in another state or first cousins got married legally in another state and they moved to ohio. ohio would immediately recognize that marriage. so that was the heart of our argument. and we won in federal court 11 days after we got married.

then we ended up in the sixth circuit court of appeals with five other cases. you know how the rest turned out. so that's my story. [ applause ] >> okay. wow. no? jk. oh. wow. tough to follow. okay, so first i just want to say, like, hi, marty. we go way back. and also similar to you, i never have thought of myself as an activist. or an advocate. or an educator or any of the other things that are stated in my bio and included on my website. i did not write that.

i just thought i was someone who was trying to be the best them they could be. that i was going to make a difference in this world for women, for women of color and for transgender women by assimilating. by blending in. by being successful in my corporate endeavors and getting an education and doing all the things people think we just can't do. that's highwayow i was making a impact. all of sththat got thrown in my face and a tornado came through. its name was house bill 2 in north carolina. and hrc. marty rowes who went from someone i didn't know to being someone who i thought of as one of my like, guru, like, i texted

him more than i texted my husband. and equality in north carolina, which i now have the pleasure of sitting on the board of. they all contacted me and said candice, you know, your story is really amazing. we think you would be a great person to come down here and tell your story and i said, oh, sure. of course. i don't mind doing that. and i did. and then chad griffin, i don't know if you -- you know, he said let's go for a walk. i'm not making this stuff up. i said, okay. where are we walking to? the governor's office. oh, okay. why? and i blinked my eyes and next thing i know i'm walking into his office with about 5,000 news cameras at our backs as we step over the threshold. and we spend about 30 minutes talking to him. and telling him i am a north

carolina citizen, i'm transgender how this bill affects me and my life. i walk out of there and everyone is asking questions. why is this such a big deal? and then i saw on like, cnn, like my picture. and i was like, hey. and they're like, the only transgender person to have met with the governor. i was like, wait, i'm the only one? and with hrc's help and them coming into our state and taking over our state, i think marty feels like he's a north carolina resident. they were there so much really helping us and coordinating and working with constituents all over the state and helping to educate people. and show people ways in which they could help. and, you know, to toot your own horn. with hrc and a lot of people's help, and to pat my own self on the back, we were able to

unelect the first incumbent north carolina governor in history. [ applause ] depending on if you live in virginia or north carolina, that's a big deal since we're the first state. virginia. colony, all that stuff. so from that moment on, my life -- i got a lot of attention and a lot of people started noticing me. i said let's take advantage of this. and be visible i think that america needs to just have someone in front of them and uncomfortable moments and say, hi, i'm transgender. what do you want to know. i took eventualadvantage of eve opportunity. i was like, what am i doing?

getting to work with kacate blanchett. i'm name dropping because i'm like this is my life now? i get to travel all over the world and i get to talk to people about my life which i thought was basic because i was blending in. through doing that i realize that people within the lgbtq community and outside the community, has a lot of misconceptions. a lot of false notions of what transgender looks like. what it means to be. what we go through. one thing it's done for me, which is what made me feel passionate and i'll shut up. i'm long winded. about coming to do this, is i have same sex parents. i know people are like, oh.

and i'm like, not exciting. but i remember going to connecticut with them so they could get legally married. after having been my parents for 25 years. and being amazing, amazing moms. and now that marriage is recognized. but i remember how much that hurt, that i was able to marry my fifth gender husband five years before my parents' marriage. and mine was legally recognized at a wake county courthouse in raleigh, north carolina. that hurt because these people, they paid for my transition. they supported me. they raised me. they loved me. what do i deserve to have the government recognize within me that my parents don't? then something i've now learned is that we can't be too

congratulatatory with ourselves. when people talk about marriage equality, they talk about gender. and when people talk about gender, they still try to think of gender in the very narrow, you know, male and female, male male, female, female and they prove how little we actually understand about humanity and about gender and about sexuality. and so when we're talking about marriage equality, they sometimes lump transgender in and sometimes they remove us from it. and we have to make sure that people understand that we've got the legal stuff but we still have the social work to do. and that is educating our population on who we are and what we look like and what our needs are. i'll shut up now. [ applause ] >> hi. i grew up in california. and when i came out when i was a

freshman in college i was 18 years old. i was happy to know that about myself, but i also knew i lived in a state where i would never be married. and i would never have children. that's what it seems like to me at the time. i'm older now and i was fortunate many years later to fall in love with sandy almost 18 years ago. at work where we spent a lot of time. and when we fell in love we also recognize there was the same limitation in california that there had been when i was a freshman in college. we wanted to pursue marriage anyway. we were really in love. we each had two sons. we were blending our family. we were building a home and a life. we wanted what everybody in our family had, the right to choose, make the most important choice you make as an adult. the person you'll spend your life with. so even though we didn't think it would be legally recognized we were going to go down that path. she said great, how do we do that. and we started figuring it out

but it was the same year that the mayor of san francisco threw the doors open of city hall and told couples they could be married. even though we thought we'd get married in august, we couldn't miss this great chance to be married legally. at least it seemed there was a possibility of being legal. we ran to the school, and got our kids, one of them is sitting in the audience. we got in line and went inside and were married on the steps of city hall in san francisco. a few months later, in fact just a few days after we were married with our friends and family, we received a later saying that's been rescinded. those aren't legal. you're not married. here's your $30 check back for the marriage license, it's over it's done. it wasn't over, because states were fighting really hard for marriage equality prior to that and since then. you heard about maryland and ohio. california hadn't taken on the

fight yet. what happened was more of a sort of legal effort. lawyers got together, the city and county of san francisco and other lawyers started to fight with the state of california about the constitution. eventually the lawyers prevailed. they got to the california supreme court. there was a ruling that basically made marriage equality legal in california right before the 2008 election. there were a number of people who were very unhappy with that. a group of political people. right leaning political people. decided to run a campaign called prop 8. they wanted it to be yes on 8. yes, in other words, take away the right to marry, which seems like an odd thing, but it was confusing on purpose and they won by a couple of percentage points the very same day the 44th president of the united states was elected. that was a tough day. what follows is the next legal fight. our fight. the one we didn't know we would

ever be in because all we really tried to do was raise our boys. be a family. and be married. but the voters in california took that away from us. and it was the fact that they took a right away that had just been given to us that attracted ted oleson and david boyes to our state and case and led us through a historic trial. do you want to talk about the second half of that? >> yeah. thank you. hi, everybody and i'm getting to see some folks i got to see earlier today when i was participating in a panel talking about the federal government's role in advancing lgbt issues. i work for the federal government right now. so it's interesting and a pleasure to do. so once we got involved in the case, with proposition 8 case in california, we went on an amazing adventure. some people participated in that with us. we sued the state of california and federal court. we sued the governor of california. the governor of california was chris's boss because she was an

appointee to a director of a state agency in california that worked on early education and health issues for young children. so when perry sued schwarzenegger, she sued her boss. that wasn't the weird thing. the crazy thing is we went to the court and expected to have a series of court dates where we would have a ruling based upon briefs being submitted. we expected to have a passive role in that process. what the judge brilliantly did, especially looking back, the judge in the ninth district decided to ask for a trial. he said to the court, i want a full presentation of the facts. and that was a really major turning point. that had not been done before. there hadn't been a trial in federal court on the issue of marriage equality. and we indeed, became involved in the trial. the trial, of course, involves a lot of participation of different people, including us. so we went through depositions,

and became very much embroiled in presenting our case as the individuals that we were, working closely with ted oleson and david boyes and a slue of lawyers. it was an amazing strategy they employed because they had the four plaintiffs of chris and i and two gentlemen from southern california. but they took every issue that we brought to the table. every instance of discrimination and how discrimination impactsiimpacts us. our emotional well being, how we feel or don't feel politically empowered. they brought other expert witnesses into the courtroom to provide the data and the research that backed up every single thing we said. if chris talked about what it was like to grow up in bakersfield and know she was gay and worry about a teacher in high school.

they brought in an expert witness who would talk about that. it was a great opportunity for many individuals to bring forth their work that typically just doesn't get this kind of an audience. and the impact in a court setting. we had the overwhelming >> in fact, we had the overwhelming number of expert witnesses and the other side really had a hard time finding expert witnesses who were willing to come into court and present their evidence because, as we all found out along the way, there really isn't a lot of evidence that supports discrimination. there just isn't. [ laughter ] >> and, as david said, the court is a lonely place to lie. when you walk into this court and sit in front of me, you'd better be prepared to tell the truth. he, in fact, was able to eke the truth out of the other side, we called them the other side, like "star wars" by his amazing cross-examination of those witnesses. and, in fact, on a couple of occasions, bringing those witnesses to our side with his

incredibly expert questions. so, somebody who had walked into that courtroom and intended to talk about why they felt like discrimination was for children, it was best for children to have parents, one of their fundamental constructs, he was able to with a series of questions eventually bring that witness to say, actually, the most important thing for children is to have parents who love them and parents who are parenting -- people parenting children able to do so more effectively with the support of government for their relationship. you put those things together and the next thing you know you have a witness saying, actually, we will truly be more american the day we have marriage equality. that actually happened in a courtroom. chris and i participated in a three-week trial in san francisco in 2010. in january, months later in august we got a ruling in favor of us so, in other words, we won, which is amazing. the findings of fact were a

brilliant strategy. in fact, that, um, the findings of fact in that ruling became incredibly instrumental moving forward with many other states. we had a number of appeals going through in california in federal court and couple odd detours the california supreme court ended up at the united states supreme court in 2013, the same day as doma, and had our hearing there in front of the judges. in fact, we did win the same doma did, we won on standing. it is a great thing to win the case. winning on standing didn't give us the big national win we hoped for but a very important win in california, and, of course set the stage to move forward. so, thank you. [ applause ] >> my name is [ inaudible ] i'm proud to represent the people of south and southeast baltimore city in the maryland house of

delegates, the 46th legislative district, the fighting 46th. goes from butcher's hill to brooklyn, canton to curtis bay. if you haven't visited, you really should. that psa for live baltimore and visit baltimore. that's fine. they'll be happy with me now. [ laughter ] >> i -- this is my second term as a member of the house of delegates. in my day job on a state's attorney in anne arundel county, the city of annapolis and area north and south of there where i prosecute domestic violence cases and serious felony property crime. again, i got elected in 2010, which was a pretty incredible time in maryland on this issue. actually at that point, suffered some setbacks but we could start to see the way forward. in 2006 two incredible people

who i consider great friends and have been incredible advocates on this ish 145sue in the state maryland -- -- were courageous, some of the courageous people who stepped forward in maryland to try and have our ban on same-sex marriage overturned. -- were not successful in maryland, turned them down 4-3. in 2009, the attorney general -- issued an opinion that started to move the ball forward for us and moved it forward just a pinch by saying that a non-binding opinion but that, in his opinion, the state of maryland could recognize out-of-state marriages. we started to move forward. then in 2010, the caucus doubled

in size in maryland from three to six. we elected more lbgt members to the house delegates. we had a new member of the house actually came out on the floor in 2011, who took that very courageous step and very important step with seven of us we began to share our -- we began to share who we were. and because of that, again, we kept [ inaudible ] -- we had the bill that would allow for -- [ inaudible ] -- then all of a sudden, here we

were and we were short, we were short about five or six votes and we got together and, um, we -- -- all right, we're not going to take it today. we're going to ask the speaker to hold it and we're gonna redouble our efforts next year. and because of the support of organizations like hrc, i want to recognize him for everything he's done, did in the state of maryland to help us all the way through this process, we were able, then, to come back in 2012. and it wasn't easy in 2012, either. we made this pretty exciting vote, weren't quite sure what was going to happen. on the day of the vote. we knew we had a solid 70 and we needed 71. and a story and if mr. speaker, if -- or the speaker staff, if you're upset for me telling this story, i'm sorry. but, we managed to get a 71st

vote and that was great and we were moving it forward but what we didn't [ inaudible ] -- 71st vote so we actually ended up with 72 because the speaker was not as familiar with the text messaging function on his phone as he might have been. but, we were able to get the 72 votes because a group of legislators from across the state who were in districts that were marginal stood up and said, we're gonna vote for this. and they were given a pretty [ inaudible ] look we're not quite sure we're going to have the votes. it's okay if you've got to vote red or vote no for your district, it's okay. they went into the speaker's office. and they had the courage to say, no, we're gonna do the right thing and we're going to vote so that everyone has the opportunity to get married in

maryland. so, we passed it and we passed it in 2012. the governor signed it. it was, again, i shouldn't understate the support of the governor's office that year. i got to be the house leader in 2012, working on the bill morning, noon, and night. being at the meetings -- [ inaudible ] -- in concrete where if they vote now it's going to be harder to flip 'em. and we -- we decided that we wanted to see this forward and we -- -- and, um, and i think it was no small part because of the relationships that we had and that we built in the legislature that we brought the vote over the line. our opponents weren't done. they took the legislation to referendum and so we had to fight a referendum campaign in

2012 and i got to be on the steering committee -- -- even some people who were advocates on this issue said that we should -- -- shouldn't go out there. they were concerned that we weren't -- [ inaudible ] -- of the vote in 2012. and, with that, we were able

to -- -- legislation that added -- to our anti-discrimination law in 2014. that was subject to -- -- chamber on that legislation, including the -- one of the floor leaders of the bill, from college park. we've been able to accomplish a lot in maryland. and, we've been able to -- to secure those rights. but, we do look around the country and we look to the federal government and it gives me pause and it makes me wonder.

and so, we have to continue the work and we have to continue electing people who are lgbt. we have to continue to push issues forward. -- chair of the caucus. [ laughter ] >> that was a tough election. [ laughter ] >> we folded out. um, but -- but, it's --

-- what's important to you? what's important to your families? and what's important to our communities? and by doing that, we -- we continue and we continue to make this a more just country. and that has to be our goal. [ applause ] -- was debated throughout the decades, the battle over gay marriage. are you going too fast? are you going too slow? should you proceed by litigation? should you seek legislation? should you wait and run candidates for public office? should you attend referenda? stepping back from it, i think the answer is all of the above.

i think that's what we've really learned. when marty -- -- enormous chorus of "it's too early." -- the first case today, in 2017, there would be the same chorus "it's too early." someone always has to be too early. someone always has to be too early. and i -- i think what we saw unfold in the litigation in california is that the litigation itself had its own effect on the courts and the judges. uh, it created a national dialogue. and whether votes would have been there the day before the suit was filed, by the time it unfolded, it had generated its own momentum.

um, you know, i -- [ inaudible ] -- of the restrictive marriage laws we're in the position of those french academics who try to right novels without using the letter "e" they couldn't say

"simply because we say so, that's why it's bad." they had to show concrete evidence that it was harmful, rather than helpful to children to have their parents married. and that is why i think the fact that there was a criminal trial -- it was an enormously successful venture. george vaughn walker, the trial judge -- -- sweeping across the board and the state of california with jerry brown as attorney general and arnold schwarzenegger as governor decided not to appeal judge walker's decision. and 30 days after the decision came down, i wrote a piece for "slate" saying that the great california gay marriage case is over and gay marriage won because no one else has standing, no one has standing to interfere with anybody else's happiness but it was the fact that they won that victory and

the fact that the court accepted the standing argument in the supreme court that you secured marriage equality in one of the largest countries in the world, california. and that led to, along with the doma decision, as a result of that pair of victories, lower courts across the country started striking down marriage laws and marriage started happening and one of the most powerful forces known to man took effect, the power of the actual. the normative power of the actual. when people saw it actually being done, uh, then it began to have this enormous effect on the judges and, by the time jim and his case were in the supreme court, the court was fully ready then. but [ inaudible ] -- -- and i think we have too seldom because they're also cheerful and positive, jim and

chris and sandy, it's really hard to be a plaintiff in a case of world-wide publicity, hard on them and hard on their families and i want to thank you all for the courage for what you did. [ applause ] >> we have some amazing experiences and these stories are just amazing. um, the normative power of the actual, that is -- you've told me that before and that got in my head and i was thinking about it a lot. um, i remember right after jim's case was handed down and we won and, you know, as you recall it was a little bit earlier than we thought it would be. it was announced on a friday, which was [ inaudible ] -- of windsor, rather than the following monday when we thought it was going to be so people kind of went nuts and i got a

media call and ran down to the television station and they asked the question, why did this happen? how did it happen so quickly? someone has to do it too early. and what's -- resonates here is that [ inaudible ] -- there was this very, very dramatic turn, ten years previously, something in the area of 65 or 75% of the american population thought that it was against -- was against same-sex marriage and we did a flip in a very, very short period of time. and my feeling was that everybody knew somebody who was gay who wanted to be married or should have been married. the personal stories just like the ones you hear here came out and that gives us, you know, enormous power of the actual. so, thinking moving forward and marty, i'll go back to you and have you start on this, what similarities do you see, since starting messaging and you've

been working on this moving forward, what similarities do you see in all of these cases regarding marriage and, you know, will this give us some sort of purchase in making progress moving forward? marriage is something that, you know, everyone can -- can sort of agree, for lack of a better term, a secular topic than, for instance, employment or health or house are or things like that. um, do we -- do you see something we can really pull from these cases moving forward -- like public accommodation and housing and discrimination in gender? >> it's a great question. what i would say that what was so evident from the beginning and we talk about massachusetts but we have to go before then, vermont, even hawaii but it was really the power of personal stories and bringing -- not just talking about the rights and benefits and protections needed and the discrimination, which is very, very important as you

heard in legal cases but just the personal stories of individuals and the power of love. it really is that simple. and everyone understood that. and so, going forward in state after state, making sure that we were to bring forward couples and when you talked about the power of the actual, i couldn't help but think about may 17th, 2004, the first day of marriage equality in our country in massachusetts how every moment of that first wesdding was cor o choreographed -- -- everything was choreographed because we knew that television sets and newspapers and photographs all over the country and all over the world were gonna see for the first time the power of the actual. and we knew that governor romney did not want that day to happen

because he knew that once people saw what it was, that it wasn't scary and it was something that everybody understood and everyone had an immediate connection to and that was an amazingly historic day and it was so planned and choreographed for a reason. and as we move forward, the lessons are there. every single thing we do as a movement and other movements do you have to make sure it's about the personal stories. if we cannot connect ourselves, if there is no kansas cop talking to the governor in north carolina, being on television programs all across north carolina and newspaper stories coming forward, people inn nort carolina would not be supportive today. that's really our future, making sure that we are visible, making sure that we tell our stories and how we tell our stories because we just want to live our lives freely and openly. it's some ways so simple and sometimes we think about this too hard. but, it is the power of telling

your own story to your family, which for lgbt people sometimes is really difficult but to our legislator, which sr important to do, telling your story in court and just telling your story to everybody. once we can do that, that's how we can win. the path forward is going forward in congress, now trying to pass federal protections and trying to pass the equality act in congress, we need to show the real arms that exist in states across the country because there are no protections and we need to show [ inaudible ] and if we have these protections people in america will be safer and more secure. and so, that's what we're doing now is finding those stories from wyoming to florida to alaska and maine and that's the power that we have and the power that makes sure we bring it all together and if we -- -- eventually, those politicians [ inaudible ] --

>> when the district judge in north carolina, following the, um, the victories in hollingworth reduced the stay order and decreed we could have marriage equality in north carolina, the front page of the paper had a picture of two men, two north carolina deputy sheriffs were the first to be married and that made and enormous impact. >> kenneth talk -- i mean, i'm really interested to hear your first-hand experience because you are on the edge right now of turning [ inaudible ] -- how are

you being received by, you know, not only people you know who are friendly but, you know, when you go into not-so-friendly environments, do you feel like you are getting anywhere -- having them understand your story and what you're up against and feel any sort of empathy? >> -- dramatic and say where i go it's awful and people shout things. they don't. what i find myself having a lot of struggles with is that, um, my -- my story, my work, unlike some of the other cases here, hinges a lot on the aesthetic. the way i physically look, that is when we're talking about my issues, it's not people's

concept, it's not god's law, it's literally what we look like. um, i have a lot of acceptance. and that's really not fair, because people look at me and say i represent transgender. much in the way they look at candace kane, la vern mock. -- we are representatives of but we are not a model. we're not, um, what transgender should be. or what it should look like. -- i struggle with often is people accept me and then when i tell them, oh, but wait, there's more, um, they kind of shut down because they're like, i thought i was doing so good. i accepted you when you walked in the room. um, but now, you want to tell me that, um, there's variance in

this gender spectrum? and i'm like, yes, yes. and that surgery is not a prerequisite and that identity is something that's personal and it can manifest itself in many different ways and when i start having those conversations that's when the roadblocks start to happen and you see that wal go up. and you see them say, i can accept you and i can accept a transgender person if they look like you, act like you, talk like you, dress like you, and fit into my image of what -- if a man were going to emulate a hetero-norm tiff white [ inaudible ] that's what i've been described by people. that is offensive. that is for me what is offensive, not the tranny or freak. it's the you're doing so good candace because you fit the mold of what we think is good a

acceptable in america. and i'm like, great, so you don't accept me for me. you accept me for fitting something that makes you feel comfortable and something that is familiar to you and you think that i am actually trying to be that instead of you recognizing that i'm trying to be me, not your image of what's right. um, that all -- >> i just want to add one thing. >> i'm sorry. i poapologize. >> candace, one thing i want to say to everybody, it is important to realize how candace is perceived and received. but what was just as important and sometimes more important was the poise and the grace that candace has and, when she's on tv, that she has been able to bring more transgender people forward in north carolina, all across the state and so it's important to have someone come forward who is -- people can be

proud of and relate to and that has made a tremendous difference because now legislators all across north carolina can't say there's no transgender people in my state senate district. people have come out all across north carolina and to a large extent because of candace and how she is all over the television in north carolina representing so well, reporters all across north carolina know you and nationally now and that has really helped make a difference. and so, as transgender issues come all across the state, we now have many more people coming forward and being open about who they are and opening doors for others and that is one of the key reasons why we're being so successful not just in north carolina but in other places. >> thank you. [ applause ] >> um, and i do just want to touch on, i'm sorry, wow, thank you, like i'm almost gonna cry.

the fact that we are still having conversations about me helping to make it easier for transgender people all over the country, um, to feel comfortable coming forward, going to their legislators and outing themselves in areas that we never once perceived being possible, the fact that we still have panels in which we're talking about equality, um, within the lgbtq community, that is what drives me. it is not my personal experiences. it's something that i push down because i believe that my voice does not speak for me; it speaks for the collective we that is lgbtqia, everybody and i believe that my fight, um, every -- every success, every step

forward that i make is one that is made for all of us, for all americans. um, not just trans, not just lgbtq. that's what drives me. and it's -- you know, it's wonderful that we get to have these conversations. a reminder to me of how far we have to come that we still have to have panels in which we, um, talk about our very unique stories and talk about the very real pain that we've all experienced, um, and that's something that's very real. and tangible and still in our lifetime. so, the amount of work we have ahead of us far surpasses the gains that we've made. okay? [ applause ] >> let me play devil's advocate in a bad way and be a bit of a party pooper here.

does not a large section of our populace think that we already have all the rights we need? do they not think, oh, they got this done, everything. or worse yet feel like they should take it back and, you know, they've got a little momentum now? we've got sort of a scary situation where they're all used to kind of pull this back and maybe i can direct another thing to your -- our two lawyers in the house. you know, how real is a danger of, you know, losing what we've made? from a legal standpoint. where is the danger? is it real? >> uh, i think it's very substantial. i think we have a court that is poised to have a more and more expansive view of what constitutes a religious objection. evermore deferential to what counts as complicity and other people's supposed sins. a court that is willing to allow

those who have economic power, in the name of religious liberty, to impose their religious views on other people through their economic power whether you are the owners of hobby lobby that object to contraception and, therefore, don't want your employees to have the standard coverage for it or whether you're people in the commercial world that want to resist serving customers. i think the fact the supreme court granted for next term this masterpiece cakes case that steve mentioned, a case they didn't need to take because it doesn't even raise the hard question about forcing someone to express themselves artistically in a way they don't want to. that's a hard question. let's assume you can say i'm not

using new art to express an idea i don't want to express. that's not this case. because, the baker in this case wouldn't sell any cake to a couple who was going to have a marriage between same-sex partners. and so, the smartest people that i listen to say this is a really surprising [ inaudible ] just like the auto remayorman saying i'm not going to change your tire if you are heading off to get married. -- the idea of this widespread exemption is part of a process where i think we have to be quite concerned there will be an ever-expanding categories of exemptions. we have draft orders from the current administration that would have a very expansive view of what corporations can do to claim their religious exemption from any discrimination

principles. so, i think luke mentioned this in his opening remark, i think a -- i think we have to be on guard and not throwing rice at the nuptials and forget what might be happening in the woshplace awos the workplace and otherwise. >> i don't see this agenda we're going to have an interaction with the panel and the persons in -- and the audience. and i just want to know, for clarification, is that going to be a possible chance that that's going to happen? because, in my mind, in my mind as a transgender woman of color living in washington, d.c., it's wonderful to have a panel, to have a discussion about the things that we really, really need to be talking about but it is also just as important to me that we have an interaction with people living in the community living their lives as whatever they are and who seek marriage

equality in a manner maybe not like the panel does. because, for me, women of color in this city are struggling with sobriety and how they're going to survive with their partner, how they're going to pay their rent, how they're going to get jobs and how their job training that people need to elevate themselves is not on the to of the priority list. i'm very passionate. i'm 62 years old and been an advocate for the majority of my life on a number of issues. and what really [ inaudible ] -- we get these good feelings, panels and forums where we sit down and talk and we never engage and most of the time what really, really disturbs me we look to the audience and the audience is a trickling of the people that really need this conversation. and so, i'm here as a person representing african-american transgender women of color who have become silent or silenced

not because manch marriage equa- -- skill building is not a primary issue and housing is no longer a primary issue. and until we start engaging that conversation with the conversation that we are having about marriage equality and until we start becoming mobilized around those issues, along with marriage equality, we're just talking. >> one of the things i've learned from steve's program and i will put this to candace is, uh, the enormous economic burden that the transgender community has faced, enormous. it's not just about acceptance of sexuality, the enormous economic consequences i think, steve, we did this when you did the program on transgendered

people. >> yes, absolutely. >> um, yeah. no, um, and first, i just want to say thank you so much for coming and applaud you for being able to say, um, how you felt and speak passionately because i'm like that's not easy so thank you for that, so much. [ applause ] >> -- thinking because it kind of tied in with the question that was asked of, um, you know, in the possibilities of overturning things. in that it raises a very real fear and for -- especially trans women of color, you know, such as us. that fear is, um, made even more so real when we think of all the

things that we could lose because, if you can easily strip you of your marriage license, then what's to stop you [ inaudible ] -- -- and then as a woman taking that away from me? i mean, for that -- [ inaudible ] -- we had it longer than we haven't had it. if we can talk about taking things away, then we need to talk about the fear. but, when we're talking about the fear, it's imperative that the people who are experiencing that fear, um, the people who are actually in the line of fire, um, are the ones that are -- are actually being uplifted and being held up and i know that that's something that we, as a nation, have struggled

with. not just for trans women of color. i mean, the black movement took -- is taking place because people are saying we are not being uplifted and held up, our voices are not being heard. you do not seem to understand what we're facing. it's wonderful to talk about me meeting with the governor. um, but, what's not talked about is the financial struggle that my husband and i experienced, my car being repossessed that i worked so hard for because i lost my job fighting [ inaudible ]. that is something that is important for people to know because i didn't have that network to rely upon. i don't focus on it because, to me, i'm like, what i've been given back is fine. you know, i have a lovely car now. but, those stories are the ones that we don't want to focus on. we don't want to know what's

wrong. and i think the reason we don't want to know what's wrong is because we're still struggling to say, how can we make it right? um, we like to fix the problems that we already have the solutions for. gay marriage is easy to solve because we already have marriage. we don't have to define marriage, even though that's what we said we were trying to do or redefine. no, we're not. we know what marriage is. we are simply ensuring that everyone experiences it. now, we are stepping into the new frontier of gender identity, gender expression. and equality when it comes to that. and so, i appreciate what you said because that is important. i think it's just really hard for us to tackle and it's hard for me as a trans woman of color to say how do we express those

stories, those experiences? because, in doing so, we want to say how we're going to fix them. and unlike california, where you had a proposition to fight, you know, unlike coming out on the legislative floor or fighting with the governor, we are fighting for, um, equal recognition and equal rights as african-americans. we are talking about equal rights as women. and we are talking about the ability for one to define themselves as being them. i don't need you to define me. and those are harder things for us to be able to offer solutions. it's simple and yet it's hard because we do not know how to address the individual mind-set of people. i don't know how to make you think of me as being an equal. when you don't think of black people as being equal.

and that is something that affects all of us. and i think that that is the underlying fear that we're talking about; that if you can get rid of one thing, you can get rid of me completely because everything about me is a civil rights equality movement walking and breathing and i'm very fragile glass. >> to candace's point and the speaker's point, by the way, we will do -- very shortly. many of you may be familiar with the national center for transgender equality just published their second large study, a big one that i think 23 or 24,000 participants, very well documented, there are individual stories and i think those are the ones that get out there. those are the ones that got marriage and [ inaudible ]. but, these are not isolated cases. these are very, very real. across the board in terms of health, violence against the community, lack of access to care, employment, addiction.

it's overwhelming and they did a very good job this last study with demonstrating how intersectionaty of race and socioeconomic status and jengge orientation follows communities of color and for others. and it's severe. even in the district of columbia where he have a vewe have a ver progressive city, it is hard to find a municipality more progressive on issues, we have very, you know, disturbing cases of violence against transgender women in particular and women of color in very much in particular. that's something we really have to struggle with and work on. and i'm going to ask, actually, jim, chris and sandy since your cases have resolved as they were, have you felt or has there been any alliance or have you --

has there been connection between, you know, the marriage movement and your roles in that as sort of leaders and, you know, icons, in making connections with the trans community sort of getting gender issues more to the front? >> i know for me whenever i speak, whenever i'm at an event it's very important to me to talk about our transgender community because for me it comes down to this simple concept. every kid deserves the right to be who they are without apology and without fear. and until every kid in our country experiences that, we have work to do. and for me, it was -- i had my own personal journey of growth with transgender community. up until two years ago, if i knew a transgender person, i didn't know it. and i've had the great fortune to become friends with quite a few transgender people and that experience has changed my.

i've learned, i've grown. i've changed as a person because of that. and it just goes back to -- what we've talked about so many times, the way we change hearts and minds is by telling our stories and by helping people who are afraid of a group or afraid of a type of person, the way we change that attitude is by showing them we are no different. we want the same things you do. we want to wake up, we want to live our lives the way we want to. we want to be the people we want to be and are meant to be and we want to do that and were are no different. and that's -- that's how we change the attitudes is really just by helping people understand that. we're no different. and i think about, you know, the marriage fight now it's been two years since marriage equality across the country. and the world has not come to an end. and i think we need to remind people of that, the people who were against marriage equality and may still be against marriage equality, help them

understand nothing has changed, other than other people have the ability to partake in that right, in that beautiful thing of marriage. and that's what we have to help people understand is that we're not asking for anything different. we are asking for exactly what you experience, what you benefit from, we want those same things. so, for me, my -- i always talk about a transgender community and focus on our kids because if our kids can't grow up happy and safe and healthy, then i feel like our society, in general, is doomed, if our kids can't do that. so, for me, it's all about the entersectionalty and i always talk about the transgender community. >> um, well, i'm an early childhood education advocate and my dying wish is that we've reached a much better place in the country around respecting

and supporting and lifting up little people. and letting them be whoever they are going to be and not put policies between them and their happiness. which we do in all kinds of ways all the time. and the panel has done a great job of talking about. so, some of the things i've been doing since being a plaintiff that aren't directly [ inaudible ] -- -- tied to this idea -- -- free education and high quality care if you end up in foster care, really, really critical things that we have not done a very good job of in this country. so, in my capacity as a [ inaudible ] -- special advocates board and i'm going to work really hard on -- [ inaudible ]

-- for that group of kids. um and i'm also thinking a lot about the case we had and how the only people that would fi t fight -- -- the mormon and catholic church. that's where the money came from and that's who fought against us every step of the way and there's a way this which [ inaudible ] -- -- all feel divided. so, i'm a little bit at this sort of, you might say and upstream and downstream solution in my post-marriage plaintiff roles where i'm worried about the kids who are coming into a system and have already been affected and i'm also thinking a lot about how when there might be a way to help parents do a slightly better job than maybe what their church is teaching them about children that are different. so, those have been a couple of like new endeavors since being involved in the case.

>> -- yeah, i work for the federal government now kind of a technology role and you can't improve services if you can't help the people. so, i work in systems where you have to make sure you are counting the people. so when you are surveying or a pressure of data for the various programs we have federally or w within states or -- -- in fact, have the powerful data that presents a compelling story for providing services because suddenly you know the people exist. and that data is very powerful. and then, another thing chris and i learned from our involvement in our case the power of a bipartisan approach and to not [ inaudible ] -- as, you know, thinking about the people who believe in meverythig the way you do being only

advocates and allies on a solution. we were, we think we were successful largely or at least in part because we had this amazing bipartisan legal team to give a voice, the lawyers who faced each other in bush vs. gore. because we have that team, our case, our lawyer team became more credible to the public and, in fact, helped create that public story and [ inaudible ] -- -- and there was probably no t article more powerful -- -- where we really introduced to mainstream america that there's a conservative case for gay marriage. it's a conservative value. now, it's not the only conservative value. health, access to health is a conservative value. education. housing. economic stability. these are all things that we

share. we just have to find the common ground to move forward on those issues and not always look to the friends that we traditionally think are going to work on something with us to find solutions. >> yeah. i want you to talk and i do want you to talk about the fairness for all marylanders act because in maryland you actually did this we moved on to gender identity and got it done. talk about that, if you can. >> i want to mention one thing, just to jump onto the last question very briefly and mention another critical piece and i will be excoriating when i go back to maryland later that we had an enormous coalition of different people, different organizations, liberals, conservatives, across the spectrum. that's why we were effective winning the referendum in 2012. we would not have been able to do it if we didn't have equality

maryland, hrc, to bring these groups together. and -- [ inaudible ] -- meeting some of those coalitions, maintaining those connections, keeping people together as we go into these difficult times and maybe re-establish something of those connections because we have a lot of difficult issues that we're going to have to deal with in the next several years. i do want to mention, yeah, the fairness for all marylanders act in 2014. and this was legislation that was a long time coming. um, and -- and we -- we passed it. we passed it -- i said before that marriage and the referendum on marriage i do believe myself, i think that it may have made it easier to move forward on the fairness for all marylanders act. but equality maryland again and other groups all started

building a coalition that was very strong that was putting the pieces together, building relationships across both the house and the senate. to bring people in, bring people to the table, get them as co-sponsors to the bill. and we were able to pass it in 2014. some of those coalitions were the same. some of them were even bigger in 2014. but, we were able to do it because, you know, of that -- that ongoing work where we were able to build one thing on top of another. right? >> um, i want to start moving to q & a for questions of the audience and leave enough time. we'll need 35, 40 minutes to do that. if you have a question or something you want to say, please move to the microphone right there. a lot of people [ inaudible ] i do also want to acknowledge the sponsors of both this forum and, um, the margaret cho show coming

up shortly. they've been actually very, very sportive and have all provided something of great value. i'm going to mention them by name because i want you to look at a program and see that they are there but gel creative, metro weekly, washington blade, glamma, whitman, walker, health. village heart, co-housing, compass reality. 1 washington circle hotel. -- the society for scientific study sexuality. town, nelly's and drinker and [ inaudible ] -- -- we got a lot of time to talk and a lot of things came up and i know we're going to have a great conversation. go ahead. >> yeah, good evening. hello? okay. first of all i wanted to talk about some things that really concern me. this country is leaning more

closely to the period that have not broken down racial bias. i think it has become a country of the haves and have-nots, the privileged and the underprivileged. what is disappointing to me we forget no too long ago the people, the have-nots were african-american people, blacks in this country because of disparities in civil rights laws in this nation. and those persons that we were talking about and we were empowering in those days, struggling in the civil rights era were embarrassing to most of us because they were uneducated and they did not know how to articulate their needs and because of that not being able to articulate, we had to go and spend some time trying to shore people up. this is what i'm trying to say to everybody. and mobilizing and getting together, we have to take the time that we need to make people what we consider camera ready.

we have become a society that -- focused on what looks beautiful to us. what is pleasing to us. what we are comfortable with. the people that are being left out in our society are those who are not comfortable to us, who don't look like us, who are not pleasing to the eye. and those are the people that represent real america. and the reason why donald trump is the president today is not because there was a large number of people who did not like the direction the country was going, it's because a large number of people disenfranchised and marginalized were not represented by all of us so we share some of that blame. we share the blame we did not reach out to those persons that are not camera ready and get them ready to go to the polls. my concern about marriage equality in the transgender community today, where we have forums like this, we look around and there's misrepresentation. when we have panels today, we always had and i don't mean in

any way that you are a token because i think you are well representative of the needs of my community but appalled there is only one up there. but appalled there is only one. there should be more than one candy cox up there. -- you had more than white american, you had more than one female, you had more than one gay male but you always have one transgender woman of color or one transgender period and that needs to stop. my question to each and every one of you on this panel, if we're talking about mobilizing, one of the panelists said he was at a period of pause, i'm actually at a period of [ inaudible ] -- my society level has gone up because i know this is the most difficult time in our lives, as a child of the '60s, remembering the civil rights era, knowing what my mother and father went through through jim crowe, i see all that coming back again.

if we don't shake the consciousness of this country and this nation by being more inclusive and mobilizing, we are going to go back to those times. history is going to repeat itself, you are absolutely right, what's wrong, how could they not roll back certain things that they could easily roll back the marriage equality. i want to ask each one of you panel members how do we mobilize, how do we use instruments we used to make marriage equality a reality how do we mobilize and be inclusive of those individuals who marriage is not at the top of their priority list. at the top of their priority list to get off -- -- the top of their priority list for their significant partner not to be out selling drugs or slinging drugs because he can now get a job. how do we mobilize those people like myself who are sick and tired of seeing the same thing

as usual? thank you. >> thank you very much. [ applause ] >> we're going to talk about another panel, okay, let's talk about -- marty, when don't you start? >> yeah, i would say it's hard to answer that question in three minutes or so but i would say starting with marriage equality when we started out in marriage equality, it was hard to get people who wanted to get married in massachusetts and ended up getting married in massachusetts to actually come forward and talk about getting married in massachusetts. so, when we were fighting to protect that decision, i remember that we had to look hard to find couples that got married and to come forward and talk about defending their marriage because all they wanted to do is get married and take care of their kids. they didn't even know who their state legislator was. this is an ongoing issue in our movement and in america. americans are not politically motivated at all. that was a lesson learned early on to make sure people that were

affected were brought forward and how to bring them in forward and it was not easy in massachusetts to do that. it's hard to realize that was only 2004 but finding a married couple to come and bring their son to come forward, and why they got married and what they did. that was not easy back then at the very beginning, to go on camera and talk about it. they just wanted to watch their son play hockey. there are so many stories, and that is what i remember in the early days of the marriage movement. going forward now, we're fighting to make sure that obamacare doesn't get repealed because that is very important for many people and we're fighting for the equality act which will make the civil rights laws. the groups that fought for the civil rights acts of our country are okay and supportive of including sexual identity included in the equality act and

this has not been easy work to get the organizations together to make sure we can bring everybody together at the same time. i think you raised a really good point about representation and that's not easy. i remember in maryland, for example, luke mentioned the lack of catholics and the lack of african-american support, and the biggest fear. how do you find catholics to come forward to talk about marriage equality? that was not easy, but we found lay people to come forward and we formed catholics for marriage equality and i support marriage e and we work with the naacp very closely and we worked with naacp in prince georges -- thank you. prince georges county about making sure that the naacp was there, front and center bringing people forward. making sure there was not one african-american person on the panel talking about marriage equality, but many people. reverend coats is a big supporter and this is not easy

and it continues to be very difficult. so these are ongoing issues. we need to make sure they're addressed, but we can look right now at what legislation is being proposed in the good sense and the bad sense and we know that there is a path forward that we all have to make sure that there's diversity in many ways. we, as a human rights campaign and other groups are working in texas right now where the legislators are trying to convene a special session for the 30-day special lesson where they also passed sb4 which was discrimination against immigrant communities and we are working together with the hispanic community in texas to make sure we are all together. these are ongoing issues and it's something that we have to continue to work on together. they're not easy, but again, representing and fighting for people that are not visible that are not, as you said, the tv-friendly people. we represent them and we need to make sure that we fight for them at the state legislative level,

at the federal level and making sure that we continue to bring people forward, and we have to continue to do so. [ applause ] >> you ask really vital questions and i don't know what the answer because i look at the lgbtq community itself, we ask for people outside of our community to be our allies, but weer n we are not good at being allies within our community. it infuriates me when i hear we should drop the t. we are all fighting for the same end result. we want equality and yet there are organizations that fight each other. i don't know how we bring in the voiceless, and the people without a voice out of the community, the hidden people when we as the people who are speaking up, when we can't even get our act together and work

together for those things that really matter instead of letting our egos get in the way. i wish i had an answer for that because i think that's one of the biggest stumbling blocks we have is that we don't work well at community, so how can we work outside our community? so for me, you know, it's up to all of us, those of us who are currently speaking up, we can't stop. we have to always raise our voice and say, hey, but what about those homeless kids? what about those transgender women who are selling themselves on the street to survive? if we don't speak up, we are all going to fail. so for me, i think that's where it starts. those of us who are already part of the activist community, we've got to be louder. we've also got to go out into

the community and not stay in our offices, stay in our comfort spaces. we have to go somewhere that makes us feel uncomfortable so that we understand and we look those people in the eye and say you matter. i've gotten to know you. i'm going to fight for you. to me, all activism starts on a personal one-on-one basis, and if we don't do it nothing will change. so that's how i look at it and that's really how i approach my thoughts, my activism now that i am in this world. so it comes down to that one-on-one basis, and if we don't get outside of our comfort zones and force ourselves to recognize and value people who are different than us, what's going to change? [ applause ] >> anyone else? >> go ahead.

>> you are putting me through it tonight. it's okay. okay. so first, i'll just say it because i think that how do we do it? we start with hearing the ugly, and the ugly is, like, i am incredibly uncomfortable sitting up here right now and this is what i do. i'm uncomfortable because i feel so inadequate, attorneys and elected representatives and then what's your qualification? i've got someone. i'm re-elected. -- i'm, like, what's my other qualification?

my transition and graduateded from college with honors, so that's not meant -- [ applause ] >> i've never been arrested. i've never done drugs. i'm a catholic, ironically. i would be happy to join the group, i don't think it would have helpeded. >> sure, it would. um, and i am a transgender person, and i'm the only person up here with a tan. that's actually something that's uncomfortable because you now feel as though everyone is expecting you to speak for everyone who looks more like this and you're now thinking that no one up here is going to look at you equally. they're not going to respect you. they're not going to give you

the accolades that they give one another that, do i sound as smart as he does? i got accepted to law school. i didn't go, you know, i like shopping, but is he going to think i'm intelligent? are they going to think that i'm as important because i fight the political system that they work for? that is something that's real for me, and if i am camera ready and it's difficult, then, of course, we're not going to have other representation up here. if you're not camera ready as a trans person. if you haven't yet gone far enough in your journey that you can articulate what it is, you're not going to be up here, and let's not talk about people who are african-american, latino, native american,

muslim-american, indian-american, anybody who does not look white can all tell you what it's like to walk into a room and look for the people who look like you because that's what we do. we look for affirmation from one another when we say thing. i'll admit it. i will make -- i will look at them and say are you approving of this? or am i saying what we, the message we want to convey? and so instead what we have to do is we have to first stop thinking of us as them, us. and that was my message is that this really isn't about marriage equality, and then how does trans fit into it. this isn't about what took place in california or massachusetts or maryland or north carolina.

it's, like, we are the united states of america, not the collective states of america. we are not 50 individual states doing things. we are 50. [ applause ] we are a community and we are a family and we should be cohesive, and we need to stop thinking of battles as being fought and our very small yay for gay marriage in california. every victory is a victory for all and when we actually think of it like that it makes it a lot easier for us to then recognize the people who are not receiving the benefits of those victories. it makes it easy for us to say, is this a victory if these people who are a part of our community are still not? i mean, if gay marriage doesn't matter to you then how great of

a job have we done in getting gay marriage? because, what? we got it so that you could be homeless? we got it so that you would engage in sex work? we got so that hiv and aids could still be something that we are talking about and new diagnosis? we talk about marriage equality so the poverty could be very real for that lack of education could be very real for people? so i agree, but i think that the first step that we do is we stop thinking in this divisive way that we start thinking in an inclusive way. i agree that our community has -- we struggle, you know. we go, why don't we have equality? we don't have equality because we go on grindr and it says

no -- and no fems. bee have to st we have to stop thinking of successes in the pockets of america. we have to stop thinking of american as being the first bear caucus in maryland. the bear caucus in america. that's what he is. he is an american. he is not a marylander. and so that's what he represents and we have to think of that as being something that speaks for all of us that is a success for all of us. i'm in north carolina. i don't live in maryland. maryland delegates do not represent me, and they do affect me when i have someone say i am a delegate and i am the first and only bear caucus and that's one of ours and that's one of our successes and when we think of it like that it makes it easier because now he sees me and i see him. i don't know if that helps at

all, but it was a hard question to answer, so -- [ applause ] >> it evolves around, sometimes progress can be stopped if it can just be delayed a little bit and picking up on something i heard as sandy mentioned, we're not going to be counted in the 2020 census, and i am very concerned about that. i am concerned about its effect on us as a community as we age and i'm concerned about us in the community as our children grow up. if they can't be counted, we're less significant, and i look at that dynamic and pose the question of what strategies do we have to lay out as a community to make sure that we are counted every day?

>> go ahead. one thing i will say is there was a time in our history not too long ago when we did not want to be counted, when aids and hiv first became a problem in our country. we did not want to be counted and we did not want to be visible and we did not want the government coming after us, and there is a reticence in many marginalized communities to not to want to be identified and we have to be aware of that and there is a give and take to that, to the question of being counted. although i understand and know exactly why it's important to be counted on health surveys from the cdc and other places and of course, in the u.s. census and as far as it goes, we have to focus at the federal level, absolutely, and look at our national leader right now and make sure that we focus on the

national leader, but we have to focus on the federal government in the broader sense with the u.s. senate, the house, our state legislatures and our city councils and our school boards. just because you are not a parent, doesn't mean you shouldn't pay attention to what happens at the school board level. it's really just civic engagement in many ways and making sure we're visible? so it's a shame when the administration says we are not going to add sexual orientation and gender identity on the census? we are not going to do that or we'll take it off of the aging surveys or whatever, but there are still many ways in which we can be successful and that's at the state level and we have strong states like california and other states that have taken the lead years ago and washington state in surveys and counting, and even though there weren't federal surveys that counted back then, the state governments banded together and they looked at the states and all of these states that are

counting lgbt people. that's enough data to show there is a disparity on health outcomes and on smoking and alcoholism and other issues. so i would say that it's just important to make sure that we are visible. we are strategic and make sure that wherever we are we have to hold our elected officials accountable and any election is an important election for our community, for any marginalized community or any community because that community could still be marginalized on the federal level and we need to hold our elected officials and hold our members accountable. >> yeah. >> i thought it was great, and i'm also going to be literal in my response. i believe that while the federal government is the census and that's an important count and most services are delivered

through state organizations and local organizations and the federal government is we have the broad responsibility, and what it really comes down to is states and it's where the rubber hits the road and that's where programs are developed and that's where people are identifieded and served and that's where i think we want to the put your effort where you really want to see progress, and we'll give a small, anecdotal example from working in the mental health services in alameda county, california and we had a campaign that i participated in that was called nothing about us without us. it was a very powerful constituency group where individuals came together who were receiving mental health sources and said we will not have you plan services for us without our involvement. it's not fair. it's not okay and ethical, and they were right, it wasn't, and that became the fundamental driving force for how every dollar was spent and how every program was designed, that there was a group of individuals and their voices were heard and they

had privileges on decisions that were made because nothing about them would be decided without them. that's grassroots work at play. you see it also in will skoscho the representation ensuring that your school had a local gay-straight alliance and that's very important for you. this all happens at the local level, whether it counts or not, this is where -- if you want to make change that's where you will be the most impactful. >> spencer? >> first of all, thank you so much for being here and thank you for supporting a program deep in this fight and very near to my heart. you mentioned, we're preaching to the choir here. you quoted david and you said, it's a tough place to lie on the witness stand. in my line of work, the hardest thing that we have is getting people to get on the witness stand. how do we make sure that the people who oppose us are the

ones who are putting this at the top of the agenda? my question especially to marty, to luke and to everyone on the panel is how do we set the agenda? how do we make sure that lgbt issues and lgbtqia issues are on the talking point and not an afterthought on the news cycle. that's the hardest thing we'll ever have is making progress that this is a priority for folks. that's the question. >> do you want to go first? >> skipping the hard questions now. [ laughter ] how do we set the agenda, we participate all the time we participate in coalitions that bring together lots of groups of people and i'm going to be shameless and plug a bill that i'm working on because, hey, c-span. [ applause ]

for five years in the state of maryland we have been working to get people the opportunity to earn sick leave and in the last legislative session, it's been my bill for the last three years, we finally passed and earned sick leave legislation with the coalition of over 166 different groups, gay and straight all of the way across the spectrum, and we did it, we passed the bill and the governor vetoed it. so now we have to continue that coalition. we have to continue to expand and have to listen to those that aren't heard or that can't be heard or that haven't been heard and we -- all that you can do that and the only way that you can get and stay on the agenda is if you are participating in the process, and i think it becomes very easy.

my partner patrick will be calling me a hypocrite in exactly 30 minutes because we look at facebook and we -- don't pretend that you won't, and we -- he is a nice person. i like him. we find it very easy to do those very few, quick, you know, things on the phone, and we find it very difficult to cross the street and find out who it is and it's that that we have to start doing. we have to get out of our bubbles. b we have to get out into communities where we feel uncomfortable and when we do that, that's news. it shouldn't be, but it is and it's partly setting the agenda. >> i would add to this that for me, at least, i would turn it around a little bit.

i don't think we should be setting the agenda. i think the agenda in some ways is set, and what i mean about that is the lgbt community, we have our own concerns. we definitely do, but what is facing our country and our world today whether it's health care reform and whether we might zero out funding for planned parenthood, that's an lgbt issue and that's an lgbt issue and what's happening with immigration reform and not happening that's an lgbt issue and we can go on and on on the list, so i think it's important for us as a community to make sure we engage in the issues of the day and make sure that we speak for them from our personal experience which would include the fact that we are lgbt or the family members of lgbt people, and we should bring our whole bodies and our whole selves to the discussion and by doing that and that's how we have the allies by making sure that we

understand that immigration reform affects all of us and then we can have people that are focusing on immigration reform realize that lgbt issues affect all of us, as well and that's how i would look at it. >> thank you. you all are amazing. >> hi, everyone. thank you. i'm maryanne, and i want to give a heartfelt thanks to our warriors. we can't do it without you and it's great. all of us here. i heard something on tv the other day and it said the in be one reason that donald trump won is people didn't like people who didn't look like them. it wasn't money and it wasn't health care and it was people who don't look like us, and that's been talked about all around the circle here, my dear friends, thank you. some of it seems like, duh, this is common sense. what are we fighting about? and so what i really want to

know is what's on the other side of this? what makes people so afraid? what are people afraid of if we have gay marriage, are they afraid that their marriage is going to fail? and i moved to south carolina. i went into full-blown culture shock, and i was lucky enough to find someone with a new england patriots hat on the plane. massachusetts had gay marriage and it didn't affect anybody else's marriage. massachusetts had a marijuana law, go, massachusetts, right? so it's an interesting thing because people are afraid of what? the unknown? what are we afraid of? what are people afraid of? what's on the other side? i purposely let people troll my facebook page that has totally blown up with trump stuff, and i let the trollers come in because my friends say you should unfriend these people and i say, oh, no, i shouldn't. i want to hear what they have to

say, and so from your vantage point, what are we fighting? what's on the other side? why would anybody fight equality for all? why would anybody want somebody to live on the street? what are we fighting? can you tell me what we're fighting? thank you. >> i think they're parents telling young kids some really not entirely factual information and they grow up in an environment where perhaps someone that runs on a really religious or conservative agenda would match with what we are told is good and right in the world. so these early childhood, formative years, i think, are -- they last a life time. when we all become adults we don't know where everybody came from and what state we grew up in and what state they were, and

there there's something there about how we embrace young people and create the opportunity for them to make these decisions for themselves later on versus programming them and predisposing them into thinking -- that they can't can't figure this stuff up later on. we want to give them the ability to be analytical and the ability to make hard decisions when they're old enough to make those decisions. i really can't -- brain structure is actually hard to undo, and the messages that are coming from churches in particular and in some cases, fringes or factions of political parties are very, very negative, and i think they're penetrating into homes and they're really affecting young people and parents, and i think we all have a hard time undoing that. >> i go to ail these meetings and democratic things and what i find is what is the message,

right? and i was a fourth grade teacher so i can relate to that, right? and they're pliable and, yes, maybe they do have something at home, but they will gravitate toward what feels good. so i look at a community that says what are we fighting about? let's change our course. why don't we have messaging that gets transgender people together doing something nice for a community in the what if we show them that this is what people are about. this is what heart-centered people are about. we don't judge by the color of your skin or your gender or your sexuality, we judge by our character and our character says be kind and if the messages were behind, be kind, be kind, let me show you how to be kind, i think that we would change the dialogue, do you agree? >> i do. >> we've got time for one more question.

>> i'll try to keep this quick. i'm just freaking out being in front of you. thank you so much for what you've done for the community. my question is -- my experience as a clear south asian woman is different from the experience that a gay white male has growing up and different from what the transgender black women have growing up, in the issues that lgbt face, there are high rates of drug use, high rates of suicide. how do we address those issues while keeping in mind the broader issues that communities of color and other vulnerable communities face? thank you. [ applause ] >> i'll speak to that just briefly. i think the way that you try to

do that is to make sure, going back to the without us kind of of a model and if you think about the mental health services example that you just brought is up to advocate and insist that you have services that are matched to people appropriately. so if you are a woman of color and you're 16 years old, you might want a woman of color providing the services rather than maybe a straight white man who is 50. who will really relate to you better, and those that are out there, it's just a matter of insisting that you have it, and -- a disconnect between the service providers that we have available. [ no audio ]

>> to present the students and we have the teachers go through the training so that they have those jobs to provide those services, but that's, i think, where the service delivery happens and it's the most important to make that match, for example. so thanks. >> anyone else? we are now out of time. we are right up at 9:00. you've all done amazing. [ applause ] >> thank you. and you know you're not leaving without leaving one more pitch. thank you all for coming.

house republicans unveiled the 2018 budget plan today that includes $622 billion in pentagon spending and $511 billion in non-defense spending and it also calls for an overhaul of the u.s. tax code. the plan proposes $300 billion in cuts to entitlement programs such as medicare, medicaid and social security. it doesn't detail the specifics of the tax changes and budget. >> the house committee will have the blueprint which starts at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3. >> this sunday at noon eastern, a c-span3 special event. >> burn, baby burn! >> as american history tv is live from the detroit free press

newsroom, marking the 50th anniversary of the 1967 detroit riots. we'll talk with former detroit police chief isaiah "ike" mackinnon and pulitzer prize-winning historian to find out what happened and why. and the pulitzer prize winner stephen henderson and former detroit free press journalist discussed the media coverage of the riot and it's aftermath. the 1967 detroit riots, 50 years later. live sunday starting at noon eastern on american history tv. >> we are talking with representative mike johnson who serves the state of louisiana, the 4th district and thanks for joining us. >> thanks for having me. >> tell us how you got to this position? >> my background is in constitutional law. so for about 20 years i did litigation in the courts and public interest law firms is i did do litigationnd