NJ Dem State Convention: LGBTI Caucus (petition action)

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

Here's an update on the email below:

"Nearly three full days have passed since the Democratic State Committee's disgraceful anti-LGBTI, transphobic behavior at the Democratic State Conference last Friday night -- and still we have not gotten an apology, let alone concrete action to make the party more diverse and LGBTI-responsive. Enough is enough. We at Garden State Equality ask you to sign our petition, which will go directly to Democratic state chairman Joe Cryan, Democratic state vice-chairwoman Dana Redd, and Democratic state executive director Diane Legreide.

http://www.gardenstateequality.org /

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me, Steven Goldstein, GSE chair, at [e-mail] .

Thanks so much - and remember, please forward this email to everyone in New Jersey you know.

We want this petition to be big."

This is cross-posted from the GBLT group, and it originally was a yahoo group announcement...

"Hi, everyone, from Steven Goldstein, chair of Garden State Equality. Allow me to fill you in on what happened this weekend at the Democratic state convention.

Each Friday at the convention, different constituencies have different Caucus meetings. This year, three organizations, Garden State Equality, New Jersey Stonewell Democrats and the Gender Rights Advocacy Association of New Jersey, produced the LGBTI Caucus. We decided to do something different -- to present an entertainer at the end of our Caucus meeting. We had an open bar and hired a Cher impersonator. Last year's LGBTI Caucus attracted 8 people. This year's attracted more than 100.

Our friends from the predominantly straight Progressive Caucus would have attended without the bells and whistles, no doubt, and we love them for it. But many other party leaders in the room wouldn't have otherwise; they said so. And we got a chance to talk to them about our issues. In a Caucus that began at 6:00 pm, "Cher" only came on at 6:52 pm. It was hardly as if serious business weren't being done.

But before the event started, Diane Legriede, the executive director of the State Democratic Committee, pointed to "Cher" and said the following:

"We cannot have THAT walking in the hallway."

"You cannot have THAT inside your Caucus."

"The State Committee will not have someone like THAT attending dinner -- THAT cannot come inside the ballroom."

"What if the press sees THAT -- what if they report on THAT in tomorrow's papers?"

Diane delivered these statements as a diatribe in the hallway, ironically, drawing attention to an intolerance that was far more embarrassing than anything around her. She was also completely unself-conscious about referring to a transgender person repeatedly as THAT -- as not even a person -- right next to Barbra Casbar, a member of the transgender community who is a leader in the three organizations sponsoring the Caucus.

I answered: "Diane, it's our caucus and transgender people are part of our community. Diane responded, "It's not your event, it's our event." What a telling statement.

She added, "If THAT's going to be inside the room, we're going to boycott your Caucus."

Senator Loretta Weinberg and her staffer Debbie Francica were outraged on behalf of the LGBTI community. They went to Diane and to Chair Joe Cryan and told it like it was: "We can't believe your reaction. You're acting like Republicans. This is supposed to be a Democratic convention where we embrace diversity, not a Republican convention where we're afraid of it. Transgender people are part of this community and they're entitled to be in that room and they include people like Cher."

Friends, we all know Loretta as one of the state's greatest progressive champions. But as those of us who know her and her staff personally can attest -- and as this event proved -- they're also some of the most personally enlightened people you could ever meet in your lifetime.

Also attending our Caucus were Congressman Frank Pallone, Union County Democratic Chair Charlotte DiFillippo and Senator Bob Menendez's daughter Alicia. They all loved the event. For those of you who don't know Alicia, she is one of the nicest, most politically savvy and most progressive young leaders in the Democratic Party today. She, too, was in disbelief at the State Democratic Committee's reaction. "Your community was the first to endorse my dad and I know everything you've done since. I can't believe this."

Best of all, the entire Progressive Caucus not only joined us at the LGBTI Caucus, but also expressed passionate solidarity with us on our issues and against the State Committee's behavior. Right on site, the executive board of New Jersey for Democracy voted to protest the State Committee's behavior.

We certainly don't blame Diane Legriede's meltdown on Governor Corzine, whose campaigns, Senate staff and gubernatorial Administration have all been more diverse than any we've ever seen in New Jersey. Governor Corzine has appointed an unprecedented number of women, people of color and LGBTI New Jerseyans at the most senior levels of government. He succeeded dramatically in lifting the glass ceiling. God bless him.

(Incidentally, the Democratic State Chair in recent years with the best record on diversity has been Tom Giblin. He took several dramatic and courageous steps, a guy who walks the walk rather than just talks the talk.)

But the State Committee continues to be an uptight, insensitive and LGBTI-uncomfortable mess that does not reflect the Democratic electorate in New Jersey, likely the country's most progressive Democratic electorate in likely the country's most progressive state. At the two previous year's conventions, party officials repeatedly singled out every constituency in their speeches except for the LGBTI community. And they wonder why the LGBTI community wasn't attending the annual Democratic convention in higher numbers -- duh -- in contrast to Garden State Equality's town meetings that have drawn 10,000 people, straight and LGBTI alike, since 2003. That's an average of 400 people per town meeting.

Diane Legriede's young operatives said her hallway diatribe reflected Chairman Joe Cryan's sentiments as well. That's surprising -- we've found Joe to be a progressive, inclusive guy.

We're troubled by the "boycott" of our Caucus when the state committee has no problem with our community's money and volunteers. In the past two years, Garden State Equality has raised nearly $400,000, including more than well over $100,000 for political candidates. Like our state's progressive organizations, we at GSE have triaged droves of volunteers to Democratic candidates. We conceived and implemented a huge GOTV operation in 2005 and are about to unveil one for this fall's campaign.

The message Diane Legriede's diatribe sent was this: We will accept you in the LGBTI community so long as you look and act a certain way.

Well, she and her state committee had better embrace the LGBTI community's diversity right now. Our community is a rich and proud mosaic. We range from those identify with genders different from their birth genders... to those who like to cross-dress... to those like me who wear suits, ties and even yarmulkes. No one has the right to tell us who in our community is acceptable and who is not. We are all acceptable and we all deserve respect.

If a state party leader in a comparably progressive state like California, New York or Massachusetts delived a transphobic, anti-LGBTI diatribe like that which Diane Legriede did in the hallway of this convention, that official might well be fired.

Rumor has it that Joe Cryan is going to call me to apologize. I'll tell you what I'll tell him: Words don't matter; action does. The Democratic State Committee has got to take some very quick moves to diversify the party's leadership and number of elected officials. It goes way beyond the party's lack of LGBTI diversity -- New Jersey's Democratic-dominated legislature ranks 44th nationally in the number of women officeholders. Tragically, there's not a single openly LGBTI member of the state legislature or even on the State Democratic Committee. At the 2004 Democratic National Convention, New Jersey had merely one openly LGBTI delegate whereas comparably progressive states each had many.

More than a seat at the table, we want action.

It's time for the state Democratic Party to endorse marriage equality outright. The state Democratic Parties of California, New York, Massachusetts, Washington State, Iowa, New Mexico and Texas have done so. But it's New Jersey that has the strongest poll numbers for marriage equality in America, where two-thirds of all state Democrats favor marriage equality. If our side loses the marriage case, God forbid, the state Democratic Party had best endorse marriage-equality legislation. Garden State Equality and our millions of straight allies across New Jersey will not take no for an answer.

It's time for the state Democratic Party to get the transgender equality bill passed this year -- 70 percent of New Jersey favors the bill whereas only 19 percent oppose it. The Democrats have not even posted the bill in committee, stalling for nearly two years.

Quite simply, it's time for the State Democratic Committee to leave the Jurassic Era. This is New Jersey, an extraordinary state with a rich history of being on the cutting edge of civil rights in America, and we demand no less."

[Kire]

1. Joe Cryan asks LBTI caucus for apology!!!

Dear friends, from Steven Goldstein, chair of Garden State Equality, cell [phone]:

In all the years I've worked in politics, it's been a very long time, whether in a campaign or as an activist, that I've cried. Usually I'm as tough as the image would have it, but not the last couple of days. Democratic State Committee chair Joe Cryan told a reporter today that he would not apologize to our LGBTI community and that in fact we owe and apology to him and the party. My goodness, even in our statements the last couple of days, we went out of our way to praise Joe Cryan as a good guy, normally quite inclusive.

But now, the Democratic State Committee, including Joe Cryan and his staff, have entered into attack mode with reporters, making no difference between how they would attack a Republican opponent and how they are now attacking New Jersey's LGBTI community that has supported the state and national party so, so strongly. I'm not going to repeat their attacks here.

Specifically, the Democratic State Committee now says WE OWE IT an apology because we didn't have permission to have "Cher" at the convention.

In fact, we came to an agreement before the convention to do exactly what we did -- that we would have a regular Caucus session, with only normal business, ie talking about issues, and put on "Cher" at the very end. It was an idea that worked. Last year's LGBTI Caucus got eight attendees. This year's got almost 130.

But ultimately this is not about a performance artist who sang for five and a half minutes.

This is about some in the state party -- to be fair, a minority of leaders, but some of them nonetheless -- not really believing in their heart of hearts that the LGBTI community in New Jersey is a political force that matters, even with the community's massive population boom in the past 10 years. Because if the Democratic State Committee really believed otherwise, they'd have called over the weekend or this morning and given at least your typical middle -of-the-road conciliatory statement. "Look, we're sorry this misunderstanding happened," they'd have said, "we were under a lot of stress, it's water under the bridge, we're excited to work with the LGBTI community."

And indeed it would have been water under the bridge. I believe with all my heart that most other constituencies in this position would have gotten that call.

Instead, the Democratic State Committee is viciously attacking us in the LGBTI community, among their strongest possible supporters, for the party's own clumsy handling of our Caucus. An event the party said it would boycott.

It's devastating. New Jersey's LGBTI community has done everything right over the last few years, certainly as measured by money and GOTV, the yardsticks of success in New Jersey politics. My own organization, Garden State Equality, has raised $400,000 in the two years alone, including more than $100,000 for Democratic candidates. In 2005, we triaged droves of volunteers to Democratic campaign offices across the state. On several nights, we got reports that our volunteers were the only volunteers in various Democratic offices. We have organized town meetings attended by 10,000 people in the last three and a half years, demonstrating our grassroots muscle.

This year, we were the first community and organization in New Jersey to endorse Senator Menendez, and we did so when other Democrats were still considering running against him. Two weeks ago we met with Senator Menendez's staff -- at our request -- to propose and outline a comprehensive GOTV program targeting LGBTI and sympathetic areas of the state. For October, we are planning a major statewide fundraiser for Linda Stender. We also just put a fundraiser for Carol Gay on the board. All this at our community's initiation.

We have asked, "What can we do for you, New Jersey Democrats?" far more than we have asked the party, "What can you do for us?"

We have been model team players.

But no matter what we in the LGBTI community do, no matter how much we say through our actions, "If we do this, will you love us? If we do that, will you love us?, the answer always turn out to be 'no.' It's like being an abused spouse or child always seeking affirmation but never getting it. For the life of me, I don't think the national Democratic Party would have handled this situation in the same way - the DNC would have tried to make things better quickly. But the New Jersey Democratic State Committee is its own unique phenomenon entirely.

There is not a single openly LGBTI member of the 120-person New Jersey State Legislature. There was just one openly LGBTI New Jersey delegate to the 2004 Democratic National Convention. In a state that supports the transgender equality bill 70 to 19 percent, a bill that has a massive number of sponsors and bipartisan support, we can't get the bill posted. And in an off-the-charts progressive state that has America's strongest poll numbers for marriage equality, we can't get the party to support marriage equality outright whereas state Democratic Parties in far redder states do.

I understand how important it is to work our hearts out for Bob Menendez and Linda Stender. They are wonderful candidates with fantastic records in a year where control of both houses of Congress is at stake - where we have a realistic shot at taking back both the U.S. House and Senate. But it's hard emotionally, not just as an LGBTI citizen but as a progressive Democrat, to be there for the State Democratic Committee when it screwed up and now is in full attack mode upon one of its most rock-solid supportive constituencies.

It's a painful day.

Best,
Steven Goldstein
Chair, Garden State Equality

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

2. Front Page article in Star-Ledger today

http://www.nj.com/search/index.ssf?/base/columns-0/1158127029264510.xml?starledger?colmor&coll=1

He was no Cher, and Democrats were not sunny
Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Tom Moran
On Politics

She wore a slinky black dress with silver sparkles, just like Cher.

She had curly black hair, too. And canned music so she could sing along with Cher's greatest hits.

But this was not your traditional impersonator. Because underneath it all, this lady was a man.

And that created a ruckus when she arrived at the Democratic Party convention in Atlantic City last week to sing and dance at the meeting of the gay caucus.

"We said listen, this is Atlantic City and it's a pretty irreverent place," says Steve Goldstein, founder of Garden State Equality, the state's leading gay-rights organization. "So let's have a little fun, and be a little campy."

Goldstein had no idea what was coming.

Party leaders were not about to let the gay caucus fix this image of the Democrats in the mind of the public. Certainly not during an election season.

So as "Cher" walked the hallways at Bally's Hotel and Casino before her performance on Friday evening, the party sent young workers to tear down the posters advertising her show.

<snip>

For the record, Cher is a photographer and makeup artist who dresses as a man during the day. She gets $1,000 for her appearances as Cher, usually at weddings.

And she did sing that night, politicians be damned.

Among those dancing was Sen. Loretta Weinberg, a 71-year-old grandmother from Bergen County, who counsels her fellow Democrats to take a pill and relax.
<snip>