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More than 35 LGBT advocacy groups are asking senators to turn down President Donald Trump’s judicial nominee for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas because he has a “brazen contempt for LGBT people.”
According to a letter signed by 36 local and national LGBT groups, nominee Jeff Mateer “has spent his professional life denigrating and vilifying LGBT people and their families.”
Mateer has not responded to the letter’s accusations, which pointed to his past comments on the LGBT community.
Mateer, who was nominated in early September, said in a 2015 speech that transgender children were evidence of “how Satan’s plan is working and the destruction that’s going on.” He also said in the speech that same-sex marriage would lead the way to “people marrying their pets.”
In other speeches, Mateer said that there is no “right to homosexuality” and that he was disappointed that states were banning “conversion therapy.”
Conversion therapy, which tries to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity, has since been banned in eight states. It has also been deemed unscientific by the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association.
The letter said that Mateer’s statements show “a level of cruelty and ideological fervor that (is) incompatible with judicial service.”
Photo courtesy: ©Thinkstockphotos.com
Publication date: October 18, 2017
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