Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Politics, Society

Obama Administration Secures Stay to Continue to Bar Gays and Lesbians From Military Service

The Obama Administration has succeeded in securing a stay of a federal court’s injunction on the don’t ask, don’t tell policy. The Ninth Circuit agreed to the demand of the Administration that it should be able to continue to bar openly gay military personnel and continue to discharge those who reveal that they are gay. The policy is now again active pending review of the lower court decision.

As noted earlier, even if the Administration felt obligated to use its discretion to appeal the ruling of U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips, it clearly could have allowed the injunction to stay in place pending review. Instead, it fought to be able to continue the discrimination against gay and lesbian citizens.

For a short time, military recruiters were ordered to accept openly gay and lesbian applicants. The Obama Administration quickly put an end to that brief period of non-discrimination.

Source: here

42 thoughts on “Obama Administration Secures Stay to Continue to Bar Gays and Lesbians From Military Service”

  1. Addiction Analyst and eniobob– I disagree that President Obama is two people. Two-faced, yes. If you can put aside any belief you might have had in the past that he was a “progressive” or “liberal” and look at him realistically, you will see that he is just another self-serving corporate spokesmodel. The next two years will show you what he is and what he intends to do. If he tries to portray himself as a new combination of Robert LaFollette and Teddy Roosevelt in the next two years, knowing he can’t pass ANYTHING with a gridlocked Congress, then you will know he is trying to get his base back to run for a second term. If he starts taking Michelle and the girls on “diplomatic” tours to scenic places around the world, then you will know that he is content to be a one-term President and is ready for the big payday on the $1 million per speech Ex-President’s rubber chicken circuit. Not to mention the corporate board positions with the Carlyle Group, Boeing, Halliburton, and BP. I think we should stop making excuses for President Obama and start looking for a real Progressive to support in 2012. I won’t vote for the “lesser of two evils” any more. If Obama runs in 2012, I will find a Socialist or Greenie to vote for. I would like to vote for the Bull Moose Progressive Party candidate, but I don’t see that happening.

  2. Maybe you can all help me out.

    The Westboro group is going to demonstrate at a local military funeral this weekend.

    What can be done, if anything, to protect the family while the group exercises their freedom of speech?

    A buffer of onlookers is being proposed, but can anything else legally (i.e. not get sued) be done?

  3. This is screwed…….

    SwM,

    Social Life and Law School are not equal. Now once she gets on Law Review….well….what can I say….you don’t have to study much…..I promise…I know…free A’s for all…..so if you start off with 9 credit hours of guaranteed A’s…then its kind of hard to flunk out…

  4. “Addiction Analyst 1, October 21, 2010 at 12:52 pm

    Is it just me, or do others wonder who is running President Obama? I can’t imagine a worse time for the White House to step in on this judgement.”

    No you are not alone.

    “eniobob 1, October 20, 2010 at 8:30 am

    And the administration wonders why there is a voter apathy,You or should I say that I feel there are two different people in charge.”

  5. Also Judge Virginia Phillips is a Boalt Hall graduate and a Clinton appointee. She was not appointed by a republican. The log cabin republicans were the plaintiffs. If they had ended up with a judge appointed by Bush, I don’t think they would have had the same outcome.

  6. Henman It is too bad the L Cabin republicans have so little power in their party that they can’t convince even one republican to vote for the repeal of DADT. There are no openly gay members of the republican caucus that I know of. Don’t make the republicans the heroes.

  7. How sad, pathetic, and disgusting that in the fight to end discrimination against gays in the military, the heroes are the Log Cabin Republicans and the villains are Barack Obama and his “Justice” Department. I’m sure our gay friends are not going to forget who stood up for them and who stood in their path to equality. Obama wants Congress to end DADT by passing a bill to repeal it? How is that ever going to happen? By delaying a resolution in the courts until after the Republicans take control of the House? Then he can pretend to be a civil libertarian knowing that he will never get a bill passed with a Republican House of Representatives. He has already lost the civil libertarians. Now the gays and lesbians. Who’s next?

  8. Get this:

    From Huffington Post (10/21/2010)

    DoJ Accused Of Hypocrisy For Appealing DADT While Letting Park Proselytizing Ruling Stand
    By Sam Stein
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/21/doj-accused-of-hypocrisy-_n_771722.html

    Excerpt:
    Less than a week before the Obama administration’s Department of Justice appealed a judge’s ruling that the military’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy is unconstitutional, it elected to let stand a court ruling allowing religious groups to proselytize in federal parks.

    In a little-noticed decision last Thursday, the DoJ let stand a U.S. Court of Appeals ruling that small groups wishing to gather and demonstrate at national parks no longer have to obtain a permit from the National Park Service. The Department’s decision to let that ruling stand while challenging, days later, U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips’ decision to overturn DADT on constitutional grounds are not topically related. But it did spur another round of criticism that the administration is either insensitive or hypocritical when it comes to gay rights.

    “In the very same week, the administration says that it absolutely must appeal a federal court’s decision on ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ while it orders the Justice Department not to appeal a federal court’s ruling in favor of the conservative Alliance Defense Fund. This contradiction is simply incomprehensible and insulting,” said Alexander Nicholson, Executive Director of Servicemembers United.

    Nicholson’s statement echoed similar arguments from gay-rights activists (including Ted Olson, the Bush administration’s solicitor general) who have challenged the notion that the DoJ must defend the laws on the books, regardless of how objectionable they are. But there is an important political nuance that separates DADT from the park service’s regulation and guided the department’s thinking with respect to both.

  9. Thank you FFLEO. That was great. My daughter is enjoying the social life in law school.

  13. Obama is really Bush’s 3rd Term.

    American Democracy amounts to a One Party Kleptocracy with 2 factions that bicker over how best to screw working people.

  14. SwM,

    Thanks for the link … I understand but doesn’t much of this problem stem from Pres. Obama’s insistence on “careful review and an act of Congress”? Couldn’t he have saved the country all this unnecessary drama if he had chosen a different strategy in getting rid of DADT?

  18. “Walter Dellinger (former OLC head) makes the case (among several others) that the administration is trying to prevent a third party from intervening (the law of adequate defense….”

    In other words, “lawyers” are willing to play legal architecture games at the expense of people’s lives.

  19. And in the absence of this stay, there is a likelihood of irreparable harm … how??

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