Another legislative session ends today and HB5723 An Act Concerning Discrimination did not come to a vote. The bill passed the Judicial Committee and was put on the House Calendar but it was never brought to the floor for a vote. There are a few high ranking members of the Republican party that are against this bill, they say that it grants “Special Rights” and they also want to add amendments to the bill. The amendments that they want to add would ban teachers and students from transitioning in school, and they made an issue about bathrooms. Lobbying those legislators has not changed their mind; they are set against the bill. A friend once told me, don’t go after the immovable end, go after the movable middle. Lobby those legislators that you have a chance to persuade to vote for the bill. We need to educate the public more; I think that we need more press coverage (Something like the series of article that the Nashua Telegraph published), I think that we need to have more forums and we need to have more one on one talks to our legislators (The movable middle).
We knew that this year was going to be a long shot to get the bill passed because of the short session; however, we have to keep trying. If you do not continue to bring the bill up and put pressure on them, then they will say, “Well, there is no support for the bill” and it will be even harder to pass the bill next year. In addition, we knew that this year the focus of the legislators would be on the Three Strike bill and other criminal justice bills and it turned out that at the end of the session the focus shifted to budget issues.
Therefore, we have to regroup, look at our tactics and strategies, and come up with a new game plan.
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