There Is A Bill In Congress To…

…Make lynching a federal crime. You would think that it was already a crime to lynch someone and that criminalizing lynching would be a no-brainer, that there would be no opposition to the bill but you would be wrong.

The bill,

Senate Unanimously Passes Bill Making Lynching a Federal Crime
The New York Times
By Mihir Zaveri
Dec. 20, 2018

The Senate on Wednesday unanimously passed a bill that would, for the first time, explicitly make lynching a federal crime.

“For over a century, members of Congress have attempted to pass some version of a bill that would recognize lynching for what it is: a bias-motivated act of terror,” Senator Cory Booker, a New Jersey Democrat who introduced the bill, said in a statement. “Today, we have righted that wrong and taken corrective action that recognizes this stain on our country’s history.”

More than 4,700 people, the vast majority of them black, were lynched in the United States between 1882 and 1968, according to the N.A.A.C.P. Perpetrators were rarely prosecuted. Congress has tried and failed some 200 times to pass similar anti-lynching legislation since 1882, according to the bill.

The bill, titled the Justice for Victims of Lynching Act of 2018, was introduced in June by the Senate’s three black members: Kamala Harris, a California Democrat; Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican; and Mr. Booker. A spokeswoman for Ms. Harris said her office was trying to get the House to schedule a vote on the bill before Congress adjourns this week.

So why would anyone be against the bill?

Well I think anyone who is trans, lesbian, gay, bi, or queer wouldn’t be surprised where the opposition is coming from.

Evangelical activists want LGBT people excluded from anti-lynching bill
By Nick Duffy
8th January 2019

Evangelical activists are pressing Republican lawmakers to strip protections for LGBT+ people from an anti-lynching bill.

The Justice for Victims of Lynching Act cleared the US Senate on December 20 in a rare unanimous vote.

The bill would allow lynchings—bias-motivated mob killings without legal authority—to be charged as a federal hate crime for the first time.

Anti-lynching bill under fire from Liberty Counsel
However, evangelical law firm Liberty Counsel is upset because a portion of the bill includes protections for LGBT people as well as ethnic minorities.

In addition to “race, colour, religion, and national origin,” the law also covers crimes against “gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability” motivated by hatred.

Democratic lawmakers Cory Booker and Kamala Harris, who are both African-American, were behind the legislation.

So Evangelical Christians think it is okay to hang us! This people are sick! Their hate and homophobia has blinded them.

At least the bill has passed the Senate and with the Democrats controlling the House it will probably pass in the House, but the craven Trump I think will most likely veto it.

I find it ironic that according to CNN the senator who presided over the Senate the day it passed was,

Mississippi GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith presided over the session, a position some noted with irony due to a comment she made about attending a "public hanging" that led to widespread anger during her election bid this fall.