Tammy Baldwin may withdraw her own transgender amendment

UPDATE: The Speaker's blog has video from the ENDA floor debate.

ENDA is being debated on the House floor right now. The chair just said that Tammy Baldwin may not even offer her transgender amendment, even though Monday the House gave Baldwin permission to offer her amendment. Why is Baldwin now talking about withdrawing her amendment, i.e., not offering her amendment, when for weeks NGLTF and Baldwin and their allies have been screaming bloody murder that we'd better let them try to include transgender people in the bill? We were told for weeks by the folks calling for ENDA to be killed if it doesn't include gender identity, that it would be easy to pass the bill with gender identity because America, and Congress, have already come around on trans issue (e.g., cross-dressing, sex changes, and more). I've been arguing that such an amendment would go down in flames, as would an ENDA that includes trans coverage, and set the transgender community (and gay community) back politically. And now that Baldwin finally got official permission to offer her amendment to include trans back in the bill, she appears to be backing off.

Why?

Oh, it gets better. The House Republicans are now demanding that the full House vote on Tammy's trans amendment. Think about that. The Republicans who want to kill this bill, stymie our civil rights, and use gay issues to bash Democrats in the election are the only people pushing for Tammy's amendment now - are the only people pushing for what was, until a few minutes ago, the position that United ENDA, including NGLTF and all of its allies, have been supporting and lobbying for.

Why is United ENDA suddenly pulling its amendment when they told us for weeks that we were crazy, that trans issues would easily pass the Congress, that even a loss on trans issues would be a win, there was no downside to losing, and that there was no reason to believe that the Republicans would use trans issues to bash Democrats and kill ENDA?

Pretty much everything I predicted is now coming true. And everything United ENDA predicted, and supported, and pontificated about has now become the position of the far-right anti-gay Republicans.

Time for folks to call Tammy and ask her why she just threw the transgender community under the bus.

(Myth vs Fact re ENDA.)