Attorney General John Ashcroft met with a delegation from Log Cabin Republicans Feb. 22. It was the first meeting that he had with a civil-rights organization and one of the first meetings with an outside group since he was sworn in to office three weeks earlier.
"It was an excellent meeting," said Rich Tafel, executive director of Log Cabin. "He couldn't have been more gracious, he was actually pretty humble, he came across really well as a person."
The gay delegation included Tafel, Log Cabin's political director Kevin Ivers, board chair and vice chair Bob Stears and Bill Brownson, and Bob Kabel, chairman of the Liberty Education Fund.
"It was mainly a get-to-know-you session," said Tafel. "We had an opportunity to lay out key issues that we thought were important and offered to be a resource on those issues." The principle issues were hate crimes and employment non-discrimination that will be reintroduced in Congress later this spring.
Tafel conceded that the meeting was light on substance but he argued that "grip and grins [ primarily photo opportunities ] are extremely important, that is where everything starts. You have to build trust before an issue comes up."
That may be particularly true with regard to Ashcroft, as virtually the entire civil rights and gay communities actively opposed his confirmation. Log Cabin initially expressed its reservations with the Bush administration in private and later issued a statement that noted Ashcroft's pledge in writing and in testimony before the Senate to equal protection and equal enforcement of the law as written.
Tafel called much of the opposition to Ashcroft "very partisan" and "a miscalculation on the part of the civil-rights groups." In light of that track record, he questioned their effectiveness in working with the Attorney General. "It leaves them only with a throwing stones kind of strategy now, criticizing everything he does."
Ivers stressed the symbolic importance of the meeting, he said that Ashcroft "sent a message to the country by first meeting with a gay and lesbian group, that equal protection means everybody."
Tafel added, "It was not too long ago that we [ gays ] were not considered a civil-rights group to be met with to discuss these kinds of things. I think that is progress."
Another sign of progress may be the silence from the social right that followed the meeting. In the past, groups like the Family Research Council have issued a blizzard of press releases denouncing meetings between members of the Clinton administration and "homosexual activists." They have even attacked Bush advisor Mary Matalin. But at least with the Ashcroft meeting, the fundamentalists seem to be practicing their own version of don't ask, don't tell.
Ivers said the meeting was "a good education process for the community" as well. He stressed the fact that "the Attorney General has a clearly drawn role in government, he is the top law enforcer: He does not make law, he enforces law."
Tafel thinks that it is possible for the largely symbolic hate-crimes legislation to pass the Senate this year. But the longer-term prospects for passing the House and having it signed by the President will depend on a broader strategy.
He says, "If everybody is brought in early in a negotiation like this, and if each side is convinced that you respect them and their perspective, and you are out for a win-win for everybody, I think you can move a lot. But if the perception is that you are doing this to force me to do something that I don't want to do, guess what, I'm going to show you."
Tafel believes that "part of the strategy of the gay groups in Texas [ on moving hate-crimes legislation ] was to embarrass Bush." On that count it succeeded, but it did not result in the legislation being enacted.
He is afraid that the same strategy might play out at the national level.
But Tafel is encouraged by the fact that the Human Rights Campaign has not yet pushed for the formal introduction of either hate crimes or employment non-discrimination legislation. That may improve the odds of creating a process and negotiating language where the administration feels it has a stake in passage.
