TAMPA — During his time in office, Gov. Ron DeSantis has been aggressive in vetoing appropriations in the state budget for LGBTQ programs.
Cognizant of that fact, some Democratic legislators say, they’ve been able to continue support for those programs by omitting any direct references to the LGBTQ community in their appropriation proposals.
But that gambit may be coming to an end, one lawmaker suggested on Saturday.
“I think you need to be prepared for what is coming,” warned state Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith (D-Orlando) on Saturday, speaking during the Florida LGBTQ+ Democratic Caucus summer meeting in Tampa. “Yes, we should continue to urge our senators and our representatives in the Legislature to fund these programs. We should not stop. “
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But Smith fears the state’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiatives led by Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia are taking aim at local governments for funding anything associated with DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion). And he’s concerned that could lead to legislation barring municipalities or counties from funding such efforts in the future.
Last month, 16 Orange County employees were served with investigative subpoenas regarding the county’s diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts; climate initiatives; procurement; and contracts or grants. They were issued after Ingoglia said it was “probable” that Orange County employees tried to hide information when his DOGE team began examining spending practices within the county government.
Among the agencies caught up in the search are the Zebra Coalition Inc. and Zebra Youth Inc., plus the Orlando Youth Alliance Inc., according to the Orlando Sentinel. The paper reported that while those groups support LGBTQ communities, the county argued the programs were open to all.
“While we will fight the proposal if it comes, I believe a proposal may come that will basically now finally prohibit our local governments from being able to fund these organizations through grants, because they’re gonna say putting a roof over a young person’s head who is queer or is LGBTQ is diversity and inclusion and now prohibited under Florida law,” Smith said.
No such legislation has been introduced to date, Smith acknowledge, but “if rainbow crosswalks attached to the interim memorial of Pulse nightclub are fair game for this depraved administration, they will come for other things, too, and we have to be prepared to fight back against it,” he said.
Banning the transgendered from owing guns?Joining Smith in an hourlong discussion at the Westshore Grand Hotel in South Tampa were three other Democratic LGBTQ members of the Legislature: Sen. Shevrin Jones (D-Miami Gardens), Rep. Michele Rayner (D-St. Petersburg), and Rep. Mitch Rosenwald (D-Oakland Park).
The assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk was never explicitly mentioned during the discussion, although his death was indirectly referenced when the lawmakers were asked to opine about a news report referencing the transgender community published last week.
CNN reported that in the aftermath of the Minneapolis Catholic Church shooting that took place late last month, senior U.S. Justice Department officials are reportedly weighing proposals to limit transgender people’s right to possess firearms.
Smith called it “a bigoted and transphobic attack,” and then asked the audience to think about how conservatives had responded to mass shootings in the immediate past.
“If it is a Hispanic person that has committed a violent crime, they want to build a wall,” he said. “If it is a Black or African-American person who has committed a violent crime, it is that we need to target Black Lives Matter and we need to erase honest history. If it is a trans or an LGBTQ person who commits a violent crime, we have proposals like this.
“But if it’s a white male American, the response in the last 24 hours has now been, ‘We need to understand what we’re doing to young men and stop giving them access to video games and understand what they’re going through,'” he said. “I think we should have empathy for all people regardless of what their background is. And we have to call out bigoted, discriminatory policies for what they are.”
Rayner called the report “a distraction” and a way to paralyze members of the LGBTQ community to not commit to any positive actions.
“These are very unserious people,” she said. “These are people who are not rigorous in their actual thinking capacity. They’re just not, and so ultimately we have to see it for what it is.”
If Republicans were serious about addressing mental health, “they would just fund mental health. Period,” Jones said to cheers. “The only reason why Republicans continue to beat up on our transgender community is because they believe that’s their easy target.”
He added that it is incumbent upon LGBTQ lawmakers to fight as hard for their constituents as they ever have.
“Too often, the LGBTQIA+ community, we feel that sometimes we have to kowtow to individuals who wouldn’t spit on us if we were on fire. And so, because of that, I want to make clear that those of us who run for office … don’t allow this moment to allow us to be scared to speak up. Because there are young people and there are people dependent on our mouth, and if we have a seat at the table, dammit, we better use every ounce of our being to pushback on the BS that the Republicans are doing.”
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