HRC Article:

WASHINGTON — Last night, President Biden signed the FY25 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) into law, which includes a provision inserted by Speaker Mike Johnson blocking healthcare for the transgender children of military servicemembers. This provision, the first anti-LGBTQ+ federal law enacted since the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996, will rip medically necessary care from the transgender children of thousands of military families – families who make incredible sacrifices in defense of the country each and every day. The last anti-LGBTQ+ federal law that explicitly targeted military servicemembers was Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, which went into effect in 1994.

Biden's press release:

No service member should have to decide between their family’s health care access and their call to serve our Nation.

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[–] 0 points 2 years ago* (26 children)

A big part of the issue is they need 60 votes on budgets, constitutional amendments, court decision reversals, and removal from court/congress/presidency.

So either you have bipartisanship between moderates and literally satan to cover 99.9% of troops families, or you have the entire government collapse leaving every single troops family without coverage.

The only way out is to give the progressive party 60 votes, but every election cycle we stray further away from that.

Although there is also a way for 34 states to come together and force a constitutional change, but idk if that has ever once happened in all of US History?

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  • [–] 13 points 2 years ago* (16 children)

    What about flipping the script and accusing the Republicans on every avenue that they want the troops to go without coverage, unless they get their bigotry in it too?

    Why not accuse them of wanting to deny coverage to all these troops?

    The reality is that the Dems are fine with this and never cared about Trans rights past identifying it as relevant to get votes with progressives. Now as it has served its usefullness to them, they discard Trans people, like they will discard other LGBT, ethnic and religious minorities...

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  • [–] 0 points 2 years ago (15 children)

    Because the election was a month ago and a new congress is about to take over immediately after a recess, at which point Trump will be entering office. Either a bipartisan bill passes now or a conservative one passes after January.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    So what is the difference between a bipartisan anti-trans bill and a republican anti-trans bill, if both bills are designed by the Republicans?

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago*

    Several Republican Amendments were removed from the final version of the bill, including blocking Palestinian Refugees, defunding the Pier in Palestine used to ship necessary aid in, stopping any military academy from engaging in Critical Race Theory, blocking reproductive care reimbursement for military, among many other things.

    If you want to read up on it, heres a good SUMMARY

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  • [–] 10 points 2 years ago (12 children)

    Either a bipartisan bill passes now or a conservative one passes after January.

    This is a conservative bill.

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  • [+] -5 points 2 years ago (11 children)
  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago* (10 children)

    Both conservative parties voted for the anti-trans bill you keep defending. It can be both bipartisan and conservative. That's what bipartisan has implied for at least a decade.

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  • [–] -2 points 2 years ago (9 children)

    Its a really bad look to desperately try to remove as much context as possible.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (8 children)

    It's a really bad look to throw vulnerable minorities under the bus.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 years ago (7 children)

    And the Republicans should stop doing that, 100%.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    And Democrats shouldn't have overwhelmingly voted with them. If this came down to all Republicans and a couple Manchins, that would be one thing. But it didn't.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 years ago* (5 children)

    Democrats didn't add this to the defence bill. Democrats are compromising now after fighting these changes for a year so that the next even more conservative congress, voted in by people like you, in a month doesn't sign something far far far far worse, with actual death tolls and war crimes as a result.

    Go read some of the failed Republican Amendments to the 2024 NDAA.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    Democrats didn’t add this to the defence bill.

    They didn't have to show overwhelming support for it, either. But since they agree with you that trans people are expendable, they did.

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  • [–] -2 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    If those trans kids break a bone or get sick they get covered, so clearly I care more about them than you who wants them to get no coverage.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Know what happens when trans kids don't get the treatment that you and both parties don't want them to have? Know what happens when they can't get access to puberty blockers? Know what happens when their skeletons begin to ossify into a form abhorrent to them?

    Some of them commit suicide.

    I'd say you don't care, but I have no doubt whatsoever that dead trans kids are your preferred outcome.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 years ago (8 children)

    Disagree. The only reason 60 votes are needed is because somebody will filibuster it. So grow a fucking backbone, and call out whichever asshole senator is refusing to fund the troops because he cares more about sticking it to transgender people. Don't just vote for the thing, don't focus on getting it passef no matter what, put your fucking foot down and name and shame. Point out that one person is holding up a spending bill worth hundreds of billions of dollars over an objection to a line item that probably costs $100k.

    Or better, reform the filibuster. The filibuster is a good thing in concept. The procedural filibuster however means that it now takes 60 votes to pass something instead of 50 and there's essentially no consequence for that. That was not the intent of the Framers.

    If you want to filibuster something, you should have to get up there and read the phone book for hours. It should grind the government to a halt. It should be disruptive to everything, a measure used for only the worst bills.

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  • [–] -2 points 2 years ago (7 children)

    Some things do automatically require a supermajority, but removing Filibuster right before a Republican Majority is basically giving them complete authority, no?

    But even if every single Senate Democrat was on board with the idea, they would still be outnumbered by Republicans for the last 10 years, they've only managed to pick majority leaders in that time period because of caucusing with Ind and an occasional VP tiebreaker.

    Get 51 D + 2 Ind then I can fully support removing the filibuster.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (6 children)

    And, much like most Republicans over the last decade or two or maybe three, you are thinking about what's good for your agenda in the short-term and not what's good for the nation in the long-term.
    The procedural filibuster is bad for the country. It's bad for the country when Republicans have a majority, it's bad for the country when Democrats have a majority. And if the GOP tries to pass something awful, maybe one of our Democrats could grow a backbone and actually filibuster the damn thing.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    If you think Republicans passing their proposed tax cuts for the rich, gutting benefits, and firing squads for undocumented migrants is good for the country, then you're not going to convince me of jack shit, pal. That is the power you propose handing them.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (4 children)

    All those things would be worthy of a stand-up filibuster.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago* (3 children)

    Yes, you said the filibuster should be gotten rid of. If we got rid of that, the 53 Senate Republicans have the votes to pass these.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    I said get rid of the procedural filibuster. That's where a Senator can say 'I'm filibustering that bill' and it can't advance further until 60 Senators vote to end debate on the bill. The chamber then moves on to other business. That allows any Senator to mostly block any bill without consequence. That IMHO is bad.

    The real filibuster- where a Senator will stand up for hours and read the phone book, that is essential to stop the worst bills. It should be used sparingly and it should be disruptive.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Yeah, I guess I could get behind that. At least make it really uncomfortable for people to block reform, I guess. Still not great when the senate majority is GOP, but who knows what could come of it.

    I still think a much more ideal solutions is getting 60 Democrats in the senate.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago

    Yes exactly. If someone wants to block something, don't make it a little procedural thing that can be forgotten. Make it a big deal. Put it on the news. Let them put their face on it.

    That also means that Democrats would much less need 60 votes to push many policies. Most of what they would do can be done with 51, and real filibusters would block the really bad stuff.

    I don't believe either party has all the answers. I am disappointed that the GOP has gone down the rabbit hole of project 2025 and religious nuts, but there are some things they get right. Neither party deserves unchecked power.

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