The Senate is moving toward the first major bill that will stop employers from discriminating based on sexual orientation in almost two decades after seven Republicans and 54 Democrats cleared the bill on Monday night, the Associated Press reported.
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act would prohibit workplace discrimination against gay, bisexual and transgender Americans and will be the first major gay rights bill to pass in Congress since the ban on gays serving openly in the military passed in 2010, the AP reported.
The bill still faces strong opposition by conservative groups in the House, and Speaker John Boehner, R- Ohio, continues to insist the bill would damage small businesses, according to the AP.
According to Boehner, the bill, if passed, could lead to costly lawsuits, trample on religious freedom and undermine job creation in small businesses, the AP reported. Boehner's firm opposition of the bill may influence whether the House votes on it before the year ends.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., criticized Boehner's justification for delaying the voting and passing of the bill.
In response to Boehner's stating the bill may cause small businesses to confront lawsuits, Reid cited a study by the Government Accountability Office which found few lawsuits in states already enforcing discrimination laws, the AP reported.
"Coming from the man whose caucus spent $3 million in taxpayer dollars defending the unconstitutional Defense of Marriage law in court, that's pretty rich," Reid said, according to the AP.
Beside Boehner, no other Republican Senator has spoken against the bill in over a day, and no argument was raised before Monday night's vote, according to the AP.
Republican Senators Rob Portman from Ohio and Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania are currently drafting amendments to the bill dealing with religious exemptions, showing signs this may be a victory for gay rights equality.
If the bill passes, it would end a 17-year battle in support of a similar discrimination law that failed by one vote in 1996, the same year Congress and President Bill Clinton signed off on the law which prohibits federal recognition of same-sex marriages, the AP reported.
Senator Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., is a chief sponsor of the bill, said he's happy about passing the first hurdle, but hopes the bill gets passed "sooner rather than later."
"I think back to Martin Luther King's commentary that the great arc of the universe bends toward justice and I feel that our notion of fairness about employment, how central that is to pursuit of happiness, how central it is to equality, how central it is to the golden rule ... means that we will accomplish this," Merkley said, according to the AP.
After the Senate's first passing vote on Monday night, President Barack Obama called the vote "common sense starting to prevail," according to the AP.
"Inexorably, the idea of a more tolerant, more prosperous country that offers more opportunity to more people, that's an idea that the vast majority of Americans believe in," President Obama said to a group of supporters in Washington on Monday night, the AP reported.
