Kamala Harris centers LGBTQ+ rights in speech to teachers’ union

In a campaign appearance today at the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) convention in Houston, Texas, Vice President Kamala Harris spoke at length about the corrosive effect that book bans and other anti-LGBTQ+ policy and legislation are having on America’s teachers and children. Her speech indicated that she’ll devote attention to those issues in her presidential campaign.

“We are in a fight for our most fundamental freedoms,” Harris declared to the thousands of teachers at AFT’s annual gathering. “And to this room of leaders, I say: Bring it on.”

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Chants of “Bring it on! Bring it on!” erupted across the hall.

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Harris has made the far-right assault on personal freedoms — like the right to choose and marriage equality — central to her vice-presidency, leading the administration of President Joe Biden to call for federal legislation restoring the protections of Roe v Wade nationwide and working with legislators to shepherd the Respect for Marriage Act through Congress. President Biden signed that legislation in 2022.

Shortly after the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v Wade, Harris called Justice Clarence Thomas’ concurrence a harbinger of other reversals to come. Thomas said the nation’s highest court should consider overturning the gay marriage law as well as others guaranteeing the rights to consensual same-sex intercourse and access to contraceptives.

“I think he just said the quiet part out loud,” Harris said.

Harris drew a stark contrast in her speech between Democrats and the MAGA-fueled Republican candidates that voters will choose between in November.

“In this moment across our nation, we witness a full-on attack on hard-won, hard-fought freedoms,” she told the teachers’ union members on Thursday.  

“While you teach students about democracy and representative government, extremists attack the sacred freedom to vote,” Harris said.

“While you try to create welcoming places where our children can learn, extremists attack our freedom to live safe from gun violence. They have the nerve to tell teachers to strap on a gun in the classroom while they refuse to pass common sense gun safety laws!

“And while you teach students about our nation’s past, these extremists attack the freedom to learn and acknowledge our nation’s true and full history, including book bans. Book bans, in this year of our Lord 2024!” she added.

From deep in the hall, a supporter shouted, “You tell ’em, President Harris,” eliciting a broad smile from the presumptive Democratic nominee.

“Just think about it: we want to ban assault weapons, and they want to ban books! Can you imagine?” Harris asked incedulously.

“All the while, these extremists also attack the freedom to love who you love openly and with pride. They passed so-called ‘Don’t Say Gay’ laws,” Harris said of Republicans in Florida and other states that turned out copycat versions of Gov. Ron DeSantis‘s signature legislation that restricts classroom instruction on LGBTQ+ identities.

Harris, who has boasted she’ll hold her record up to former President Trump’s “any day of the week,” then fully embraced her role promoting marriage equality in its earliest days.

“Many of you may know, in 2004 on Valentine’s Day weekend, I was one of the first elected officials in the country to perform same-sex marriages,” Harris told the teachers to applause.

“It pains me so to think 20 years later that there are young teachers in their 20s who are afraid to put up a photograph of themselves and their partner, for fear they could lose their job,” she said.

“And what is their job? The most noble of work, teaching other people’s children — and God knows, we don’t pay you enough as it is,” she said.

“We are in the fight,” Harris went on to say. “We who believe that every American should be free from bigotry and hate, to protect our teachers and our students from discrimination and make sure every student can learn America’s history.

“And we who believe in reproductive freedom will restore the freedom of a woman to make decisions about her own body, and not have her government telling her what to do!” she continued.

Chants of “Bring it on! Bring it on!” rose in the hall.

“That’s right,” Harris added. “Bring it on.”

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