Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) issued the following statement regarding the memorials planned for openly gay, 15-year-old hate crime murder victim Lawrence King:
“I was deeply saddened by the recent death of 15-year-old Lawrence King who was killed at his school in Oxnard , CA . No one should face intimidation or violence, particularly at school, because of their sexual orientation or the way they express their gender identity.
“We must finally enact a federal hate crimes law to ensure that gay, lesbian and transgender Americans are protected against violent, bias-motivated crimes. We must send a unified message that hate-based crime will not be tolerated.”
I did a search to see if Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) had yet made any statement on the situation, but I couldn’t find anything. That, of course, isn’t to say that Obama hasn’t said anything — I just couldn’t find it.
February 24th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
he did it yesterday:
“It was heartbreaking to learn about Lawrence King’s death, and my thoughts and prayers go out to his family. King’s senseless death is a tragic example of the corrosive effect that bigotry and fear can have in our society. It’s also an urgent reminder that we need to do more in our schools to foster tolerance and an acceptance of diversity; that we must enact a federal hate crimes law that protects all LGBT Americans; and that we must recommit ourselves to becoming active and engaged parents, citizens and neighbors, so that bias and bigotry cannot
take hold in the first place. We all have a responsibility to help this nation live up to its founding promise of equality for all.”
carefully worded – no mention of sexual orientation, gender identity, etc. Hillary spoke the words explicitly -” transgender, lesbian, gay. Obama and his people craft everything to not offend anyone.