By Christopher Lisotta

On Sept. 5, Lee Badgett, the research director for the UCLA Law School’s Williams Institute, sat down in front of a U.S. House subcommittee to talk. Badgett was one of several academics, legal minds and business leaders to appear in front of the the House Subcommittee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions to discuss H.R. 2015, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), which would make it illegal to fire, refuse to hire or refuse to promote employees based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Speaking on her research showing that there is clear evidence of discrimination based on orientation and identity in the workplace and that ENDA could help change that picture, Badgett said the subcommittee was “professionally respectful, even the folks who were expressing skepticism.”

In a sign of how close ENDA may be in terms of passage into law, Badgett noted Democrats on the subcommittee “seemed quite comfortable” in their support of the bill, while “no one came out and said they disagreed.”

“I think people sound optimistic,” Badgett said of ENDA’s passage. Reintroduced in April by out Democratic Reps. Barney Frank (MA) and Tammy Baldwin (WI), along with their straight Republican colleagues Deborah Pryce (OH) and Christopher Shays (CT), ENDA’s supportive response during its day of testimony points to the bill’s good chances of Congressional passage this year.

Besides sponsoring legislation, Baldwin also testified at the subcommittee hearing, where she spoke of her first-hand experience with workplace discrimination when she practiced law in her home state.

“ENDA does not create special rights,” Baldwin said. “It simply affords to all Americans basic employment protection from discrimination based on irrational prejudice.”

Along with Badgett and Baldwin, two people directly impacted by discrimination testified at the hearing. Officer Michael P. Carney, a Massachusetts police officer, and Brooke Waits, a Texas cell phone company employee, both spoke about how they were terminated because of anti-gay job discrimination. Carney spoke about how a state law protected him, while Waits testified that in her home state no such protections were in place to help her.

Nancy Kramer, founder and CEO of the Ohio firm Resource Interactive, spoke about how her small business’ nondiscrimination policies have strengthened its ability to compete.

“Passing ENDA will not create a burden on businesses, large or small,” Kramer said before testifying. “Instead, it will ensure that hardworking GLBT Americans can earn a living, provide for their families and contribute to the innovation and creativity that makes American business great.”

Supporters of ENDA point to public support for nondiscrimination as a reason why the bill deserves to be made law. A Harris Interactive poll taken in August showed that 64 percent of American adults believe it is unfair that federal law currently allows for an employer to fire someone because they are gay or lesbian. A similar majority—60 percent—of heterosexual adults were not even aware that federal law does not provide protections for employees on the basis of sexual orientation.

ENDA is hardly a new legislative concept. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force first worked with then-New York Democratic Reps. Ed Koch and Bella Abzug as far back as 1974 to introduce a workplace discrimination bill in Congress. Twenty years later, during the Clinton Administration, ENDA made its appearance with 30 co-sponsors and Senate hearings. In 1996 a political deal backfired in the face of LGBT activists when the Defense of Marriage Act and ENDA were introduced together in Congress. While a federal DOMA was passed and signed into law by President Clinton, ENDA was rejected in a nail-biter 50-49 floor vote in the Senate. Following its 1997 introduction, Clinton signed an executive order barring workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation for Federal civilian workers in 1998. The bill was brought up or discussed in committee four more times from 1999 and 2003, but saw its scope expanded when transgender activists pushed to have gender identity included in its language, a move that some lawmakers and advocates initially feared would jeopardize its chances for passage.

The 2007 ENDA is making history, since it marks the first time the bill will make it to the House floor, something that was close to inconceivable before 2006, when Republicans controlled the legislative agenda in that chamber. The Senate has yet to introduce its version of the ENDA for the current legislative session, but Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy is expected to usher the bill through over the next few weeks. If ENDA made it through both chambers of Congress, that would be a milestone, but to make it to actual law, the bill would need to survive any veto challenge from the White House.

According to Human Rights Campaign spokesman Brad Luna, the Bush administration has not put out any statements regarding its position on ENDA in the event it makes it to the president’s desk, but “we all know that George Bush doesn’t have a very good track record on gay issues,” he said.

Even if ENDA is vetoed and its supporters are unable to muster the two-thirds majority needed in both chambers to override the president (a tall order for any bill), that doesn’t mean the exercise will be a total defeat for the LGBT community, Luna said. He pointed to the Family Medical Leave Act, which languished in Congress for years before being vetoed by the first President Bush. The bill made it to law in 1993 when it was signed by President Clinton.

“Congress works on precedent,” Luna explained. “It is extremely significant if this passed Congress.”

For Dave Noble, director of public policy and governmental affairs for the Task Force, ENDA’s congressional passage puts everyone on record, particularly the president, who Noble noted “has obviously tried to disparage LGBT people as part of his political tactics in the past.”

The bill will force the president to “decide whether or not he'll actually veto basic civil rights protections,” Noble said. “Does he really want to be remembered as that out-of-touch and that divisive? We need to make him choose.”