Dec 07, 2007  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO J  | COMMENTS     

Gordon Smith (R-Ore.), who said they chose to combine the hate crimes bill with the Department of Defense bill as a strategy aimed at discouraging President Bush from vetoing the hate crimes bill.

The White House has said Bush opposes the hate crimes measure.

The legislation, known informally as the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act, would expand existing federal hate crimes laws to allow federal prosecution of violent hate crimes targeting persons on the basis of their sexual orientation and gender identity.

Although the bill explicitly limits enforcement to hate crimes involving violent acts, conservative religious groups have waged a nationwide campaign claiming it would subject preachers to prosecution for condemning homosexuality or “cross dressing” from the pulpit.

The Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay political group, stepped up its lobbying efforts over the past week for the combined Defense/hate crimes bill, calling on members and supporters to make phone calls and send e-mails to their representatives, urging them to back the joint bill.

“We’ve worked very hard to pass the hate crimes bill through both the House and Senate this year and now we’re steps away from sending the legislation to President Bush’s desk,” HRC said in a blog entry posted on its web site. “However, our battle is not yet over because the hate crimes language is in danger of being stripped out of the defense authorization conference report if we don’t fight to keep support for the hate crimes bill intact.”

Frank said he and Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), the only openly lesbian member of Congress, were continuing to urge fellow House members to support the combined bill. But Frank said many of his House colleagues who are longtime gay rights supporters have expressed strong objections to the Senate strategy of combining the two bills.

White House officials have said attaching the hate crimes bill to the defense bill most likely would not deter the president from vetoing it. Frank noted that if Bush does veto a combined bill, as expected by some political observers, it would come back to Congress within days, and House and Senate leaders most likely would drop the hate crimes bill and pass the defense measure.

He said gay advocacy groups should now call on the Senate to pass a freestanding version of the hate crimes bill early next year. Since the Kennedy-Smith hate crimes amendment received 60 votes, a freestanding version of the bill should also receive at least that many votes, Frank said.

This year’s House approval of the bill would carry over to next year’s session of Congress, Frank noted, and an early 2008 Senate approval of the bill could send it to Bush’s desk as soon as February or March.

Most of the bill’s supporters acknowledge that there aren’t enough votes to override a Bush veto. But Frank and other Democrats said approval of the bill by Congress this year would lay the groundwork for passing the<