Dec 19, 2008  |  By: CHRIS JOHNSON  | COMMENTS     

Gay activists met with members of President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team last week in a two-hour session focused on policy issues and presidential appointments, according to gay group leaders.

Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said transition leaders were “very receptive” to requests from gay activists.

“I think they went to great lengths to explain their vision for how [policy initiatives] would work and how our community would be a part of that,” he said.

Rea Carey, executive director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force, said transition team officials were attentive during the meeting and very appreciate of the clarity of recommended policy changes.

“They were taking notes, they were listening, they were responding, they were asking questions, they were a very, very engaged transition team and that bodes well for our community moving forward,” she said.

About 60 people attended the Dec. 10 meeting, including transition leaders such as John Podesta, co-chair of Obama’s transition team; Jim Messina, who is in charge of Obama’s personnel decisions; Mike Strautmanis, director of public liaison and intergovernmental affairs; Melanie Barnes, whom Obama tapped to become the White House’s domestic policy director; and Parag Mehta, the transition team’s liaison for minority groups, according to activists.

Gay members of the transition team also were at the meeting, Solmonese said, including Roberta Achtenberg, Elaine Kaplan and Fred Hochberg.

The Obama transition team did not respond to a request for comment on the meeting.

Appointing more openly gay people to high positions in the Obama administration was a major focus of the meeting.

Chuck Wolfe, president of the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund, urged Obama’s team to give serious consideration to appointing former Interior Department Assistant Secretary for Policy Management & Budget John Berry, who is gay, to a cabinet post. Obama later chose U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar (D-Colo.) for the job.

“President-elect Obama promises a diverse administration filled with talented individuals from all walks of life,” Wolfe said during the meeting, according to his prepared remarks. “This must include gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans. Anything less is not fully inclusive, and that could be seen as an indication that our community is little more than an ATM for campaigns.”

Solmonese said Wolfe had “a very legitimate point” and “there is going to be that censure if there is not a high-level person” in the Obama administration who is openly gay.

Obama has noted “his vision of diversity and a diverse administration very clearly includes GLBT Americans,” Solmonese said, adding that he thinks “there is an expectation that he will hold true to that, now that he’s been elected president.”

Carey said activists also told transition officials that the gay community is interested in being part of the major issues of the day, whether they be the economic crisis or health care reform.

“I encouraged the transition team to view our community not simply as interested in what they might think of as discreet LGBT issues,” she said, “but to fully honor that we are part and parcel of the people that are losing their homes, the people losing their retirement funds, the people who are losing their jobs and the people who do not have access to adequate health care.”

Activists made it clear that the gay community wants to be “part of creating solutions to these problems” and asked transition officials to make sure that “LGBT people are not left behind when these discussions are taking place,” Carey said.

Besides Berry, activists urged the transition team to consider bringing into the administration Mary Beth Maxwell, a lesbian and founding executive director of American Rights at Work, who is being considered for labor secretary, and Hochberg, a gay man who is being considered to head up the Small Business Administration, Solmonese said.

Last week, Obama brought in the first openly gay person to a prominent position in his administration by tapping Nancy Sutley, deputy mayor of Los Angeles for energy and environment, to head the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

Wolfe commended the decision to bring Sutley on board and said in a statement that her nomination “sends a signal to young people that they can participate in their government at its highest levels, regardless of their sexual orientation, gender or ethnicity.”

Wolfe told the Blade that transition officials were “very receptive” to requests to appoint gay people to the administration and said Obama’s team told gay activists they “we would be very happy with the results of the appointments.”

“Our point is we will be happy if there is a cabinet-level appointment,” he said. “Anything less than a ...