ADVANCING RACIAL JUSTICE How HRC Deepened Our Work in 2020

by Alberto Morales, he/him pronouns

2020 will be remembered as the year when the entire world was forced to reckon with the fight for racial justice in meaningful and transformational ways. This year, the Human Rights Campaign has deepened our work in this space in a number of ways, serving to make the organization’s mission more diverse, equitable and inclusive than ever before.

“See yourselves in each other.” That was the challenge that HRC President Alphonso David offered to the HRC community during an inaugural address in July 2020. He invited us all to use radical empathy to bridge divides that exist within the LGBTQ community and those that exist between the LGBTQ movement and other civil rights movements.

He further crystallized HRC’s new direction last September in a USA Today op-ed titled “Human Rights Campaign hasn’t always defended LGBTQ people of color - we’re changing that.” The oped was a clear and public statement of our goals, providing a roadmap to help guide HRC’s work and ensure that we would be held accountable.

Little did we know that 2020 would demand action on all of these promises and then some; action on which HRC was more than eager to deliver.

One of the first steps that HRC took soon after David’s arrival was to make four critical hires: Tori Cooper as director of community engagement for the Transgender Justice Initiative, Michael Vazquez as director of HRC Foundation’s Religion and Faith Program, Jason Starr as litigation director and Elizabeth Bibi as senior advisor for communications. Concurrently, also in the spirit of expansion for the sake of increasing touchpoints with new communities, HRC opened two satellite offices in New York and Los Angeles.

But within a few short months, the COVID-19 crisis — and the protests following the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hands of police officers — changed everything. In May, the world was banging on the doors of all institutions to do more for racial justice, and we doubled down on our efforts.

That same month, we sprung into action and drafted a letter, citing the need for LGBTQ organizations to center racial justice in their work. So far, more than 800 LGBTQ and civil rights organizations have signed on, making explicit commitments to embrace anti-racism and end white supremacy, not as necessary corollaries to our missions, but as integral to the objective of full equality for LGBTQ people. This is incredibly significant because these organizations are saying — some for the first time — that they will center racial justice in their core work.

But the moment demanded more of us, and so began a rapid succession of a great number of anti-racism efforts at HRC.

In June, through the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, we signed on to several letters calling on Congress to enact sweeping policing and criminal justice legislative policies in order to combat a history of anti-Black racism.

We successfully challenged a bill pushed by the Republican leadership in the Senate that effectively undermined the movement for transforming policing and instead sought to simply continue to fund the current operational construct. The bill was ultimately rejected.

We also drafted a strong policy document on transforming policing and secured more than 350 LGBTQ organizations to join in support. For the first time, this letter developed, for the first time, an organizational framework to advocate for divestment of police resources and reinvestment in communities and outlined other key policy issues that result in over-policing in minority communities. It has also been used as a reference for other non-LGBTQ organizations seeking to inform and advance the public discourse on this issue.

In addition, we released a letter, joined by more than 100 prominent faith leaders, condemning the Trump-Pence administration for failing to denounce racism and the epidemic of violence against Black people, as well as their use of religious symbols as props.

Under Cooper’s leadership, the Transgender Justice Initiative, has created new programs to assist Black trans and gender non-conforming leaders in capacity building, leadership development. Notably, the initiative has also created a program in economic empowerment which established task forces in communities hardest hit by the epidemic of anti-trans violence.

We also continue to work with Stacey Abrams on researching how voter suppression impacts marginalized communities.

On all of these issues, we have provided consultation and support to local, state and national organizations in their racial justice work, including Equality Florida, NAACP and the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.

We also amplified our message of equality and inclusivity on our building as a form of advocacy. The Human Rights Campaign building has been used as a form of advocacy in the past, with installations that have recognized the Pulse nightclub shooting and marriage equality. On Juneteenth, we continued that tradition and unveiled a massive art installation at our headquarters in Washington created by renowned artist Hank Willis Thomas. The work wraps the white walls of our building in black. The panel designed by Thomas reads, “All Li es Matter,” and an additional panel declares, “Black Lives Matter” and “Black Trans Lives Matter.” Just a few blocks from the White House, it is the largest-ever presentation of a work by Thomas.

We worked with Grammy/Emmy/ Tony award-winning actor, singer and activist Billy Porter to release an inspiring video encouraging people to vote and marking 100 days until the 2020 election.

We launched a public education campaign called Vote Equal, Vote Safe to help share important information about mail-in voting and to start building excitement for the upcoming presidential election.

The impact of all of our work is clear and demonstrable. Because of our engagement, we have been able to better inform the public discourse on racial justice, inform public policy including legislation to better protect communities, challenge industry partners to step more intentionally into racial justice work and increase the relevance of the Human Rights Campaign and the LGBTQ rights movement.

2020 asked us all to do more than we’ve ever done before for racial justice. HRC is proud to have taken up the fight and we are more committed than ever to do this work and to play a leading role in delivering on the promise of justice for all.

“See yourselves in each other.” Yes, indeed, but more than that, we’re committing ourselves to do battle for each other, because an injustice to one of us is an injustice to all of us.