LGBT Equity, D.C. Style

WASHINGTON — The Consumer Electronics Association last week announced that it was providing financial support to the Log Cabin Republicans, but CEA president and CEO Gary Shapiro is not the only top trade executive promoting gender equality.

“I’m very proud of CEA’s groundbreaking financial support for the Log Cabin Republicans,” said CEA president Gary Shapiro. “Our visible announcement proves that trade associations want lawmakers and policies that recognize the economic value of hiring the best and brightest minds, regardless of sexual orientation.”

The Log Cabin Republicans’ mission is to “advance the interests of the gay and lesbian community within the Republican Party,” including backing candidates who support “equal rights under law to persons who are gay or lesbian.”

National Cable & Telecommunications Association president Michael Powell has also made his voice heard on the subject of gender equality.

In 2013, Powell joined a large group of conservatives in a brief to the Supreme Court on the challenge to California’s Defense of Marriage Act, expressing the view that “there is no legitimate, fact-based reason for denying same-sex couples the same recognition in law that is available to opposite-sex couples.”

“This position reflects his personal views,” an NCTA spokesperson said. “He was asked by a group of Republicans that supported the case to sign on, and he did.”

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.