“Unless you’ve had a right withheld, it is often hard to comprehend what it would mean to gain it."

Montana Lawmakers Reject LGBT Anti-Discrimination Law: “I Do Not Rent To Your Kind”

Lawmakers in Montana killed a bill this week that would have extended civil rights protections to LGBT residents in housing, services, employment and other areas.

On Monday, a legislative committee voted to table HB417 11 to 8, just days after members of the LGBT community testified to the abject discrimination they had suffered in the state.

One woman, Kathleen O’Donnell, told the Judiciary Committee that after four years in the Army, she and her fiancé were turned away by a potential landlord in Billings because they were lesbians.

After O’Donnell looked at the home, the owner asked her who would be living there with her.

“I said my fiancé, Casey, and my son,” she recounted. “‘Is Casey a girl or a boy?’ he asked. I was little taken aback, but I answered, ’Casey is a girl.'”

He looked me in the eye and said, ‘I do not rent to your kind.’”



O’Donnell shared she was also let go from a job because the owners disproved of her sexual orientation.

“I was fired based on the whims of two powerful people who did not want a lesbian working for them,” she testified. “My family was forced to live without income for three months. At the end of the day, we’re all human beings. We are asking and we deserve the same rights as everybody else.”

The Montana Human Rights Act currently protects people from discrimination on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, sex, disability, age and nationality.

Rep. Abbott gives heartfelt personal story about fear as an LGBTQ person living w/out legal protections. #HB417 pic.twitter.com/2E5QocbyXq — Kim Leighton (@km_leighton) February 21, 2017

Opponents argued the bill—Opponents maintained the measure, which would have added sexual orientation and gender identity to Montana’s Human Rights Act—would create “special rights” for people based on a “lifestyle choice,” and that it attempted to solve a problem that didn’t really exist.

Rep. Lola Sheldon-Galloway (R-Great Falls) actually recounted historical discrimination against Mormons as a reason to oppose the measure.

“In 1930, a state governor extended an extermination order for a religious sect. You could shoot these people on the spot and not get accused of anything,” she said. “I’m part of that group… This extermination order wasn’t even relinquished until 1976.”

“Next we’re going to have another group here that wants their name in [the Human Rights Act],” she added. “And another group, and another group.”

Sheldon-Galloway and other Republicans maintained the prohibition against sex discrimination already protected LGBT Montanans.

“I’m not trying to divide you. I’m trying to include you in. And I’m offended that I could be told that because I’m going to say ’no’ to this bill that I’m not wrapping my arms around this group and defending them… The stories we heard were wrong. Absolutely wrong. But you’re already protected and I will stand with you in that protection.”

Attempts by President Obama and others to do just that—include orientation and identity under sex discrimination—have been met with forceful resistance.

“If it were enough, we wouldn’t even need to have this conversation,” said House Minority Leader Jenny Eck. “The fact of the matter is people are being discriminated against and the language in the law as it currently stands is not enough.”

Opponents also raised the usual canards that the bill would infringe on religious freedom and open the door to sexual predators attacking women in public restrooms.

But for LGBT Montanans, not having protections has caused real—not theoretical—pain and suffering. Angie Rolando of Great Falls, part of the lawsuit that overturned Montana’s same-sex marriage ban in 2014, cried as opponents to HB417 testified.

“Unless you’ve had a right withheld,” she said, “it is often hard to comprehend what it would mean to gain it.”

In 27 states, LGBT people can still denied access to housing, services or employment.