Rebekah L. Sanders

The Republic | azcentral.com

Democrats are fueling the debate over the Obama administration's directives on school accommodations for transgender students by pushing legislation in Congress related to LGBT issues.

The latest attempt comes from U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., who plans to introduce on Friday a bill requiring the U.S. census and other federal surveys to ask respondents about their sexual orientation and gender identity. Like other census data, the responses would be reported anonymously.

The answers would help lawmakers better understand policy that affects LGBT people, Grijalva said.

"The current lack of sound data about sexual orientation and gender identity in many federal surveys means we are ill-prepared to meet the needs of these communities," he said in a written statement. "To go uncounted is to be unseen in the eyes of policymakers, which is why we must develop a credible and confidential understanding of these vulnerable populations we currently know too little about."

The bill has one New York Republican supporter and more than 60 Democratic original co-sponsors. They include Arizona Democratic Reps. Kyrsten Sinema, the only openly bisexual member of Congress, and Ruben Gallego, a straight member of the LGBT Equality Caucus.

Grijalva led a letter by about 70 lawmakers in April that urged the U.S. Census Bureau to accelerate plans to add questions beyond same-sex marriage to its forms. Federal agencies already have been meeting to discuss LGBT data collection.

Some critics warn people may not answer the census accurately for fear of "outing" themselves to the government. But some opponents of gay rights welcome the idea, predicting data will show a smaller demographic than activists claim.

Grijalva's bill is likely to go nowhere in the Republican-led Congress. But it signals Democrats' willingness to push issues important to their liberal base in an election year, even if it holds up important legislation.

"Democrats (are looking) to sabotage the appropriations process," House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.,said late Wednesday, after the minority party sought successfully to add gay-rights protections to a water and energy bill.

"If they drive the bulldozer at us, we have to push back," U.S. Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., told the Washington Post.

Republicans countered with an amendment asserting religious exemptions. The controversy helped kill support for the underlying legislation, sending House leaders back to the drawing board on a key annual spending bill.

A similar fight unfolded last week. Chaos erupted when Republicans held open a floor vote on a military spending bill so that several of their members could switch their votes in order to defeat an LGBT amendment offered by Democrats.

Both amendments sought to uphold President Barack Obama's executive order barring employment discrimination by federal contractors on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation.

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said the outcome is the fault of Ryan's own party: "House Republicans' thirst to discriminate against the LGBT community is so strong that they are willing to vote down their own appropriations bill in order to prevent progress over bigotry."

USA Today reporter Paul Singer contributed to this article.