The Governor's Task Force on Hate Crimes was an agency created by then-Governor William Weld, linking representatives of the state police and local law enforcement agencies with community advocates to further the state government's commitment to eradicating bias-motivated crime in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Task Force was given permanent status by former Governor Paul Cellucci in 1998. [1]
In 2003, Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney vetoed a bill funding hate crimes prevention funding, after which he impounded money previously approved by former Governor Jane Swift for a bullying prevention program. The anti-bullying program was based on a 165-page guide, "Direct from the Field: A Guide to Bullying Prevention", which the Task Force intended to publish and make available to communities to provide guidance on implementing bullying prevention programs in middle schools and high schools. The editor of the bullying prevention manuscript was Don Gorton, who had been appointed chair of the Task Force by Weld in 1991.
The bullying prevention guide was ready in 2003, but according to Gorton, the $10,000 needed to publish it was not available. Mitt Romney, who was inaugurated as governor on January 2, 2003, eliminated all funds for hate crime prevention after taking office. The result was that the Task Force lost its staff. Gorton stayed on as co-chair of the Task Force and continued to nurse the anti-bullying project. The bullying prevention program continues to attract the ire of right-wing Christian activists, who attempt to equate it with the Anita Bryant canard that homosexuals are actively engaged in "recruiting" young people into their ranks. [2]
Willard Mitt Romney is an American politician, businessman, and lawyer serving as the junior United States senator from Utah since January 2019, succeeding Orrin Hatch. He served as the 70th governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007 and was the Republican Party's nominee for president of the United States in the 2012 election, losing to the then incumbent president, Barack Obama.
William Floyd Weld is an American attorney, businessman, author, and politician who served as the 68th Governor of Massachusetts from 1991 to 1997. A Harvard and Oxford graduate, Weld began his career as legal counsel to the United States House Committee on the Judiciary before becoming the United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts and later, the United States Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division. He worked on a series of high-profile public corruption cases and later resigned in protest of an ethics scandal and associated investigations into Attorney General Edwin Meese.
Shannon Patricia Elizabeth O'Brien is an American politician and attorney who served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1987 through 1993, in the Massachusetts Senate from 1993 through 1995, and was the Massachusetts state treasurer from 1999 through 2003. In that last position she became the first woman to be elected in Massachusetts to statewide office by her own accord. She was the Democratic Party nominee in the 2002 Massachusetts gubernatorial election, but lost in the general election to Mitt Romney.
Trans bashing is the act of victimizing a person emotionally, physically, sexually, or verbally because they are transgender. The term has also been applied to hate speech directed at transgender people and at depictions of transgender people in the media that reinforce negative stereotypes about them. Trans and non-binary gender adolescents can experience bashing in the form of bullying and harassment. When compared to their cisgender peers, trans and non-binary gender youth are at increased risk for victimization, which has been shown to increase their risk of substance abuse.
Glenda Evans Hood is an American politician, who was Secretary of State of Florida, from 2003 to 2005, and the first woman to serve as Mayor of Orlando (1992–2003).
The Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) is a quasi-independent public authority that provides grants which partially fund municipal and regional school districts for kindergarten through high school construction and renovation projects in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
The Romney family is prominent in U.S. politics. Notable Romney family members include George W. Romney (1907–1995), the 43rd Governor of Michigan (1963–1969), and his son, Mitt Romney. Mitt Romney was 70th Governor of Massachusetts (2003–2007), Republican nominee for President of the United States in 2012, and is currently U.S. Senator for Utah. George W. Romney's father was Gaskell Romney (1871–1955), and his mother was Anna Amelia Pratt (1876–1926). Anna's grandfather was the renowned early Latter-day Saint apostle Parley Parker Pratt.
The 2002 Massachusetts gubernatorial election was held on November 5, 2002. Incumbent Republican acting governor Jane Swift chose not to seek a full term in office. Republican businessman Mitt Romney defeated Democratic Treasurer Shannon O'Brien.
Kerry Murphy Healey is a former U.S. politician who served as the 70th Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007 under Governor Mitt Romney. She is currently the inaugural president of the Milken Institute's Center for Advancing the American Dream in Washington, DC. Dr. Healey was previously the president of Babson College for six years. She served as a special advisor for Mitt Romney's Presidential Campaign in 2012.
Reed V. Hillman is an American law enforcement officer and politician who was the Republican nominee for Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts for the 2006 gubernatorial election in Massachusetts, as well as a former Massachusetts State Representative. He currently lives in Sturbridge, Massachusetts with his wife and two children.
Ernesto Scorsone is a notable LGBT advocate, American lawyer, politician and judge from Kentucky.
Don Gorton is a Massachusetts attorney who served as a state tax judge from 1997 to 2008.
Mitt Romney was sworn in as the 70th Governor of Massachusetts on January 2, 2003, along with Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey. Romney's term ended on January 4, 2007; he chose not to run for re-election.
The political positions of Mitt Romney have been recorded from his 1994 U.S. senatorial campaign in Massachusetts, the 2002 gubernatorial election, during his 2003–2007 governorship, during his 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, in his 2010 book No Apology: The Case for American Greatness, during his 2012 U.S. presidential campaign, and during his 2018 senatorial campaign in Utah. Some of these political positions have changed, while others have remained unchanged.
Gloria Cordes Larson is a prominent lawyer, public policy expert, and business leader. Larson was named president of Bentley University in 2007 and served in that role until June 2018. She was the seventh president of Bentley and the first woman to hold the post. Prior to joining Bentley, Larson served as secretary of consumer affairs and business regulation from 1991 to 1993, under former Massachusetts Governor William Weld and led a business advisory council for former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick.
MassResistance is a hate group that promotes anti-LGBT and socially conservative positions. The group is designated an anti-LGBT hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, in part for claims linking LGBT people with pedophilia and zoophilia, and claims that suicide prevention programs aimed at gay youth were created by homosexual activists to normalize and "lure" children into homosexuality.
A Massachusetts general election was held on November 5, 2002 in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in the United States have a long history, including vibrant subcultures and advocacy battles for social and religious acceptance and legal rights.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in Massachusetts have the same rights and responsibilities as cisgender heterosexuals. The U.S. state of Massachusetts is one of the most LGBT-friendly states in the country. In 2004, it became the first U.S. state to grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples after the decision in Goodridge v. Department of Public Health, and the sixth jurisdiction worldwide, after the Netherlands, Belgium, Ontario, British Columbia, and Quebec.
The White House Initiative on Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders (WHIAANHPI) is a United States governmental office that coordinates an ambitious whole-of-government approach to advance equity, justice, and opportunity for Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders. The Initiative collaborates with the Deputy Assistant to the President and AA and NHPI Senior Liaison, White House Office of Public Engagement and designated federal departments and agencies to advance equity, justice, and opportunity for AA and NHPIs in the areas of economic development, education, health and human services, housing, environment, arts, agriculture, labor and employment, transportation, justice, veterans affairs, and community development.
Romney/Healey tactics delay anti-bullying guide, In Newsweekly