More co-sponsors signing on to the DOMA Repeal Bill

Politico's story earlier this morning has it at 69, AFP provided a later count at 75, and the latest from AP puts it at 76.

Obstacles remain even as the number of co-sponsors grows. Glenn Thrush reports:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Barney Frank (D-Mass.) aren't backing the bill, which seeks to roll back DOMA restrictions on federal benefits and partnership rights for gay and lesbian couples, opting to press other anti-discrimination bills first.

According to the AP, even supporters of the bill acknowledges that this is not an easy task:

Ilan Kayatsky, spokesman for Nadler, said the repeal was being introduced now primarily "to gain support and momentum and educate people." Nadler chairs a Judiciary subcommittee that would consider a repeal.

The president of a gay advocacy group, the Human Rights Campaign, said Frank's disagreement was about tactics, not the goal of repeal.

"We're making a case for an ambitious bill, and I don't have any illusions that it will be easy or happen overnight," added the group's president, Joe Solmonese.

Other gay leaders have a more optimistic view:

Still, gay leaders say the bill is a necessary first step. “We're obviously strongly supportive of the bill, and we're very grateful that Congressman Nadler has introduced it,” said Mary Cooley, president of Lambda Independent Democrats, a gay political club in Brooklyn.
“To have Congress repeal DOMA I think is very viable,” said Ron Zacchi, executive director of Marriage Equality New York, an all-volunteer nonprofit advocacy group that formed in 1998. “Both political parties have said that government on the federal level shouldn't be involved in marriage, and the Defense of Marriage Act is [Washington] taking a stance on marriage. Letting states decide for themselves is something both parties have said they support.”

I still think Rep. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi's EDNA->DADT->DPBOA approach reflects politics of a bygone era, where we were craving for nothing more than bread crumbs. Keep in mind that even if Frank's prediction is true, that the GLAD lawsuit prompts the Supreme Court to overturn DOMA in 2013, without the "Certainty Provision" that Rep. Nadler is proposing, it would only benefit a very small LGBT population that is lucky enough to live in states where same-sex marriage is legal. For the vast majority, it'd be meaningless.

One interesting thing to note is that Barney Frank has recently indicated he'd retire from Congress after 2011 and is interested in becoming the secretary for Housing and Urban Development. That might explain, in part, why he went from criticizing the Obama Administration for filing the infamous DOMA brief to defending the decision. Could it be that his lack of interest in the DOMA Repeal bill is just another way to make his future boss' life easier?