President Obama has just signed the Presidential Memorandum on Federal Benefits and Non-Discrimination which extends “some” benefits to the partners of federal gay and lesbian employees. Those benefits are restricted to:

Civil Service Employees

• Domestic partners of federal employees can be added to the long-term care insurance program
• Supervisors are required to allow employees to use their sick leave to take care of domestic partners and non-biological, non-adopted children

Foreign Service Employees

• Use of medical facilities at posts abroad
• Medical evacuation from posts abroad
• Inclusion in family size for housing allocations

The Memorandum unfortunately does not extend healthcare benefits to partners of gay and lesbian. In fact, many of the benefits already exist, as reported by John Aravosis at Americablog:

I just asked OPM Director John Berry, on a White House media conference call, whether in fact federal agencies already have the right to give these benefits to gay employees. The answer, “yes.” So what’s new about tonight? Obama is going to “tell” the agencies to give the benefits – as if any agency in the Obama administration would dare tell a gay employee no to a request for time off to attend their partner’s funeral?

Obama also announced his support for the Domestic Partners Benefits and Obligations Act which extends equal treatment in benefits for federal employees.

Video of Obama signing the Memorandum below:

The full text of the President Obama’s statement available here.

Add the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) to the growing list of those refusing to attend a DNC $1000-a-plate LGBT fundraiser over the recent DOMA brief controversy. As reported by Americablog, HRC joins Andy Towle of TowleRoad, Alan Van Capelle, Executive Director of the Empire State Pride Agenda and Foundation, former top Clinton aide Richard Socarides  and David Mixner, long time friend of Bill Clinton.

Vice President Joe Biden will be speaking at the event, hosted by gay representatives Barney Frank, Tammy Baldwin, and Jared Polis. Polis released a statement on the DOMA brief today.

“I was shocked and disappointed to learn that President Obama chose to defend DOMA in federal court, especially given his campaign promise to call for a full repeal of DOMA. My sadness turned to outrage when I read the Justice Department’s brief that not only defended this hurtful law but seemed to embrace it. Comparing my loving relationship with my partner, Marlon, to incest was unconscionable coming from a president who has called for change.”

Tammy Baldwin is also disappointed with the brief as reported at GayPolitics.com:

“Last week the Department of Justice filed a motion to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of DOMA.  I was profoundly disappointed by this action, particularly coming from this administration.”

Barney? Where are you?

It appears the fundraiser has all the makings of a PR disaster. Ben Smith at Politico writes: “Organizers, I’m told, are scrambling to get visible White House action on gay issues in advance of the June 25 dinner to prevent it from becoming a protest stage.”

Pam’s House Blend has published a list of those who were invited to the fundraiser, and the Washington Blade plans to cover the event to see who shows up.

The New York Times published an editorial today criticizing  Obama’s controversial defense brief for the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which cited decisions involving incest and underage marriage to make it’s case. From the New York Times:

The brief insists it is reasonable for states to favor heterosexual marriages because they are the “traditional and universally recognized form of marriage.” In arguing that other states do not have to recognize same-sex marriages under the Constitution’s “full faith and credit” clause, the Justice Department cites decades-old cases ruling that states do not have to recognize marriages between cousins or an uncle and a niece.

These are comparisons that understandably rankle many gay people. In a letter to President Obama on Monday, Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights organization, said, “I cannot overstate the pain that we feel as human beings and as families when we read an argument, presented in federal court, implying that our own marriages have no more constitutional standing than incestuous ones.”

…

If the administration does feel compelled to defend the act, it should do so in a less hurtful way. It could have crafted its legal arguments in general terms, as a simple description of where it believes the law now stands. There was no need to resort to specious arguments and inflammatory language to impugn same-sex marriage as an institution.

The best approach of all would have been to make clear, even as it defends the law in court, that it is fighting for gay rights. It should work to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” the law that bans gay men and lesbians in the military from being open about their sexuality. It should push hard for a federal law banning employment discrimination. It should also work to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act in Congress.

The controversy is definitely picking up steam, with coverage in the Wall Street Journal, CBS News and of course on the Rachel Maddow Show. Let’s hope Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is asked about it today.

A Fresno hospital has been asked to apologize, and adopt policy changes after a lesbian was denied access to her partner after she collapsed at the Meet in the Middle 4 Equality march last month. Teresa Rowe, and her partner Kristin Orbin, who suffered an epileptic seizure near the end of the 14 mile march, began to experience discrimination the moment the ambulance arrived.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) have sent a letter to the Community Regional Medical Center in Fresno on behalf of the couple, seeking an apology and the policy changes listed below:

1. Adopt a comprehensive visitation’ policy that:
   • Affirms all patients’ rights to have visitors, explicitly including same-sex partners and their children;
   • Outlines a clear process for determining when visitors will be restricted and how that decision will be communicated; and
   • Includes a grievance procedure in the case of visitation denial that can be acted on quickly in an emergency situation
2. Ensure that your hospitals’ non-discrimination policy explicitly describes LGBT individuals as a protected group;
3. Ensure that that your patients’ bill of rights explicitly describes the rights of LGBT patients;
4. Provide LGBT healthcare training to the Emergency Department staff at Community Regional Medical Center in Fresno; and
5. Participate in the 2009 Healthcare Equality Index, an annual survey of healthcare industry policies and practices related to LGBT individuals and families.

The Community Regional Medical Center has until June 22, 2009 to respond to the letter or risk possible legal action. The hospital however has already issued a statement denying any wrongdoing.

Rowe and Orbin told their story to ABC7 in San Francisco. Watch: