Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, our monthly Call your Senator segment with New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. 212-433-WNYC. She's here on a potentially historic day for the United States Senate as it may pass, with as many as 12 Republican votes, the bipartisan Respect for Marriage Act, which would require same-sex marriages performed in any state to be recognized by every state. There still could be some drama in today's vote over several amendments designed to protect the rights of some people and institutions to discriminate against same-sex couples on the basis of religious faith.

The amendments are framed as religious liberty amendments that would prevent discrimination based on religion, just as the bill prevents discrimination based on sexual orientation. Can the country have it both ways? We'll talk about that and more now with Senator Gillibrand. Senator, thanks as always. Welcome back to WNYC.

Senator Gillibrand: Thanks, Brian. I'm happy to be on.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners in New York, call your senator with any question or opinion about senate business or anything else relevant to Senator Gillibrand, and don't tell anyone outside New York, but really, they can call from the other 49 states too and anywhere else in the world as well. 212-433-9692 or tweet @BrianLehrer. Senator, is today the day that the Senate codifies same-sex marriage in the United States of America?

Senator Gillibrand: I do believe so. We have our vote later today. I think we have the votes we need to codify marriage equality. The Respect for Marriage Act will be a beacon of light to show all same-sex and interracial couples that Congress will stand by them and fight for their fundamental rights.

Brian Lehrer: To be specific, the bill does not force every state to perform same-sex marriages. It just forces every state to recognize marriages performed in every state. What's the practical implication for, let's say, a couple from Texas, if they can't get married there, but they fly to New York to get married here and then they return to Texas where they live? What's the practical impact of this law in this way?

Senator Gillibrand: It basically means that their marriage has to be recognized. It has the force of law and so that if you do have a marriage that you had before this terrible Supreme Court decision came out through Dobbs. It intimated that we might take away marriage equality next, that you can know that your marriage is legal, it is real, it has got the protection of law. It doesn't tell states they have to allow for marriages in those states, but it does give you federal protections that you are a legally married couple.

Brian Lehrer: Also state protections. If you get state health insurance benefit, let's say if you're married in the state of Texas in this hypothetical where Texas doesn't perform same-sex marriages, would you qualify for that?

Senator Gillibrand: I believe so. I think what the religious liberty amendments that we're going to probably vote on today are more focused on is saying that if you're not-for-profit religious organization, that you don't have to participate. I think that any law that says a state law has to recognize a federal contract, federal marriage, those laws are still in place, so you will have protections from states.

Brian Lehrer: About the religious liberty amendments. Let me read from a statement by Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah who wrote one of the amendments. He says, "Congress can recognize the ongoing validity of same-sex marriage without trampling on the first amendment rights," means religious liberty rights, "of those who believe in traditional marriage, but under the bill's current language many religious schools, faith-based organizations and other nonprofit entities adhering to traditional views of marriage would be at risk of losing tax exempt status and access to a wide range of federal programs."

Then he adds, "Many small businesses would also be affected. For example, wedding vendors, including kosher caterers, would be subjected to endless lawsuits and harassment based solely on their beliefs." He says, "Without my amendment, the Respect for Marriage Act would only exacerbate and nationalize discriminatory policies." Senator Gillibrand, how will you vote on Senator Lee's amendment?

Senator Gillibrand: I intend to vote no. His amendment is extreme because it's basically codifying discrimination and that it's okay to discriminate against people in the public sector, in the economy, in places where we do not tolerate that. The protection that might pass will be very narrow, that will be just for not-for-profit or religious organizations. We'll see which amendments actually get voted on, but I would not support the Lee amendment.

Brian Lehrer: I see. There might be a version of that that doesn't include for-profit businesses, is I think what you're saying.

Senator Gillibrand: Yes, I think there's an effort for a much narrower amendment, but I haven't seen the final amendments that we're going to vote on yet.

Brian Lehrer: Is it ultimately a zero-sum game, and the law has to discriminate against one or the other, and that makes it hard? Either allow nonprofit organizations, I guess, could include religious schools up through colleges, religion-affiliated hospitals, to deny services to same-sex couples or deny those religious people the right to practice this aspect of their religious beliefs. Is it a zero-sum game in that way?

Senator Gillibrand: I don't think it's a zero-sum game. I think it's just our constitution does not permit discrimination. When the constitution and laws that support these values say you can't discriminate against people for their race, their religion, their background, their ethnicity, that's what it means. You can't say just because you believe something different than I believe you can't participate. That's why we have laws that protect against discrimination. If a religious organization wants to only support and participate with people of their own religious faith, well, then they don't get the benefit of federal dollars. They can exist. They can do their work, but they don't get the support of things that we protect.

The First Amendment goes both ways. It protects everyone's right to free speech and everyone's right to religious freedom, whether you have faith or not. There are faiths that directly oppose the religious rights view on abortion and LGBTQ rights. We don't pick and choose our favorites here. We say everyone has equality and equal rights. We actually have to protect that because that's what our constitution says.

Brian Lehrer: Last thing on this. Do you have to get it done now in the lame duck session because the Republican Speaker of the House next year would refuse to even bring it up for a vote in the House, even though it would probably pass in the new House as well as the current one?

Senator Gillibrand: That is correct. We believe that the House will create a very right-wing agenda. I don't think they will bring up marriage equality in the new Congress, so doing it now is essential.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call on this topic first. Nathan in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi, Nathan.

Nathan: Hi, there. Good morning. I'm a longtime listener and a huge fan of yours, Brian, and I'm glad to be speaking with you Senator Gillibrand. I'm a raised Mormon. At 16, I was sent to conversion therapy at the church's institution. I was kicked out of BYU for being gay. I don't say that any way to create sympathy, but to talk about, obviously, my ambivalence with this bill. I've been listening, since I called in, to what you're saying Senator Gillibrand, and I very much feel similarly. I guess I'm just curious about, outside of the political arena, which, obviously, that's where we're focused right now, but this compromise that we're constantly trying to strike. Brian, you were talking about it being a zero- sum game.

I view religion primarily as the driver of homophobia and transphobia in America. It seems like we're really caught in this conundrum between the rights enumerated in the constitution that you were discussing. I don't know if it's just providing a little more perspective to the conversation or to get some thoughts from you Senator on it as well. That conundrum, which you've already addressed.

Brian Lehrer: Nathan, could it--

Senator Gillibrand: Well, thank you.

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead, Senator.

Senator Gillibrand: Sorry.

Brian Lehrer: Senator, go ahead.

Senator Gillibrand: I just want to say thank you to the caller for sharing your story and for your courage and your braveness. These are very hard and difficult things. So many horrible things have been done in our history in the name of religion, and it's not what our constitution supports. We believe that people have this right to freedom of religion, to freedom of speech, to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. A lot of what I fight against are efforts to deny that. I was the first to start leading the charge on repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell because we were discriminating against men and women in the military who were sacrificing their lives and telling them they could not do so if they were LGBTQ.

This is something I've been working on my entire time in the US Senate, and I'm not going to stop. I think it's important that we respect everyone and that if you are looking at this from a religious lens, the number one rule is love your neighbor as yourself. A lot of the ways this court is acting, and then these individuals are acting, does not do that. There is not respect and dignity for all humans under their views.

Brian Lehrer: Nathan, thank you very much for your call. Please call us again. Senator, as you know, another lame-duck session agenda item is funding for Ukraine. You're on the Armed Services Committee and I see you attended an international security conference in Halifax this month, where that was a focus. What happened there and what's the question on the table for the Senate now?

Senator Gillibrand: I attended the Halifax Security Forum, which is an opportunity for allies around the globe to get together to talk about global security issues. The three biggest issues we talked about was Russia's war in Ukraine, and how they're going to survive the winter and what is the plan over the next however many months to continue to support the Ukrainians' desire to win and to survive and to defeat Russia. We talked a lot about Iran, and the women's movement there and how the country is rebelling against its current leadership for being so restrictive and authoritarian and violent, and how we can help those freedom fighters and those advocates for religious freedom and for women's rights specifically.

We talked about Afghanistan, and how we can help to meet the needs of the refugees, for women who are still stuck there with no access to education or rights. This forum is just an excellent chance for me and other senators and House members who went to talk to other world leaders about these challenges. We had a lot of bilateral conversations with the Kosovo Defence Minister, the Swedish Defence Minister, the Estonian president, [unintelligible 00:12:43] stock members, Australia defense minister, and talk about what we can do as allies to help strengthen these long-term security goals.

Brian Lehrer: As you know, some Republicans ran in the midterms, and I saw some very expensive national advertising by an interest group that seemed to run and run and run during the fall on national television on stop throwing billions of US taxpayer dollars at the needs of Ukrainians when there are so many needs of people in this country that there isn't enough money for. How would you respond to that?

Senator Gillibrand: There are great needs for Americans that we are very focused on, I'm particularly focused on making sure people have food. Food security, especially during the holidays is one of my highest priorities, to make sure we fund all the programs and make them easier to access, whether it's the food stamp program or the backpack program for kids to take food home on the weekends or in the summers. I focus a lot on affordable housing, a lot of people don't have a roof over their head and so figuring out how to invest in our cities in our states to get more affordable housing. Then to make sure people have access to health care.

These are the highest priorities, the greatest needs of Americans, and we will fund that and work on that. We are a great and wealthy country and when a belligerent authoritarian country like Russia decides to invade a neighbor for no reason except for their greed and corruption of wanting to take more land, we have to stand against those type of leaders. We have to stand against Putin, and we have to help people who are fighting for their democracy. We are a wealthy country and we can do both, and we should do both. The reason why I went to Halifax is because we have to make sure the world community is helping the Ukrainians is not just the responsibility of the United States, it's the responsibility of any freedom-loving nation.

We work together to figure out how to each help. We aren't alone in helping. We may be giving them certain kinds of equipment and certain kinds of military weapons and ammunition, but so are other allies. We can do both, but Congress's job is to make sure that people have the health care, the education, the jobs that they need to protect their families.

Brian Lehrer: Heather in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Senator Gillibrand. Hi, Heather.

Heather: Hi, can you hear me?

Brian Lehrer: I can hear just fine.

Heather: Great. Thank you very much for taking my call today. I'm a huge fan, I'm so grateful for you, all that you do. Thank you for taking my call. Senator Gillibrand, I'm grateful for your leadership always. I just wanted to quickly ask the senator about whether she is familiar with S. 4280, the federal carbon dioxide removal leadership act. We've been trying to get in touch with her office about this and, and provide a little information so that she could consider co-signing the bill. The bill was sponsored by Senator Coons and has a couple of co-signers that are in the works.

Senator Gillibrand: Can you, caller, tell me a little bit more about the legislation, what does it do? I can certainly reach out to Senator Coons and hear about it from him. Tell me a little bit more about what it does and why it's important to you.

Heather: Sure. I'm an industrial engineer by training, and I work in the carbon removal space and also against climate change in my professional daily life. This bill would have the government be a procurer of removed carbon. There are a number of ways both natural and technical that can remove carbon. There are several activities going on at the DOE in this area, and I can direct you to some information about that. This would make, just the way that we supported solar and wind technology many years ago, this technology is needed because the IPCC has said that even if we were to be able to halt emissions immediately today, we would still have quite a bit of legacy carbon emissions that need to be removed in order to meet our one-and-a-half-degree target.

In order to do this, there are several approaches to this that are both job drivers, and also social equity and environmental justice tools that we can bring in to make these projects something that are beneficial for all.

Senator Gillibrand: Thank you very much for sharing that with me. I'm looking at the bill right now, it's the kind of bill I would support. I will review it carefully and I will sign on if my initial instincts are correct. Addressing global climate change is one of my highest priorities because of the severe impacts it has on New York state citizens. You've seen what we've suffered through with flooding all across our state, we've seen how these storms have gotten more and more violent because of global climate change's impacts and the rise in temperatures of our oceans.

I'm very committed to it, and it looks like a very thoughtful bill. I also noted that Paul Tonko is the house lead, and he and I work very extensively together on climate issues. I will look into this and I would be very likely to support it. I also had the chance to travel with Senator Coons last year when we went to the COP26 Climate Conference where we talked about what we could do as a nation to meet our climate goals. I'm very much in agreement and supportive of those efforts.

Brian Lehrer: Heather, thanks for your call. Thanks a lot. As we continue with our monthly Call your Senator segment with New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. 212-433 WNYC or tweet a question @BrianLehrer. Senator, another issue related to your Armed Services Committee membership is the Defense Department budget and Authorization Act that's coming up, I know. I'll read a version of a take on this published by Forbes yesterday. It says, "Defense secretary Lloyd Austin urged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer in a letter Monday to pass a full-year funding bill writing that a short-term stopgap measure would force the department to curb spending by $3 billion a month.

Austin said the short-term bill would stall progress of nuclear weapons programs, space exploration, military recruitment, and infrastructure development among other initiatives while hamstringing the US in competing with China's military operations." I guess my question is, I'll bet some progressives are hearing that plea from the defense secretary and thinking, "No, please cut that three billion a year from the Pentagon budget. Please cut that nuclear weapon spending and so much recruitment when nobody's going to invade the US, et cetera, and spend it on Americans' healthcare and other needs."

I read the Pentagon budget is on track to reach a trillion dollars in a few years. Is this the country that we want to be?

Senator Gillibrand: Actually this funding is essential for the men and women who serve for their families for their ability to have access to food and housing. We should not short shrift our military. More importantly, Brian, is the national security of the country. The reason why I go to the Halifax Conference and the COP 26 Conference is the world is much more dangerous than then I think people understand, and the risks to America are far greater than they actually know. The war in Ukraine has destabilized the norms. Country like Germany assumed that we are postwar and so they made contracts with Russia assuming they would never be their enemy.

They received their gas pipelines from Russia that, the elite said, "Of course we'll never have problems with them." Well, now that Russia wants to take over country after country, destabilize the whole region, kill thousands of people in the process, creating 10 million refugees already from Ukraine alone, they don't have access to affordable cheap energy because they can't take the energy from the pipeline. They made the wrong judgment. Now all the money that we've invested over the last decade is being used to help Ukrainians survive and fight to win this war against Russia because we have to stand up against authoritarian belligerents who are stealing land and countries for their own wealth.

The next challenge we're going to have is going to be China's same ambitions. She has said they want to take Taiwan, another freedom loving democracy, and we're going to have questions about what is America going to do? Well, China's built up their tools to attack this country through cyber, through satellites, through space, through sea, through land, and it will be an attack on our homeland. Cyber is easy. You can shut down someone's electric grid in a New York minute. You can shut down their supply chain. You can shut down their access to computers. You can destroy people's ability to heat their homes immediately.

We have to be much more thoughtful about our place in the world and how we protect America and protect all these freedoms and protect everything that's necessary for human life. You cannot do that without making these long term investments. I think the Ukrainian people are so grateful that America had the resources to send them the equipment they needed. Most of NATO did not invest in that way over the last two decades because they assumed there'd never be a war in Europe again. Unfortunately, we have narcissistic maniacal leaders like Putin who want to destroy people's countries and kill people and harm people.

God forbid use nuclear weapons because if they use nuclear weapons they can use it anyway anywhere, against our allies, against us. These are real concerns that people should not be flippant about.

Brian Lehrer: Here's another reason that the full year Defense Authorization Act might be delayed. I see from Politico and from Fox News that would be how speaker Kevin McCarthy, this is the Politico version, said Congress should delay the National Defense Authorization Act until next year when the Republicans have control of the House, citing the need for the new majority to crack open the bill and try to roll back policies meant to make the service more inclusive. This quotes McCarthy saying, "I've watched what the Democrats have done in many of these, especially in the National Defense Authorization Act and the wokeism that they want to bring in there." That's a quote from McCarthy.

Politico says he didn't cite a specific issue, but Republicans use the term wokeism to refer to what they call a Fox News fueled litany of complaints against Defense Department Policies from vaccine mandates to efforts to root out extremism, to a push to create more diversity in the ranks. All are framed as distractions that weaken the military. My question is, do you expect battles with Republican House members next year and that house majority over diversity in the military or rooting out right wing extremism there?

Senator Gillibrand: I'm very concerned about the direction that the new speaker will take because they have a very far right wing agenda and they will try to harm women in the military. They will try to undermine diversity in the military. They will try to not enforce laws to protect our service members. This year's defense bill, Brian, has the work I've put in over the last decade to change how we address military sexual assault, harassment, murder, so that these cases can be dealt with by trained military prosecutors and not commanders who have no legal training and may well have bias.

This professionalization is in this year's defense, though. I want that bill voted on immediately. I don't want that reform to be taken out, that will help people. When they talk about wokeism, they're talking about not prosecuting people who are committing crimes and destroying good order and discipline and destroying the ability of our service members to have cohesion. It's about creating a climate where people can respect one another and that our service can be as strong as it should be because diversity is our strength. It needs to represent the whole country. I think what he's talking about is wrong, unethical, and it's just part of this very extreme agenda to divide the country.

Brian Lehrer: One more call. Joanne in New Rochelle, you're on WNYC with Senator Gillibrand. How'd Joan?

Joanne: Hi, good morning. I'm a big fan Brian. Wonderful. Senator Gillibrand, thank you for your work. I want to ask if there's anything else on the lame duck agenda like codifying woman's right to choose or equal rights for all or voting rights or anything else that really is never going to happen once the Republicans are in power.

Senator Gillibrand: There's a couple of things that we're hoping can be voted on before the end of the year. The Electoral Count Act reform, which is fixing the loophole that President Trump tried to use to undermine and unwind the election results. That bill is a very discreet bill, though. It just fixes this notion that the vice president's role, it clarifies it, that's just ceremonial. It increases the threshold of lawmakers it takes to challenge the results of an election. It just cleans up the mess that President Trump created over this electoral count process. The other bill we might be able to get in that's really important is the 9/11 Health Funding bill.

Unfortunately, when they calculated how much it would cost to protect our family members from Ground Zero and our first responders, they didn't expect inflation for healthcare to be so high. The inflation in healthcare costs is higher than almost anything else. No one expected that. We're about three billion short. We're going to try to get that in there, but I don't think we have a way to codify Roe because we don't have 60 votes in the Senate. We probably have maybe 52. We have no vehicle to do that because Republicans do not support women's rights generally. We would need a bigger majority in the House and the Senate to do that.

That's what next election cycle's all about. I'm going to work very hard to organize our state to make sure we win elections in New York and we can win some of those house seats back. That's important because without it we cannot guarantee women's rights in this country.

Brian Lehrer: In our last minute, let me come back to one of the things you just mentioned as a possible lame duck session item that I know you've been very involved in and is one of your enduring issues and that our listeners here in the New York area care very much about, and that's healthcare funding for 9/11 survivors. You've been talking recently about a funding gap. You brought that into the conversation just a minute ago. Why don't you end by telling us what the current gap is, what you're trying to get through, and what you think are the obstacles to that?

Senator Gillibrand: The gap is $3 billion, and it's for healthcare. It's so that the men and women who were exposed to all the toxins at Ground Zero, whether you were a family member who lived at ground zero or whether you were a first responder who was saving lives or cleaning remains, or working at the pile for weeks and months thereafter, those toxins are deadly and they create horrible cancers and other illnesses. The money would be for them so that they can continue to get the healthcare they need to survive. It's typically a very bipartisan issue. If there's an omnibus, which is a large piece of legislation that has funding attached to it, we would try to put it in there.

Brian Lehrer: Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, good luck on that one. Thank you very much as always for joining us monthly and taking calls from listeners and talking to me. We always appreciate it. Talk to you next month. Happy holidays.

Senator Gillibrand: Happy holidays to you and all your listeners. Thanks Brian.

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