In short, the signs are not at all encouraging. Gorsuch appears to have been the deciding judge to take up the important Masterpiece Cakeshop case, which will decide whether businesses can openly discriminate against LGBT customers on "religious" grounds.
Fortunately, fewer justices can decide to take up a case than will make a majority, and the votes don't appear to be there to rule in favor of anti-LGBT discrimination.
In all honesty, I'm not surprised Gorsuch is showing his true stripes like this. The idea some people had that he was somehow pro-LGBT was delusional.
Gorsuch was strongly supported as a nominee by ultra-conservative and anti-LGBT hate groups. They looked at his history as a jurist and could see he was way over to the far right with the likes of Justices Samuel Alito and Antonin Scalia. Most of us on the pro-LGBT side of the spectrum could easily see this, too.
In other Supreme Court news yesterday, the rumor that Trump supporters had been widely and wildly circulating, that pro-LGBT Justice Anthony Kennedy would retire, turned out to be bullshit. He made no such move and hired clerks for the 2017-2018 session, which is a good sign he isn't going anywhere for at least another year.
So for the time being, it appears the pro-LGBT 5-4 majority on the Supreme Court will hold. Kennedy does not rule with progressives on all other issues, but on this issue, I think he has our backs.
If any justice in that majority faction should leave, however, then I am saddened to say there will be hell to pay for the LGBT community. Trump will nominate another far-right anti-LGBT justice and it will be a very, very dark day if and when he or she is seated on the high court.
Let's all keep our fingers crossed that no other justice will retire before Inauguration Day 2021. Hopefully the GOP will be swept out of the White House on that day.
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