Today, the Human Rights Campaign announced the endorsement of Gov. Steve Bullock for Senate.

“Throughout his tenure as Governor, Steve Bullock has been an outstanding leader on behalf of LGBTQ people in Montana,” said Alphonso David, president of the Human Rights Campaign. “As governor, Bullock issued a 2016 executive order that offered some of the Equality Act’s workforce protections to LGBTQ state employees in Montana. Now it's time to expand those protections to every American. We need a champion like Steve Bullock in the United States Senate to help ensure every person in our country is free to live their lives free from discrimination based on who they are or who they love. From the Equality Act to preserving and improving affordable health care, we need Steve Bullock’s leadership in the Senate. The Human Rights Campaign is proud to endorse Governor Bullock and will work around the clock to ensure he is elected this November.”

“No Montanan should have to face discrimination or hate because of who they are or who they love,” said Governor Steve Bullock. “That’s why I worked with Democrats and Republicans to remove hateful and discriminatory laws from our books and extended protections for LGBTQ Montanans –– and why I will work to pass the Equality Act in the Senate. The fight for the rights of LGBTQ Montanans continues, and I am grateful to have the support of the Human Rights Campaign in this race.”

Last year, the U.S. House passed the Equality Act, historic and crucial federal legislation that would finally guarantee explicit, permanent protections for LGBTQ people under our nation's existing civil rights laws. However, Sen. Steve Daines and Senate Majority LeaderMitch McConnell are blocking the Senate from voting on the bill. Instead, they have supported the Administration’s efforts to roll back protections for LGBTQ people. While Bullock has expanded access to health care in Montana, Daines has fought to repeal and gut the Affordable Care Act.

In the 2018 midterms, HRC helped register more than 32,000 voters and recruited more than 4,200 volunteers, who worked over 8,500 shifts and clocked more than 30,000 volunteer hours. In the critical final four days of the campaign, HRC staff and volunteers in get-out-the-vote efforts alone knocked on more than 80,000 doors, and held 36,400 conversations with voters at their doors and by phone on behalf of our endorsed candidates. HRC's unprecedented grassroots mobilization worked to recruit volunteers, mobilize constituents, register voters and grow the organization's grassroots army in an all-out effort to pull the emergency brake on the hateful anti-LGBTQ agenda of the Trump-Pence administration and elect a Congress that would hold them accountable. In 2020, our engagement and mobilization efforts will only deepen.  HRC will have at least 45 full-time staff in seven priority states and an additional 20 staff focused on a second tier of states and districts.