Biden signs Respect for Marriage Act into law at star-studded ceremony

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

72% : President Biden received thunderous applause from the mostly LGBTQ+ attendees as he spoke about his first public support for same-sex marriage 10 years ago.
68% : "Everyone should have the right to be with the person they love, and we look forward to President Biden signing this landmark legislation into law, and making it clear to the Supreme Court where this country stands on marriage equality."
56% : The signing of the law is a victory for the LGBTQ+ community as it further protects the right to marriage for same-sex and interracial couples.
51% : Currently, same-sex marriage has a federal right, which was granted after the Supreme Court's affirmative ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015.
50% : He called on the need for Congress to also pass the Equality Act, which would enshrine federal protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
49% : However, the statutory authority granted by the RMA doesn't exactly make same-sex marriage the law of the land, as U.S. Rep. Mondaire Jones previously noted in an interview with theGrio.
48% : The Respect for Marriage Act would, for the first time, enshrine same-sex and interracial marriages into federal law and allow the federal government to bring a civil lawsuit against anyone who violates the statutory rights of gay, lesbian or interracial couples.
46% : In his concurring opinion in the case, Dobbs v. Jackson, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that previous rulings granting federal protections for same-sex marriage and intimacy under the 14th Amendment should also be reconsidered.
43% : Days later, during an interview with ABC's Robin Roberts, President Obama declared, "I think same-sex couples should be able to get married."
41% : It does not require all states to allow marriage equality," explains Jones.
41% : Therefore, if the conservative-majority Supreme Court votes to overturn marriage equality, as Justice Thomas has indicated he would do, the federal government -- much like in the case of abortion after the court overturned Roe v. Wade -- would be powerless to stop states from repealing marital rights for gay and lesbian couples.
38% : Senate Republicans worked with Democrats to pass the legislation amid political worry that marriage equality could be overturned after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the constitutional right to an abortion this past summer.
35% : Biden had gotten ahead of President Barack Obama, who at the time had not yet affirmed his support for same-sex marriage.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.