ENDA—the Employment Non-Discrimination Act—is finally likely to pass this year, but one of the country’s most explicit forms of employment discrimination—the military’s “don’t ask don’t tell” (DADT) ban on out gay service members—probably won’t be considered because military leaders appear to be more likely to recommend that Congress delay consideration of a DADT repeal measure, according to an exclusive report by Associated Press national security writer Anne Gearan. The current session of Congress appears to offer the best opportunity to pass ENDA, which has been introduced in various forms for 15 years, Rea Carey, executive
director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, told Gannett News Service reporter Erin Kelly. Lead sponsors of the bill say they expect a vote in the House in the first quarter of this year, Kelly reports. 
“I think it’s particularly poignant that this comes at a time when the nation is facing such a crisis in unemployment,” Carey told Gannett. “Each day that a job is lost because of prejudice compounds the problem.”
Opponents of the measure quoted by Kelly in her report cite the usual grab-bag of anti-gay arguments.
Peter Sprigg, senior fellow for policy studies at the conservative Family Research Council, claimed to Kelly that there is “lot of controversy” about an explicit religious exemption in the bill.