On Friday, Gov. Newsom signed a new bill introduced by Democrat State Senator Scott Wiener that will loosen restrictions on certain LGBT sex offenders by not requiring that they be registered.
The argument from Senator Wiener is that even though consensual sex between 15 to 17-year-olds and someone within 10 years of age is illegal and forms of intercourse such as oral and anal intercourse require sex offender registration, vaginal intercourse does not not require an offender to register as a sex offender. He sees this as a disparity that unfairly discriminates against the LGBT community.
While he is technically correct that there is a disparity, his response is certainly not the solution. The correct response would be to require sex offender registration for vaginal intercourse and to increase restrictions, not to lower them. Just because the law isn’t enforced for one group does not mean that the law shouldn’t be enforced for other groups. The law should be equally enforced and all offenders should be required to register as sex offenders.
What Wiener leaves out is that he also sponsored a 2017 bill, SB 384, resulting in 90 percent of California sex offenders not having to register with law enforcement for life. So it’s not just that Senator Wiener is seeking to equalize heterosexual and homosexual sex offenders, he is trying to reduce the penalties for sexual assaulting minors across the board.
“This bill is about treating everyone equally under the law. Discrimination against LGBT people is simply not the California way. These laws were put in place during a more conservative and anti-LGBT time in California’s history,” Wiener argued. “They have ruined people’s lives and made it harder for them to get jobs, secure housing, and live productive lives. It is time we update these laws and treat everyone equally.” He is right that the laws should be updated. The law for vaginal intercourse should be treated just as seriously as those for oral or anal, not the other way around.
Even far-left Democrat Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez was notably disgusted by the legislation. “I cannot in my mind as a mother understand how sex between a 24-year-old and a 14-year-old could ever be consensual, how it could ever not be a registrable offense,” said Gonzalez. “We should never give up on this idea that children should be in no way subject to a predator.”
When even radical Democrats like Lorena Gonzalez believe that a bill is too far left, you know it’s serious.
