Obama to Nominate Openly Gay Ambassador to New Zealand & Samoa

U.S. President Barack Obama plans to nominate David Huebner as U.S. Ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa, which would make him the third openly gay ambassador that the U.S. has employed.

In a few days, there will be an LGBT protest at the White House in support of equal rights for homosexual citizens. Obama is showing his support with a gesture of his nomination for U.S. ambassador to New Zealand an Samoa. His choice, according to The Huffington Post, is David Huebner, who is openly gay. Huebner works for a U.S. firm in Shanghai, China, where he deals with cases of international arbitration and mediation. He graduated from Yale law School as well and Princeton University. In addition, he served on the board for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation and is currently their general counsel. Other qualifications include his position as chair of the California Law Revision Commission. He has taught at the University of Southern California's Gould School of Law and has served as president of the Los Angeles Quality and Productivity Commission. Obama has been reluctant to take a definite stance regarding LGBT issues, making it more of a Constitutional issue. In 2007, he said, "At its core, this issue is about who we are as Americans. It's about whether this nation is going to live up to its founding promise of equality by treating all its citizens with dignity and respect." His actions regarding this issue have been both supportive and non-supportive. He did make a pledge to try to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, which allows states to limit how they recognize partnerships and determine benefits. Yet, his administration did defend this law in a court brief, claiming that they were only backing a law that was already active.