Tico Almeida, founder and president of Freedom to Work, recounts the conversation the White House’s senior staff had with him and three other LGBT leaders in an effort to explain Obama’s decision not to sign an executive order that would have banned federal contractors from discriminating in the workplace on the basis of sexual orientation. Signing the order, which has broad support across party lines, “would have been a perfect opportunity to use this as a wedge against conservatives,” Almeida says.
