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<H5>April 22, 2005</H5><NYT_HEADLINE version="1.0" type=" ">
<H2>Microsoft Comes Under Fire for Reversal on Gay Rights
Bill</H2></NYT_HEADLINE><NYT_BYLINE version="1.0" type=" "><FONT
size=-1><STRONG>By <A title="More Articles by Sarah Kershaw"
href="http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=SARAH KERSHAW&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=SARAH KERSHAW&inline=nyt-per"><FONT
color=#000066>SARAH KERSHAW</FONT></A> </STRONG></FONT><BR></NYT_BYLINE>
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<P>SEATTLE, April 21 - The Microsoft Corporation, at the forefront of corporate
gay rights for decades, is coming under fire from gay rights groups, politicians
and its own employees for withdrawing its support for a state bill that would
have barred discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.</P>
<P>Many of the critics accused the company of bowing to pressure from a
prominent evangelical church in Redmond, Wash., located a few blocks from
Microsoft's sprawling headquarters.</P>
<P>The bill, or similar versions of it, has been introduced repeatedly over
three decades; it failed by one vote Thursday in the State Senate. Gay rights
advocates denounced Microsoft, which had supported the bill for the last two
years, for abandoning their cause. Blogs and online chat rooms were buzzing on
Thursday with accusations that the company, which has offered benefits to
same-sex partners for years, had given in to the Christian right.</P>
<P>"I think people should feel betrayed," said Tina Podlodowski, a former
Microsoft senior manager and former Seattle city councilwoman who now runs an
advocacy group for AIDS patients. "To me, Microsoft has been one of the big
supporters of gay and lesbian civil rights issues, and they did it when it
wasn't an issue of political expediency, when it was the right thing to do."</P>
<P>Microsoft officials denied any connection between their decision not to
endorse the bill and the church's opposition, although they acknowledged meeting
twice with the church minister, Ken Hutcherson.</P>
<P>Dr. Hutcherson, pastor of the Antioch Bible Church, who has organized several
rallies opposing same-sex marriage here and in Washington, D.C., said he
threatened in those meetings to organize a national boycott of Microsoft
products. </P>
<P>After that, "they backed off," the pastor said Thursday in a telephone
interview. "I told them I was going to give them something to be afraid of
Christians about," he said.</P>
<P>Microsoft's decision not to endorse the anti-discrimination bill and its
meetings with Dr. Hutcherson were first reported Thursday by The Stranger, an
alternative weekly newspaper in Seattle. </P>
<P>The bill, which had passed in the State House, would have extended
protections against discrimination in employment, housing and other fields to
gay men and lesbians. It was supported by other high-tech companies and
multinational corporations including Nike, Boeing, Coors and
Hewlett-Packard.</P>
<P>Microsoft officials said that the recent meetings with the minister did not
persuade them to back away from supporting the bill, because they had already
decided to take a "neutral" position on it. They said they had examined their
legislative priorities and decided that because they already offer extensive
benefits to gay employees and that King County, where Microsoft is based,
already has an anti-discrimination law broader than what the state bill
proposed, they should focus on other legislative matters.</P>
<P>"Our government affairs team made a decision before this legislative session
that we would focus our energy on a limited number of issues that are directly
related to our business," said Mark Murray, a company spokesman. "That decision
was not influenced by external factors. It was driven by our desire to focus on
a smaller number of issues in this short legislative session. We obviously have
not done a very good job of communicating about this issue."</P>
<P>"We're disappointed that people are misinterpreting those meetings," he
said.</P>
<P>But State Representative Ed Murray, an openly gay Democrat and a sponsor of
the bill, said that in a conversation last month with Bradford L. Smith,
Microsoft's senior vice president and general counsel, Mr. Smith made it clear
to him that the company was under pressure from the church and the pastor and
that he was also concerned about the reaction to company support of the bill
among its Christian employees, the lawmaker said. </P>
<P>Mr. Smith would not comment for this article.</P>
<P>Representative Murray said that in a recent conversation with Mr. Smith, Mr.
Smith said that the minister had demanded the company fire Microsoft employees
who testified this year on behalf of the bill, but that Mr. Smith had refused.
According to Representative Murray, Mr. Smith said "that while he did not do the
many things that the minister had requested, including firing employees who had
testified for the bill, he believed that Microsoft could not just respond to one
group of employees, when there were other groups of employees who felt much
different.</P>
<P>"My refrain back to him was that this is a historic moment, that I only had a
few weeks, and I wanted Microsoft to do the right thing," the legislator said.
"Their concern, he said, was that obviously they were hearing from fairly
conservative employees who were connected to this minister. They needed to sort
out how they were going to deal with those problems."</P>
<P>Representative Murray said the company's contention that the decision not to
support the bill had nothing to do with the church was "an absolute lie."</P>
<P>A Microsoft employee who said he attended a meeting this month with Mr. Smith
and about 30 employees, most of them gay, said that Mr. Smith discussed his
meetings with Dr. Hutcherson and left the impression that the company was
changing its policy on the bill as a result of those meetings. </P>
<P>"Brad was very clear that the decision to be neutral on the bill was made
subsequent to his meeting with Ken Hutcherson," said the employee, who spoke on
condition of anonymity because he feared retribution from the company. "My gut
feeling is that the pastor and his threat of a boycott and the general
sensitivity around this issue was a factor in this decision."</P>
<P>He added, "At the meeting, what Brad told us was that Microsoft made its
decision on the bill between the first and second meetings he had with
Hutcherson." </P>
<P>The Washington bill was one of several similar bills being debated in state
legislatures across the country, which remains divided on social issues like
same-sex marriage.</P>
<P>Dr. Hutcherson, who has become a leading national critic of same-sex
marriage, said he believed he could have organized a widespread boycott of
Microsoft. He said he told the Microsoft executives, "If you don't think the
moral issue is not a big issue, just count the amount of votes that were cast on
moral issues in the last election."</P>
<P>"A lot of Christians would have joined me," he said, "But it would have been
a lot more people, too."</P></NYT_TEXT></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>