150 Gay Activists March to Protest Governor’s Veto of Job Bias Bill

Scores of homosexual activists led a demonstration in Century City Saturday to protest Gov. Pete Wilson’s veto of a job discrimination bill.

The marchers, numbering about 150, chanted and whistled outside the Marriott Hotel in Century City for about 90 minutes. Inside, Wilson was attending a fund-raiser for the Ronald Reagan Foundation, which supports the new presidential library.

“We’re here. We’re here. We will not disappear,” chanted the protesters.

The demonstration was designed to show displeasure with Wilson’s veto of AB 101, which would have banned job discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Wilson has been dogged by protests since he vetoed the bill on Sept. 29.

An estimated 300 Los Angeles police officers, some dressed in riot gear and some on horseback, swept the streets around the Marriott before allowing the demonstrators to take up their post on the circle driveway entrance.

Los Angeles police confirmed that Reagan and U.S. Sen. John Seymour (R-Calif.) were inside the hotel and that former Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford were scheduled to stay there in advance of the Monday opening of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley.

“It’s a balance, trying to let them exercise their rights without infringing on everybody else’s,” a police spokesman said of the demonstrators. “We know how sensitive this issue is, and how fragile this relationship can be.”