Wasting no time, the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage reacted bitterly to today’s ruling overturning Proposition 8 in California. A NOM press release even went after Judge Vaughn Walker’s sexual orientation:
“The ‘trial’ in San Francisco in the Perry v. Schwarzenegger case is a unique, and disturbing, episode in American jurisprudence. Here we have an openly gay (according to the San Francisco Chronicle) federal judge substituting his views for those of the American people and of our Founding Fathers who I promise you would be shocked by courts that imagine they have the right to put gay marriage in our Constitution. We call on the Supreme Court and Congress to protect the people’s right to vote for marriage,” stated Maggie Gallagher, Chairman of the Board of NOM.
Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund president and CEO Chuck Wolfe said NOM’s reference to Walker’s sexual orientation is another attempt by the group to belittle and dehumanize LGBT Americans: “Maggie Gallagher lost big today, and her reaction is to gay-bait the judge. Absolutely pathetic.”
Walker, who was originally nominated to the federal bench by Ronald Reagan in 1987, was confirmed in 1989 after renomination by President George H.W. Bush. Some Democrats opposed his nomination then because of his supposed insensitivity toward gays and lesbians. He is described as having libertarian leanings by some.
