TO:  Interested Parties

FROM:  Zach Silk, campaign manager, Washington United for Marriage

RE:  Rick Santorum Is Not Welcome in Washington 

DATE: October 4, 2012

Preserve Marriage Washington’s (PMW) claims about respecting gay and lesbian Washingtonians is seriously undermined by its decision, through its affiliated Family Policy Institute (FPI), to bring Rick Santorum — a politician who has never missed a chance to insult and degrade gay Americans — to our state.  If they are committed to the rhetoric on their website and spouted endlessly to media and voters alike, they should cancel these events and tell Rick Santorum he is not welcome in Washington.

Santorum is scheduled to kick off two high-profile fund raisers, one in Spokane on Oct. 9, and a second in Bellevue on Oct. 10, to raise money for PMW’s campaign to reject Referendum 74 which would affirm the state’s bipartisan marriage law.  To bring Santorum here in the final weeks of this election season is both mean-spirited and ill advised.

Why?  Because there isn’t a living politician who has built his bona fides more on the backs of gay and lesbian Americans than Rick Santorum.  You’d have to go back to the days of Jesse Helms to find rhetoric as hurtful and demeaning as that uttered by Santorum through the years.

While PMW’s current opposition to R74 puts a rosy spin on their position, with a lot of talk about respecting their gay and lesbian neighbors, bringing Santorum here should finally put that ruse to bed.

In fact, bychoosing to headline Santorum – someone who has likened same-sex marriage to the tragedies of 9/11, calling it the “ultimate homeland security” issue – only underscores our lead opponents’ true colors.

Santorum’s views are so outside the mainstream that Chris Barron, political director for the Log Cabin Republicans in 2004, said, “I think that Rick Santorum is the face of exclusion and intolerance.  I think that if we are going to maintain our status as the majority party in this country then we can’t be led by folks like Rick Santorum.”  (Roll Call, 9/8/04)

Please take a look at just a small sampling of Santorum’s words and actions towards gay and lesbian Americans.

 Rick Santorum’s Greatest Hits of Intolerance

Santorum Said Imprisoned Fathers “Who Abandoned Their Kids Were Still Better Than” Gay Parents.  During the 2012 Republican primary, Santorum cited an anti-poverty expert in arguing against same-sex couples as parents.  Santorum said: “He found that even fathers in jail who had abandoned their kids were still better than no father at all to have in their children’s lives.” Santorum also said that allowing same-sex couple to get married and raise children leads to “robbing children of something they need, they deserve, they have a right to. You may rationalize that that isn’t true, but in your own life and in your own heart, you know it’s true.” (Los Angeles Times, 1/7/12)

 Santorum Invoked “Man On Child, Man On Dog” While Discussing Homosexuality, Importance Of Marriage, And Procreation.  Santorum said: “Every society in the history of man has upheld the institution of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman.  Why?  Because society is based on one thing: that society is based on the future of the society.  And that’s what?  Children.  Monogamous relationships.  In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality.  That’s not to pick on homosexuality.  It’s not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be.”  (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 5/4/03)

Santorum Said That Bigamy Was A Logical Conclusion To Arguments For Gay Marriage. During a 2004 appearance on the CBS news program “Face the Nation,” Santorum said that bigamy was “a logical conclusion” to arguments in favor of same-sex marriages:  “Let’s say three or four people now say they should be allowed to get married too.  If it’s OK for two people, why not for three or four?…This shouldn’t be out of bounds…And it’s not being mean.”  (Madison Capital Times, 3/1/04)

Santorum Co-Sponsored Amendments to the U.S. Constitution in 2004 & 2005 which would have banned same-sex marriage, marking the first time the Constitution would have been used to deny people rights.  Both measures failed in Congress. (Library of Congress, Bill Summary & Status, 109^th Congress, SJ Res 1; Library of Congress, Bill Summary & Status, 108^th Congress, SJ Res 40, http://thomas.loc.gov)

Santorum Said Marriage Equality Issue Was “Just Like 9-11.”  In 2004, defending his Federal Marriage Amendment, Santorum said, “This is an issue just like 9-11.  We didn’t decide we wanted to fight the war on terrorism because we wanted to.  It was brought to us.  And if not now, when?  When the supreme courts in all the other states have succumbed to the Massachusetts version of the law?”  (Allentown Morning Call, 2/25/04)

Santorum Called Federal Marriage Amendment The “Ultimate Homeland Security.”  In a July 2004 editorial, the New York Daily News criticized the Federal Marriage Amendment.  The editorial board wrote: “Chief among the proponents was Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, who proffered the most fatuous of arguments.  ‘I would argue that the future of our country hangs in the balance because the future of marriage hangs in the balance,’ Santorum said.  ‘Isn’t that the ultimate homeland security, standing up and defending marriage?’”  (New York Daily News, 7/15/04)

Santorum Repeated Belief That Marriage Was “Not To Affirm The Love Of Two People” and Would Lead to “Lots of Different Combinations.” During an August 2003 appearance on “Fox News Sunday,” Santorum said: “…I think, to most people in America, number one, it’s common sense that a marriage is between a man and a woman.  I mean, every civilization in the history of man has recognized a unique bond.  Why?  Because – principally because of children.  I mean, it’s – it is the reason for marriage.  It’s not to affirm the love of two people.  I mean, that’s not what marriage is about.  I mean, if that were the case, then lots of different people and lots of different combinations could be, quote, ‘married.’ … Marriage is not about affirming somebody’s love for somebody else.  It’s about uniting together to be open to children, to further civilization in our society.”  (Fox News, 8/3/03)

Santorum Warned That Heterosexuals Stopped Marrying In Countries That Adopted Gay Marriage, Leaving Children To Be Raised By The State.  During a 2004 GOP news conference, Santorum warned that, in countries that had adopted gay marriage, heterosexuals stopped getting married.  Santorum said, “And what we’ve seen in countries that have adopted gay marriage – and there are several countries who have done so in Europe – is not that many gays have decided to get married.  In fact, quite the contrary; very few have.  What has happened is that heterosexuals stopped getting married.  … People just aren’t getting married any more, and, as a result, families aren’t being formed and children are being left to be raised by, in many cases, the state.”  (Federal News Service, 2/24/04)

Santorum Said By Allowing Marriage To Only Affirm The Love Of Two People, Then “Mothers And Daughters And Fathers And Sons Could Be Married.” During a February 2004 GOP news conference, Santorum spoke in support of the Federal Marriage Amendment, arguing that the purpose of marriage was procreation: “Marriage has been set up by cultures in the past not to affirm the love of one person of another.  If that were the case, mothers and daughters and fathers and sons could be married, if all it was about was affirming love between two people.  The whole point of marriage and why it was treated as a special status in society was for the procreation and furtherance of the culture with the raising of children in a stable environment where a man and a woman can participate in the nurturing of a child.  And that that’s why it was given special status.  What does having other people other than a man and a woman who are not related be married?  What does that – what does that do, and why is that a threat if we allow others to be married?  Because it devalues what marriage is.  It turns marriage into not a union of two people for the purpose of the furtherance of the culture, but simply a sign of affirming someone’s love for another, which, while not unimportant, is not the centrality of what marriage is about.”  (Federal News Service, 2/24/04)

Santorum Wanted To Limit States’ Ability To Make Marriage Laws.  In 2005, discussing the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment, Santorum said that it would be “too disruptive” to allow states to decide marriage laws on their own.  Santorum said, “Marriage and families are foundational institutions of our society, and you can’t have that foundational institution be different things in different states.  It’s far too disruptive.”  (Hotline, 1/26/05)

Santorum Vehemently Condemned the U.S. Supreme Court Ruling That Struck Down the Texas Anti-Sodomy Law in 2003. Following the ruling, Santorum issued a statement saying the court’s ruling “undermines the proper role of legislatures by limiting their ability to speak to issues of public morality.  The policy-making process belongs to elected representatives, not to the courts, whatever the issue and whatever the outcome.”  (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 6/27/03)

— In Siding With The Minority On The Court, Santorum Links Homosexuality With Bestiality, Incest, Obscenity And Bigamy:  In an Associated Press interview in April 2003, Santorum said: “Today, the dissenting justices expressed the same concerns I did, stating, ‘The Texas statute undeniably seeks to further the belief of its citizens that certain forms of sexual behavior are immoral and unacceptable … the same interest furthered by criminal laws against fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality and obscenity.’”  (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 6/27/03)

— Santorum Said The Right To Have Consensual Gay Sex Would Lead To The Right To Bigamy, Polygamy, Incest, Adultery.  On the Supreme Court’s ruling to strike down Texas’ sodomy law, Santorum said: “If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery.  You have the right to anything.” (Associated Press, 4/21/03)

— Santorum Said Right To Privacy “Doesn’t Exist.”  During an interview in which Santorum discussed the right to privacy that the Supreme Court referenced in striking down Texas’ anti-sodomy law, Santorum said: “I would argue, this right to privacy [–] that doesn’t exist, in my opinion, in the United States Constitution.” (Associated Press, 4/21/03)

Claimed Satan Is Attacking The Great Institutions Of America.  Santorum said in a 2008 speech: “Satan has set his sights on the United States of America. Satan is attacking the great institutions of America, using the great vices of pride, vanity, and sensuality as the root to attack all of the strong plants that has so deeply rooted in the American tradition”  (Santorum Address, Ave Maria University, August 2008)

During 2012 Presidential Primary, Santorum Again Compared Same-Sex Marriage To Polygamy.  Santorum said during the 2012 Republican presidential primary: “So anyone can marry anyone else. … So anyone can marry several people? … Well, what about three men? If reason says that if you think it’s OK for two, then you have to differentiate with me as to why it’s not OK for three.” (New York Times, 1/9/12)

Santorum Argued State Legislatures, Not Courts, Should Legislate Morality.  In January 2004, Santorum was asked if a push to constitutionally ban gay marriages was an attempt to legislate morality.  Santorum initially responded, “The answer is, ‘Yes.’  The question is who is going to legislate it?”  Santorum said the issue was also a question of legality: “Marriage is a legal construct.  So the question is, are we going to allow the legislatures of this country to create new rights and amend their constitutions as they see fit, or are we going to allow the courts to dictate how the legislatures do it?”  Santorum said Republicans wanted “to stop unelected judges from going in and telling legislatures what to do.”  Later, Santorum changed his mind on the issue of legislating morality: “The more I think about it, this is not legislating morality.  This is protecting the democratic process.”  (Intelligencer Journal, 1/21/04)

Santorum Does Not Believe in Separation of Church and State.  Santorum said on ABC’s “This Week” in 2012: “I don’t believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute. The idea that the church can have no influence or no involvement in the operation of the state is absolutely antithetical to the objectives and vision of our country.” (ABC “This Week,” February 2012).