Rick Santorum has called the Ninth
Circuit Court of Appeals “intolerant” for ruling California's gay
marriage ban, Proposition 8, unconstitutional.
(Related: Court
says gay marriage ban Prop 8 violates 14th
Amendment.)
Santorum, who won GOP presidential
nominating contests in Missouri, Minnesota and Colorado on Tuesday,
first criticized the court's long-awaited decision in a tweet to
supporters late Tuesday.
“7M Californians had their rights
stripped away today by activist 9th Circuit judges. As
president I will work to protect marriage,” he messaged.
At campaign stop in McKinney, Texas on
Wednesday, Santorum told supporters that the court was calling
opponents of marriage equality “bigots.”
“Your belief of marriage between a
man and a woman is purely irrational, based on hatred and bigotry.
That's what they just wrote,” he said.
“You are bigots and haters.”
“Where is the tolerance of someone
having a belief structure that is based in nature, that is based in
reason, that is based in faith?” Santorum rhetorically asked. “The
intolerance of the left, the intolerance of the secular ideology, it
is a religion onto itself, it is just not a biblical-based religion.
And it is the most intolerant – just like we saw from the days of
the atheist in the Soviet Union.” (The video is embedded in the
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