Mitt Romney has claimed credit for
preventing Massachusetts from “becoming the Las Vegas of gay
marriage.”
Romney made the claim on Friday during
a speech to the annual Conservative Political Action Conference
(CPAC) in Washington D.C.
“Now, you may recall as well that
during my term in office, our conservative values also came under
attack. Less than a year after I took office, the [Massachusetts]
Supreme Court inexplicably found a right to same-sex marriage in the
constitution written by John Adams,” Romney told a receptive
audience. “I presume he'd be surprised. I fought to have a stay
on that decision, then pushed for a marriage amendment to our
constitution – We lost by only one vote in the Legislature. And I
successfully prohibited out-of-state couples from coming to our state
to get married and then going home. On my watch, we fought hard and
prevented Massachusetts from becoming the Las Vegas of gay marriage.”
(Relate: Mitt
Romney blasts Prop 8 ruling.)
Romney has previously been attacked by
Rick Santorum and Michele Bachmann with claims that he advanced gay
marriage during his tenure as Massachusetts governor.
“He personally, as governor, issued
gay marriage licenses,” Santorum
asserted during a GOP debate in Iowa.
A surprised Romney responded by saying
he was powerless to stop the court: “The idea that somehow that was
up to me to make a choice as to whether we had it or not was a little
unusual.”
At CPAC, Romney also said that as
president he would defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which
bars federal agencies from recognizing the legal marriages of gay
couples from states such as Massachusetts.
“When I am president, I will defend
the Defense of Marriage Act,” Romney said. “I will fight for an
amendment to our constitution that defines marriage as a relationship
between a man and a woman.” (The video is embedded in the right
panel of this page. Visit
our video library for more videos.)