Louis Marinelli, a former strategist
for the anti-gay marriage group National Organization for Marriage
(NOM), has recorded a video urging New Yorkers to support gay
marriage
Marinelli quit the nation's most
vociferous opponent of gay marriage two weeks ago, taking
with him the group's official Facebook page and its 219,000 fans.
In his one minute video, Marinelli is
seen standing in St. Petersburg, Russia urging New Yorkers back home
to support the legalization of gay marriage.
“For years I worked against the
constitutional principles of equality that I as a conservative
Republican value very deeply,” Marinelli says. “And I was
wrong.”
“During the summer tour I organized
with the National Organization for Marriage last year to oppose
marriage equality, I came to see that everyone was deserving of the
freedom of marriage, because this is not a political issue. Being
conservative and supporting marriage equality are not mutually
exclusive. They are compatible.” (The video is embedded in the
right panel of this page.)
Marinelli
said in an interview last week that he's considering returning to the
United States to help advance the cause of marriage equality.
The ad is not affiliated with the Human
Rights Campaign's (HRC) New Yorkers For Marriage Equality but is
similarly themed.
According
to a new poll released last week, a majority (58%) of New York
voters favor giving gay and lesbian couples the right to marry.