Gov. Mark Dayton To March In Minnesota Gay Pride Parade
- By
- On Top Magazine Staff
- | June 24, 2012
Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton will march in Sunday's 40th annual Twin Cities Pride parade in downtown Minneapolis.
Dayton marched as governor in last year's parade, which drew a crowd of over 125,000 revelers.
Opponents of putting Minnesota's law banning gay nuptials in the Minnesota Constitution hope to galvanize a base of thousands over the weekend to attempt to win the November ballot fight.
“Passing this amendment and limiting their freedom to call their marriage a marriage and limiting their church's freedom to perform that same marriage doesn't bode well with me,” Matt Abbott, a volunteer gathering signatures for Minnesotans United for all Families, the group working to defeat the measure, told CBS affiliate WCCO. “Getting something in folks' hands … makes it real.”
Dayton has emerged as a leading opponent of the amendment.
In April, Dayton told a crowd of supporters at the state capitol that he had a dream that Minnesota would become the first state in the nation to reject a gay marriage ban.
“I think Minnesota's better than that,” he said.
The parade kicks off at 11AM.