Rhode Island House Speaker Gordon Fox
said Saturday that the House would vote on a gay marriage bill in
January.
Fox made the pledge to a group of
supporters gathered at the restaurant Blaze in Providence. He said
the legislation would come up for a vote “during the third or
fourth week of January.”
Fox, who is openly gay, first announced
during the summer that he would call a vote next year if re-elected
to his post.
“I'm calling the vote,” Fox said on
WPRI's Newsmakers. “It's one of those issues that I need to
come back, we need to address, and I intend if I'm elected speaker to
address it early.”
“It's one of the main reasons I'm
coming back,” he added. “There's unfinished business.”
The General
Assembly ended its 2012 session without taking up debate on bills
related to gay marriage. One such bill sought to legalize marriage
equality.
Fox has come under
heavy criticism from gay marriage advocates for abandoning efforts
last year to approve a marriage equality bill in favor of civil
unions. Fox explained at the time that the marriage bill was doomed
in the Senate because President Teresa Paiva Weed and other top
Democrats remained opposed.
(Source: WPRI.)