A year after Minnesotans voted against
a proposed gay marriage ban and four months after such unions became legal,
the group which spearheaded the campaign to ban same-sex marriage is
attempting to make marriage equality an election issue.
In an email to supporters, Minnesota
for Marriage chided Rep. Tim Faust, a Democrat, for saying that “most
people have moved on.”
“I think we are seeing that other
states are doing this, and I think that by the time next election
comes around it will not be near the issue people said it was going
to be and what we thought it was going to be,” Faust told Politics
in Minnesota. “As a rule, there have been more positive
comments than negative. Most people have moved on.”
“Do you agree: Have you 'moved on?'”
Minnesota
for Marriage asked in its email.
“Apparently, Rep. Faust thinks that
simply because other states have passed same-sex 'marriage' since he
voted to pass Minnesota's same-sex 'marriage' law in May (even
though you, along with the vast majority of his constituents wanted
to keep Minnesota as a true marriage state), you will forget about
his vote by the time his re-election comes around.”
Faust, a Lutheran minister, was lobbied
heavily from both sides after he declared himself undecided on the issue. In
an emotional speech on the House floor, Faust explained that his
recent marriage helped him decide how he would vote.
“In this state there are people that
feel that way about each other, that cannot live without that other
person, that feel the same way they do about each other that I feel
about my wife and yet because of religious beliefs of other people,
they do not have the right that I have taken for granted since the
day I realized what the opposite sex was,” Faust said.