CNN anchor Anderson Cooper on Tuesday
confronted Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi over remarks she made
aligning herself with the LGBT community.
Cooper interviewed Bondi in front of
the hospital where many of the injured from Sunday's attack on a gay
nightclub in Orlando were being treated.
“I saw you the other day saying that
anyone who attacks the LGBT community – our LGBT community, you
said – will be gone after to the full extend of the law,” Cooper
said during the live interview.
“I talked to a lot of gay and lesbian
people here yesterday who are not fans of yours and said that they
thought you were being a hypocrite. That you for years have fought –
you've basically gone after gay people – said that in court that
gay people simply by fighting for marriage equality were trying to do
harm to the people of Florida.”
“Do you really think you're a
champion of the gay community?” Cooper
asked.
In a 2014 filing, Bondi's office argued
that allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry would “impose
significant public harm.”
Bondi argued, as she has before, that
she was simply doing her job. “I've never said I don't like gay
people,” she insisted.
“Had there been no gay marriage, no
same-sex marriage, you do realize that spouses – there would be no
spouses – that boyfriends and girlfriends of the dead would not be
able to get information and would not be able to visit in the
hospital here. Isn't there a sick irony in that?” Cooper asked.
“I was defending the constitution,”
Bondi answered. “You know what today's about? Human beings. It's
about victims.”
“It's about gay and lesbian victims,”
Cooper interrupted.
“We're human beings,” Bondi later
added, “and that's what this is about.”