Domestic-partner benefits 'a travesty,' says Anthony Verdugo of the Christian Family Coalition

Christian Family Coalition founder Anthony Verdugo spoke with me Tuesday afternoon about the Miami-Dade County domestic-partners law:

"We fully expected the vote and margin. It's a travesty. The commissioners who supported this didn't have the courage to tell the truth. This is about same-sex marriage. When the court ruled to support gay marriage in California last week, they did it on the basis of domestic partner benefits."

Verdugo said the proposal was "not about health benefits."

If it had been, Verdugo said, the board would have adopted Commissioner Jose "Pepe" Diaz's alternate plan to insure family members who live together. "A clear act of discrimination," Verdugo said.

"You take care of your home first. The commission has taken care of strangers first. That is a travesty and an embarrassment. They should be ashamed of themselves. They don't merit the respect they want to get."

Verdugo concluded by speaking about Commission Chairman Bruno Barreiro, a Republican in a nonpartisan seat:

"Commissioner Barreiro has betrayed his own party -- the one that put him in office -- by spearheading this effort. When he was told this might end up in court, he said he didn't care that this could cost thousand of dollars to defend. You know why he didn't care? Because it's not his money. He could care less. He doesn't care about the people. He acted in a corrupt and cowardly manner today."

Comments

[allan]

grrr. Must be a mighty weak god they have.
They are afraid of everything.

[Kurt]

Wow. Anthony Verdugo makes a pathetic argument. Somehow bestowing the same legal rights that married couples have on those in our society who cannot be legally bound to each other through the exclusive institution of marriage is somehow a travesty?? What incredible hypocrisy, this is, and a profoundly undemocratic principle. It seems to the average level headed American that these self righteous individuals don't embody love and compassion whatsoever while in fact just the opposite, vigorously working hard to discriminate against a vulnerable minority. If anyone should be ashamed of themselves it's Anthony Verdugo.