President Barack Obama surprised a gay Michigan couple with a special invite.
Kent and Diego Love-Ramirez have been invited by the president for a Father's Day celebration at the White House on June 14, as the Lansing State Journal reports.
The two fathers have a two-and-a-half year old son named Lucas, whose birth they were both present for. Diego cut the umbilical cord and Kent was first to hold Lucas after his birth in 2011. What makes Obama's invite particularly special is the fact that Michigan doesn't have second parent adoption.
“For us, it’s especially meaningful,” Kent is quoted as saying. “Because Michigan doesn’t have second parent adoption, we’re not both legally recognized as Lucas’ fathers. Only one of us is.”
He then went on to add that the inclusion is nice. “It’s nice that even though we don’t have legal recognition in our home state that the White House has seen fit to include us.”
Kent and Diego Love-Ramirez are volunteers of Family Equality Council, which is why the couple garnered the invite, as Gay Star News notes.
The White House searched for "dynamic father leaders" and the The Love-Ramirezes had volunteered to build a family space at the Michigan Pride Festival in 2012.
Earlier this year, U.S. Army Captain Zachary Evans-Nethers and his husband Marshall partook in the Easter Egg Roll festivities at the White House with their children, while in December, an active duty U.S. Marine Corps captain made history by becoming the first openly gay man to pop the question to his partner at the White House.