RNC committee members gathered at their annual spring conference in Los Angeles voted unanimously on Friday to approve a number of resolutions, including one to reaffirm that the GOP still opposes gay marriage, Time's Zeke J. Miller reported.
"[T]he Republican National Committee affirms its support for marriage as the union of one man and one woman, and as the optimum environment in which to raise healthy children for the future of America; and be it further resolved, the Republican National Committee implores the U. S. Supreme Court to uphold the sanctity of marriage in its rulings on California’s Proposition 8 and the Federal Defense of Marriage Act," the resolution, first obtained by Chris Moody of Yahoo News, read.
Miller reports that the resolution was submitted by RNC committeeman Dave Agema, a Michigan Republican who has drawn criticism for calling gays and lesbians "filthy" and comparing them to people who were "dying of alcoholism."
While such an anti-gay plank already existed in the party's official platform, confirmed last summer at the Republican National Convention, the latest vote comes after a week of public consternation among social conservatives concerned that the party's aversion to marriage equality was beginning to wither in the name of expanding its outreach.
Suspicious of a recent GOP autopsy that contained suggestions that the party would need to be "welcoming and inclusive" in order to attract younger voters, top evangelical leaders began to turn the screws on Republican leaders. In a letter to RNC chairman Reince Priebus earlier this week, a group of 13 social conservative leaders vowed to leave the party if it abandoned its rigid anti-gay stance. Family Research Council President Tony Perkins later followed up, calling for supporters to withhold contributions to the GOP until it grew "a backbone" on the gay marriage issue.
In a speech before the vote, Priebus appeared to address the criticism.
"Let me make crystal clear something I've said since January," he said, according to CNN. "While we have to do things differently, there's one thing that can't and won't change: our principles. There are some that would like us to abandon them, but as long as I'm chairman, we'll stay true to them. Some would have us turn into Democrats-lite, but I refuse."
While some members of the GOP, including Sens. Rob Portman (Ohio) and Mark Kirk (Ill.), have broken the party mold and announced support for gay marriage, it appears for now that those views will continue to be held as contradictory to the broader Republican platform.
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