One of the country’s top anti-gay-marriage conservatives, Michael Farris, who endorsed congressional candidate Gabe Evans in December, declined to comment Monday on Evans’ decision to vote for a pro-gay ballot measure that would remove language banning same-sex marriage from the Colorado Constitution.
“I would have to check on this; I don’t think it would be appropriate to answer without talking to Gabe,” said Farris, who’s a hard-charging right-wing lawyer who’s pushed for the prohibition of gay marriage.
Evans revealed his plan to vote for the measure, called Amendment J, after being asked about an anti-gay letter he’d written in high. He also has anti-LGBTQ threads running through his life.
The amendment faces local opposition from social conservatives like former state Sen. Kevin Lundberg (R-Berthoud).
Lundberg told the Colorado Times Recorder that he, too, would need to talk to Evans before commenting on Evans’ stance.
“I haven’t heard his side of the story, so I can’t comment on what he’s saying,” said Lundberg. “I will be voting against it. I can tell you that much. I was very much engaged in the political battles that resulted in at least that much being in the Colorado Constitution, and I think it should stay there. But I’m not going to comment on Gabe’s decision without having some direct knowledge on what he is doing and why he is doing it.”
Lundberg declined an offer from the Colorado Times Recorder to send him Evans’ comments, as reported in the Colorado Sun, on Amendment J. Lundberg said he wanted to talk to Evans directly.
In 2006, Colorado voters passed an amendment to the Colorado Constitution that defined marriage as only between a man and a woman. But the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges legalized same-sex marriage nationally, including in Colorado, and rendered the 2006 amendment moot. In 2022, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the court should consider overturning Obergefell as well. If that happened, and Colorado’s language prohibiting gay marriage was still in the state Constitution, then same-sex marriage would be banned here as well.
Farris is also the founder of Patrick Henry College, which requires students to sign an anti-gay honor code. “Therefore, marriage is a sacred God-made union between a man and a woman, which is to be separated by no man. It is to model the reverence, love, sacrifice, and respect exemplified by Christ for His bride, the college states on its website. “Husbands are the head of their wives just as Christ is the head of the church, and are to love their wives just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her. Human sexuality is a great blessing created by God to be enjoyed within the context of a monogamous marriage between a man and a woman; any sexual conduct outside the parameters of marriage is sin.”
Evans, who’s running in Colorado’s hotly contested 8th Congressional District (CD8) north of Denver, attended Patrick Henry College from 2005 – 2009.
