The National Organization for Marriage Cooks Up an Iowa Strategy to Defeat Gay Marriage

by Michael Jones · 2009-08-25 04:55:00 UTC
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IowaIowa's Supreme Court may have ruled earlier this year that the state's constitution requires the recognition of same-sex marriage, based on an equal rights clause that provides for basic fairness and equality for all of Iowa's citizens.  But that's not stopping the National Organization for Marriage, the radical anti-LGBT group hell-bent on repealing the rights of gays and lesbians, from pouring loads of money into the state and working behind the scenes to ignite a political movement that will strip marriage rights from same-sex couples.

The National Organization for Marriage (NOM by many standards) is pledging to support politicians in Iowa that oppose same-sex marriage.  Their first honoree?  A guy named Stephen Burgmeier, a conservative Republican running in a special election for Iowa's House District 90. Burgmeier wants to put same-sex marriage on a ballot - ala California and now Maine - to take away the civil rights of gays and lesbians to get married.

Not only is NOM choosing to support Burgmeier, but they are giving him the equivalent of a Tiffany's store in the realm of political donations.  This fairly rural house district has a very small media market.  But NOM is dumping almost $90,000 into the district to support Bergmeier, which may not only buy a blanket airing of television commercials, but it might just be enough for Bergmeier to buy himself his own damn television station.

Is this race that important to NOM that they would dump nearly $90K in it?  Yup, sure is.  NOM wants to show that they can get people elected who support putting same-sex marriage on a ballot in Iowa.  A special election is a ripe time to do that because (1) turnout is always lower, which means that (2) special interest groups like NOM can sometimes have a much more serious impact than normal election cycles.

This one bears watching.  At nearly $90,000 and counting, this special election house seat in Iowa is shaping up to be ridiculously expensive.  But the more expensive outcome would be to not pay attention to where NOM is funneling its Rick Santorum-raised money, in hopes to place anti-LGBT political candidates in positions of power.

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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