The conservative Heritage Foundation is reportedly spending one million dollars on ads opposing the passage of the pro-gay marriage “Respect for Marriage Act.” The ads are set to run during Thanksgiving NFL and college football games.
The Washington-based think tank hopes to sway the U.S. Senate against voting in favor of the bill in next Monday’s vote for final passage, Fox News reported.
Conservative critics of the bill claim it is deceptively named and would not codify any new rights to same-sex couples. But, worse, if passed, people of religious faiths that oppose gay marriage would be vulnerable to legal actions and other forms of retaliation by radical LGBTQ activists.
“America’s religious liberty is under attack with this impending vote in the Senate,” Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said in a statement. “This legislation does not add one additional benefit to same-sex couples in the United States; it’s an attack that sets the stage to take rights away from people of faith. What it does accomplish is deputizing radical activists to target Americans who cannot in good faith endorse anything other than a man-woman marriage. The American people deserve all the facts.”
Heritage maintains that the bill is being rushed through Congress to get ahead of the GOP takeover of the House in January and that if it becomes law, the bill will “expose religious schools and nonprofits to lawsuits.”
The Respect for Marriage Act (RFMA) was introduced following the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade due to Democrats’ unfounded concerns that the Supreme Court could use the Dobbs decision to overrule the Court’s Obergefell gay marriage decision. The measure passed the House in July with the help of 47 Republicans. Still, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) agreed to postpone a vote until after the midterms to give the bill the highest probability of passing — with the expected help of weak Republicans.
Indeed, 12 Republican Senators crossed the aisle and joined Democrats, giving Schumer the victory he was expecting.
Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee warned that the bill is aimed directly at religious institutions and individuals and that the bill’s sponsors refused to add an amendment that protects religion.
New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan also warned that the misnamed bill threatens religious Americans.
“The Respect for Marriage Act seeks to shunt our idea of marriage aside,” Cardinal Dolan said a week ago. “We who hold to these time-honored convictions would be voices in the wilderness, increasingly marginalized and dismissed in the face of Congress’s endorsement of same-sex civil marriages as the national norm.”
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