VA Delegate Wants Attorney General Impeached for 'Sodomy Marriage'

In Depth

A Republican Delegate to the Virginia General Assembly has called for the impeachment of that state’s attorney general for refusing to defend the state’s ban on same-sex marriage.

Unsurprisingly not a big fan of LGBT+ rights, Virginia Del. Bob Marshall (R) filed the resolutions for starting the inquiry into the impeachment process of Attorney General Mark Herring last week. However, only in a new email, did he outline his reasons for doing so.

Removing all standards against same sex or sodomy ‘marriage,’ to the detriment of children and the well-being of society…Mark Herring’s actions constitute a radical structural alteration in our representative form of government.

None of this is particularly surprising for Marshall. He has a pretty long history of being horrible to gay people. In a 2011 letter attacking Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) for supporting marriage equality, Marshall compared homosexuality to pedophilia, prostitution, polygamy, necrophilia, and bestiality. More recently, he has called for circumventing the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and refusing to allow openly gay servicemembers in the Virginia National Guard. And he has declared, “sodomy is not a civil right.”

He also seems to have some serious issues recognising current constitutional jurisprudence, threatening the same impeachment proceedings for judges who rule in favor of same-sex marriage, and saying rulings based on the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause are not good enough because when that Amendment was ratified, “sodomy was a felony in nearly every state.” Yeah, and that Amendment was also being ratified because slavery had just been legal in half of the states.

Marshall’s public petition is pretty much dead in the water. Good luck, Bob.

Image via AP Images.

 
Join the discussion...