Social Conservatives and LGBT Community Team Up to Defeat Gay Republican

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The right thinks he’s a gay rights activist, but the LGBT community don’t think he’s supportive enough.
The only thing social conservatives and LGBT activists in San Diego’s 52nd congressional district agree on is that they don’t want Carl DeMaio, the openly gay Republican candidate, to be their next congressman.

Social conservatives have made a deal with the devil, urging voters to support incumbent Democratic Representative Scott Peters over DeMaio. Meanwhile, the candidate never managed to convince the local LGBT community that he was a strong advocate for gay rights.

This week the National Organization for Marriage, an anti-gay rights/pro-traditional marriage group, joined Republicans and Independents for Scott Peters, a coalition of religious leaders and individuals who would rather see a straight Democrat in office than a gay Republican.

“We’re excited about what we’re doing.” said Brian S. Brown, president of NOM

The idea is to suffer through Peters for two years, until “we can work together to elect a true conservative in two years to replace him,” Brian S. Brown, the president of NOM, wrote in a message to “marriage supporters.”

Brown also lent his voice to a robocall urging San Diego voters not to vote for “fake Republican Carl DeMaio,” because it would give him a platform to advance his “flawed ideas.” In the message he asks voters to “consider” voting for Peters.

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If electing a Democrat you don’t agree with at all to keep out a Republican you only disagree with sometimes sounds like a dumb idea, then you don’t understand how willing California’s far right are to cut off its nose to spite its face, especially when the GOP has a shot of picking up a House seat in the district. 

San Diego is, more-or-less, equal parts Democratic, Republican and Independent, meaning De Maio had a legitimate shot of winning. The San Diego Union-Tribune released a poll conducted from Oct. 17 to 20 that showed the De Maio and Peters  statistically tied. And that was after a former DeMaio staffer accused him sexual harassment. (He’s since been cleared of the charges.)

“We’re excited about what we’re doing,” Brown told Bloomberg Politics over the phone Thursday, referring to the anti-DeMaio campaign. “We think we’re making a difference.”

While Peters is just as bad, Brown said, social conservatives are “not going to be taken advantage of by the Republican Party," and criticized Speaker John Boehner and the National Republican Congressional Committee for fundraising for DeMaio and “kicking social conservatives to the back of the bus.”

And while Peters could win reelection in two years, at least he won’t be “featured by the leftist media as a ‘new Republican’ to be [sic] role model for young people,” as Brown wrote in a message to “marriage supporters.”

The DeMaio campaign has been diplomatic on the issue. DeMaio has “always been trying to push for a more inclusive Republican party,” said DeMaio spokesman Dave McCulloch. 

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