Billie Jean King, tennis star turned social activist, is pretty happy about Joe Biden’s recent admission that he supports gay marriage.
“Being a lesbian, I was thrilled,” King told Yeas & Nays during her visit to the National Press Club on Wednesday. “I think Vice President Biden says what he really thinks and feels.”
King doesn’t necessarily blame the president for hedging on gay marriage. “I think President Obama is trying to win an election,” she said. “Whoever’s trying to win elections always has challenges. Whatever they say comes back. Everyone’s brutal with him, with all the candidates.”
Besides, she said, “it’s up to the person” to decide when and if to express public support for gay marriage. “Each person has to decide for himself or herself if they’re going to put it on the line, if the timing’s right.”
President Obama spoke in support of gay marriage during an interview Wednesday with ABC following pro-gay marriage statements this week from Biden and Secretary Arnie Duncan, plus the passage of a gay marriage ban in North Carolina.
“North Carolina, I’m very disappointed in them,” King said. She wasn’t surprised at the vote, which made gay marriage illegal in the state, despite polls showing that half the country supports gay marriage. “I think their grassroots efforts, they’re unbelievable,” she said of anti-gay marriage activists. “I think they’ve very organized. I think they’re much better organized than we are.”
She added that religious convictions that marriage should be between a man and a woman are “fine,” adding “but I think religion and the state, I think those should be separate.”
King herself has experienced a variety of sexual statuses. “I was married to a guy for a long time,” she said. “So I’ve been heterosexual, bisexual, and a lesbian.”
