President Obama reversed course and endorsed gay marriage Wednesday amid growing pressure from Democrats and gay-rights advocates, completing what he called his evolution on an issue that could have major repercussions in the November election.
“I think same-sex couples should be able to get married,” Obama told ABC News’ Robin Roberts in a hastily arranged interview at the White House.
It was a change of position for the president, who generally supported gay rights but resisted endorsing same-sex marriage.
“I had hesitated on gay marriage in part because I thought civil unions would be sufficient,” he said. “I was sensitive to the fact that for a lot of people the word marriage was something that invokes very powerful traditions, religious beliefs and so forth.”
Yet, the president isn’t ready to change any laws. He said individual states should choose how to define marriage.
Obama chose to speak out on the issue just days after Vice President Joe Biden and Education Secretary Arne Duncan publicly endorsed same-sex marriage, prompting questions about where Obama stood.
Obama’s endorsement of gay marriage could cause a backlash among moderates, blacks and independents, who adamantly oppose gay marriage despite its growing acceptance nationwide — particularly among younger voters, analysts said.
Still, Obama and his supporters surmised that the president risked looking weak and unprincipled by remaining quiet about the issue.
Obama has taken a variety of positions on gay nuptials over the years, leading to criticisms that he was shifting according to political calculation.
When running for the Illinois state Senate in 1996, Obama said he favored same-sex marriage and “would fight efforts to prohibit such marriages.” But as a U.S. Senate candidate in 2004 and presidential contender in 2008, he described marriage solely as a union between a man and a woman.
As president, Obama said his views on same-sex nuptials were “constantly evolving.”
Gay marriage could very well become a wedge issue in an election that most expect to hinge on the economy. And presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney was quick to strike a clear contrast with Obama on the issue.
“My view is that marriage itself is a relationship between a man and a woman,” Romney said at a campaign event in Oklahoma, calling the debate a “tender and sensitive topic.”
Former Republican presidential contender Rick Santorum, who made family and social issues the centerpiece of his campaign, said Obama and “cultural elites” were using gay marriage to undermine “the basic building block of our society.”
“President Obama has consistently fought against protecting the institution of marriage from radical social engineering at both the state and federal level,” he said. “The charade is now over, no doubt an attempt to galvanize his core hard left supporters in advance of the November election.”
The White House insists Obama has done more to promote gay rights than any other president. Aides point to the lifting of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” ban on gay troops serving openly in the U.S. military and the Justice Department’s refusal to enforce a federal law that defined marriage as an exclusively heterosexual institution.
Still, those efforts didn’t appease gay-marriage supporters, who said the shifting public perception surrounding gay couples should make it easier for politicians to coalesce behind a previously toxic measure in battleground states.
