NATIONAL

Gays explain why they voted for Bush
‘National security more important than marriage’

LOU CHIBBARO JR.
Friday, November 12, 2004

Michael Winn, 62, a health care industry professional who lives in Deerfield Beach, Fla., said he voted for George W. Bush for president this year after having voted for Al Gore four years ago.

Winn is a gay man and a lifelong Democrat, although he admits he “strayed” from his party in the 1980s when he voted for Ronald Reagan.

“When 9/11 happened, I thought President Bush was so wonderful because he brought the country together,” he said. “He began the war on terrorism, which I strongly support.”

Winn makes clear that he disagrees with the president on some issues, such as a constitutional ban on gay marriage and stem cell research.

“But I feel the issue of national security is more important than the issue of gay marriage and the other issues I don’t agree with him on,” he said.

Winn is among those who put a face on the 23 percent of gay voters that a national exit poll claimed voted for Bush, breaking from the 77 percent of their gay brothers and sisters who reported voting for Democrat John Kerry.

The 23 percent of gay voters who backed the president translate into more than one million gay male, lesbian, or bisexual voters, according to the exit poll, a figure that stunned and baffled many gay activists.

The percentage was nearly identical to the level of gay support for Bush four years ago, and for Republican nominee Bob Dole in 1996.

Kerry waffles hurt
But to voters like Winn and James Warren, 41, a resident of nearby Oakland Park, Fla., there should be no surprise over why they chose Bush over Kerry in the key battleground state of Florida.

“John Kerry is an admirable man,” said Warren, an airplane mechanic who is retired on a disability. “Right now, the No. 1 issue is terrorism,” he said. “I watched John Kerry waffle on that issue. I’m not comfortable with that.”

The two men said that while they don’t share Bush’s support for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, they also don’t agree with efforts by gay activists to push the issue at this time.

“I look at gay marriage as a way for attorneys to make money,” Warren said. “That’s why this has gotten into the media.”

“I don’t agree with gay marriage,” Winn said. “I think a marriage should be between a man and a woman. I do feel civil unions should be approved.”

Chris Taylor, 42, a Wall Street financial analyst who lives in New York’s Greenwich Village, said he voted for Bush because he agreed far more with his positions on the issues than Kerry’s positions.

“Gay issues are only 20 percent of what I base my vote on,” he said. “I base my vote mostly on national defense and economic issues, like taxes and free trade.”

Added Taylor, who moved to New York three years ago from Atlanta, “Basically, I’m a small government kind of guy. The only area I want government to be strong is national defense and law enforcement.”

Unlike Winn and Warren, Taylor said he supports the goal of obtaining legalized same-sex marriage but he believes gay rights leaders made a mistake by pressing forward too soon.

“I think the gay movement has been incredibly irresponsible in the way they handled the gay marriage issue,” he said. “The gay movement rushed into this without thinking it through. They went full steam ahead, and we got shot down.”

Taylor acknowledges that White House political adviser Karl Rove “capitalized” on the gay marriage issue to help defeat Kerry. Media reports indicate that Rove encouraged conservatives to place gay marriage bans on the ballot in battleground states, encouraging a stronger evangelical voter turnout.

But Taylor’s support for Bush on a wide range of non-gay issues justified his decision to vote for a president who may have resorted to gay baiting to win election to a second term, Taylor said.

“You never get perfection,” he said. “You have to go with the candidate who is the least bad.”

Some gay Bush supporters have said their backing of the president has miffed some of their friends and acquaintances, who criticize them for going against the best interests of fellow gays. Taylor said he has encountered such sentiments in a dramatic way in his Greenwich Village neighborhood, an historic hotbed of liberalism.

“I went to a gay forum last week at the gay community center,” Taylor said. “Every left-wing cause came up. I made a conscious decision, for the first time in my life, not to tell people I’m a Republican.

“I went to a Baptist junior college in the South,” he said. “As a gay person, I felt more at home there than I do now in New York City as a Republican.”

Kerry not gay-friendly enough?
Ben Barkai, 24, a resident of Washington, D.C., said he is not reluctant to talk to his friends and acquaintances about his decision to vote for Bush, whose loss in the District of Columbia was the most lopsided in the country. Kerry won 91 percent of the D.C. vote, to Bush’s 9 percent.

But Barkai’s reason for backing Bush is likely to surprise some gay activists.

One of the reasons he chose not to vote for Kerry, he said, was Kerry’s opposition to same-sex marriage. Barkai, a personal trainer, said he strongly supports full legal recognition of same-sex marriage and calls civil unions a “copout.”

“Since neither party was supporting same-sex marriage, I felt I should vote for Bush on other issues, which I agree with him on,” Barkai said.

Some gay voters say that John Kerry did not convince them that he would be better on terrorism, gay issues or other concerns they had. (File photo by AP)

“Gays I talked to saw civil unions as a first step to marriage,” he said. “I don’t want anything to do with civil unions. I want marriage.”

He said Kerry gave “double talk” on marriage and civil unions and engaged in “flip-flopping” on a variety of other issues, Barkai said.

“I believe in the flat tax,” Barkai said in discussing other issues that are important to him. “You can’t overtax someone for being successful. I support privatizing Social Security for people 40 years old and older,” he said. “I’m for school vouchers.”

Patrick Guerriero, executive director of Log Cabin Republicans, the national gay GOP group, declined to comment on whether he voted for Bush. The LCR’s board of directors voted earlier this year not to endorse the president following Bush’s endorsement and vocal support for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

Brian Pruitt, president of the Log Cabin Republicans of D.C., which is affiliated with the national LCR group, said his group complied with LRC rules by also not making an endorsement in the presidential race. But he said he personally was proud to have voted for Bush, even though he penned an opinion column in February about how he felt betrayed by the president’s support of the FMA.

“I voted for the president because I thought he was the better of the two candidates,” Pruitt said. “I voted for him because I believe in a lot of his policy positions. I agree with his idea of reforming Social Security. I disagree with him on the Federal Marriage Amendment. But that’s only one of many different issues.”

In Palm Beach, Fla., Maurice Bonamigo, president of the disbanded LRC chapter in that city, said he, too, proudly voted for Bush. LCR ousted Bonamigo and the members of the Palm Beach group as an organizational affiliate to the LCR after the Florida group defied the national group’s rules by endorsing Bush.

“If you’re a Republican and you believe in the principles of the Republican Party and you support a Republican president, you should be able to endorse him,” Bonamigo said. “We feel he’s done a tremendous job.”

Bonamingo, 44, a hairdresser, said he and most of the members of his group agree with Bush’s opposition to gay marriage.

“It is totally wrong for liberal judges to change the definition of marriage,” he said. “The president said it right from the beginning, that he supports civil unions.”

Just days before the election, Bush said in an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that states should be allowed to enact civil union recognition for gay couples, even though gay activists have argued that the FMA would preclude that option. Bush did not, however, say he supported civil union recognition.

According to Bonamingo, the president is not to blame for the effort to push for a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

“It wasn’t the president doing this out of spite,” he said. “It was the liberal judges and the radical, liberal gay community that created the push for the marriage amendment. Nobody is disagreeing that homosexuals should have their civil rights.

“I think gay marriage is dead,” said Bonamigo. “It’s never going to happen in this country. But we will work with the White House to try to move ahead on legislation for civil rights.”

Lou Chibbaro Jr. can be reached at lchibbaro@washblade.com.

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