HRC Blog

President Obama will reiterate his support for marriage equality in an ABC News interview with George Stephanopoulos set to air on ‘Nightline’ later tonight. In a transcript provided by ABC, the President tells Stephanopoulos that he sees no reason for any state to discriminate against loving, committed same-sex couples who want to marry:

My hope is that the Court looks at the evidence and- and in the California case, for example, the only reason presented for treating gays and lesbians differently was, "Well, they're gay and lesbian." There wasn't a real rationale beyond that. In fact…all the other rights and responsibilities of a civil union were identical to marriage. It's just you couldn't call it marriage. Well, at that point, what you're really saying is: "We're just gonna treat these folks differently because of who they are." And I do not think that's who are as Americans.

‘Nightline’ airs at 12:35am tonight.

Last month, the Obama administration made history by filing a brief at the Supreme Court arguing for the first time on behalf of the U.S. Government that a law denying loving and committed gay and lesbian couples the ability to marry is unconstitutional.