Virtually the entire field of potential 2016 candidates will be in Iowa this weekend. Gov. Scott Walker is scheduled to attend a fundraiser with King in Iowa Friday night. On Saturday, Walker is scheduled to join Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee, Bobby Jindal, Rick Perry, Marco Rubio, and Rick Santorum at the Faith and Freedom Coalition Spring Kickoffin Waukee, Iowa. The Faith and Freedom Coalition is led by founder and chairman Ralph Reed, an outspoken opponent of marriage equality.

“Congressman King has forced the issue – when 2016 candidates go to Iowa to campaign and raise money with Steve King, they need to be asked whether they agree with him and will continue fighting against the majority of Americans who agree that same-sex couples deserve the same rights and responsibilities that come with marriage,” said JoDee Winterhof, HRC Vice President for Policy and Political Affairs. “It speaks volumes that less than a week before historic oral arguments on marriage equality at the Supreme Court, and when the majority of Americans agree that same-sex couples deserve the same rights and responsibilities that come with marriage, virtually the entire field of Republicans are campaigning with outspoken opponents of marriage equality.”

Background:

Rep. Steve King Introduced The “Restrain The Judges On Marriage Act Of 2015.” According to KCCI, Rep. Steve King introduced the “Restrain the Judges On Marriage Act of 2015” to “‘stop the court from destroying traditional marriage and preserve the votes of millions of voters in states that have passed bans on same-sex marriage.’…. ‘For too long, federal courts have overstepped their constitutionally limited duty to interpret the Constitution,’ said King in a news release. ‘Rather, federal courts have perverted the Constitution to make law and create constitutional rights to things such as privacy, birth control, and abortion. These unenumerated, so-called constitutionally-protected rights were not envisioned by our Founding Fathers.’” [KCCI, 2/22/2015]

The Human Rights Campaign is America’s largest civil rights organization working to achieve lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality. HRC envisions a world where LGBT people are embraced as full members of society at home, at work and in every community.

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