Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota, the first Muslim ever elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, predicts that his home state will be the first one to defeat a referendum to ban marriage equality by popular vote. The polls are currently showing an almost even split between supporters and opponents of the referendum.
Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) told TPM on Saturday that he expects a constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage in Minnesota will fail when voters head to the polls in November.
“I believe that the right to marry someone who you please is so fundamental it should not be subject to popular approval anymore than we should vote on whether blacks should be allowed to sit in the front of the bus,” Ellison said after a panel on voting rights at the Netroots Nation conference here.
At the local level, Ellison said his campaign staff is working to defeat the amendment. “When we call, we don’t call and say, ‘Please vote for Keith.’ We say Keith is fighting to defeat the voter ID and the anti-marriage amendment. Will you support these efforts too?”
Ellison commended President Obama for endorsing same-sex marriage. “I was happy he did it,” Ellison said. “Who you marry is your business. That’s up to you.”
The funny thing is that the wingnuts went berserk when Ellison was elected to Congress, claiming that he has “ties” to Islamic radicals who want to take over America and other such nonsense (“ties” meaning any 25 degrees of separation they can find — if he once had dinner with someone who attended a mosque that was attended at another time by someone whose former college roommate knew someone who once said anything even mildly supportive of the Palestinian cause, that’s all the “proof” they need). And we all know that radical Islamists like Ellison just love equality for gay people.
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regexp
June 13, 2012 at 9:52 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Who is he calling? His district is as blue as it can be – he is just preaching to the choir. I’ve already had two groups of people come to the door asking me to vote against this – and I live in the bluest area of this blue district. What we need are the suburbs to kill the amendment and that needs outreach and calls to that set of voters.
(didn’t vote for him the first two times – not voting for him this year either – but he will most likely win with 70% of the vote)
d cwilson
June 13, 2012 at 9:53 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Obviously, Ellison’s endorsement of marriage equality is proof of “creeping Shariah” because, shut up! That’s why.
sisu
June 13, 2012 at 10:06 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
regexp, hi neighbor! :) I live in Keith’s district too. I got one fundraising call from his campaign – I actually laughed at the caller when she said that his seat was in jeopardy of going Republican. I agree, the People’s Republic of South Minneapolis is not going to vote for the anti-marriage amendment. Michele Bachmann’s district, on the other hand…
slc1
June 13, 2012 at 10:13 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Actually, it appears that the referendum in Maryland is more likely to go down to defeat.
Hercules Grytpype-Thynne
June 13, 2012 at 11:18 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Clearly Ellison’s Islam is “evolving”, just like the Muslim-in-Chief’s.
Mr. Upright
June 13, 2012 at 12:04 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@regexp: “Who is he calling? His district is as blue as it can be – he is just preaching to the choir.”
Not being a political worker myself, this still makes perfect sense to me as a GOTV effort. Ellison isn’t going to change the minds of anyone who didn’t vote for him, but he might change the minds of some who did, and he surely is reminding them (particularly young people) to get off their butts and vote.
Michael Heath
June 13, 2012 at 12:27 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Based on past results I’d argue bigots have an edge in an upcoming election if the polls show the race at 50/50.
We know some bigots hide their bigotry, which would result in some polled claiming they’ll support equality or are undecided when they instead intend and vote their bigotry.
I’ve also noticed the bigots who draft these bills* are pretty good at creating language that has somewhat uninformed voters confused by the language where they end up voting for bigotry when they intended to vote for equality. We saw this language in 2004 when Michigan voted to amend our state constitution institutionalizing our bigotry towards gays and their children.
*Not sure this observation is in play in Minnesota. Which side drafted the language?
slc1
June 13, 2012 at 1:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Re Michael Heath @ #7
The last I heard, the polls are decidedly one-sided against the repeal referendum in Maryland. It would seem that the Obama endorsement of same sex marriage, as lame as it might be, had some effect in heavily Afro-American Prince Georges County in reducing the pro-repeal support there.
naturalcynic
June 13, 2012 at 1:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Jeepers, you can’t see nefarious backhanded creeping shariah when it’s right in front of your faces. This quote will also mean that Ellison wants his four wives. /snark
and Romney too
abb3w
June 13, 2012 at 3:23 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@7, Michael Heath:
The most recent poll I’ve spotted from PPP 2012-06-05 is 49-43 opposed to gay marriage. Alas.
Of the four states that I know of with upcoming ballot measures (ME, MD, MN, WA), Minnesota seems the least blue-leaning relative to the national mean, and thus the most likely to have a defeat. (NC leans slightly red relative to US mean, so was not a big surprise in the result, though the degree of gap was.)
DiscordianStooge
June 13, 2012 at 3:54 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Which side drafted the language?”
ALEC.
stubby
June 13, 2012 at 4:38 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I hope Ellison is right. I am looking forward to voting no.
johnryder
June 13, 2012 at 5:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
abb3w:
Actually that poll showed it being 49-43 FOR gay marriage. It’s against the amendment banning gay marriage.
Minnesota also has the benefit of amendments having to get 50% of all voters approving it to pass. So if 49% of people vote for the amendment, 48% of people vote against it, and 3% of people don’t vote on it then it will not pass even though a plurality of voters approved it.
tfkreference
June 13, 2012 at 8:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Here’s the text of the Minnesota ballot proposal:
“Shall the Minnesota Constitution be amended to provide that only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Minnesota?”