7 Politicians Who Changed Their Minds About Gay Marriage

Let’s not forget who played the pivotal, inciting role in that moment of historic first support from the executive branch of gay marriage: it was good ol’ Joe.

In a May 2012 appearance on NBC’s Meet The Press , Vice President Biden (unwittingly, deliberately, who knows) undermined President Obama’s standing on the key issue.

“I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and heterosexual men and women marrying one another are entitled to the same exact rights, all the civil rights, all the civil liberties,” Biden said.

Obama hadn’t yet planned to announce his “evolution” — he was saving it for later in his campaign against Mitt Romney, hoping to deploy the news to maximum political effect. But the optics of a Vice President out in front of his number one on a major civil rights issue proved too much heat to sustain, and days later, the rest was history.

In the realm of American power politics, the story of former Vice President Dick Cheney’s support for gay marriage stands out as one of the most peculiar, personal, and conflicted.

It’s peculiar because Cheney was and is a Republican, and in basic terms, Republican officeholders don’t often support gay marriage. It’s personal because Cheney’s second daughter Mary is also a lesbian. Cheney has spoken publicly about his love for her, and his belief that the right of gays to matter is a fundamental freedom issue.

It’s conflicted, however, because Cheney was the willing second-half of the 2004 presidential ticket, which tried to turn the campaign into a galling referendum on the marriage rights of LGBT citizens.

Notwithstanding, Cheney has been very forthcoming after leaving office about his belief in marriage equality, going so far as to lobby a Republican Maryland state lawmaker to change his vote in 2012.

In March 2013, Senator Rob Portman announced he was coming out for gay marriage. Portman’s son Will was a freshman at Yale in 2011 when he told his father that he was gay — like many a marriage equality conversion case, it was his coming out that opened up a new constellation of empathy for Portman.

“It allowed me to think of this issue from a new perspective, and that’s of a Dad who loves his son a lot and wants him to have the same opportunities that his brother and sister would have — to have a relationship like Jane and I have had for over 26 years,” Portman said.

Portman was the first Republican Senator to embrace gay marriage, and he paid a price at the polls with Ohio Republicans for it.

When Illinois Senator Mark Kirk came out for gay marriage in April 2013, the statement he issued referenced a deep personal significance. Kirk had suffered a major stroke about a year prior, and feared for his life. And in that fear came a different understanding of life’s meaning:

“When I climbed the Capitol steps in January, I promised myself that I would return to the Senate with an open mind and greater respect for others. Same-sex couples should have the right to civil marriage,” Kirk said. “Our time on this earth is limited, I know that better than most. Life comes down to who you love and who loves you back — government has no place in the middle.”

Now if only we could get more Republicans to have near-death experiences — we’d have a functional government on our hands.

As one of the party’s moderate figures that has survived a direct Tea Party challenge — she reclaimed her seat by winning an independent write-in campaign against Joe Miller, who’d beat her in the GOP primary — Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski was a sensible recruitment target for proponents of same-sex marriage. Having already survived a challenge from the right-wing, she was on firm standing to get on the right side of history.

Murkowski announced her support for gay marriage in June 2013, dropping a line from a recent claim by former President Ronald Reagan’s daughter that her father would have backed gay marriage:

“Like Reagan, Alaskans believe that government works best when it gets out of the way,” Murkowski said. “Countless Alaskans and Americans want to give themselves to one another and create a home together. I support marriage equality and support the government getting out of the way to let that happen.”

Perhaps chastened by her uncommon position as the survivor of a lost primary battle, however, she seemed to know some people would never see it her way.

“There may be some that when they hear the position that I hold that are deeply disappointed. There may be some who embrace the decision that I have made. I recognize that it is an area that as a Republican I will be criticized for.”

Like President Obama, Hillary Clinton’s transition from ostensible opponent of gay marriage to a full-throated supporter was slow-going, but always seemed inevitable. As a presidential candidate in 2008, Clinton refused to voice the sort of unambiguous support for marriage equality; instead advertising her enthusiasm for civil unions.

As Secretary of State, however, Clinton would deliver with passion on the issue of LGBT rights around the world. She delivered a landmark speech defining the United States’ position, saying that ”gay rights are human rights,” in concert with a directive from President Obama tying foreign aid considerations to treatment of LGBT populations. She formally announced her support for gay marriage in March 2013.