Newt Gingrich to gay man: Vote for Obama

Scott Arnold

Newt Gingrich told a gay Iowan that he should vote for President Barack Obama when the man asked him about gay rights, the Des Moines Register reported.

Gingrich reportedly made the comment during an event Tuesday at Smokey Row coffee house in Oskaloosa.

“I asked him if he’s elected, how does he plan to engage gay Americans. How are we to support him? And he told me to support Obama,” said Scott Arnold, an adjunct professor of writing at William Penn University.”

Arnold, a Democrat, said he came to the event at Smokey Row coffee house with an open mind. But he wanted to ask Gingrich about how he would represent him as president after reading past comments the former U.S. House Speaker has made about gay and lesbians.

“When you ask somebody a question and you expect them to support all Americans and have everyone's general interest. It's a little bit frustrating and disheartening when you're told to support the other side. That he doesn't need your support.”

Gingrich recently pledged to two conservative groups that as president he would work against marriage equality by supporting a federal constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and offering a vigorous defense of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

At an October campaign stop in Iowa, Gingrich said that gay marriage “is a temporary aberration that will dissipate.”

“It doesn't inspire hope at all,” Arnold added. “And if that's what he's trying to do and that's what he's trying to say, that this is a collective effort if he's elected president, yet he tells me to support the other side?”