Gays ‘Welcome’ in Campaign, Bush Says

After months of shying away, George W. Bush met Thursday with a group of gay Republicans and afterward said he would not ban gays from serving in a Bush administration.

Surrounded by nearly a dozen gay activists, handpicked for the occasion, the Texas governor said that sexual orientation is “not a factor” when it comes to his hiring decisions--a more conciliatory stance than he took during the GOP nominating fight.

“I welcome gay Americans into my campaign. I’ve always welcomed gay Americans into my campaign,” Bush told reporters after the hourlong session at his Austin campaign headquarters. “I hope Republicans, conservative Republicans, understand that we judge people based upon their heart and soul.”

On a day in which he also announced plans to meet next month with vanquished rival John McCain, Bush sounded a distinctly harmonious note. He said he was “a better person” for having heard gay activists share their life stories. Even so, he emphasized his continued disagreement on matters such as gay marriage.

“These are people from our neighborhoods, people with whom all of us went to school,” Bush said. “I appreciate them sharing their stories with me. I’m mindful that we’re all God’s children.”

For the many kind words, however, the gathering occurred only after several weeks of bitter back-and-forth between the Bush campaign and the gay Republican group that first requested the meeting. Ultimately, leaders of the organization, the Log Cabin Republicans, were excluded from the session.

“This was not a meeting about politics, it was a meeting about people,” said Steve Gunderson, a gay former congressman from Wisconsin who attended the meeting.

Still, some social conservatives were quick to condemn Bush for even hosting the summit--the first of its kind for a Republican presidential standard-bearer--saying it raised doubts about his commitment to core GOP values and threatened to drive Republicans into the arms of independent Patrick J. Buchanan.

“Just by meeting with this group of gay supporters, Gov. Bush has elevated the gay rights agenda to a level of recognition within the Republican Party that contradicts our long-standing commitment to pro-family values,” said Gary Bauer, a conservative lobbyist who unsuccessfully challenged Bush for the GOP nomination.

Bauer and others were particularly rankled by Bush’s suggestion that he would consider having a gay speaker address the Republican National Convention this summer. “I think it’s a strange way to make decisions when we elevate a private matter into a public yardstick,” Bauer said.

The criticism suggests the tensions Bush faces as he tries to soften his image by reaching out to gays, working women and Latinos while still maintaining his support with the party’s base of religious and cultural conservatives.

The session Thursday provided a coda to a week in which Bush repeatedly sought to emphasize moderate stances by unveiling a health care plan and other proposals aimed at boosting struggling Americans into the middle class.

Bush’s few campaign statements on gay and lesbian issues present a mixed message. He has never engaged in hostile anti-gay rhetoric. But his comments grew decidedly less friendly as the Republican primaries wore on, particularly when his fight with McCain shifted to South Carolina, where the party is dominated by religious conservatives.

During a debate there, he implicitly criticized McCain for meeting with Log Cabin Republicans. In an interview on Christian radio, Bush seemed to back off his earlier intimations that gays and lesbians might be welcome to serve in his administration. A spokesman later said Bush only meant to suggest that gay “activists” would probably not share his conservative views.

In Texas, Bush is seen as no friend of gays and lesbians. As governor, he opposed gay adoptions as well as the repeal of the state’s 1879 anti-sodomy law, which remains on the books. What particularly angered many gay activists, however, was Bush’s opposition last year to efforts to bring anti-gay violence under the umbrella of Texas’ hate-crime law.

“I’ve always said all crime is hate crime,” Bush said last spring.

But Dianne Hardy-Garcia, an Austin gay-rights activist who did not attend Thursday’s meeting, asserted Bush’s opposition to the hate-crime protection was purely political. “He didn’t want to sign any bill protecting gays and lesbians because he was afraid of losing the right wing,” said Hardy-Garcia, head of the Lesbian and Gay Rights Lobby of Texas. “He put his own political gain above a real need in this state.”

But Bush has not been altogether unsympathetic to gay and lesbian concerns. In 1998, the Texas GOP barred the local Log Cabin chapter from setting up a booth at the party’s annual convention. Bush admonished the party to “stop the name-calling” and welcome Log Cabin’s participation.

Leaders of the national organization have been seeking a meeting with Bush since last fall. McCain met with the group in November. Steve Forbes also agreed to a session but quit the GOP nomination race before it took place, according to a Log Cabin spokesman.

Bush, in contrast, issued a series of contradictory statements, ultimately delaying any meeting until well after he secured the GOP nomination.

As Bush stalled, Log Cabin leaders grew increasingly critical. The group even placed radio ads before the March 7 primaries in California, New York and Massachusetts, chiding Bush for refusing to meet with gay activists.

Some critics faulted the Bush campaign for letting the controversy fester, saying the quibbling made Bush seem “petulant and a sore winner,” as GOP strategist Nelson Warfield put it.

In 1995, Warfield was among the campaign advisors who recommended that then-Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.) return a $1,000 presidential campaign contribution to the Log Cabin club. Warfield now considers that move a mistake. Dole, who became the GOP nominee, ultimately reversed the decision, accepting the money and apologizing to the group publicly.

“Most voters don’t care about gay rights,” Warfield said. “But they do want a president who shows tolerance and forbearance.”

In fact, recent surveys, including a Newsweek magazine poll, show the public increasingly supportive of anti-discrimination protections for gays and lesbians. More broadly, Americans are also less inclined to condemn homosexuality as a sin.

The Log Cabin club, which takes its name from Abraham Lincoln’s humble home, claims 10,000 members in 52 chapters across the country. Members contribute approximately $100,000 to GOP candidates each election cycle, according to club President Rich Tafel, who said roughly a third of the country’s gays and lesbians vote Republican--making them a larger group than Jewish or black Republicans.

Gays and lesbians make up roughly 5% of the national electorate, according to exit polls, and somewhat more in California and New York. Although gay voters tend to be overwhelmingly Democratic, Tafel insisted it was risky for Bush to snub gay support.

“This election cycle, the test of tolerance is reaching out to the gay and lesbian community,” said Tafel, who was left off Thursday’s invitation list.

On another matter, Bush used a news conference after the meeting to announce his plans to get together with McCain on May 9. “I’m looking forward to it a lot. I’m sure John and I will have a very constructive conversation.”

For his part, McCain told the Reuters news service that he supports Bush and hopes and expects he will win the White House, but he still did not feel sufficiently comfortable to endorse him. “I would be much more comfortable if I could be involved in the campaign on issues of reform,” McCain said.