Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) will speak at a fundraising dinner this week honoring Mat Staver, an ardent anti-gay activist who has defended Malawi's ban on homosexuality.
Staver is suing New Jersey GOP Gov. Chris Christie for signing a law
banning gay-to-straight conversion therapy, and has said that teaching
gay rights in schools is tantamount to "sexual assault."
Rubio, a possible GOP presidential candidate in 2016, will deliver
the keynote address at the annual fundraiser for the Florida Family
Policy Council, a prominent social conservative organization that promotes
so-called "conversion therapy" to help LGBT individuals become
straight. Conversion therapy has been condemned as a form of abuse by
psychologists. It is banned outright in a handful of states beyond New
Jersey, including California.
The American Psychiatric Association, which does not endorse conversion
therapy, says the practice is at best ineffective and at worst can
"reinforce self-hatred already experienced by the patient."
According to an invitation to the November 16 event, first reported by the progressive watchdog site Right Wing Watch, the
dinner will honor Staver, dean of Liberty University School of Law and
founder of the Liberty Counsel, which provides legal support to social
conservative organizations. Staver's group filed
a lawsuit against Christie last week alleging that New Jersey's new ban
on gay conversion therapy prevented a couple from properly treating
their son. Staver has a history of making incendiary claims about gays.
In June, he claimed
that the passage of the Employee Non-Discrimination Act, which would
prohibit employers from discriminating against LGBT employees and
applicants, would "result in significant damage and even death of some
individuals." After the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of
Marriage Act last summer, Staver suggested the decision would bring the
nation closer to "the realm of rebellion."
John Stemberger, the Florida Family Policy Council's president, is
also an anti-gay activist. He is chairman of Trail Life, the "moral
alternative" to the Boy Scouts of America, which recently lifted
its ban on gay Scouts. Trail Life won't accept openly gay boys as
members, but offers counseling services to kids who suffer from "gender
confusion."
"We're not going to tolerate somebody who's, you know, here and queer, loud and proud, all of that nonsense," Stemberger told
social-conservative radio host Janet Mefferd. Stemberger, a lawyer,
also triggered a minor international incident in 1999, when he sued
Dollar rental car for negligence for renting a vehicle to an Irish
tourist who got in an accident with his client. "Anyone
who has studied Ireland knows it's just a fact: To the Irish, drinking
and driving is not a big deal," he said at the time. The former mayor of Dublin told the Irish Times that Stemberger's lawsuit was "racist and absurd."
Rubio's office did not respond to a request for comment.
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