The Detroit News published audio recordings today that expose an effort by two married Michigan Republican lawmakers to try to suppress news of their affair with each other. As part of the cover-up, state Reps. Todd Courser and Cindy Gamrat, among the most vocal opponents of gay rights and defenders of “traditional marriage” in the state legislature, planned to start a rumor that Courser was actually having an affair with a man.
“Courser, a Lapeer Republican, said on one recording the email was designed to create ‘a complete smear campaign’ of exaggerated, false claims about him and Gamrat so a public revelation about the legislators’ relationship would seem ‘mild by comparison,'” Chad Livengood reported. “Interviews with former House employees and the recordings show freshman lawmakers Courser and Gamrat, R-Plainwell, used their taxpayer-funded offices to maintain and cover up their relationship.”
Fearing that news of the affair would come out, Courser demanded that an aide send out a mass email to state Republicans claiming that Courser, had “male on male paid sex behind a prominent Lansing night club,” describing him as a “bi-sexual porn addicted sex deviant” and a “Godless Addicted Monster.” Courser, explained to the aide, who refused to send the email, that it was part of a “controlled burn” strategy.
As Livengood pointed out, Courser and Gamrat “are socially conservative legislators who often invoke their Christian faith in pursuit of new legislation governing gun rights, abortion and marriage,” and are closely aligned with the Tea Party.
Gamrat and Courser made waves earlier this year when they tried to circumvent the Supreme Court’s marriage decision by introducing a bill declaring that only members of the clergy could perform marriages in Michigan. Gamrat denounced the marriage ruling as a “sad day in our nation” and blasted the court for trying to “redefine for our entire nation, marriage, the bedrock of families and society since the beginning of time.” She also warned that people who “do not embrace the homosexual lifestyle will need protections” to fend off impending persecution.
Courser has similarly alleged that LGBT rights advocates are trying to do away with freedom, maintaining that “this decision by the Supreme Court was and is an absolute tragedy for our nation and its future.” He responded to the Supreme Court ruling by announcing that we “are living in the last days” and that it “was a crushing day for those who believe in traditional marriage and traditional morality.”
Days before the decision, Courser told his supporters: “I will say that I grieve for our nation as we take one step after another to deny the diety of God and who He is. As we step further and further away from Him and His Holy word we lose His protection for ourselves, our families, our communities, our states and of course our Nation!”
Last December, we reported on Courser’s efforts to block an LGBT nondiscrimination measure, accusing its supporters of “promoting evil” and attempting to “destroy freedoms of religion and speech for our children and their children” and “institutionalize discrimination against Christians and other faiths.”
He also said that gay marriage is leading to the End Times and “persecution”:
It is a decision that will embolden and expand the tyrannical hammer of the secular progressive left….
This decision will be a toe hold and from this decision we will see many more decisions that curtail our first amendment rights of free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of association, and of course freedom of conscience. This decision will unleash the power and scope of government to further society by its power of persuasion and its hammer of threat of governmental persecution. Every regulatory apparatus of government will be focused henceforth on indoctrinating children and the greater society that same sex marriage is moral and every bit accepted, preferred to traditional marriage. Anyone who disagrees with this new paradigm will be vilified as a homophobic bigot. Some of these activists are the most intolerant viscous hate mongers who will demonize anyone who opposes their tyrannical agenda. It works and virtually none are left in elected leadership who will now stand and oppose them publicly as they destroy our rights to freedom of religion and freedom of speech.
If we do not act now we will see public officials, pastors, and private citizens alike being limited in what they can say or do. The effects of this decision, many unforeseen, on our nation and the world will echo through the end of time. It will destroy and tear down families and with it our social fabric of our society.
We are indeed living in the last days….
May God discipline and correct the hearts of our countrymen and in so doing may He once again bless the United States of America!
