David Jolly, who won a Special Election in March to replace long time Congressman Bill Young in Florida’s 13th Congressional District, has become the latest Republican to come out in support of same-sex marriage:
Rep. David Jolly (R-Fla.) announced his support for gay marriage Monday, saying that he believes it is “fully appropriate” for a state to recognize both same-sex marriages and “traditional” ones, even though he, as a Christian, believes in the the latter.
When asked by The Washington Post whether he supports gay marriage, in light of a Florida judge’s decision last week to overturn the state’s ban, Jolly said that his personal views on marriage are that it should be limited to one man and one woman. But, he added, states should not be defining the “sanctity” of marriage.
“As a matter of my Christian faith, I believe in traditional marriage,” said Jolly in a statement to The Post. “But as a matter of Constitutional principle I believe in a form of limited government that protects personal liberty. To me, that means that the sanctity of one’s marriage should be defined by their faith and by their church, not by their state. Accordingly, I believe it is fully appropriate for a state to recognize both traditional marriage as well as same-sex marriage, and therefore I support the recent decision by a Monroe County Circuit Judge.”
Jolly becomes the eighth current Republican member of Congress to come out in support of gay marriage. He joins Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), Rep. Richard Hanna (R-N.Y.), and Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.).
Jolly isn’t taking much of a political risk here. He faces no opponent in the Republican primary, and the candidate that Democrats had recruited to run against him in November dropped out of the race several months ago. Nonetheless, it’s always good to see someone getting on board with the idea that people should be treated equally under the law.
