Nevada Attorney General Catherine Corte Masto, who in January compared gay marriage to bigamy and incest in a brief defending the state's ban and shortly thereafter said she would reconsider the brief in light of the 9th Circuit's opinion in SmithKline Beechum Corp. v. Abbott Laboratories, has now decided that the state's arguments in defense of the ban are no longer tenable, the AP reports:
Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto filed a motion Monday to withdraw the state's legal arguments in a case pending before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval says he agrees with the move, saying it's clear the state's arguments are no longer defensible in court.
The decision means Nevada will not argue to uphold the constitutional prohibition against same-sex marriage that was passed by voters in 2002.
In SmithKline Beechum Corp. v. Abbott Laboratories, the 9th Circuit ruled that attorneys could not exclude gay jurors from juries based on their sexual orientation.
In a piece written last month, Towleroad's legal editor Ari Ezra Waldman predicted that the SmithKline Beechum Corp. v. Abbott Laboratories ruling would be impacting marriage equality cases around the country.
