Barney Frank Backtracks, Now Supports DOMA Brief

Rep. Barney Frank released a statement yesterday backtracking on his remarks to the Boston Herald, saying that he commented to the press on the DOMA brief before having even read it…and…he now supports it.

Said Frank:

"When I was called by a newspaper reporter for reaction to the administration’s brief defending the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, I made the mistake of relying on other people’s oral descriptions to me of what had been in the brief, rather than reading it first.  It is a lesson to me that I should not give in to press insistence that I comment before I have had a chance fully to inform myself on the subject at hand… Now that I have read the brief, I believe that the administration made a conscientious and largely successful effort to avoid inappropriate rhetoric.  There are some cases where I wish they had been more explicit in disavowing their view that certain arguments were correct, and to make it clear that they were talking not about their own views of these issues, but rather what was appropriate in a constitutional case with a rational basis standard – which is the one that now prevails in the federal courts, although I think it should be upgraded."

His full statement, AFTER THE JUMP…

Americablog: "Our senior most gay member of Congress actually said that had Obamaargued in court that DOMA is unconstitutional, that would be akin toGeorge Bush not going to court to, for example, get a warrant to spy onAmericans. Get it? Defending gay people is like spying illegally. Butcomparing us to incest and pedophilia, using what I'm told was prettymuch the original brief the Bush administration used against us yearsago, is somehow a sign that we're better than the Republicans – byrepeating their arguments in court."

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Congressman Barney Frank issued the following statement in response to a newspaper story regarding his position on the brief by the Department of Justice about Smelt v. United States.

“When I was called by a newspaper reporter for reaction to the administration’s brief defending the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, I made the mistake of relying on other people’s oral descriptions to me of what had been in the brief, rather than reading it first.  It is a lesson to me that I should not give in to press insistence that I comment before I have had a chance fully to inform myself on the subject at hand.” 

“Now that I have read the brief, I believe that the administration made a conscientious and largely successful effort to avoid inappropriate rhetoric.  There are some cases where I wish they had been more explicit in disavowing their view that certain arguments were correct, and to make it clear that they were talking not about their own views of these issues, but rather what was appropriate in a constitutional case with a rational basis standard – which is the one that now prevails in the federal courts, although I think it should be upgraded.”

“It was my position in that conversation with the reporter that the administration had no choice but to defend the constitutionality of the law.  I think it is unwise for liberals like myself, who were consistently critical of President Bush’s refusal to abide by the law in cases where he disagreed with it to now object when President Obama refuses to follow the Bush example.  It is the President’s job to try to change the law, but it is also his obligation to uphold and defend it when it has been enacted by appropriate processes.  It would not be wise, in my judgment, for those of us who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, or who sympathize with the fight for our rights, to argue for a precedent that says that executives who disagreed politically with the purpose of the law should have the option of refusing to defend it in a constitutional case.”

“I strongly opposed DOMA when it was adopted and I will continue to fight forchanges.  I support very strongly the lawsuit brought by the people at Gay & LesbianAdvocates and Defenders (GLAD) that make the cogent argument that DOMA’s provisiondenying federal recognition of same-sex marriages blatantly violates the equalprotection clause.  And I will work with the Obama administration as they havepromised to do to enact laws protecting LGBT people from hate crimes, from jobdiscrimination, and from discrimination in the military.  I will also be criticalwhen I think inappropriate language is used.  But after rereading this brief,I do not think that the Obama administration should be subject to harsh criticismin this instance.”