Prop 8 trial plaintiffs rested their case today following the introduction of videos and documents from the Prop. 8 campaign.
The AP's Lisa Leff reports:
"The federal trial concerning California's same-sex marriage ban has resumed with lawyers showing videotape of a simulcast in which pastors supporting the ban say gay marriage would lead to polygamy and bestiality.
Lawyers for two same-sex couples suing to overturn the voter-approved measure known as Proposition 8 showed the footage Monday as an example of the work of San Diego pastor Jim Garlow, who helped organize evangelical Christian support for the measure in 2008.
Proposition 8 sponsors are objecting to the videos, saying the content of the simulcast was not controlled by campaign managers or leaders.
Chief U.S. Judge Vaughn Walker allowed the material to be put into the record because the coalition of religious and conservative groups behind Proposition 8 paid for Garlow's work."
Said Chad Griffin, Board President of the American Foundation for Equal
Rights: "We saw again today how the Prop. 8 campaign sought to link marriage
equality to incest, polygamy, bestiality and pedophilia to justify the
restriction of people's civil rights. This clearly points to the
discriminatory motivations and unconstitutionality of the initiative."
According to Tweets from the courtroom, Prop 8 sponsors have called their first witness, Kenneth Miller, an associate professor of government at Claremont
McKenna College, to the stand.
