CHAPTER 2
Members Only
Being a gay Republican, especially someone involved in politics, is a tightrope act. No event better summarizes this reality than a meeting of the Republican National Committee (RNC) in the spring of 2013. It was a defining moment in my personal and professional life.
As the RNC meeting was getting underway, LGBT Americans had made considerable progress toward equality, in both public opinion and the law. At the end of 2010, Congress repealed the odious Clinton-era “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy; so now gay men and lesbians could serve openly in the U.S. military. Many states and localities had adopted anti-discrimination laws protecting the LGBT community. The freedom to marry was now legal in several states and the District of Columbia. Plus, the Supreme Court was considering two important cases involving marriage rights for gay and lesbian Americans.
The RNC’s April meeting was held in the heart of Hollywood, at a hotel adjacent to the theatre that annually hosts the Academy Awards. Meeting in L.A. was part of a strategy developed after the 2012 election defeat — called the Growth and Opportunity Project and commissioned by RNC Chairman Reince Priebus — to, among a lengthy list of action items, “reach out” to the liberal-leaning blue states and especially to certain minority constituencies. I have enjoyed these meetings. We all share a love of our country and a desire to serve it by promoting the Republican Party’s core policies and principles. One of my favorite events during this three-day meeting was an awards luncheon for Asian-American Republicans. It was heartwarming to see so many deserving senior Asian-Americans receiving awards for service to their country and party. It was also gratifying to hear their eloquent comments, filled with wisdom derived from a long life and a culture that reveres its seniors. President Ronald Reagan’s son Michael also spoke at this luncheon; he was terrific in warning of the dangers of being overly harsh on social issues. It was a harbinger of things to come.
A few weeks before the spring meeting, I had learned there would be two resolutions addressing the freedom to marry. One resolution highlighted the GOP’s socially conservative principles as stated in the party’s 2012 platform, including the definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman. The other resolution specifically outlined the party’s opposition to gay marriage. From my perspective, and that of many other RNC members, these resolutions were unnecessary, if for no other reason than the 2012 GOP platform that had been adopted the previous August already included those items. There was no need to accentuate them. Let me be clear: I opposed having these references in the party platform at all, but I understood they were there to placate social conservatives. I also knew the