Californians Against Hate

2011-05-27T09:43:00.001-07:00

Statement by President Clinton

New York, NY; The capture of Ratko Mladic enables the Bosnian people to close another chapter of one of the most terrifying conflicts of our time. As the military commander who systematically carried out brutal atrocities and mass murder, Mladic will finally be held accountable -- to Bosnia and the world. For their role in Mladic's apprehension, President Tadic and the leadership in Serbia are to be commended.

Once again, we have seen that crimes against humanity will not escape the long arm of justice.

His arrest also should allow the people of Serbia to take an important step toward integration into Europe and the international community.

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2009-12-02T06:46:00.000-08:00

The Californians Against Hate blog has moved. If you're not transported, click here to visit the new website.

2009-11-30T10:31:00.000-08:00

Standoff: Manchester Boycott Leadership vs American Historical Association

Both Sides Pushing for Most Fruitful Solution

Morgan M. Hurley, CopyEditor Fri, 11/27/2009

Photo credit: Fred Karger Advertising the Manchester Hyatt Boycott at Stockholm Pride

Cleve Jones is furious.

This coming January, the American Historical Association (AHA) is holding their 124th Annual Meeting at the Manchester Grand Hyatt here in San Diego, despite their knowledge of the ongoing boycott against that property and repeated appeals for them to move venues.

The Grand Hyatt’s owner not only contributed $125,000 to Proposition 8, he helped get it on the ballot. Prop 8 ended marriage equality for millions of Californians when it was narrowly passed in November 2008.

The AHA, founded in 1884, is a Washington D.C. based organization made up of 15,000 scholars and educators across the country, a large number of which are also in the LGBT community. It is the oldest and largest professional organization in the United States.
“I am profoundly disappointed that gay historians will be the first LGBT people to violate this boycott,” said Jones. “It is a slap in the face of the hard work of the LGBT community in San Diego.

“San Diego’s gay community has come so far after decades of struggle in this conservative city, and to have these out-of-towners come in and thumb their nose up – it’s unconscionable.”
Jones, a long-time gay activist and co-founder of the NAMES Project and AIDS Memorial Quilt, is currently the International Director of LGBT Community Programs for the labor union, UNITE HERE (which includes Hotel and Restaurant Employees). SDGLN.com spoke with Cleve at the union’s Local 30 offices in San Diego.

Although the Manchester property is not unionized, UNITE HERE has taken an official stance behind the boycott for several reasons. Most importantly, Jones pointed out, are the large numbers of gays and lesbians within the hospitality industry. Secondly, the LGBT community is also an important target market for the industry.

“UNITE HERE supports full equality for LGBT rights and fights for protections, ENDA inclusive language and health care benefits for employee partners in all contracts, which we just succeeded with in Hawaii,“ explained Jones. “We also look for any opportunity to further relationships with progressives by getting involved in things such as Proposition 8, local elections, and other contracts to support LGBT workers.”

Doug Manchester, a resident of La Jolla, says he contributed $125,000 to Prop 8 on behalf of ProtectMarriage.com because of his Roman Catholic beliefs, but also said that despite this, gays and lesbians are welcome at his hotel.

Said Jones, “He was the second largest individual contributor to get Proposition 8 on the ballot and he has a history of providing financial support to extreme right-wing, anti-gay, anti-worker organizations. He’s a bad guy.”

The boycott was launched in the spring of 2008 as a result of GLAAD pulling major events that corresponded with San Diego Pride out of the Hyatt. The action came after word got out of Manchester’s contribution. Since then, over $7 million dollars in contracts with the Manchester Grand Hyatt have been thwarted as a result of the boycott. Taking into account figures on individual cancellations and other potential lost revenue not tracked or included- it could be millions more.

Several different organizations are providing leadership for the boycott: Californians Against Hate, Courage Campaign, Equality California, and UNITE HERE. Leaders of the boycott have worked closely with dozens of organizations - many of which had been booked years in advance - encouraging their participation and helping them find loopholes in their contracts, if necessary. These same people have offered their services to the AHA but they have not been responsive.
Citing a contract that they finalized six years ago, the AHA states that if they could get out of their contract without facing bankruptcy or extreme hardship, they would. Their cancellation fee is $750,000.

“We looked at the contract very closely,” said Arnita Jones, Executive Director. “There is an anti-strike clause, and if the workers at the Hyatt were participating, we could have opted out, but there are no workers from the hotel on the picket line, and there is no official strike.”
Cleve feels their explanation for moving forward with the contract falls a dollar short.
“This is a labor sanctioned boycott. An official labor boycott,” he said. “I don’t want to lecture historians, but the AHA is being used by Manchester to violate the boycott.”

After the passing of Proposition 8, LGBT members of the AHA brought forth the issue at a smaller annual conference of the AHA last January. As a result, the AHA adopted a resolution, full of ways they could step into the conversation. Much to the chagrin of the boycott leadership, moving their annual meeting from the grounds of the Manchester Grand Hyatt was not one of them.

One of the first things the resolution did put forth was the creation of a LGBTQ Task Force “to take a careful look at all professional concerns of the community - at Grad school, in employment - what can be done to make it more welcoming, more equal, with less discrimination,” explained Arnita.
In addition, a Working Group was launched to advertise, request a call for papers and structure a series of special sessions on same-sex marriage to take place at the Hyatt during their Annual Meeting. In a press release announcing the resolution, the 2010 annual meeting was identified as “an opportunity to seize a significant teaching moment.”

“The AHA has a rich body of research on (the institution of) marriage throughout history, and it’s always been evolving,” she continued. “We think it is very important to take these sessions into the Hyatt and have a scholarly conference, with no specific point of view in mind.” On the AHA website, the Executive Committee refers to the sessions as "scholarly findings that should increase public understanding of the complexity and fluidity of marriage practices."

The 15 special sessions, according to the AHA website, fall under a special event titled, “Events of the AHA Working Group for Historical Perspectives on Same-Sex Marriage.” The sessions span each day of the four day conference, with Paper and Panel Topics on a wide range of related subjects, such as: Gay Marriage and Proposition 8, Reflections; Access Denied: Comparative Biopolitics of Marriage Restriction; Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Marry; and, Male Couples and the Meanings of Same-Sex Love in Turn-of-the-Century Europe and America.

Arnita said the focus of these sessions will be on marriage over time and place, equality in other countries, and changes to marriage in the US. “Just in the last half century, things such as social security and health benefits have been added to marriage. In the early 19th century, women even didn’t have the same rights in a marriage. Marriage has never been static.”

Cleve Jones and others behind the boycott, including Californians Against Hate founder Fred Karger, already upset that the AHA will continue with their conference at the Hyatt, are offended that the AHA would consider holding any session with a LGBT focus inside the hotel that is in the midst of a boycott for LGBT reasons.

“This adds insult to injury – it is outrageous,” said Jones. “It is arrogant of the AHA and not helpful in any way. I recognize it is inconvenient, but standing up for one’s principles is often inconvenient.”

Karger agrees. “If they really want to make a statement, they’d take those sessions outside of the hotel.”

Both men stated they’d be happy to help the AHA find alternative spaces to conduct the special sessions, so people involved do not have to cross the picket line or violate the boycott.
Although the location of the conference remains a touchy subject- the AHA isn’t backing down.
Said Arnita Jones, “It has never been our intention to offend any member of the LGBTQ community. On the contrary, this mini-conference on historical perspectives of same-sex marriage is designed to make a serious and lasting contribution to the conversation on marriage equality. The 15-session event is a major focus of our annual meeting.

“The mini-conference will address the diversity of approaches to marriage and family over time and place,” she continued. “It is a direct response to arguments used by proponents of Proposition 8, that marriage has been the same through the ages and is now changing for the first time. By voting to hold these sessions in the Hyatt, the AHA members wanted to take this information to where we felt it was needed most.”

The AHA also states they are not paying for the meeting spaces, meaning Doug Manchester will not make any money from the meetings specifically. In keeping with their desire to make the sessions as public and as accessible as possible, they’ve even extended an invitation to Manchester, himself.

In addition, alternative hotels in the area have been offered up to the 5,000-6,000 expected attendees, and many are taking advantage of those alternatives. The AHA leadership is also encouraging membership dialogue and debate regarding their decisions, and promises to keep attendees informed of developments.

None of these concessions matter one bit to Cleve Jones, who feels the boycott still needs to be honored.

“Boycotts are a very important weapon and an effective tool," said Jones. “They give people of conscience who are not directly affected by an issue or struggle the opportunity to support that struggle.”

Now a union employee himself, Jones referenced Cesar Chavez’ 1965 nation-wide boycott of grapes in support of the farm workers union, which lasted five years and ended in agreements suitable to both parties. The whole nation participated in the boycott while the previously unsuitable conditions the boycott was bringing attention to, affected only a specific group of individuals.

“Manchester did real damage to our community. One would think that historians of all people…..” his voice trailed off. Jones has started SleepWithTheRightPeople.com which focuses on gay friendly hotel properties so travelers can plan accordingly. The website also highlights individual LGBT hospitality employees.

Karger, who has been directly involved in assisting organizations out of their contracts; is a little more sympathetic, he understands the predicament of rigid contracts, how binding they can be, and the difficult situation they can put organizations in.

“I appreciate their position, but I hope they will never go back to the Manchester Hyatt again.”
The leaders of the boycott repeatedly stated throughout each interview that the AHA is not considered the enemy to the LGBT community; they just don’t want the AHA supporting the enemy by following through with their conference at the property in question. The AHA, on the other hand, truly wants to educate the masses, including Manchester, with their focus on topics related to the challenges that have always surrounded marriage, as well as the LGBT community.

Both the boycott leadership and the AHA have such strong opinions, and both sides feel they are pushing for the right outcomes. In the end, it appears they will need to agree to disagree, but there may be bruised egos left behind on both sides.

Only one thing is for sure, Cleve Jones will be on the picket line come January, to personally welcome the gay and straight historians of the AHA upon their arrival to Doug Manchester's Grand Hyatt hotel.

Source: For more information about the boycott click HERE »

NEWS RELEASE - Extremists' Declaration

2009-11-24T17:27:00.000-08:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

November 24, 2009

Contact: Fred Karger

619-592-2008

Manhattan Declaration -- Who Are They Kidding?

MANHATTAN, New York -- NOM head, Maggie Gallagher, as she puts it, “likes fairy tales.” This sure sounds like a fairy tale to me, a very scary one.

Once upon a time there were 152 - how should I say it – extremists, all meeting in Manhattan (crazy place for this group to meet). These 152 zealots drafted, approved and signed their Declaration of War on full civil rights for gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgender (LGBT) Americans last week. They threw in some other societal beefs, just to try and mask the overriding issue, their fervent opposition to same-sex marriage.

One major leader of their movement is missing from the 152 names.

There are NO MORMONS on the list, and several of us read it very carefully.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) has been leading the anti-gay marriage movement in this country for the past 14 years. They have spent tens of millions of dollars in practically every state ($30 million in California alone last year) to fight equality and to pass constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage.

So where are the Mormon representatives on this illustrious list? Are they truly backing off their longstanding opposition to gay civil rights?

To their credit, Michael Otterson, a high ranking Mormon Church official recently testified in support of the Salt Lake City ordinance that would no longer allow discrimination in employment and housing against LGBT people in Utah’s largest city. While a small step, it has been broadcast around the world. That’s because the Church, through its Public Affairs Department, got the word out – big time.

Let’s hope the Mormon leadership is truly softening its position on this issue. It has been a huge PR nightmare for the Church, and one that divides so many Mormon families. Maybe they will redirect all that time, talent and money to other causes, real problems.

There are plenty of Catholics on this list, however, and some very prominent ones. Two Cardinals and lots of Bishops. Catholics appear to be the new Mormons in the fight against same-sex marriage.

The Catholic Church has become much more visible as the Mormons have backed off. Maine Bishop Richard J. Malone and his sidekick, Marc Mutty ran and heavily funded the recent campaign in Maine to take away same-sex marriage in that state. The Roman Catholic Dioceses of Portland (ME) even set up a Political Action Committee (PAC), and gave and raised $553,000 to pass Question #1. That’s a lot of money, especially when they recently closed 5 churches in Maine.

Now, last week in Washington D.C., the Catholic Church there threatened to stop feeding the homeless if the City Council passes a same-sex marriage bill. Yes, the Catholic Church will stop feeding the hungry!

Here’s what the New York Times editorial said about that yesterday:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/23/opinion/23mon1.html

National Organization for Marriage (NOM) Chairman Robert P. George authored their new manifesto, along with former Watergate felon Chuck Colson. They hired a PR firm to publicize the Manhattan Declaration, the Mark DeMoss PR Group in Atlanta. Their web site identifies them as “the first and largest PR firm exclusively representing faith-based leaders, organizations and causes.” The DeMoss Group promotes itself on www.ManhattanDeclaration.org web site almost as much as its client. Take a look:

The DeMoss PR Group even has a bible covering an American Flag on their web site’s home page:

And please read this great story on the Manhattan Declaration by Carlos Santoscoy, Editor of On Top Magazine: Click here

Religious Leaders Unite Against Gay Marriage, Rights

One-hundred and fifty-two evangelical, Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christian leaders have signed a declaration saying they oppose laws that would compel them to recognize gay unions or marriages, among other social issues.

“We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on Earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence,” says the Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience.

The manifesto was unveiled Friday at the National Press Club. The document outlines the group's three most pressing issues, two of which deal with gay rights: abortion, marriage and religious liberties.

“We argue that there is a hierarchy of issues,” Chuck Colson, a prominent evangelical who founded Prison Fellowship and co-authored the document, told the New York Times. “A lot of younger evangelicals say they're all alike. We're hoping to educate them that these are the three most important issues.”

Among the signatories are Rev. Donald W. Wuerl, the archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. and Bishop Harry R. Jackson, Jr.

Wuerl and Jackson are the chief opponents of a gay marriage law expected to be approved by the D.C. City Council on December 1. Wuerl has threatened to pull the plug on D.C. social programs, including serving the homeless and providing health care for the poor, unless the law includes language that allows individuals and private business owners to refuse to provide goods and services related to the nuptials of gay couples.

Jackson founded the Christian-backed group Stand4MarriageDC.com after city leaders approved a gay marriage-recognition law in the spring. His group is currently fighting for the right to put a gay marriage question on the ballot.

The document says, “We will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other antilife act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the equivalent.”

The document's language also takes aim at other gay rights laws, including a recently approved law that adds sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of federally recognized hate crimes and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, a bill that would ban workplace discrimination against gay men, lesbians and transgender people.

Social conservatives have argued that such measures would have a chilling effect on religious liberties.

Signers to the document include prominent opponents of gay rights, including Frank Schubert, who headed the campaign to reverse gay marriage in California, Alan Sears, president and general counsel of the Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund, David Welch, the Houston-area pastor leading the charge against mayoral candidate Annise Parker because she is openly lesbian, James Dobson, founder of the anti-gay group Focus on the Family, and Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council and a leading opponent of gay rights.

A surprising omission is the Rev. Rick Warren, the evangelical minister whose prayer at the inauguration of President Obama drew heated protest because of his support for Proposition 8, California's gay marriage ban.

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News Release: Maine’s Election Ethics Commission “Eager” to Continue Investigation into NOM's Role

2009-11-19T16:02:00.000-08:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 19, 2009

CONTACT:
Fred Karger
(619) 592-2008

Maine’s Election Ethics Commission “Eager” to Continue Investigation into the National Organization for Marriage’s Role in Referendum Campaign against Marriage Equality

Augusta, Maine, November 19, 2009 — Californians Against Hate was pleased to learn this morning, at a hearing in Augusta, Maine, that Jonathan Wayne, Executive Director of the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices, is “eager” to proceed with the commission’s investigation into the role played by the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) in the state’s election held November 3, 2009.

The investigation is the result of allegations of election irregularities leveled by Californians Against Hate founder Fred Karger. The Washington D.C.-based NOM contributed $1.6 million to eliminate marriage equality in Maine — an amount well in excess of the allowable $5,000 “for the purpose of initiating [or] promoting” the people’s veto referendum on same-sex marriage in Maine.

The scope of the investigation, to be conducted by the commission’s staff and Maine’s Attorney General Janet Mills, will include:

What fundraising methods did NOM employ to solicit the money that it has contributed to Stand for Mariage Maine PAC?
What was NOM’s purpose in soliciting or receiving these funds?
What did NOM communicate to the individuals and organizations it solicited?
Did NOM receive any contributions within the categories set forth in §1056-B(2-A)? If so, how much was received in these categories?
Of the fundraising methods that are presently known (e.g., e-mail solicitations, newsletter), how much did NOM receive in response to these solicitations?

The inquiry may also extend to investigating whether NOM made any expenditures to initiate or to promote the referendum other than by contribution to Stand for Marriage Maine PAC.

Reacting to the commission’s decision, Californians Against Hate Founder Fred Karger, who attended the hearing in Augusta today, said, “I am extremely pleased that the State of Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Elections Practices has decided to pursue its investigation with such vigor into potential improprieties on the part of the National Organization for Marriage during the recent campaign in Maine.” In addition, Karger offered his help with the investigation as someone who has been tracking NOM for the past 17 months.

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Californians Against Hate is the new political watchdog for the LGBT community, and closely monitors all who oppose our civil rights. Individuals and organizations who give millions of dollars to deny LGBT full equality will be held accountable.

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NEWS RELEASE - NOM Fires Miss California

2009-11-16T16:26:00.000-08:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

November 16, 2009

Contact: Fred Karger

619-592-2008

November 16, 2009

Ms Maggie Gallagher

President

National Organization for Marriage

1100 H Street, NW, Suite 700

Washington, DC 20005

Dear Maggie --

It looks like you fired former Miss California, Carrie Prejean, just like Donald Trump did back in June.

She is no longer on your web site: nationformarriage.org I called your Washington, DC - PR firm, Mary Beth Hutchins at 703-683-5004 ext. 105, but no one was there to tell me why.

What happened to *"the future of our movement, and the future of America," as you referred to Carrie just two months ago? Was it because she lied again? This time she said in numerous interviews that she "made only one sex tape." Now it appears to be more like 15 or 20. We just heard that from the guy she met on My Space.

He also said that Carrie asked him to lie and say that she was only 17 when she made the sex tapes. In an interview with TMZ's Harvey Levin, her ex said that she made the tapes when she was from 19 to 21, so not that long ago like Carrie insists.

Listen for yourself, it's really interesting how the two stories are so different. Here's a link: TMZ

Wonder if her attorney, Charles LiMandri, knew that she was asking her ex to lie? That is not looked kindly upon by the California Bar Association.

In the past week, Carrie was uninvited from her speech at the Conservative Capitol Hill Club. Then she kept calling CNN's Larry King "inappropriate," and ripped her microphone off on live TV! It's up on YouTube and has had over 1.5 million visitors so far - huge!

Here's the link: Larry King

Why did you take her off your web site?

Did you hear from a lot of your high powered Board of Directors on this? What about your likely creator and largest backer, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church)? They gotta be uncomfortable with the whole multiple sex tapes thing.

You sure changed your tune, Maggie.

Do you remember what you said when Donald Trump fired Carrie? This is from your press release of June 10, 2009:

THE NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR MARRIAGE RESPONDS TO THE FIRING OF MISS CALIFORNIA USA CARRIE PREJEAN:

(Princeton, NJ) - Today, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) issued the following statement in response to the firing Miss California USA Carrie Prejean:

"Hollywood hates Carrie. First they abuse her, then they try to get her to recant, then they threw mud, and now they are doing what they wanted to do from day one: Get rid of Carrie.

This cover story about a contract dispute doesn’t pass the smell test. Americans aren’t fooled that easily. God knows, and we know, the truth about Carrie: She’s a young woman of great beauty who chose truth over the glittering tiara that Hollywood offers," said Brian Brown, Executive Director for NOM. "Of course they will try to punish her, but we know she will be fine in the end, because her values are in the right place."

"Hollywood will dance its tribal war dance over her body--the hatred generated against her has been extraordinary--but Carrie will be free to define her own mission and message from now on. Congratulations," stated Maggie Gallagher, President for NOM.

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Guess she's free again. Looks like Brian and you treated her worse than Hollywood did, and she's on your side! They gave her a second and third chance. You threw her right under the bus.

I said it before, Maggie I feel sorry for Carrie. She is just a young woman trying to make something of her life.

You and all your friends are not very tolerant of your paid spokeswoman, the star of your commercials, and the future of your movement.

Carrie is not as she appeared, and was very dishonest, but she is only 22 years old. Brian Brown and you should learn from this, and soften your anger towards others, and treat everyone fairly.

Sincerely,

Fred Karger

Founder

Californians Against Hate

* From Maggie Gallagher’s September 18, 2009 introduction of Carrie Prejean, at Tony Perkins and the Family Research Council sponsored Voters Value Summit in Washington, DC.

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Maggie declares victory for marriage in Maine

2009-11-09T09:56:00.000-08:00

From the Catholic News Agency: Maggie Gallagher, president of the National Organization for Marriage, comments on Maine´s victorious Question 1, which repealed a legislative act legalizing gay ´marriage´ in the state.

The Mormon's Other Problem

2009-11-09T09:48:00.000-08:00

From the Salt Lake Tribune:

BYU Football: Remembering the Black 14 Protest

By Jay Drew

The Salt Lake Tribune

Updated:11/06/2009 05:41:09 PM MST

It's not like they ever got used to it.

Protests, taunts and charges of racism greeted Brigham Young University's football, basketball and other athletic teams almost everywhere they went in the late 1960s and early 1970s, owing to doctrine in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - which then, as now, owns and operates BYU - that prohibited blacks from holding ecclesiastical positions in the faith.

But nothing could have prepared BYU's football players and coaches for what they would encounter on Oct. 18, 1969 when they arrived at War Memorial Stadium in Laramie, Wyo.

On the eve of the game, 14 Wyoming football players, all African-Americans, were kicked off the team by Cowboys coach Lloyd Eaton for threatening to wear black armbands to draw attention to the fact that the LDS Church did not allow black males to hold its priesthood.

The incident intensified the national spotlight on the LDS Church and BYU in what was already a period of racial strife in America. It also essentially decimated the Wyoming football program - which had played in the Sugar Bowl just two years earlier and was unbeaten going into the BYU game - for years to come.

Most of all, it forever changed the lives of a group of black players who hailed from large East Coast cities, small towns in the racially torn South and pretty much everywhere in between.

"We were young and a bit naive, and there were some things we all wish hadn't happened," said Tony McGee, perhaps the best known of the group that came to be known as the "Black 14" because he went on to an NFL career. "But I am glad it did happen. Perhaps that was our mission."

Saturday, 40 years later, the Cougars will meet the Cowboys at high noon in Laramie under entirely different circumstances than in 1969. BYU is ranked in the top 25, and has the more successful and nationally recognized football program. However, Wyoming is improving under a new coach and seeking a return to glory - something, save a short stretch in late 1980s - that the Cowboys have never really reclaimed since that 1969 season.

A slow burn, then an explosion

Antipathy toward BYU had been building that fall.

The previous year, the Cougars had played a college football game in a near-empty San Jose stadium, except for a hundred or so heavily armed guards. That was just a few hours after a bomb threat was called into their hotel at 3 a.m., and a day after their flight was diverted to a different airport in California's Bay Area for security reasons.

But in Laramie it got personal. Bottles were hurled at the BYU players, church services were picketed and interrupted and the team hotel was surrounded by demonstrators.

"It was just an ugly scene, one I will never forget," said Dick Legas, a defensive back on that BYU team and now a track coach at the school. "I remember one sign that asked if the seagulls were going to save us, and a lot of anti-Mormon stuff like that. It was just a shame."

Added Marc Lyons, who was BYU's quarterback season and is now an analyst on Cougar football radio broadcasts: "It was pretty unnerving for all of us. Several wives and girlfriends made the trip to Laramie, and I still remember coach [Tommy] Hudspeth telling them, 'I wish you hadn't come.'"

A cauldron of unrest

The irony? The Black 14 incident is largely unknown to the current players on both teams, and to many younger BYU and Wyoming fans.

But America is also a different place today than it was then. The late 1960s were a time of societal unrest, ignited by both the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War. And some of that unrest played out on the athletics stage -- just the year before, John Carlos and Tommie Smith had raised their black-gloved fists and bowed their heads in protest after their 200 meters race at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City.

The campuses were alive with activists and protests of all stripes, and it was into that cauldron that the Wyoming and BYU football teams fell into in 1969.

"We were right in the middle of the social revolution," said Mel Hamilton, who would become the most vocal of the Wyoming players. "When your time is called, your time is called."

Even without their black teammates, the suddenly all-white Wyoming football team still routed the all-white Cougars 40-7 that day to improve their season record to 5-0.

"The Wyoming guys were playing for a cause, and they were intense and ferocious, and so was the crowd," remembered Mel Olson, an all-conference lineman on that team who is now a professor of exercise science at BYU.

But victories on the gridiron in the future would become few and far between for the only major college football program in the "Equality State." Black athletes shunned the Wyoming for nearly a decade after, according to school athletic department official Kevin McKinney, who was a student at the time of the protest.

Stirred into a frenzy

Members of the Black 14 say they don't remember anything terribly controversial about the looming BYU game as the 1969 college football season unfolded.

Don Meadows of Seattle, McGee of Fayetteville, Ga., and Hamilton, who now lives in Casper, Wyo., recalled BYU as just another Western Athletic Conference rival, and really not much of a football threat.

However, that changed dramatically when they attended a meeting of the newly formed Black Student Alliance the Monday after they had walloped Texas-El Paso, 39-7, and five days before they were scheduled to play the Cougars.

During the gathering, Willie Black, a doctoral candidate in mathematics, "stirred us up, almost into a frenzy," remembered Meadows, who returned to play for Wyoming the following year.

During the meeting, Hamilton said they were told about LDS Church policies regarding race and the priesthood, and the plan was hatched to have the players wear black armbands to draw attention to that perceived racism.

Black told the players about how seven black members of the UTEP track team, including Bob Beamon, who would go on to win a long jump gold medal in world-record fashion at the 1968 Olympics, had refused to compete against BYU earlier that year. He told the players about the incident at San Jose the previous year in which 21 black players refused to play and urged a fan boycott in a game the Spartans won, 25-21, in the empty stadium.

"It was our time to rise up," Hamilton said.

Swift retribution

Wyoming coach Eaton, a strict disciplinarian, said at the time he kicked the players off the team for breaking rules regarding protests. The players say he used racial slurs and made derogatory comments about the players headed toward "Negro relief" when he told them they were no longer members of the team.

The coach was reassigned within the Wyoming athletic department after losing his last four games of 1969 and going 1-10 in 1970. He died in Kuna, Idaho, in 2007.

Although Eaton's actions probably led to more national scrutiny and scorn for the LDS Church and BYU than if he had allowed the protests, former Cougars coach Hudspeth says he will never forget the gesture.

"Lloyd Eaton, out of respect for us, didn't suit up his black football players that day," said Hudspeth, now an athletic department official at Tulsa University. "Lloyd was a great gentleman, a great supporter of the conference."

What Eaton's actions - and the support he received in the aftermath from university and government officials in Wyoming - accomplished for certain was to alienate the Cowboys' black players, students and faculty.

"When it was over, I had more hurt feelings from how the Wyoming people reacted and the way I was treated than the whole thing with BYU," McGee said.

BYU changes

Wyoming and San Jose State weren't the only places where BYU teams were met with protests and outrage during that era.

Most notably, when BYU's basketball team played at Colorado State the following winter (1970), protestors threw raw eggs and a flaming molotov cocktail on the floor, and a piece of angle iron struck a newspaper photographer, drawing blood and knocking him unconscious. Approximately 50 blacks and whites charged onto the floor at halftime to disrupt a performance by BYU's Cougarettes, and police were called in to quell the riot.

But many believe what happened on that snowy day on the high plains of southeastern Wyoming provided an impetus for the church to change its policy.

Hudspeth, predecessor to legendary BYU coach LaVell Edwards, said that during those tumultuous times - he cannot remember the exact date or how - he was "made aware" that LDS Church leadership wanted him to add African-Americans to his team, and fast. The following year, BYU's team included Ronnie Knight, a black defensive back on scholarship from Sand Springs, Okla., by way of Northeastern Oklahoma A&M Junior College.

In 1978, the LDS Church lifted the ban on blacks holding the priesthood and disavowed the practice many viewed as racist and discriminatory.

Changes also have come to some of the members of the Black 14. Hamilton's son, Malik, became a member of the LDS Church and now works as a banquet chef for BYU, with his father's acceptance.

But neither Hamilton, nor any other black members of the Wyoming football team regret the bold decision they made in 1969 - or the price they paid for it in the aftermath.

"That's what this whole thing was all about - the fight for equal rights," Hamilton said earlier this week at a symposium recognizing the 40th anniversary of the Black 14.

"I think we got our point across."

The Black 14 and BYU

Saturday's BYU-Wyoming football game in Laramie, Wyo., marks the 40th anniversary of what would come to be known as the "Black 14" protest. On the eve of a Cowboys-Cougars game in 1969, 14 African-American football players at the University of Wyoming were kicked off the team by coach Lloyd Eaton for threatening to wear black armbands during the game to protest the racial policies of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- which operates BYU.

Several BYU coaches and players who participated in that game, and three members of the Black 14 who angrily watched from the stands, recently gave The Salt Lake Tribune their recollections of the event that had an effect not only on both institutions and their future football teams, but race relations in the United States as a whole.

Key members of the 1969 BYU Football Team

Marc Lyons -- Olympus High math teacher, KSL-Radio football analyst
Larry EchoHawk -- Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs, U.S. Department of the Interior
Dick Legas -- BYU assistant track coach
Mel Olson -- Former BYU assistant football coach, current BYU professor
Ken Serck -- All-conference offensive lineman
Chris Farasopoulos -- The "Galloping Greek" played in the NFL for Jets, Saints and Giants
Gordon Gravelle -- All-conference lineman played in the NFL for the Steelers, Giants and Rams
Dennis Poppinga -- Father of BYU stars Brady and Kelly Poppinga

The Black 14

Jerry Berry, Tony Gibson, John Griffin, Lionel Grimes, Mel Hamilton, Ron Hill, Willie Hysaw, Jim Isaac, Earl Lee, Tony McGee, Don Meadows, Ivie Moore, Joe Williams, Ted Williams

Postscript: 10 of the 14 Wyoming players eventually graduated from college; Isaac, the only player from Wyoming, is deceased; the whereabouts of Ted Williams and Moore are unknown to their former teammates; Ted Williams, Griffin and Meadows returned in 1970 to play for Wyoming; McGee and Joe Williams played in the NFL and Griffin played in the Canadian Football League

Source: Black 14: The Rise, Fall and Rebirth of Wyoming Football

NEWS RELEASE - Will NOM's Maggie Gallagher Fire Miss California?

2009-11-05T12:59:00.000-08:00

November 5, 2009

Ms Maggie Gallagher

President

National Organization for Marriage

1100 H Street, NW, Suite 700

Washington, DC 20005

Dear Maggie --

Maggie, are you going to fire Carrie Prejean??? Donald Trump did.

Carrie Prejean 'sex tape' spurred pageant settlement

By Alan Duke, CNN

I was shocked and dismayed to hear yesterday that your lead spokeswoman, the "future of our movement, and the future of America*" according to you, has starred in a sex video as reported by TMZ.

Carrie dropped her $1 million law suit yesterday against the Miss California USA Pageant, as soon as news of her sex video was exposed. She filed her law suit back in August claiming, of all things, "religious discrimination." Sound familiar?

Are you going to keep her as a paid consultant, Maggie? Are you going to keep her photo and that praise that you heap upon her all over your National Organization for Marriage (NOM) web site?

Does she still represent the true "family values" that you and your NOM Executive Director, Brian Brown espouse.

What does your high powered Board of Directors think? What does your largest backer, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) think of this scandal?

Carrie has been a big fund-raiser for NOM, a speaker, you've flown her all over the USA, you have even shared the stage with her, and now this news comes out.

I read that San Diego's own Charles LiMandri, who was your General Counsel on the Yes on Prop 8 campaign, is also Carrie's lawyer. Bet he was surprised to hear about that sex video, too. He usually has a lot to say, but yesterday only said that, "it's a confidential settlement, and he can't discuss it."

I feel sorry for Carrie. She is just a young woman trying to make something of her life.

It will be interesting to see how you handle this one, Maggie. Will you be a voice of reason and compassion, or will you toss her to the sharks?

I would hope that you will reflect on this moment in history.

Will you embrace someone whose life is so different from your beliefs? Or will you demonize, bully, rip apart and treat Carrie like someone who has less rights than you have.

Time will tell.

Sincerely,

Fred Karger

Founder

Californians Against Hate

* From Maggie Gallagher's September 18, 2009 introduction of Carrie Prejean, at Tony Perkins and the Family Research Council sponsored Voters Value Summit in Washington, DC.

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Doug Manchester: Crush Organized Labor to Crush Progressives

2009-11-04T09:39:00.000-08:00

By Rick Jacobs, Courage Campaign - Nov 3rd, 2009 at 5:40 pm PST

As I write this, we are beginning to hear results from Maine’s version of Prop. 8 and will soon enough hear about right wing attempts to quash freedom in Kalamazoo, Michigan and Washington state. How well we all remember election night here in California last year, that flash of impossible joy and elation at the election of Barack Obama juxtaposed with the horror of the loss of equal rights. How could both be true? How could we elect Barack Obama and simultaneously watch our fellow Californians vote away our rights?

A year later, regardless of the outcome of these elections tonight, the progressive movement is much broader, more determined and smarter. We know what must be done to change the way people think. We know that multiple tactics, ranging from court fights to ballot box battles to marches to push for federal legislation all must happen simultaneously. We also know that those who invest in repression, in damaging families and in singling out LGBT people (or other minorities) for discrimination must be called on their actions and their investments.

I am saddened, but not really surprised then, that Doug Manchester selected today of all days to launch a new website that hides his attacks on progressives and the LGBT community behind the Hyatt global brand.

Lest anyone forget, Mr. Manchester donated $125,000 in the summer of 2008, at the very moment the National Organization for Marriage and Frank Schubert (the fund bundlers and CEO of the anti-equality fights in California and Maine) desperately needed those final dollars to get Prop. 8 on the ballot. That’s right: Had Mr. Manchester not written his check right then, we may well not have had to fight Prop. 8 at all.

The website that Mr. Manchester and his minions launched today does not even address Mr. Manchester’s deep personal commitment to regressive causes. For example, Mr. Manchester “apologizes” for his donation.

“I respect all members of the GLBT community and have several gay and lesbian employees in various departments and professional levels at Manchester Grand Hyatt San Diego. While I stand by my belief that as a private citizen I may make personal donations to causes and charitable organizations of my choosing, I have been reminded daily that not all such actions are correct or favorable to the company, its employees or the community.”

Does this sound like a man who would not again write a check to prevent lesbian and gay people from marrying? Not to me. More insulting, Mr. Manchester then offers “bribes” to 501-c-3 organizations, the type that may not legally engage in politics, as a way to absolve himself of his “actions [that are not] correct or favorable to [his] company.” If Mr. Manchester really wanted to apologize, he would start by saying, “I am sorry that I put up the money that got Prop. 8 on the ballot because I have learned that what I did caused harm to individuals all over this state and nation. As such, I will donate at least twice that amount now to a campaign to reverse Prop. 8.”

But there’s more. While Mr. Manchester’s website complains about the boycott organized so effectively by Fred Karger and our friends at UNITE HERE along with many, many others in San Diego and beyond (including the Courage Campaign and Equality California), he cynically attempts to divide the LGBT community from our allies in organized labor.

Mr. Manchester and his advisors seem to think that organized labor appeared out of the night, saw the boycott and latched onto it. That myopia is what separates progressives from reactionaries. The truth is that organized labor contributed in excess of $2.5 million to defeat the very Prop. 8 that Mr. Manchester helped place on the ballot. Every labor union in the state openly and officially opposed Prop. 8. They spent their members’ funds not trying to win a progressive victory, but trying to stave off the defeat of another reactionary initiative. So it’s only logical and appropriate that the LGBT community would work arm in arm with our brothers and sisters in organized labor—many of whom are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender—to highlight unacceptable working conditions at Mr. Manchester’s hotel. Let us not doubt Mr. Manchester’s true goals. He seeks to defund organized labor in order to prevent it from participating in the political process. The so-called “paycheck protection” effort for 2010, that progressives and organized labor spent tens of millions of dollars defeating in November 2005, will be back on the ballot if Mr. Manchester has his way. This is an excerpt from a Lincoln Club letter of October 7, 2009, three weeks before Mr. Manchester launched his “I like gay people” website:

"If we are unsuccessful in passing the proposition in November 2010, we will have the organization in place to put it back on the 2012 ballot. The unions will be in a much weaker poosition and we will have a finance committee and coalition.

To kick off this campaign the Lincoln Club of Orange County and Doug Manchester have each committed $100,000 to this effort."

Tomorrow night, there will be another protest outside of the Manchester Hyatt. Based on this insulting website and Mr. Manchester’s determination to undo the very coalition that we’ll need to restore our rights in California, a protest and recommitment to the boycott are the best possible replies. One day, maybe Mr. Manchester will issue a proper apology that will flow from a meeting with the coalition of California’s future.

We have to know our foes as we build our victory.

Letter to Maine Ethics Commission on the National Organization of Marriage from Michael B. Keegan

2009-10-30T11:44:00.000-07:00

People for the American Way

October 30, 2009

Mr. Jonathan Wayne
Executive Director
Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices
135 State House Station
Augusta, Maine 04333

Dear Mr. Wayne,

I am writing you concerning misleading and inaccurate statements made by Brian Brown, Executive Director of the National Organization for Marriage, at the Commission's October meeting pertaining to the disclosure of the organization's 990 federal tax form. As you are aware, nonprofit organizations such as NOM are required by law to provide a redacted 990 upon request. This requirement is such a basic and widely accepted part of nonprofit management that there is rarely any sort of controversy surrounding the disclosure of 990s. NOM, however, is an exception.

The issue of NOM's 2008 990 came before the Commission due to testimony by Fred Karger, founder of Califorians Against Hate, and Danielle Truszkovsky, a Florida-based political columnist. Both testified that NOM had refused to provide a copy of the 990. Mr. Brown, in response, categorically rejected the claims of Mr. Karger and Ms. Truszkovsky and testified that NOM had faithfully complied with federal disclosure requirements. However, the facts simply do not support Mr. Brown's testimony.

NOM, according to Mr. Brown, filed its 2008 990 with the IRS on August 14, 2009 -- one day before the August 15 deadline for groups, including NOM, that filed for an automatic extension. Per IRS regulations, the 990 "must be made available from the date it is required to be filed" -- in this case, August 15. Yet when Lou Chibbaro, a veteran political reporter for the Washington Blade, interviewed Mr. Brown the following week and requested the 2008 990, Mr. Brown "promised to release to the Blade NOM's 2007 IRS 990 finance reporting form and said the group would also release its 2008 990 form as soon as it completes its processing." On August 28, Mr. Chibbaro visited NOM's DC office and delivered a written request for the 990s. Mr. Brown called him back that day and informed him that his staff was still at work "processing" the form.

However, there is no such thing as a "processing" period beyond the filing deadline during which time an organization can refuse to disclose its 990. Furthermore, Mr. Chibbaro never received the 2008 990, nor was he notified when NOM suddenly posted the 990 on the web in the days leading up to the October Commission meeting.

Ms. Truszkovsky had a similar experience. She visited NOM's DC office on September 1 and met personally with Mr. Brown. When she requested the 2008 990, she was told that it was not available. Ms. Truszkovsky never received the 990 from NOM and was also not notified when the form was posted online. Additionally, a representative of Californians Against Hate submitted a request via certified letter to NOM's offices for the 990s, with the same outcome.

The experiences of these three individuals -- and most likely others -- directly refute Mr. Brown's testimony. Mr. Brown said in response to Mr. Karger that it "is simply not the case" that "we refuse to disclose our financial records." In response to Ms. Truszkovsky, he said "in fact, when journalists have asked, we've gotten [990s] out to them. At the time that some have requested our 2008 990, it wasn't filed. So we cannot provide something that has not yet been filed.

"Then, when asked by Commissioner Walter McKee whether NOM's 990s had been "provided every time it's been asked for," Mr. Brown said the following: "Many of these requests, if not all of them, included our 2008 990, and so once we had filed that, we would get all of the documents to them. Could some have been a little later than the 30 day window? Yes, if we did anything like that it would just have to do with the amount of processing." He continued, "whenever we've been asked, we've attempted to comply, and mail them out, we're not trying to hide them, we know our obligations, and we follow them." Finally, in response to a question from Commissioner André Duchette, Mr. Brown replied that NOM was continuing to "comply if people write us letters before that time in sending them the 990 through the mail.

"But NOM did none of the above in response to multiple requests for the 2008 990. Ms. Truszkovsky and Mr. Chibbaro personally requested the 990 from Mr. Brown, and Mr. Chibbaro and Californians Against Hate requested the 990 in writing. Yet they never received the form, nor did NOM even notify them when the 990 was posted online. This does not appear to be an accident or an isolated instance of carelessness on the part of NOM. Indeed, the evidence clearly points to a concerted effort to conceal the organization's finances for as long as possible and then to conceal the effort from the Commission.

We do not know what NOM hoped to gain by its actions, but this incident raises serious questions about NOM's operations and leadership. We would therefore encourage the Commission to review and investigate the veractiy of Mr. Brown's testimony.

Sincerely,
Michael B. Keegan
President
People For the American Way

CC: Commissioner Walter McKee
Commissioner André Duchette
Commissioner Michael Friedman
Commissioner Francis Marsano
Commissioner Edward Youngblood

News Release: Federal Judge in Maine - NOM Must Abide by Election Law

2009-10-28T14:18:00.000-07:00

NOM Must Report Contributors

NOM Heads -- Brian Brown (right) Administers a Lie Detector Test to NOM Chairman, the Infamous Maggie Gallagher (left)

AUGUSTA, MAINE - Californians Against Hate applauds the Federal Court and Justice D. Brock Hornby for its decision today upholding the Maine election law, and ruling in favor of truth and transparency.

The Washington, DC based National Organization for Marriage (NOM) challenged the law while it is under investigation by the Maine Ethics Commission for financial improprieties, reporting violations and money laundering. NOM is the biggest donor by far to Yes on 1, which would ban the recently enacted same-sex marriage law in the Pine Tree state. NOM gave 60% of the $2.6 million raised so far, but wants to keep its contributor's names secret. Question 1 will be voted on next Tuesday, November 3rd.

NOM Shows Its True Colors

"In over 30 years in politics, I have never seen such a blatant disregard for the law as Maggie Gallagher and Brian Brown are doing in Maine," said Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate. "They are up to their old tricks. They did the same thing in California when their apparent creator, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) became the target of an investigation by that state's Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC). The FPPC began an unprecedented investigation of the Salt Lake City based Church (Case #08-735), and the National Organization for Marriage nearly one year ago. NOM sued every top election official in California in order to keep the contributors to last year's Proposition 8 secret as well."

Californians Against Hate asked the Maine Ethics Commission to investigate NOM in a formal request sent on August 24, 2009 to investigate the National Organization for Marriage. NOM had failed to disclose the names of any of its contributors as required by state law. Fred Karger and political columnist Danielle Truszkovsky testified in support of an investigation at the commission hearing in Augusta on October 1, 2009. The Commission voted to investigate NOM at that meeting. NOM's reaction: sue Maine!

Assistant Attorney General Phyllis Gardiner represented the Ethics Commission before Justice Hornby stated, "The compelling interest for the public is to know whose spending money to influence their vote. Voters may want to know whether they are being lobbied by people from within or outside Maine." Gardiner said the lawsuit is the first challenge of the state's requirement for ballot question committees to register and report contributions.

The state law requires anyone raising or spending more than $5,000 on a ballot question in Maine to disclose anyone who contributed more than $100 for that purpose. All other organizations are complying with the law.

"The statute doesn't restrict in any way what they can raise or what they can spend. It doesn't restrict political speech in any way. It's simply about reporting after the fact how much you spent or raised for the purpose of influencing the vote in Maine," Gardiner says.

Violations can lead to fines, and, in the most extreme cases, a small amount of jail time.

Concluded Karger, "NOM was well aware of Maine's longstanding reporting requirements and election law before it went charging up there to put this referendum on the ballot. From day one they tried to hide the source of their funds, and then sue the state when they got caught. They think that they are above the law, and today we saw that is not true."

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News Alert: Harry Reid: A Mormon in the middle

2009-10-26T11:59:00.000-07:00

From The Salt Lake Tribune:

Harry Reid: A Mormon in the middle

Politics » Some say his liberal stands clash with his LDS faith.

By Thomas Burr

Washington » Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid keeps a copy of the Book of Mormon in his office just off the chamber floor. There's a second copy handy to give away to someone in need of spiritual guidance.

"I've had more than that," says the Nevada Democrat, pulling the extra edition from his desk drawer. "I have one left."

The Temple-recommend-carrying Reid is very active in his church, say fellow members in the Washington area. But that may come as a shock to some Mormon critics who contend that the Senate leader's political stands put him at odds with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The latest round of religiously charged criticism came after Reid told gay rights groups in a private meeting that the LDS Church's efforts to back the anti-gay marriage Proposition 8 in California was a waste of resources and hurt the faith's missionary efforts.

Utah Republican Party Chairman Dave Hansen posted a news story on that subject on his Facebook page, prompting several conservatives to challenge Reid's Mormon credentials.

Conservative activist and Utah blogger Holly Richardson said she found Reid's comments disconcerting and doesn't see how Reid's far left political beliefs can align with the LDS Church.

"I just don't get how his politics translate to somebody who has LDS beliefs," Richardson says. "He's an embarrassment to me as a Mormon."

Reid, who in 2007 became the highest ranking elected Mormon in the church's history, says he's faced this for years. And he's not offended.

"I think some of the most unChristian-like letters, phone calls, contacts I've had were from members of the [LDS] church, saying some of the most mean things that are not in the realm of our church doctrine or certainly Christianity," Reid said last week during an interview in his office.

Reid converted to Mormonism his senior year in college and attends church just outside the District of Columbia when in Washington or in Boulder City when in Nevada.

He recalls a time when his grandchildren were trick-or-treating at a local LDS ward event and came upon a poster featuring a picture of the Devil and Reid, and asking "Can you tell the difference?"

"I remember it," Reid says when asked how he deals with the criticism, "but I try not to let people who do not represent the teachings that I have learned interfere with my basic beliefs."

Religion and politics » Reid isn't the first and likely not the last political leader to face fire for personal religious beliefs.

When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called on the Vatican earlier this year, an anti-abortion Catholic group hand delivered a letter calling for her to be ousted from the faith for her pro-abortion rights stand. A few Catholic bishops said during the 2004 presidential campaign that they would refuse Democratic Sen. John Kerry communion for his position on abortion.

Questions were raised during John F. Kennedy's bid for the presidency about whether Rome would call the shots because of his Catholic faith and similar questions arose with Mitt Romney, a Mormon, during his White House bid last year.

"Having Mormons criticize Harry Reid, Catholics criticize Nancy Pelosi -- George W. Bush got criticism from Methodists -- it's not an uncommon experience at all," says John Green, senior researcher at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.

"There are disputes within almost every religious community about what it means to be a strong supporter of the faith. What is it to be a good member?" Green continues. And because much of that dispute deals with controversial subjects, it spills over to politics.

"It is a very tough spot that Sen. Reid is in," Green says. "It ought to be tough enough to represent Nevada [and be majority leader] without the religion angle and the religion angle just makes that much tougher."

Washington lobbyist William Nixon, who is also the church's Arlington Stake president, says Reid is in politics' most precarious position.

"Serving as a majority leader in either party is always difficult for politicians," says Nixon, a Republican. "You need to be the spear carrier for your party even on issues that are in the extremities and that often is at odds with what's good politics at home or even how you may worship personally."

The LDS Church declined comment for this story but pointed to its statement on relationships with government.

It says that elected officials who are LDS make their own decisions "and may not necessarily be in agreement with one another or even with a publicly stated church position."

And the church has made efforts in the past to dispel the notion that it sides with conservative politics. In 1998, church General Authority Marlin Jensen stressed that good Mormons can also be good Democrats. The late James E. Faust, a Democrat and then a member of the First Presidency, the church's top governing body, said it was in the church's best interest to have a two-party system.

Still, Mormon faithful remain overwhelmingly conservative. A survey released in July by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life showed that 65 percent of Mormons aligned themselves with the Republican Party or leaned that way, while 22 percent sided with the Democratic Party.

There are 14 members of the LDS Church in Congress. Ten are Republicans and four are Democrats.

But even some of the well-known Republican elected Mormons defend Reid as a faithful church member.

"He has the right to voice his opinions but I would under no circumstances challenge Harry's credentials as a member of the church," says Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah.

Bennett's Utah Senate colleague, Orrin Hatch, says it's not fair for fellow Mormons to disparage Reid as anything but a devout Mormon. Hatch says he didn't agree with Reid's statement on the gay marriage ballot question but said he's entitled to speak it.

"I can personally tell you that Harry is a good member of the LDS faith and he was expressing a personal opinion that his side feels very deeply about," Hatch says.

Reid says church leaders have never complained about his political statements.

Reid's calling » Shortly after being elected in 1986, church leaders summoned Reid to their Salt Lake City headquarters.

"It was a pretty short meeting," Reid says. "They said, here's your assignment: Be the best member of the church you can be. That was it."

Even on the most recent issue of gay marriage, Reid says he doesn't disagree with the church's position on traditional marriage. The senator says he voted in Nevada for the state constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

But he says he's expressed his concern for years to leaders about the church stepping into the debate and that the millions the church invested in the Prop 8 campaign was bad strategy.

Reid said he's not suggesting the church change its position, just that it not speak out so strongly. "It's just bad strategy to create so much ill-will in California."

The Democrat, though, says he understands the backlash he gets over such statements. He notes that most of the church's lay ecclesiastic leaders are conservative and he's fine with that.

"I don't think my faith is a hindrance to what I do and I'm sorry if people feel that I in some way embarrass them," Reid says, "but I have to frankly say that even on this issue there are a lot of people that say 'we agree with you.'"

On Sunday, Reid, with his security escort in tow, likely made his home teaching rounds after his ward's three-hour service. Anyone who questions his Mormon credentials should see that, says Jim Vlach, his home-teaching companion.

"He's got a tremendous burden with health care [reform] right now, but despite that, he finds time for home teaching," says Vlach.

8: The Mormon Proposition Trailer

2009-10-25T13:31:00.000-07:00

8: The Mormon Proposition, a film by Reed Cowan. View at YouTube.

Learn more about the film at www.mormonproposition.com Read Fred Karger's article on 8: The Mormon Proposition at the Huffington Post:

8: The Mormon Proposition Will Knock Your Socks Off

By Fred Karger, Founder, Californians Against Hate

Producer Reed Cowan's amazing new documentary is ready for its close-up.

This could well be the movie of the year. Take a look at the web site, read all about the movie and see who is behind it. You will be even more impressed.

I received a call from Reed earlier this year. He was coming out to San Francisco to film all the activities around the oral arguments being made before the California Supreme Court in San Francisco in the case to overturn Proposition 8.

Having played a very active role in uncovering the massive involvement of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) in last year's Prop 8 campaign, Reed asked me to be in his documentary.

I went up to San Francisco on Wednesday, March 4th to be a part of history, and see this filmmaker begin his journey. I met Reed and his partner Greg in front of the Castro Theater at 6:00 pm. That is the spot where the march to City Hall was about to begin on a chilly San Francisco night.

There were thousands and thousands of demonstrators gathering, ready to begin their solemn candlelight vigil to City Hall. We were recreating the famous nighttime march of 30 years ago, right after Harvey Milk was assassinated.

Reed grew up Mormon in Utah, and knows firsthand the inner workings of the Church. He knew that there was an incredible story to tell, and he spent the better part of a year putting every aspect of this documentary together.

All his hard work, and that of so many others who participated in this strong indictment of the Mormon Church and its leaders, will undoubtedly change history.

I have watched this filmmaker every step of the way over the last eight months. I went to Miami for a second interview in April, and this summer, Reed dispatched a film crew to my home for some final questions. He is very thorough.

8: The Mormon Proposition will explain once and for all just how the Mormon Church operates, and how they have led the fight against marriage equality all across the United States since Utah became the first state to ban same-sex marriage in 1995. 29 states have followed Utah's lead, and the Mormon Church has made sure of that.

The film also goes into great depth about how the Mormon Church has destroyed so many lives and families in its desire to impose its will on others.

Please tell the world about this incredible documentary. It is a film for all to see.

Thank you Reed Cowan and everyone else who gave up so much and worked so hard to make Reed's dream a reality.

HELP US FIGHT BACK.

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News Alert: Bangor Daily News - The Plot Thickens

2009-10-23T15:42:00.000-07:00

Anti-Gay Marriage Group Sues State

by Kevin Miller

AUGUSTA, Maine — A Washington, D.C.-based organization under investigation for its financial role in the campaign to repeal Maine’s gay marriage law has fired back with a lawsuit questioning the constitutionality of a state election law.

The National Organization for Marriage is the largest contributor to the Question 1 ballot initiative, which seeks to overturn Maine’s same-sex marriage law. As of the end of September, the organization had funneled more than $500,000 to Stand for Marriage Maine, which supports the repeal.

NOM'S Brian Brown Meets the Press Right After the Maine Ethics Commission Voted to Investigate His Organization

Earlier this month, the Maine Ethics Commission directed staff to determine whether NOM was skirting campaign finance laws in order to avoid disclosing the identities of contributors.

Now, the organization has filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Bangor alleging that Maine’s financial reporting requirements are unconstitutional.

The lawsuit seeks a court injunction prohibiting the state from enforcing a law that NOM officials claim is being used to harass and intimidate opponents of gay marriage.

“The reporting requirements become onerous and burdensome, especially when you are working in several states, and are an infringement of free speech,” said Brian Brown, NOM’s executive director.

Ethics Commission officials declined to comment on the specific case but defended the law, which requires organizations soliciting more than $5,000 for a ballot question campaign to file financial disclosure reports with the state.

“The ‘ballot question committee’ system is very important to the public’s understanding of who is influencing these elections in Maine,” said Jonathan Wayne, executive director of the Ethics Commission.

The National Organization for Marriage came to prominence last year when it helped overturn a gay marriage law at the ballot box in California. Critics questioned the group’s fundraising techniques.

One of those critics, Fred Karger with the organization Californians Against Hate, filed a complaint with the Maine Ethics Commission earlier this year. Karger alleges that NOM was essentially “money laundering” by soliciting donations from opponents of same-sex marriage for the Maine campaign, all the while promising those donors their identities would remain confidential.

Under the state’s rules governing ballot question committees, which are different from political action committees, anyone who donates more than $100 would have to be identified in campaign finance reports.

The Ethics Commission went against the staff recommendation and voted 3-2 to order an investigation.

Brown and NOM’s attorneys contend the organization did not violate Maine’s rules because they were soliciting donations for the general fight to protect “traditional marriage,” not for the Maine campaign in particular.

Brown argued in an interview Thursday that the reporting requirements — which include registering as a ballot question committee, appointing a treasurer and keeping detailed records for four years — are an undue burden. He also described Maine’s law as legally unclear and “patently unconstitutional” because it prohibited or discouraged free speech in the form of advocacy on one side of an issue.

He also accused the Ethics Commission members and Karger of waging a politically motivated “witch hunt,” despite the fact that the vote to order an investigation was bipartisan.

“What we are basically doing is filing a lawsuit to make clear our First Amendment rights to free speech,” Brown said. He also said that some donors to NOM during the California campaign later were harassed and threatened.

Wayne said the law is set up to ensure transparency in the election system.

“In the past couple of decades, a lot of important issues have come before voters as statewide ballot initiatives, including environmental issues, gambling, tax and spending limitations and hunting practices,” Wayne said.

“It’s common for national groups to want to get involved in these elections … and it is important for Maine voters to know who is attempting to influence these state laws,” Wayne said.

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News Alert: Uncovering secrets in Maine

2009-10-23T08:37:00.000-07:00

Uncovering secrets in Maine

Anti-gay group rolls out scare tactics as referendum nears

By Danielle Truszkovsky

ON OCT. 1, the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics & Election Practices met to determine if a complaint filed by Fred Karger of Californians Against Hate against the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) would be investigated. In his complaint, Karger claimed that NOM violated campaign reporting requirements and that the group was actively participating in money laundering. Despite the evidence he submitted, which included NOM emails pertaining to fundraising specifically for Maine while alluding to donor anonymity, the commission's staff recommended that no investigation be conducted due to lack of supporting evidence.

NOM had failed to disclose even its required IRS 990 filings to the public so it is not surprising that the evidence Karger possessed was limited. In my last Blade column published Sept. 18 entitled, "Follow the money: Why the federal gov't must investigate NOM's financial practices," I detailed how the group has habitually hidden and revised its records. Uncovering NOM's secrets has been the focus of my work for many months and as the title of my last column implies, I do believe an investigation into the group is warranted.

So I flew to Maine specifically to attend this hearing but due to circumstances beyond my control, I missed the first portion of the proceedings. I arrived just in time to hear the testimony of NOM Executive Director, Brian Brown, and a member of his legal team, Barry Bostrom.

Both Bostrom and Brown lavished praise on the staff and the Commission for their professionalism. They insinuated that the entire proceeding was a waste of everyone's time and it was obvious that Brown had thought he had already won. At that point, most of us in the audience believed NOM had won as well -- it is rare that a Commission overrules a staff recommendation.

Then Brown made an egregious error, stating: "Mr. Karger refers to the fact that we refused to disclose our financial records ... this is simply not the case. We have given our 990s to journalists. They are now publicly available -- they're available on our web site and we did that because we got so many calls and people showing up at the office asking for them that it became quite difficult to work."

Apparently, Brown had no idea I had entered the room. If he had, perhaps he would have reconsidered that statement because I am one of only two journalists who showed up at NOM's office requesting 990s -- I know this because Brown told me so in person when I interviewed him on Sept. 1. (The other was the Blade's Lou Chibbaro Jr.)

IRS regulations require charities to release the documents within 24 hours of an in-person request. Brown did not release the documents to me -- ever. And his reference to the documents "now [being] publicly available" was laughable because popular blogger ChinoBlanco revealed that NOM had secretly released the 990s on the web within days of the Maine hearing, presumably to feign compliance in front of the Commission.

Brown went on to attack Karger's efforts and made false claims against the gay civil rights movement in general. Although it was never my intention to speak at this hearing, by the time Brown was finished, I simply couldn't remain silent and allow his false statements to go uncontested.

ALTHOUGH THE COMMISSION does not allow public questioning of witnesses, they did grant me a few moments to speak. Here's what I said:

"My name is Danielle Truszkovsky ... I'm a political columnist ... one of the journalists who have visited the NOM offices to request the 990s. It's been an ongoing process attempting to obtain the records. I know that the group Californians Against Hate sent an initial request in March and (NOM) had 30 days to release the records, which they did not do and as far as I know, they have still not sent the records to Californians Against Hate.

"I also personally visited their 'national headquarters' in Princeton three times to make an in-person request and no one was ever available at that office -- it's basically a barren, empty space. I did speak with Brian [Brown] at his Washington, D.C., office and they did not have the returns available at that point."

I went on to explain that NOM has also amended its 2007 return numerous times even though it is extremely rare for charitable organizations to do so. I quoted an e-mail ...

from NOM to its supporters in which the group "takes credit" for the signature gathering and fundraising efforts in Maine. This is a direct violation of the campaign laws in Maine that require groups that fund these efforts to register as PACs (Political Action Committees) or BQCs (Ballot Questioning Committees). My testimony ended with, "Now, I ask, how is it possible that this group [NOM] is the largest contributor to Stand for Marriage Maine at $160,000 but they are the only one who is not registered as a PAC or BQC?"

BROWN AND BOSTROM were then given the opportunity to speak again and when the pair finished, the Commission had some very interesting questions about NOM's activities and attempts to conceal its records from the public. Brown admitted that NOM released its 990s on the web only within the past week. It was also revealed that after NOM donated its initial $160,000, the group has since poured hundreds of thousands more into Maine. As they scrambled to defend their activity in Maine, their story seemed to simply fall apart.

Upon completion of the discussion, the Commission voted 3-2 to conduct an investigation into the National Organization for Marriage.

Prior to the hearing, Brian Brown submitted a sworn affidavit, which states, "NOM does not accept donations designated for the Maine referendum" and "NOM has not made expenditures exceeding $5,000 for the purpose of initiating or promoting the people's veto referendum in Maine, other than by contribution to Stand for Marriage Maine PAC." If it is determined that NOM did violate any of the points listed in the affidavit, Brown could face perjury charges.

It will be interesting to see what developments occur next. It is safe to assume that NOM will do everything in its financial power to prevent its records from being examined. In California, NOM lodged a lawsuit against the secretary of state, the attorney general and the five commissioners of the California Fair Political Practices Commission for allowing an investigation into the group. NOM has also initiated litigation in California that attempts to remove all disclosure of contributors to political initiatives and campaigns. Rather than comply with state and federal regulations, it seems NOM and its backers prefer to use their massive war chest to conceal records and intimidate the officials who seek to protect the citizens they represent. Will NOM resort to the same desperate scare-tactics in Maine?

On Oct. 1, the Maine Commission on Ethics & Governmental Practices made a courageous decision to stand up for fairness. This, however, is just one small victory. On Nov. 3, the citizens of Maine will decide if their gay and straight neighbors deserve the same civil rights. For more information on protecting equality in Maine, visit the No on 1 campaign www.mainefreedomtomarry.com.

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NEWS From Maine to California and the World

2009-10-23T00:49:00.000-07:00

News Coverage #26

San Francisco Examiner – Maine

Portland Press Herald – Kennebec Journal

The Advocate

New York Times – Scott James Column

Associated Press – Oaks Speech

WBZ CBS – Maine Finance Reports

KGTV – San Diego

Ohio Chrocicle

Metropolitan News-Enterprise

On Top Magazine

Edge Boston

Mike Tidmus – Subpoena

Metropolitan News-Enterprise

On Being Notorious

Mike Tidmus – Subpoena

Planet Transgender

Frontiers IN LA

People for the American Way

Personal Money Store

San Diego News Network

Tips Q

Mike Tidmus – Manchester Boycott

LGBT News

Pam’s House Blend

TPM

Gay Agenda

On Top Magazine -- Maine

Maybe It’s Just Me

NG Blog

Arkansas Times

GLT – Bragman Commentary

Gay Marriage Watch

NG blog

Queerty

Gay News Bits

Joe My God

On Being Notorius

Bilerico Alex Blaze Radio Interview

America Blog – Maine

WGME – TV

WGME TV – CBS

Fox Maine

Bangor Daily News

Pam’s House Blend – Maine

Bureau News

KRSO Sonoma

Bay Windows

Bangor Daily News

MPBN News Radio Maine

Bangor Daily News Longer Story

WBZ Boston

Pink News UK

New Civil Rights Movement

Mike Tidmus Maine

MPBN

Kennebec Journal Morning Sentinel

The Celebrity Cafe

Tips-Q

She Wired

Daily Variety

Gay Agenda

America Blog

Queerty

LGBTPOV Blog

Towleroad

Ameriqueer

Queerty

Joe My God

Morning Sentinel

Mike Tidmus – NOM Law Suit

Article VI Blog

Pam’s House Blend

New University

Nathan Shumate

Live Journal

The Examiner

Mike Tidmus

KFSM TV – Maine Law Suit

South Florida Blade

Gay News Bits

Gay Agenda

Bangor Daily News

LGBT POV

MPBN News

Tips Q

National Organization for Marriage Shows Its True Colors – Sues State of Maine to Change Reporting Laws

2009-10-22T16:26:00.000-07:00

AUGUSTA, MAINE -- In one of the boldest attempts to circumvent a state election law in recent memory, the Washington, DC based National Organization for Marriage (NOM) filed suit in Federal Court yesterday to wipe out Maine's campaign reporting law. NOM is the biggest contributor by far to Question 1, which would rescind Maine's recently enacted same-sex marriage law. The Maine Ethics Commission voted on October 1, 2009 to launch an investigation of NOM for improper reporting and possible money laundering charges at the request of Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate. Karger filed a formal complaint on August 24, 2009 against NOM and the Yes on Question 1 committee, Stand for Marriage Maine.

"These people come into Maine from Washington, DC fully aware of the state election laws, pay $350,000 to professional signature gatherers to qualify their referendum to take away the rights of a minority, and then have the audacity to sue the state to change its years old election laws," said Fred Karger. "They did the identical thing in California after that state's ethics commission, the California Fair Political Practices Commission, launched an investigation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church), and the very same National Organization for Marriage, whom many feel was created by the Mormon Church."

"Do they think they are in Afghanistan or Iran?" asked Karger. "We have long-standing laws in this country which allow for free and open elections, but NOM continues to try and get around these state and federal laws at every opportunity. The State of Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Elections Practices showed tremendous courage when its Commissioners voted to investigate the highly questionable finances of the National Organization for Marriage at its October 1st meeting. This was done under the threat of a law suit. They are to be commended for standing up for transparency and truth in Maine elections."

Here is a copy of the AP story: Anti-gay Marriage Group Challenges Reporting Requirements

Copy of Law Suit: Motion for Temporary Restraining Order

The Actual Complaint - Verified Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief

The National Organization for Marriage has already contributed over $500,000 to Stand for Marriage Maine, Yes on Question 1, but refuses to file as a PAC in Maine. This is 100 times the $5,000 PAC requirement. It appears that all other committees raising money for Question 1 have complied with the law, including the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, that has given over $350,000 to the election.

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2009-10-21T01:29:00.000-07:00

Karger: Proposition 8 Film Explains Mormon Gay Marriage Involvement
By Carlos Santoscoy Published: October 21, 2009

Director Reed Cowan's documentary on the Mormon Church's decades-old involvement in the fight to ban gay marriage in the United States is ready for its premiere screening. And Californians Against Hate Founder Fred Karger says the film will “undoubtedly change history.”

While still in production the film drew fire when Cowan released several controversial audio clips in February.

Utah State Senator Chris Buttars, a practicing Mormon, lost his chair of the powerful Judicial Committee after the Republican was heard in a Cowan interview calling the gay rights movement “probably the greatest threat to America” and gay folks “mean.”

“They're mean. They want to talk about being nice. They're the meanest buggers I have ever seen.”
“It's just like the Muslims,” he adds, moments later. “Muslims are good people and their religion is anti-war. But it's been taken over by the radical side.”

Not surprisingly, Cowan's trailer for his film, 8: The Mormon Proposition, begins with a tight close up of the senator.

In a series of interviews with Mormon Church leaders, gay activists and Utah politicians, Cowan shines a bright light on the church's profuse involvement in banning gay marriage throughout the nation since the early 1990s. A revelation no more since Karger began meddling in the church's affairs.

“It tells my story,” Karger told On Top Magazine. And it will “knock your socks off,” he added.
Cowan first interviewed Karger in San Francisco. The pair met in front of the Castro Theater on Wednesday, March 4 just as a huge gay marriage vigil was about to step off. Karger spoke to the filmmaker two more times over the course of the next year.

What is the Mormon proposition? The film is expected to showcase the major gay marriage battles the Mormon Church has backed since Utah became the first state to ban gay marriage in 1995. And how church officials attempted to conceal their deep involvement in the issue. Is the Mormon Church the mastermind puppeteer of the anti-gay marriage movement?

In a blog post, Cowan said the film had divided his family.

“My determination [to finish the film] has been tested. At this writing, I have lost communication with my sisters and my mother and my father. They are wonderful people and they are Mormons. The fear they have over what this film will say has worn thin to the point that our relationships are stressed and I fear broken forever,” he said.

The film is being considered for a Sundance Film Festival premiere in January.

2009-10-14T01:44:00.000-07:00

National March on Washington -- October 11, 2009

Philanthropist, Bruce Bastian addressing the demonstration in front of the U.S. Capitol
Oscar winning screen writer Lance Black speaking before the 200,000 attendees

Sean and the amazing Rick Jacobs backstage

Daniel the French documentarian on the press platform

A young activist who came down from New York to join in the National Equality March -- his first

Three leading LGBT women activists backstage, Urvashi -Vaid, Cynthia Nixon

and Kate Clinton

The Manchester Hotels Boycott was front and center during the March down

Pennsylvania Avenue

We are Marching to the Capitol, the Capitol......

General Cleve Jones, March Creator and Organizer extraordinaire inspecting his troops

The demonstrators were mostly all under 30, no wait 25 -- hundreds of thousands of them!

Mike out from LA with a group of 20 others ready to don his Boycott T-shirt

Reid rips LDS Church's Prop. 8 support

2009-10-13T13:35:00.000-07:00

This is an amazing story in today's Salt Lake Tribune by Matt Canham of the Tribune's Washington, DC bureau. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in the highest ranking Mormon elected official in the U.S.

Reid rips LDS Church's Prop. 8 support

Politics » Majority leader calls it a waste of church resources and good will.

By Matt Canham
The Salt Lake Tribune

Washington » In a meeting with gay-rights activists last week, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid criticized the LDS Church for backing a ballot measure banning same-sex marriage in California, saying the leaders of his faith should have stayed out of the contentious political fight.

Reid, a Democrat from Nevada, is the highest ranking elected official who is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He previously has not commented on the flood of Mormon money and volunteers who helped propel Proposition 8 to victory in November.

But three organizers of the past weekend's National Equality March said Reid brought up the topic during a conversation in his office.

"He said that he thought it was a waste of church resources and good will," said Derek Washington, a Nevadan who worked as the outreach director for the march. "He said he didn't think it was appropriate."

Reid spokesman Jon Summers would not discuss the private meeting, but he didn't deny the conversation took place.

"While Senator Reid agrees with his church that marriage is between a man and a woman," Summers said, "he also believes that the resources that went into the Proposition 8 effort could have been put to better use."

LDS Church officials declined to comment Monday. But Frank Schubert, campaign manager for the pro-Prop 8 movement, said: "All churches have not only the opportunity to speak out on important public issues, but really a moral obligation to do so."

The Mormon Church, headquartered in Salt Lake City, repeatedly has fought attempts to legalize same-sex marriages. California's Prop 8 was no different. Church leaders announced their support in a letter that was read during Sunday services in meetinghouses throughout the Golden State. LDS officials called for financial donations and volunteers. Members of the church did not disappoint.

More than 1,000 Utahns contributed either individually or through a business to the Prop 8 fight, giving $3.8 million. More than 70 percent of that cash went to groups backing the gay-marriage ban. Utah ranked second only to California in the amount given to the ballot battle.

The LDS Church kicked in nearly $190,000 in in-kind contributions to ProtectMarriage.com, the leading pro-Prop. 8 group. In the end, Prop 8 passed with 52 percent of the vote.

Marchers in Sunday's equality rally, which drew tens of thousands to the U.S. Capitol, repeatedly referenced the Prop 8 defeat in signs, statements and even face paint. But when organizers sat down with Reid, it wasn't a topic they intended to raise. They wanted to thank him for supporting the march and push him on their desire for federal action giving gay Americans the ability to get married, serve openly in the military and fight workplace discrimination.

Reid signed a letter supporting the march and encouraged a sustained lobbying campaign.

In the meeting, those present touched on issues most important to them. Dan Choi, a veteran of the Iraq War, who was booted from the military under the "Don't ask, don't tell" policy, thanked Reid for lobbying President Barack Obama on his behalf. Robin McGehee, of California, talked about her own family. Then, McGehee said, Reid brought up his LDS faith and discussed a recent meeting with Mormons in which he criticized the Prop 8 efforts.

"He personally said they needed to be focused on other things," she said, "and he felt it was harmful for the church to focus on such a divisive issue."

mcanham@sltrib.com

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2009-10-08T17:58:00.000-07:00

State commission to investigate gay marriage repeal backer

By Lorie Costigan, Times Record Bureau

Friday, October 2, 2009 2:05 PM EDT

AUGUSTA — The Commission on Governmental Ethics and Elections Practices voted 3-2 Thursday to launch an investigation of the Stand for Marriage Maine Political Action Committee’s primary funder, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM). Both are working for a Nov. 3 people’s veto of a same-sex marriage law the Legislature passed and Gov. John Baldacci signed this spring.

A referendum to repeal that law — initiated by a petition drive — will appear as Question 1 on the Nov. 3 state ballot.

The commission’s decision reversed staff recommendations and followed nearly 40 minutes of conflicting assertions by Fred Karger, executive director of Californians Against Hate; Barry Bostrom and Brian Brown, of the National Organization for Marriage; and Danielle Truszkovsky, a freelance journalist from Florida.

Karger asserted that NOM was attempting to circumvent Maine election law by obscuring the names of its donors. He submitted dozens of documents dating to Aug. 13 and brought additional material to Thursday’s commission meeting.

Brown, NOM’s executive director, and his attorney, Bostrom, called Karger’s requests nothing more than attempts to identify those opposed to same-sex marriage as targets for future hate crimes. Each reiterated NOM’s compliance with Maine election law, explaining NOM does not solicit donations for work in specific states and instead conducts more generalized fundraising drives to support causes through its general treasury.

Of its effort to protect donor identities, Truszkovsky indicated NOM failed to disclose basic nonprofit financial statements, an Internal Revenue Service 990, and had filed amendments to the 990 three times. She told commissioners less than 1 percent of nonprofit organizations amend the disclosure one time, indicating three amendments in one reporting period was highly unusual.

Brown and Bostrom said the forms are now available on NOM’s Web site, http://www.nationformarriage.org/, in part because repeated requests for the public documents had interfered with staff work.

It was Karger’s documents, however, that piqued the interest of Commissioner Walter McKee, who seized on newsletters and other material specifically citing NOM’s interest in preserving traditional unions in Maine.

McKee seemed particularly incensed by one newsletter, where more than half the content was dedicated to funding efforts in Maine.

Bostrom responded that NOM’s e-mail newsletters solicited funds to “cover the costs of sending out e-mail newsletters.” Because NOM did not receive more than $5,000 from the newsletters, Bostrom said Maine law does not require NOM to register in the state as a political action committee. He also refuted arguments that NOM would be required to register as a ballot question initiative committee under Maine law.

This is not Karger’s first attempt to challenge supporters of same-sex marriage repeal initiatives. He asked the California Fair Political Practices Commission to investigate the connection between NOM and the Church of Latter Day Saints and its purported donations to Proposition 8, the 2007 measure that repealed same-sex marriage in California.

Brown told commissioners the Californian commission had not issued a finding of wrongdoing against NOM, which raised $1.8 million in less than two years in support of a California PAC supporting Proposition 8. Brown further asserted Karger’s efforts were merely to expose the names of those who consider marriage a union between one man and one woman.

Maine’s referendum has earned national interest, a point reiterated by those speaking before the commission Thursday. Karger traveled from California; Bostrom traveled from Indiana; Brown from New Jersey; and, Truszkovsky from Florida.

No one from Maine spoke in favor of or in opposition to the request to investigate National Organization for Marriage.

The proximity of the vote did not weigh on commissioners, who urged staff to review allegations given what one commissioner called the “slippery slope” of groups attempting to circumvent Maine election law.

Of the $343,689 in donations reported by Stand for Marriage Maine PAC as of June 2009, Karger wrote that religious organizations and James Dobson’s Focus on the Family fund donated all but $400 of the total raised.

He alleges the amount of donations to NOM, and the organization’s mission, makes NOM subject to Maine’s election laws.

McKee, of Hallowell, was initially inclined to follow staff recommendations, yet was persuaded by Karger’s arguments.

“There is a large amount of money in this campaign that concerns me, and I have to say authorizing investigations in circumstances like this is appropriate,” McKee said.

“I am troubled by the slippery slope when entities can circumvent the intent of what our laws seek to cover,” Commissioner Andre Duchette of Brunswick said. “I do think an investigation is warranted.”

Outgoing commission chairman Michael Friedman of Bangor disagreed, saying the pattern of national money flowing to Maine elections was the norm, not the exception. He urged commissioners to review statutes.

Commissioner Edward Youngblood of Bangor also voiced opposition. “There is no reason to get involved in a time-consuming investigation,” he said.

Commissioner Francis Marsano of Belfast said the commission needs to focus on the intent of the law.

“Time is not of the essence,” Marsano said, adding commission staff could not be expected to complete the investigation by the Nov. 3 election.

“This investigation should be done in a way that will produce the kinds of results Commissioner McKee was proposing,” he said.

McKee and Duchette, both Democrats, and Marsano, a Republican, voted to order the investigation. Republican Youngblood, and Friedman, who is not enrolled in a political party, opposed.

Marc Mutty, chairman of Stand for Marriage Maine, released a statement blasting the decision. “Stand for Marriage Maine is in complete compliance with Maine campaign disclosure laws,” he wrote. “The decision today by the Maine Ethics Commission to open an inquiry based on frivolous allegations concerning the fundraising procedures of one of our allies, the National Organization for Marriage, is an unfortunate abuse of power. It is yet another example of the harassment that follows supporters of traditional marriage. The split 3-2 vote overruled the independent professional recommendation of the commission staff that an investigation was not warranted. Instead, a bare majority of commissioners agreed with a California-based hate group that exists for the sole purpose of harassing marriage supporters ..."

If California’s investigation is any indication, Maine’s probe will carry on well past Election Day. Reached for comment Thursday, Roman Porter, executive director of CFPP, said the California investigation spurred by Karger’s complaint is in its 11th month. Porter was unwilling to provide a timeline of when the investigation might end.Jonathan Wayne, executive director of Maine’s ethics commission, sought clarification of the staff role in the investigation and was authorized to subpoena Brown, through attorney Bostrom, as needed.The commission meets next on Nov. 19. news@timesrecord.com

Maggie & Brian -- Sign the Oath!

2009-10-07T21:45:00.000-07:00

Brian Brown not happy at his press conference right after the Maine Ethics Commission
voted to investigate his National Organization for Marriage Last Thursday

I was personally attacked last Friday by Brian Brown in an email to his over 500,000 supporters and in a NOM press release. Brian is very unhappy that his organization is now being investigated by Maine, its second state, and lashed out at me.

LINK TO BRIAN BROWN’S NASTY EMAIL: CLICK HERE

LINK TO NOM’S PRESS RELEASE: CLICK HERE

I felt it was necessary to respond to Brian's tirade.

I have recently been subpoenaed by Maggie Gallagher and Brian Brown and their Magical Mysterious Mormon Front Group, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM).

NOM and its law firm, Bopp, Coleson and Bostrom of Terre Haute, Indiana, have been viciously attacking me for over 15 months, with all the power of an over $12 million organization, simply because I am after the truth.

NOM heads, Maggie Gallagher and Brian Brown do not like the truth. They both claim to be protecting marriage and children. They are both doing just the opposite.

Their creator, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- day Saints (Mormon Church) has led the national battle against LGBT civil rights in this country for over 20 years. They have repeatedly lied and covered-up the truth, while harming millions of gays and lesbians.

This cruel trio is on the brink of finally getting caught. If California and Maine, the two states that are currently investigating them, find that all their deception was done willfully and with intent, then this merry band could face criminal charges and be hauled off to jail.

Maine joined California last week in a courageous vote to investigate NOM. The State of Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices stood up to NOM's threats of legal action at a very emotional meeting in Augusta last Thursday. By a 3 to 2 vote the Commission agreed with the complaint that I filed, and felt that there were too many inconsistencies and unanswered questions. They voted to investigate the National Organization for Marriage.

By giving $250,000, NOM is by far the biggest contributor to Question 1 on the November 3rd ballot in Maine. They have not disclosed any of their donor's names, nor filed as a PAC. Question 1 would take away the recently granted right for same-sex couples to marry in Maine. If it passes, NOM will succeed in banning same-sex marriage in the 31st state.

NOM’s attorney, Barry Bostrom, claimed at the hearing that the Maine election law could be unconstitutional, and thus threatened to sue the state just as his firm has done in California. Bostrom’s firm filed suit in federal court against every major California election official earlier this year after the California Fair Political Practices Commission decided to investigate NOM’s creator, the Mormon Church.

What’s wrong with these people? Why are they working so hard to harm so many? What is their true motivation? Why do they continue to lie and cover-up at every turn?

Well, I for one am fed up with their whining about being the victim here, when in fact, the very opposite is true. They raise millions and millions of dollars to take away the rights from a minority. They beat down people and cast an entire minority as 2nd class citizens – not equal to them.

They hide their federal tax returns for two years until just before Thursday’s hearing in Maine. NOM's IRS 990 filings for 2007 and 2008 magically appeared on its web site during the wee hours of Thursday morning. I got tipped off right before the hearing, and I was able to point out the truth to the Ethics Commission. Commission members questioned Brian Brown about that. He said that he wasn’t sure when they were posted. And still no sign of the NOM 501(c)3 Educational Fund's (Tax ID Number 26-0240498) 2008 return. So,

Maggie and Brian – SIGN THE OATH

Mr. Brian Brown and Ms. Maggie Gallagher, I am asking both of you to sign the oath below, in the hope that from here on, you will change course and tell the American public the truth about where all your money comes from and all that you are doing. It’s a simple oath, and one that you might recognize.

I do solemnly swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

You both are parents. Show your children that they can be proud of you, and that you will change your ways and conduct all your activities with truth, openness and integrity.

We at Californians Against Hate live by this golden rule, and we hope that you and your backers will agree from this day forward to fully comply with the oath posted below.

I await your reply.

OATH FOR
NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR MARRIAGE

I do solemnly swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God.

_________________________ ________________________
Maggie Gallagher Brian S. Brown

2009-10-06T11:38:00.001-07:00

Statement by Fred Karger
Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices
October 1, 2009

Thank you for responding to the complaint that I filed, and for holding this important hearing today. The Commission has been so cooperative throughout this process, and I am very grateful for that. Keeping our elections free from corruption is essential to a democracy. You have consistently done just that.

I originally was not going to testify here today, but after reading both of Mr. Bostrom’s letters responding to my charges, I felt compelled to raise some issues and pose some questions.

I have been keeping a watchful eye on the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) for the past 18 months. In California, NOM raised the bulk of the money to qualify Proposition 8 for the ballot. They came out of nowhere to become a huge force in that election. Now they are leading the fight against same-sex marriage across the country.

Their finances have always been clouded in mystery. They refuse to turn over any of their tax returns as required by federal law. We have repeatedly asked to see those records and so have many journalists. NOM refuses all requests. They feel they are above the law.

In one letter to you, however, Mr. Bostrom states that NOM raised $3.5 million in 2008 and will spend $7 million in 2009. That is the very first time they have said what they are spending, but who knows if it is true. They have made so many un-kept promises to release their 990 tax returns for 2007 and 2008, and have told so many different stories, that they cannot be trusted.

Funny thing, in the middle of the night last night, NOM finally released its way late 990 tax returns for 2007 and 2008 and posted them on their web site. This was done just in time for today’s meeting.

What we do know, is that NOM has sent out lots of email solicitations to raise money to be spent in Maine and several other states.

As a part of my complaint, I submitted 79 emails to the Commission that I was able to gather that NOM has sent out since November 4, 2008.

Of these, 16 mention Maine specifically, and directly ask for money. Mr. Bostrom claims that only two of these 16 solicitations should count against its $5,000 PAC reporting threshold.

And in another highly suspect claim, Mr. Bostrom states that these two email solicitations only raised a combined total of $295. That’s it? Only raised $147.50 per email? Highly unlikely.

On August 21, 2009 NOM Executive Director Brian Brown announced in a press release, “that we have passed a HUGE milestone: 500,000 activists have joined NOM’s merry band of marriage warriors.”

So we are supposed to believe that they raised only $147.50 per email from 500,000 supporters? Come on.

And Brian goes out of his way to state in fund-raising requests things like, “and unlike in California, every dollar you give to NOM’s Northeast Action Plan today is private, with no risk of harassment from gay marriage protestors.” Or “Donations to NOM are not tax-deductible and they are NOT public information, either.” Or “Your gift is confidential: no public disclosure!”

And NOM only raises $147.50 per email to 500,000 of its supporters?

Mr. Bostrom’s letters to the Commission admit guilt. They state that they are raising money for Maine, but claim that they are not covered by the Maine statute.

Mr. Bostrom threatens you by saying that your law is unconstitutional, that election laws are a burden and limit First Amendment Free Speech, while acknowledging that they broke the law. He says that the law doesn’t apply to his clients. Please don’t be intimidated by him.

One statement in Mr. Bostrom’s letter on behalf of NOM caught my attention. He stated emphatically that, “No other solicitations were made for ballot measure activities in Maine by email, direct mail, or other means. True? No.

NOM’s Inaugural News Letter that came out in July 2009 is devoted to the Maine election on Question 1, and the last line of the article is pretty clear, “Your support for NOM is critical to the success of the effort.”

How many other solicitations has NOM made to raise money for Maine? How else have they raised money? Where did they get the $250,000 that they gave Stand for Marriage Maine? They claim not from their emails. Then where?

If the Commission staff were to talk to all nine Board members of NOM individually, I’ll bet you could get these answers pretty quick.

Mr. Bostrom filled a very similar response to the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board when charges of financial irregularities were filed against his client in August by One Iowa and the Interfaith Alliance of Iowa Action Fund.

The threshold for reporting as a PAC in Iowa is only $750, and NOM claims to be well under that just like they claim to be well under Maine’s of $5,000.

Maybe that is why they came up with the $295.00 as the only money they raised for Maine. They had to be well under both state’s limits after the fact, to explain why they broke the law by not forming a PAC.

I have spent 30 years in politics managing campaigns. I have filed and read literally thousands of campaign reports in probably 25 states. I have never seen this type of blatant disregard for election laws like I have seen with NOM in several states.

All I have done in Maine was to pull together evidence found in the public record and point out what I felt were campaign reporting irregularities. I just want to get to the truth.

I did that in California right after the election which led to the ongoing investigation of NOM by your counterpart there, the Fair Political Practices Commission.

My citizen activism in Maine and California has caused me to get subpoenaed by the National Organization for Marriage and its allies in a federal law suit. That suit was filed so they could keep their contributor’s names secret, just like Mr. Brown promised his donors giving to your election.

They are retaliating against me in an attempt to silence me and bully me by dragging me into federal court.

This is what they do to stop any attempt to shed transparency on their operation. I am not scared, because I know that I am doing the right thing. The Fair Political Practices Commission is not afraid to investigate NOM and its allies because they know that it is the right thing to do as well. I hope that the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Elections Practices will stand up to their threats and scare tactics.

An investigation is the only way to get to the truth.

Today, October 1st marks the start of LGBT History month in this country. It began 15 years ago to encourage openness and honesty for those of us who happen to be gay, lesbian, bi-sexual or transgender.

Please don’t let NOM’s threats against your state deter the five of you from doing the right thing today, by always striving for openness and honesty in the electoral process.

Thank you very much.

2009-10-04T21:49:00.000-07:00

News Coverage of Maine Ethics Commission Investigation from Around the World!

Maine Marriage Campaign Probe Gets OK
By GLENN ADAMS (AP) – 1 day ago

AUGUSTA, Maine — Maine's campaign oversight board overruled a staff recommendation Thursday and authorized an investigation into fundraising by groups supporting the campaign to repeal the state's gay marriage law in a Nov. 3 referendum.

The Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices voted 3-2 after some members said there was sufficient evidence to warrant a closer look at finance reporting by the National Organization for Marriage, a major contributor to Stand for Marriage Maine.

The latter group is leading the people's veto campaign to repeal Maine's legislatively enacted law recognizing same-sex marriages. Maine's law, which was signed in May by Gov. John Baldacci, and the challenge forced by a petition drive have drawn national attention.

In the case before the ethics commission Thursday, Californians Against Hate founder Fred Karger complained that the Princeton, N.J.-based National Organization for Marriage is circumventing Maine law by not reporting the names of donors whose money is spent by the Maine campaign.

Karger's whose group was formed to identify major donors in last year's Proposition 8 campaign in California, in which voters overturned that state's same-sex marriage law. Karger said NOM's finances "have always been clouded in mystery."

"They're trying to shield their donors," Karger said Thursday. "An investigation is the only way to the truth."

NOM attorney Barry Bostrom said the organization's policy is to collect donations not targeted for specific campaigns so donors will not have to fear business boycotts, property damage and other forms of harassment by same-sex marriage activists. Bostrom said NOM complies with state campaign financing laws in all states in which it's active.

Brian Brown, NOM executive director, dismissed Karger's complaint as "nothing more than an attempt to harass and intimidate those of us who believe in the core truth that marriage is between one man and one woman."

Thirty states have voter-approved gay marriage bans in their constitutions, and federal law bars federal recognition of gay unions. Six states have passed laws or have been ordered by the courts to allow same-sex marriage, but the people's veto fight has focused national attention on Maine.

"I do believe Maine is now the No. 1 fight throughout the country," said Brown. "Of course it's critical."

While the state ethics commission has authorized an investigation into whether violations of Maine's finance reporting law occurred, it did not issue a deadline for a finding, either before the Nov. 3 election or after it. The commission staff had concluded there was not enough evidence to justify an investigation.

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

More Coverage:

WGME CBS TV Portland, ME -- http://www.wgme.com/newsroom/top_stories/videos/wgme_vid_753.shtml

WCSH NBC TV Portland, ME -- http://www.wcsh6.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=109659&catid=2

San Francisco Examiner -- http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/ap/63112492.html

Bangor Daily News -- http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/123348.html

Maine Bureau News -- http://blog.taragana.com/n/maine-ethics-commission-approves-probe-of-anti-gay-marriage-fundraising-184173/

WBZ CBS Radio Boston -- http://wbztv.com/wireapnewsme/Ethics.commission.approves.2.1219009.html

Maine News Update -- http://updates.mainetoday.com/updates/gay-marriage-funds-to-be-investigated

Bay Windows -- http://www.baywindows.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=blog&sc2=news&sc3=&id=97085#

Pam’s House Blend -- http://pamshouseblend.com/diary/13294/press-release-from-fred-karger

America Blog -- http://www.americablog.com/2009/09/newsmax-is-backing-away-from-obama-coup.html

Pink News UK -- http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2009/10/02/anti-gay-national-organisation-for-marriage-to-have-finances-probed/#

Californians Against Hate Encouraged by Maine Ethics Commission Decision

2009-10-01T11:35:00.000-07:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Source: Californians Against Hate

On Thursday October 1, 2009

PRESS CONTACT:

Fred Karger

Founder, Californians Against Hate

Tel: (619) 592-2008

Email: info@californiansagainsthate.com

Californians Against Hate Encouraged by Maine Ethics Commission Decision

Allegations of Election Irregularities in Upcoming Election Will Be Investigated

Augusta, Maine, October 1, 2009 — Californians Against Hate is encouraged to learn the State of Maine’s Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices will further investigate accusations made against the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) and Stand for Marriage Maine PAC (SFMM).

Today’s hearing in Augusta, Maine resulted from allegations of election irregularities leveled by Californians Against Hate founder Fred Karger. Reacting to the Commission’s decision to pursue an investigation, Karger stated, “I’m extremely grateful for the courageous stand the commission took today.”

In a letter, dated September 21, 2009, NOM’s and SFMM’s legal representatives, Bopp, Coleson &Bostrom, indicate that NOM “makes large contributions to various state ballot measure committees from its general treasury,” but claim that, with a few exceptions, the organization “did not solicit or accept designated donations for Maine.” The letter also insists that Maine’s registration statute for non-political committees is “unconstitutional because it burdens an association’s right of free speech by requiring such to register and report as if they were political action committees, when they are not political action committees, and when they do not have the major purpose of influencing a Maine ballot question.”

The State of California, which investigates fewer than 5% of similar complaints, felt compelled to investigate allegations of election campaign irregularities on the part of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and, among others, the National Organization for Marriage. That investigation, instigated by a complaint filed by Californians Against Hate, is now in its tenth month.

The State of Iowa is currently contemplating its own investigation, as a result of similar allegations against the National Organization for Marriage lodged by the state’s Interfaith Alliance Action Fund and One Iowa, into NOM’s independent expenditure of $86,060 to influence Iowa District 90’s special election.

NOM is aggressively endeavoring to effect bans on same-sex marriage in some 29 states. The aforementioned letter filed by NOM’s legal representation reveals the organization’s projected 2009 operating budget to be $7 million.

###

Copies of the letters from Bopp, Coleson & Bostrom can be found in PDF form online at the link.

Fred Karger's Statement on Being Subpoenaed

2009-09-24T12:41:00.000-07:00

This is my statement on the subpoena that I received from the Protect Marriage Campaign & the National Organization for Marriage. These two powerful and rich organizations are trying to silence me.

My story was published in the Huffington Post yesterday.

Please take a few minutes to read it. Thank you very much! Fred Karger
Link: Huffington Post

Fighting For Civil Rights Has Consequences

I think of myself as a citizen activist. But that hasn't always been so.

I began my odyssey on July 18, 2008 when I called for a boycott against San Diego hotel owner Doug Manchester. Mr. Manchester gave $125,000 of very early money to qualify Proposition 8 for last November's California ballot. Why spend our money at his two hotels, The Manchester Grand Hyatt and the Grand del Mar, only to have it used against us?

I then led three other boycotts of mega-donors to the campaign to end same-sex marriage in California. Terry Caster, who owns A-1 Self Storage with 40 locations throughout California, is our other ongoing boycott. Mr. Caster gave a whopping $693,000 to ban same-sex marriage in California. When he was asked why by a reporter from the San Diego Union-Tribune he replied, "those kinds of marriages would create a 'sick society.'"

Two other boycotts were settled after meeting with their CEOs. The founder of Bolthouse Farms gave $100,000 to Prop 8, and the Garff family of Salt Lake City's Garff Automotive Group also gave $100,000 to Yes on 8. Both companies are now very active and generous supporters of the LGBT community.
And then there is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church). They raised and spent an inordinate amount of money, $30 million of the $40 million Yes on 8 raised, yet the church only reported $2,200 in non-monetary contributions.

So, I filed a complaint with the California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC). Although the FPPC investigates fewer than 5% of the complaints it receives, it continues to investigate my charges of numerous campaign reporting violations by the Mormon Church. That ongoing investigation (FPPC Case #08/735) is
in its tenth month.

I have also been focusing much attention on the National Organization for Marriage (NOM). It has so many similarities to numerous other Mormon Church created front groups, that I filed a supplemental complaint with the FPPC and asked them to investigate.

Apparently, NOM feels it is above the law. It decided to hide its federally required tax forms for 2007 and 2008. They don't want anybody to see how they spend their millions and millions of dollars. I have filed numerous complaints with the IRS, and have called for a Congressional investigation of this two year old National Organization for Marriage.

Finally, I filed a complaint in Maine dealing with the campaign there to ban same-sex marriage. 99.999% of all the money raised to hire the professional signature gathering firm to qualify Question 1 for the November 3, 2009 ballot came from only four religious organizations. Those were: NOM ($160,000), the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland ($100,000), the Knights of Columbus of Washington DC -- a two person office -- ($50,000) and Focus on the Family ($31,000). Money laundering charges will be heard by the State of Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices on October 1st against the campaign committee, Stand for Marriage Maine and the National Organization for Marriage. The five member commission will hold its hearing in Augusta to decide if they, too are going to investigate NOM.

It appears that I have angered some pretty powerful people.

On Saturday morning, September 5, 2009 I was served a subpoena in a federal lawsuit where the old Prop 8 campaign committee, ProtectMarriage.com has filed suit against every major California election official from the Attorney General, Secretary of State, all five commissioners of the FPPC (who are in the middle of the investigation of the Mormon Church) to the big county registrars of voters. The lawsuit attempts to end reporting of contributor names in California. California was the first state in the nation to implement this type of law when the voters passed the Political Reform Act of 1974. It has worked well over the past 35 years, but NOM and its allies obviously do not believe in transparency.

By subpoenaing me, they are forcing me to spend lots of money on attorneys to represent me throughout the proceedings.

The subpoena calls for me to produce all emails, correspondence, faxes and all stored information that deal with my activities with Californians Against Hate from January 18, 2008 to the present. They demand to see all correspondence pertaining to three of my four web sites: www.CaliforniansAgainstHate.com , www.BoycottManchesterHotels.com, and www.BoycottA-1SelfStorrage.com. They left one out. It is our second most visited web site: www.Mormongate.com. Must have been an oversight.

They have also demanded to know how I received all of our research information and how it was disseminated. They also want to see "any and all" financial records. How ironic, I have been trying to view the required financial information from NOM for over 6 months. NOM refuses to release any of its finances, even to the IRS, as required by federal law. The Mormon Church will also not reveal any of its expenditures.

So what better way to persecute me, than to drag me through the legal system.

Unlike all these mega-organizations, it is just my laptop and me. I really am a citizen activist.
It has been a real rollercoaster of emotions over the past 14 days. Last Tuesday, the state's top legal newspaper, the Daily Journal ran a front page story about my plight. It is a great article by reporter Matthew Pordum.

Well, that triggered an outpouring of calls, emails, Facebook messages, tweets, you name it. The first call that I got was from Cleve Jones, Harvey Milk's former aide, and one of the leading LGBT activists in the country. "What can I do to help?" he asked.

Wow, then it really hit me, I am not in this alone. It has been pretty much non-stop all day, every day. Lots of lawyers calling and offering assistance -- some I knew, many I didn't. I received so many offers of help, including some of the most moving notes of support that I could ever imagine. This has been quite the emotional experience.

In my 59 1/2 years, I have never been subpoenaed, but there is a first time for everything.
So to everyone who reached out to me, and to those who back my efforts, a big thank you for believing in me. I feel we must stand up to those whose goal is to destroy the LGBT community.

Our opponents want to send a message to all of us that we are second class citizens, who are not entitled to the same rights as our mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, aunts, uncles, co-workers, neighbors and our friends who happen to be straight.

This will not deter me. I will continue to bring attention to those companies and individuals who spend millions and millions of dollars to stop us from attaining full and equal civil rights.

EQCA & Courage Campaign Join Manchester Hotels Boycott

2009-09-23T14:41:00.000-07:00

September 21, 2009

Doug Manchester, the wealthy hotel owner who donated $125,000 in critical seed money to put Prop. 8 on the ballot, has launched a cynical public relations campaign by trying to buy off EQCA with a $25,000 donation.

We said no to Doug Manchester. Will you join us?

Launched in the summer of 2008 by Californians Against Hate and Cleve Jones, the highly successful boycott is believed to have cost Manchester's Grand Hyatt more than $7 million in lost business.

To keep putting pressure on Doug Manchester, EQCA and the Courage Campaign are launching the new "Say No To Manchester" web site along with UNITE HERE and Californians Against Hate.

Join the boycott by adding your name to the pledge.
http://www.SayNoToManchester.com/Pledge

By signing, you will urge Doug Manchester to make a public apology for his $125,000 donation to Prop. 8 and negotiate an honest, fair resolution with boycott organizers.

Please, sign up today and pledge your support.

In solidarity,
Geoff KorsExecutive DirectorEquality California

2009-09-17T12:19:00.000-07:00

Gay GOPer has star role in same-sex marriage fight

Published 09/17/2009
by Matthew S. Bajko m.bajko@ebar.com

LINK TO STORY

A sought after Republican campaign adviser for three decades beginning in the 1970s, Fred Karger called it quits and retired nearly five and half years ago. During his time working to elect GOP politicians, such as former state senator and then-California Governor George Deukmejian, Karger remained in the closet.

After leaving the political world, he split his time between homes in Los Angeles and Laguna Beach. He probably would have stayed silent about his being gay had his idle seaside lifestyle not wore thin.

But Karger became restless and his political instincts called out to be put to use.
"I was a closeted political aide for decades," said Karger, 59, who considers himself a moderate Republican and worked for The Dolphin Group, whose clients have included Presidents Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, and the senior George Bush.

In a twist of fate that would propel Karger to break his silence and thrust him into the media spotlight, it was the threat of losing a famed Southern California gay bar that would forever change his life.

Back in 2006 a developer bought the building housing the Boom Boom Room, which for 60 years had operated out of a hotel nestled above Laguna Beach's coastline. Shocked at losing an LGBT institution, Karger launched a campaign to save the gay bar. In the process, he came out publicly, first in the local Laguna Beach paper and then in a cover profile in the Los Angeles Times' Sunday magazine.

"I wasn't taken seriously at first with the Save the Boom campaign. Then right before the L.A. Times piece came out we won a reprieve," said Karger, referring to the developer's decision to put off his plans for a year. [The club shuttered last year after its lease expired, but activists are still pushing to see it reopen since the building has yet to be demolished.] "It was this huge profile with 12 photos of me, one even ran on the cover. Then everyone knew I was gay. It was a major hurdle for me."
His newfound activist role didn't end there. Last year Karger was astounded to read how much money anti-gay groups pushing Proposition 8, the voter-approved same-sex marriage ban, were able to raise in San Diego, a place he knew well from his political campaign work.

"It was surprising because it is not a socially conservative place," said Karger, who was especially irked to see hotel mogul Doug Manchester "gloating" about donating $125,000 to help put Prop 8 on the ballot.

Another quote in the news article also struck a chord with Karger.
"This one guy said we should boycott these businesses supporting the anti-gay groups," recalled Karger.

Fred Karger founded Californians Against Hate: Photo courtesy of Fred Karger
Inspired, Karger founded Californians Against Hate, a 501(c)4 organization, and set out to do just that; he led a successful boycott of Manchester's hotels that continues to this day. Knowing how to draw a media crowd, he chose to launch the boycott the Friday of San Diego's Pride weekend and invited parade grand marshals Cleve Jones, founder of the AIDS Quilt, and Gilbert Baker , creator of the rainbow flag, to speak.

"My bottom line is you have to change people's opinions. You got to think big," said Karger, who donated $2,500 of his own money to the No on 8 efforts. "Our target is straight women throughout the country. We have gay people with us, and straight men are not as likely to be with us. But straight women are more likely to be with us."

He then set his sights on the donor rolls for the Yes on 8 campaign, listing them on his Web site and creating more media attention. And he worked in tandem with Equality California, alerting the statewide LGBT group and lead coordinator of the No on 8 fight.

"I told them I would not raise a dime so as not to compete against the No on 8 campaign. We will be the watchdog group and follow the money," said Karger, who has been closely monitoring the money anti-gay groups are raising to overturn Maine's pro-same-sex marriage law. "We would list donors who gave $5,000 or over to Yes on 8."

EQCA Executive Director Geoff Kors called Karger "a great partner and colleague" whose work has been beneficial to the fight for marriage equality.

"He has been successful in highlighting to a lot of people that the community is not going to support any businesses who believe we should be denied the same rights everyone else has," said Kors.
In the process Karger has morphed into the main nemesis of the Alliance Defense Fund, an anti-gay group that has provided legal counsel to campaigns in numerous states against LGBT rights, and the National Organization for Marriage, a group helping to finance anti-gay ballot fights across the country.

He also helped expose the involvement of the Church of Jesus Chris of Latter-day Saints in last year's No on 8 fight. The church insisted it did not financially support the campaign, and ProtectMarriage.com, the group behind the Yes on 8 effort, unsuccessfully tried to conceal its final donor report this January to hide the Mormon money it received.

"I never thought of the Mormon donations until the end of the campaign and the reports came out and I discovered the Mormon money given to Yes on 8," said Karger. "Once you start communicating outside your church membership, it is reportable."

ProtectMarriage.com is now suing California in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California in Sacramento in a bid to throw out the state's campaign contributions disclosure laws. The Alliance Defense Fund is representing the anti-gay group in the lawsuit and is working with Indiana-based attorney James Bopp Jr. and his firm.

The lawyers for the anti-gay side just won a victory in Washington state when a federal judge ruled the backers of a voter-referendum aimed at repealing a newly enacted domestic partnership law did not have to identify who signed the petitions to put Referendum 71 on the ballot.
Timothy D. Chandler, an attorney with the Folsom, California-based Alliance Defense Fund, did not respond to a call seeking comment for this article.

Chandler has subpoenaed Karger to appear at an October 13 deposition in the California case. He is seeking documents and records on Karger's various Web sites about the boycotts he launched and his Californians Against Hate group. He is also seeking documents on how Karger obtained the donor records of those supporting Prop 8, who he disseminated that information to, and the financial records for Karger's nonprofit, which as a 501(c)4 does not have to report its donors if it does not raise or spend more than $25,000 a year.

"They are trying to intimidate me and silence me. To harass me, they called me as a witness, now I have to get lawyers and be prepared," said Karger, who does not draw any salary from the nonprofit group he founded. "The Mormons are trying to use it to deflect attention away from them. It's a publicity stunt."

As for the lawsuit, Karger said, "I don't think they have a snowball's chance in hell of getting it through. There is no reason to throw out this law."

Fred Karger Subpoenaed by NOM

2009-09-16T01:39:00.000-07:00

Daily Journal

Sep. 15, 2009

Prop. 8 Supporters Subpoena Activist Who Revealed Contributors

By Matthew Pordum Daily Journal Staff Writer

SACRAMENTO In its continuing efforts to protect the identity of those who bankrolled the campaign to pass Proposition 8, lawyers for The National Organization for Marriage have issued a subpoena for one of the leaders behind the opposition, Californians Against Hate founder Fred Karger, who led boycotts and created websites outing top contributors.

The subpoena compels Karger to produce the group's financial records and all communications and documentation regarding affiliated websites and the dissemination of donor information. It also directs him to appear for a deposition on October 13th.

"This is harassment and they are trying to silence me," said Karger, who points out that he's not a party to the case. "I'm a citizen activist, and my organization is just me, funded entirely by myself versus the power of a group who has millions and millions of dollars behind it."

The subpoena, served over the Labor Day weekend, stems from a lawsuit filed in federal court in Sacramento in January by The National Organization for Marriage against California Secretary of State Debra Bowen, Attorney General Jerry Brown and FPPC Chairman Ross Johnson. ProtectMarriage.com v. Debra Bowen, 09-0058.

The group referred a reporter to its lawyer, Illinois-based James Bopp Jr. of Bopp, Coleson & Bostrom. Bopp did not return several calls seeking comment.

According to court records, the group is challenging the constitutionality of campaign finance disclosure requirements, claiming donors to Proposition 8 have been ravaged by e-mails, phone calls, postcards and even death threats.

In the suit, Bopp claims that the requirements of California's Political Reform Act of 1974 are unconstitutional by virtue of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

Karger's website, www.californiansagainsthate.com, currently lists the names, addresses and donation amounts for the top 12 contributors to the Yes on Proposition 8 campaign, under the heading "Dishonor Roll."

The Yes on 8 campaign raised nearly $30 million and won the ballot battle over gay marriage last November by a vote of 52 percent.

Karger contends the subpoena is simply an act of revenge for the complaints he filed with the Fair Political Practices Commission against the Mormon Church for its alleged failure to report non-monetary contributions to the Yes on 8 campaign.

"This is all part of the PR [public relations] offensive being carried out by the Mormon Church," Karger said.

The Utah-based church did not directly donate to the campaign, but its members provided millions of dollars to it.

The Mormon Church is not a party to the January lawsuit.

California Attorney General Jerry Brown is defending the political reform act, arguing in court that disclosure requirements assist the state in detecting efforts to hide the identities of large donors and illegal spending of political funds for personal use.

"Political democracy demands open debate, including prompt disclosure of the identities of campaign donors," Brown said in a prepared statement.

The most recent action in the case came on Jan. 28, when U.S. Eastern District Judge Morrison C. England Jr. turned down the Yes on 8 group's request for a preliminary injunction exempting the group from campaign disclosure laws, saying that he was not persuaded that the threats were serious enough.

The group's subsequent report, made public Feb. 2, included its first disclosure of "major donors" who had given more than $10,000 to the campaign since June 30, 2008.
The Sacramento case is not the only effort by anti-gay rights groups to roll back campaign finance disclosure laws.

Bopp filed suit against the Washington Secretary of State July 28 to prevent the state from releasing the names and addresses of more than 138,500 Washington citizens who signed a petition in favor of Referendum 71.

The ballot referendum asks voters in Washington this November whether they want to expand domestic partnership rights and obligations in the state's originally limited domestic partnership legislation.

Washington Governor Christine Gregoire signed off on an expansion of rights for domestic partners in May, but opponents of that move rounded up 137,689 signatures to have the issue brought to voters this year.

In an enormous win for the group, a federal district judge ruled on Thursday that Washington officials were not allowed to reveal the names of those who signed the petition.

matthew_pordum@dailyjournal.com

From Blogger Chino Blanco

2009-09-13T10:11:00.000-07:00

The video speaks for itself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubZQ5TgFRac

My very first post on the Prop 8 issue was back on June 27th of last year: It was an invitation to Mormons to show up and walk out when the Prop 8 call-to-arms from LDS church authorities began to be read.

It is so gratifying to finally watch a faithful Mormon taking such a stand at church. Please help post this video far and wide. This is what courage looks like.Cheers! Jason--

www.ChinoBlanco.com

News About Californians Against Hate 'Round the World

2009-09-12T00:02:00.000-07:00

CAH News Coverage #25

Washington Post

Associated Press – Maine Ethics Investigation

San Diego Union-Tribune – Manchester Divorce

San Diego Union-Tribune – Kiss-In

Salt Lake Tribune -- Maine

Kennebec Journal - Investigation

Towleroad

Huffington Post

Edge - Boston

Strollerby

Latter-Day Chino

Death and Taxes

Lavender Newswire

Cyclizen – Politics on Wheels

Gay Agenda

2015Place.com

Conservative Babylon

Susan’s Soapbox

Pam’s House Blend

Mike Tidmus

On Top Magazine

2015Place.com – Stand for Marriage PAC

Dr. Feed

Democrat Underground

GLT – Kiss-in

Silobreaker

Southern Voice

Washington Blade

On Top Magazine - Iowa

America Blog

Mormon Times

Edge Boston

Maine Public Broadcasting Network

WBZ TV -- CBS

Mike Tidmus

Boston Globe

Gay Marriage Watch

Seacoastonline.com

Gayapolis

On Top Magazine – Maine

Democratic Underground

2015 Place

Queerty

Gayapolis

Lavender News Wire

Pink Banana

Americablog

Pink Banana #2

Bilgrimage Mike Tidmus – Brian Brown

Justin McLauchlan

Edge – Iowa and Maine

The Coastal Packet

Mike Tidmus – NOM 990

The Advocate – Maine Complaint

Towleroad

Queerty

The Advocate – Manchester Boycott

Pam’s House Blend – Maine

This is America with Jon Elliott -- San Diego

Bay Windows Media

Box Tuttle Bulletin

Diana’s Little Conner

Media Matters

Q Notes

The NLGJA Blog

Town Hall – by Maggie Gallagher

Lavender Newswire

People Chronicle

Queerty

Joe My God

Mike Tidmus – Maggie Gallagher

2009-09-11T16:55:00.000-07:00

Equality California Supports Protest of State Bar Annual Meeting at Manchester Hyatt

San Francisco – Today, Equality California (EQCA) joined the Bay Area Lawyers for Individual Freedom (BALIF), bar associations around the state as well as Unite Here Local 30 in protest of the California State Bar Association’s decision to hold its annual meeting at the Manchester Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Diego this weekend. EQCA sent a letter to the State Bar several months ago requesting that they move the conference and has also declined an offer of money from Manchester to call off the boycott.

“One of the primary roles of the State Bar is to provide greater access to the justice system for all people,” said Geoff Kors, Executive Director of EQCA. “How can they in good faith patronize a company whose owner has worked so hard to take away the fundamental rights of one group of people as guaranteed by the California Constitution? If you are a champion of equality, you should not be a guest of Doug Manchester.”

Doug Manchester’s donation of $125,000 made him one of the single largest individual donors to the Proposition 8 campaign, which stripped same-sex couples of the fundamental freedom to marry and resulted in a radical, unprecedented change to the California Constitution.

The coalition protesting the annual meeting questions the State Bar’s ability to uphold its pledge to foster diversity while at the same time supporting Manchester’s hotel. In addition, the Manchester Hyatt has been accused of repeated labor violations. In 2006, housekeepers protested working conditions in the hotel, specifically workload demands that far exceed acceptable industry standards.

Equality California (EQCA) is the largest statewide lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender-rights advocacy organization in California. In the past decade, EQCA has strategically moved California from a state with extremely limited legal protections for LGBT individuals to a state with some of the most comprehensive civil-rights protections in the nation. EQCA has passed over 50 pieces of legislation and continues to advance equality through legislative advocacy, public education and community empowerment.

www.eqca.org
-30-

The Gathering Storm Against NOM

2009-09-09T21:10:00.001-07:00

POOR BRIAN BROWN

It has not been a good week for him and his Mormon front group, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM).

With two more states (Maine and Iowa) considering investigations of his organization for improper reporting of campaign contributions and money laundering, plus the on-going ten month investigation by the California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC Case #08-735), Brian went on the offensive on Friday and sent out the email below to all his supporters and the media.

We are happy to see that Brian has responded to our complaint by trying to stop NOM’s money laundering in Maine. In our August 26, 2009 complaint letter and request for an investigation to the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices, we cited many pieces of evidence to back our money laundering claims by NOM.

In numerous emails after Prop 8, Brian wrote to his supporters instructing them to give their money directly to NOM, so that their names would be kept secret and not included in campaign reports. Brown repeatedly made statements in his emails such as:

“And unlike in California, every dollar you give to NOM’s Northeast Action Plan today is private, with no risk of harassment from gay marriage protestors.”

“Donations to NOM are not tax-deductible and they are NOT public information, either.”

“Your gift is confidential: no public disclosure!”

NOM Stops Money Laundering?

Now that the Maine Ethics Commission will be considering an investigation of NOM on October 1st, poor Brian had to change his money pitch. Now he says in the 3rd paragraph of his email of Friday, September 4th:

“Money is going to be critical to getting the message out; the campaign needs to make ad buys this week, so if you can possibly spare just $10 or $100 this week, do not give it to me -- go to StandforMarriageMaine.com and fight back!”

Better late than never, Brian.

Your supporters must identify themselves when they contribute $50 or more to Stand for Marriage Maine. They cannot launder it through your NOM. That is what we suspect happened with the $250,000 that NOM contributed to Stand for Marriage Maine several weeks ago.

Whoops, the Money Still Goes to NOM!

However, there is one problem with your new approach. In your email pitch for Stand for Marriage Maine, the donate button directs donors to give money to NOM! We tested it out, and a friend gave the minimum amount and put it on his credit card. Sure enough, the contribution went directly to NOM.

Was this done by mistake? Will you disclose all of the contributors’ names of $50 or more to NOM from September 4, 2009 forward to Maine election officials? We certainly hope so.

And we hope that for the remaining 2 months until Election Day, the National Organization for Marriage and your friends, the Diocese of Portland, the Knights of Columbus of Washington, DC, and James Dobson’s Focus on the Family will fully comply with all Maine election laws. These laws are in place so that voters know who is contributing to their elections before they vote.

FPPC Investigating NOM & Mormon (LDS) Church

I was also particularly interested in your email’s rebuff of another charge that is currently being investigated by the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

You stated that, “The LDS church is not responsible for NOM's formation, and NOM has never received any promise of assistance from Salt Lake. Salt Lake is not responsible for NOM's activities and the continued press suggestions are unfair to the the LDS church leadership and to Mormons in America generally.”

Sounds kind of ambiguous to me. What do you mean by “promise of assistance?”

The Mormon Church does not deny its involvement in the Northeast, but its name does not appear on any of the campaign reports.

NPR reported last week that Frank Schubert, who ran the Prop 8 campaign in California last year for the Mormon Church, has come to Maine to do the same thing.

Schubert said, "The reality is that this is a national campaign. People around the country and internationally are looking at what's going to happen in Maine. Both sides are doing what they can to marshal support wherever they can find support. It will be a pitched battle."

Come on, the Mormon Church is not running and supporting NOM today?

How Do You Spell F-R-O-N-T G-R-O-U-P?

It’s just your boss, Maggie Gallagher and you doing all that you are doing in 11 states across the country to ban same-sex marriage? You two really must be super-human. And you do all of this work in a little one room office in Washington, DC with no support staff?

We assumed that the Mormon Church and its renowned Public Affairs Committee in Salt Lake City were making all of your slick TV and radio commercials, doing your polling, fund-raising, web sites, direct mail, robo-calling, direct connects, research and strategy and hiring and working with lobbyists just as they have done in California and many of the other states that have banned same-sex marriage.

Washington Post Story

Saw the nice profile of you in the Washington Post on August 28th. It described you as a new kinder - gentler anti-gay leader. Well, that sure sparked an uproar. It seems that lots of people who know you and all that you have done to fight marriage equality across this country don’t agree. So the Post’s Ombudsman, Andrew Alexander wrote a story entitled, “Sanity and a Smile and an Outpouring of Rage.” It’s great reading. If you haven’t seen it yet, CLICK HERE.

Transparency

Brian, let’s see your 990 for 2008? And while you’re at it, let’s see your amended 990 for 2007. We requested both 990s in person and by certified mail to your Princeton, New Jersey office way back in early March. Someone signed the U.S. Post Office receipt on March 25th, but you have refused to send us your filings for your first two years in business.

A blogger finally found your amended 990 return for 2007, and it was interesting reading. I particularly like the $166,000 that NOM gave to Common Sense America (CSA). We see that you are its Chairman and that you share your tiny Princeton, NJ office with CSA.

You got $57,000 for 6 months work from NOM in 2007 according the report. That’s pretty good money, plus the $166,000 = $223,000 from June through December 2007? That’s more than President Obama makes in 6 months!

Conclusion

Brian, let’s be honest and abide by both federal and state reporting laws. And please, show us who is giving you all those millions.

Mormons Booted Out of Guyana & Maine?

2009-09-07T20:58:00.000-07:00

A group of forty Mormon missionaries have been expelled from the South American Republic of Guyana:

GEORGETOWN, Guyana - Authorities in Guyana grew "uncomfortable" with the presence of Mormon missionaries who have been ordered to leave the South American country, a governing party leader said Thursday.

About 40 missionaries were briefly detained Wednesday and told to leave within a month as authorities said their travel documents were out of date.

+++

"While we tolerate all religions, it appears that some officials had become uncomfortable with them around," said [Donald] Ramotar, the [ruling] party's general secretary.

Ramotar declined to elaborate. But some government officials and party members said privately that leaders felt the Mormons were too close to opposition figures and also were wary of the church's independent charity work in the interior.

The government of the South American nation is reportedly “uneasy” about “perceived links” between the Mormon missionaries and the country’s opposition party.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32681635/ns/world_news-world_faith/

The Guyanese expulsion gives the impression that the Mormons are not limiting their political involvement to domestic state-level campaigns against same-sex marriage.

Frank Schubert, who helped the Mormons — and others — pass Prop 8 to eliminate the right of same-sex, California couples to marry last year, is now running the campaign against marriage equality in the State of Maine. Schubert told National Public Radio the Mormon Church will not be involved in the campaign to eliminate marriage equality in Maine.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112513826

Responding to Schubert’s announcement, Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate, said, “It was interested to see that Frank Schubert who bragged about all the Mormons did to pass Prop 8 in California now doesn’t want all their money and help in Maine. I wonder if that is really true?”

Recent statements, by a spokesperson for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in a Washington Post article imply the Maine campaign might still be an issue in which the church has an active interest:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/28/AR2009052803573.html

A spokeswoman in Salt Lake City declined to say whether the church is involved in debates going on in states such as New Jersey and New York, except to say that leaders remain intent on preserving the “divine institution” of marriage between man and woman. The faith holds that traditional marriage “transcends this world” and is necessary for “the fullness of joy in the next life.”

According to Karger, “It sounds like the Mormon Church is still involved in Maine to me.”

2009-09-01T15:14:00.000-07:00

Maine Ethics Commission Hits Hard on Opponents of Same-Sex Marriage

AUGUSTA, MAINE -- Jonathan Wayne, Executive Director of State of Maine Commission of Governmental Ethics and Elections Practices, sent a strongly worded four page letter to Stand for Marriage Maine PAC (SFMMP) and the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), seeking more information on the charges of "money laundering" against them in their campaign to repeal Maine's same-sex marriage law.

The letter sent to Joseph Keaney, Stand for Marriage Maine PAC's Treasurer and Brian Brown, NOM's Executive Director, called upon both organizations to respond in writing by September 17, 2009 "...concerning whether the Commission should conduct an investigation."

Click on the line below to view complete letter from Mr. Wayne and other documents pertaining to the charge of money laundering:

Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices

In his letter, Mr. Wayne sites section 1004-A(3), the provision of the Maine Election Law, which states; "It is illegal for a PAC to knowingly accept a contribution made by one person in the name of another person."

"That is exactly what we feel happened in the very first campaign report filed by SFMMP on July 15, 2009," said Fred Karger, who filed the formal complaint and request for investigation with the Commission last week. "The four organizational donors (National Organization for Marriage ($160,000), Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland ($100,000), Knights of Columbus -- Washington, DC ($50,000) and James Dobson's Focus on the Family ($31,000), gave 99.999% of the money raised to Stand for Marriage Maine PAC. They circumvented Maine’s campaign reporting law to avoid disclosure of the true contributors."

The Ethics Commission will consider the request for an investigation filed by Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate at its meeting on Thursday, October 1, 2009 at 9:00 am in Augusta. The Commissioners will decide at that meeting whether to conduct an investigation regarding the compliance issues brought up in Karger's complaint letter.

Californians Against Hate is the new political watchdog for the LGBT community, and closely monitors all who oppose our civil rights. Individuals and organizations who give millions of dollars to deny LGBT full equality will be held accountable.

Money Laundering Complaint Filed in Maine Gay Marrige Election

2009-08-26T10:03:00.000-07:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 26, 2009 COntact: Fred Karger 619-592-2008

Formal Request for Investigation of Money Laundering Filed in Maine Gay Marriage Election

AUGUSTA, MAINE -- Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate, an LGBT watchdog group, sent a letter detailing alleged election law violations by Stand for Marriage Maine to the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices. The request for an immediate investigation was sent yesterday to the Jonathan Wayne, the Commission's Executive Director and a copy to attorney General Janet Mills.

The nine page complaint (below) and fourteen attachments spell out how the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, Knights of Columbus of Washington, DC and James Dobson's Focus on the Family had contributors give the money to their organizations, and then they in turn gave the money to the Stand for Marriage Maine in order to hide the identity of the donors.

Letters and emails from NOM Executive Director Brian Brown were included where he stated:

“And unlike in California, every dollar you give to NOM’s Northeast Action Plan today is private, with no risk of harassment from gay marriage protestors.”

“Donations to NOM are not tax-deductible and they are NOT public information, either.”

“Your gift is confidential: no public disclosure!

Marc Mutty, Executive Committee member of the Stand for Marriage campaign on leave from the Diocese of Portland admitted in the Sun Journal that, "Political Funds Came From Donor."

"It's money laundering plain and simple," said Karger, who successfully sought a similar investigation with the California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC Case # 08/735) of the Mormon Church for vastly underreporting it's non-monetary contributions to Proposition 8. The FPPC investigation of the Mormon Church is entering its tenth month.

"We feel that we made a very compelling case in our complaint, and are asking the Ethics Commission to consider our request at their next regularly scheduled meeting on September 8, 2009. This blatant disregard for Maine's election law needs to be investigated. There is no way that only 0.001% ($400) of the $393,000 raised by Stand for Marriage Maine came from individuals." "The Church of Jesus Christ of Later-day Saints (Mormon Church) created the National Organization for Marriage specifically to qualify and pass Prop 8 in California. Now they have NOM doing their bidding in Maine, Iowa and all over the Northeast," concluded Karger.

FULL LETTER TEXT BELOW

August 24, 2009

Mr. Jonathan Wayne
Executive Director
State of Maine Commission on Governmental
Ethics and Elections Practices
135 State House Station
Augusta, Maine 04333-0135

Re: Request for Investigation of Stand for Marriage Maine

Dear Mr. Wayne:

I received your letter of August 14, 2009 in response to my letter of August 13, 2009.

You asked me to provide more detailed information on why I believe the four funders of Stand for Marriage Maine are merely conduits for those wishing to hide their contributions.

These entities are laundering money to evade the disclosure of the actual contributors to Stand for Marriage Maine.

By way of background, I have been a political consultant and corporate public relations executive for more than 30 years. I am very familiar with political campaigns, campaign finance and reporting. I have managed or had a major role in dozens of local, state and national campaigns throughout the United States.

In reviewing the Stand for Marriage Maine first quarterly filing of July 15, 2009, I noted that only 0.001% ($400.00) of the $343,689.50 raised came from individuals. The balance of $343,289.50 came from religious organizations and Focus on the Family.

By way of comparison, last year, the Protect Marriage, Yes on Proposition 8 campaign in California disclosed more than 60,000 individual contributors of $100 and above. Thousands more contributed under that amount to repeal same-sex marriage in that state.

During the qualification period in California, 1,492 individuals contributed at least $100 to put Prop 8 on the ballot. Granted, California is a much larger state, and the qualification period was longer. But even taking that into account, only four individual contributors to Maine’s effort to stop same-sex marriage seems highly unusual.

Led by the National Organization for Marriage, a federal law suit was filed in early January of this year against the California Attorney General, Secretary of State and all five member of the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC).to try to remove donor names from the Secretary of State’s web site. The lawsuit asked the court to relieve them and "all similarly situated persons" from having to meet the state's campaign disclosure requirements for donors.

The judge refused their request. What they wanted to do in California is precisely what they are now doing in Maine- hiding the identities of contributors to Stand for Marriage Maine.

The four organizational donors that gave to Stand for Marriage Maine, with the possible exception of Focus on the Family, circumvented Maine’s campaign reporting law to avoid disclosure of the true contributors.

National Organization for Marriage (NOM)
$160,000 to Stand for Marriage Maine

I have tracked this two year old organization practically from the day it was formed in May 2007. It was created to qualify Proposition 8 for the ballot in California. It raised and spent over $2 million to do so.

In California, it appears that NOM reported all of its contributors. NOM merely acted as a pass through organization. It raised big money to qualify Prop 8, and then, either paid the professional signature gathering firm directly, or gave the money it raised to Protect Marriage (another California Yes on 8 committee).

NOM was very successful in its fund-raising. It received 141 contributions during the Prop 8 qualification period between January 1 and May 31, 2008. It raised well over $1 million during those five months. The average contribution was $7,607. In Maine, the average contribution to Stand for Marriage Maine was $34,368.00 from a total of ten donors.

As the largest donor to Stand for Marriage Maine, with a seat (Brian Brown) on its five member Executive Committee, NOM is, without doubt, likely going back to its past major contributors. Likely donors include Terry Caster, who gave $293,000 to NOM, and $400,000 to Protect Marriage, John Templeton of Philadelphia, who gave $550,000 to NOM and $550,000 to Protect Marriage. The Knights of Columbus even gave NOM $250,000 in early money on February 4, 2008. It was the largest contributor to Prop 8, giving a total of $1,425,000. Or conceivably NOM’s money is coming directly from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church).

Mormon Church Created NOM

We have closely tracked the money that was raised to pass Proposition 8 in California last year. Californians Against Hate was the first to uncover the vast involvement by the Mormon Church. After much research, we discovered that Mormon Church members gave approximately 75% of the $40 million that was raised to pass Prop 8.

By virtue of their significant financial investment in Prop 8, the Mormon Church took over every aspect of the campaign. It produced and used Church members in all of the television commercials, did all of the direct mail, and organized precinct walking every Saturday from August 16th though Election Day. They ran a speakers bureau, phone banks, web sites and brought in thousands of Church members for the final “surge to victory,” the weekend before the election. We now know that all of this activity was directed from Salt Lake City, with several high ranking Church leaders traveling regularly to California.

On November 13, 2008, just nine days after the election, we filled a complaint with the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC), your counterpart in California. Our complaint alleged that the Mormon Church had spent far more than the $2,200 it reported in non-monetary contributions.

We submitted evidence supporting our claim that the Mormon Church ran out-of-state phone banks, produced 27 slick commercials (that ranged from 30 seconds to 8 minutes long) and put them up on the elaborate web site the church created for all to see on PreservingMarriage.org. We also asked the Commission to investigate costs incurred by the Mormon Church to bus people from Utah to California to engage in precinct walking, for direct mail and numerous other activities.

The FPPC announced that it had launched an unprecedented investigation into the Mormon Church (Case # 08/735) as a result of our complaint. On January 30, 2009, the Mormon Church filed a report (long past the date when it was due) showing an additional $190,000 in non-monetary contributions. When we filed our complaint with the FPPC immediately following the election, the Church attacked me and stated that it had spent “zero dollars on Prop 8.”

In February of this year, we received hundreds of purportedly “secret” Mormon documents showing exactly how involved the Mormon Church has been throughout the country in fighting same-sex marriage. The documents reveal how the Church established “front groups” in states to wage the electoral battles, and shield the Church from negative publicity.

After reviewing all the documents, we filed a supplemental complaint with the FPPC on March 19, 2009. We alleged that the Mormon Church established the National Organization for Marriage in May 2007 for the express purpose of qualifying Proposition 8 for the California ballot. This was done in conjunction with leading Catholic organizations such as the Knights of Columbus, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops as well as James Dobson’s Focus on the Family.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been the leading voice against gay marriage in this country since 1988. This was done at the request of, and under the direction of then Church President, Gordon B. Hinckley. The Mormon Church appears to have played some role in all 30 state elections where gay marriage has been banned in this country. Now, Maine is the Church’s latest target in their mission to stop same sex-marriage.

The Mormon Church does not deny its involvement in the Northeast. When asked in a May 29, 2009 Washington Post story about its activities in the Northeast, a Church spokeswoman declined comment, but said that Church leaders remain intent on preserving the “divine institution” of marriage between a man and a woman. “The faith holds that traditional marriage transcends this world and is necessary for the fullness of joy in the next life."

On our web site Mormongate.com, we describe the formation of NOM by the President and the 12 Apostles of the Mormon Church.

In reviewing official Mormon documents, one can see exactly how the Church operated in Hawaii to skirt Hawaii’s election laws. The Church funneled money through Hawaii’s Future Today, which the Church created to fund and manage that state’s campaign to ban same-sex marriage. In Hawaii as in California, the Mormon Church worked hand in hand with the Catholic Church.

The Church’s pattern of establishing front groups, demonstrates how the Church established NOM. The purpose of the organization is to shield the Church’s active involvement in paying for and running the campaigns. By qualifying Maine’s referendum for the November 2009 ballot, the Church is participating in its 31st state campaign.

In press releases and direct mail, NOM has attempted to portray itself as the “victim”. Attached to this letter is a sampling of emails and letters from NOM Executive Director Brian Brown.
Mr. Brown makes statements like, “And unlike in California, every dollar you give to NOM’s Northeast Action Plan today is private, with no risk of harassment from gay marriage protestors.” Or “Donations to NOM are not tax-deductible and they are NOT public information, either.” Or “Your gift is confidential: no public disclosure!

Clearly, NOM is telling its donors to contribute to NOM and avoid disclosure. In doing so, NOM is clearly violating Maine’s law.

NOM Active Around the Country

The National Organization for Marriage has become the most visible leader in opposing same-sex marriage throughout the United Sates. This year, it has surfaced to run campaigns against same-sex marriage in New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, Iowa and Washington, DC.

Last week, NOM filed an independent expenditure report, signed by Brian Brown, with the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board, that it spent $86,000 to buy television and radio ads supporting Iowa anti-gay marriage candidate Stephen Burgmeier.

Several months ago, NOM admitted to having spent more than $6 million in states where same-sex marriage was before state legislatures. NOM aired slick television and radio commercials, produced millions of pieces of direct mail, conducted robo-calls, direct connects, and hired lobbyists, among other activities NOM produced and spent $1.5 million to air the infamous “Gathering Storm” television commercial in the Northeast. Incidentally, the commercial must have been made by the Mormon Church, because 10 of the 13 actors in that commercial have been positively identified as Mormon Church members. See Chino Blanco’s findings: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/7/14/753343/-Knock,-Knock,-Anybody-NOM-Anybody-Mormon

Finally, the National Organization for Marriage has violated federal reporting laws. It has steadfastly refused to release its IRS Form 990s despite repeated requests from several organizations, including ours and the news media. National Organization for Marriage, Inc. was formed in 2007 as a nonprofit corporation, exempt from taxation under section 501(c)4 of the Internal Revenue Code . In 2008, National Organization for Marriage Educational Fund, was formed as a nonprofit corporation exempt from taxation under section 501(c)3 of the Internal Revenue Code.

We have visited NOM’s offices and sent certified letters requesting copies of what are supposed to be publicly available organizational reports. Yet, NOM refuses to release any of its federal financial documents, in violation of federal law.

Over its two year existence, Brian Brown and NOM president Maggie Gallagher have been the focus of the organization. These two super-humans are keeping very busy and they have been very successful. They must, however, abide by federal and state laws.

Diocese of Portland

$100,000 to Stand for Marriage Maine

The other leading financial supporter of Stand for Marriage Maine is the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland. While not as familiar with the Diocese, I have reviewed their finances though public documents, Diocesan financial reports and newspaper accounts. The Diocese appears to have substantial revenue, but it also has very high expenses. It reported losing $7.5 million in 2008 from the “deteriorating financial market conditions.” Its savings account appeared to contain only $10,812 in its 2008 report.

Recently, the Trinity Catholic School laid off employees, and the Diocese plans to close two Catholic parishes in Lewiston, both due to declining revenue. Just today, the Diocese announced that they were closing three more churches because of tight finances.

Over the past several years, the Diocese has paid out millions of dollars to settle priest abuse claims.

In each annual report, there is a reference to the priest abuse payouts in their “Message from the Finance Officer.” It’s entitled “Cost for Sexual Abuse.” It varies over the past four years that records are available. In 2005, it was reported as $625,000; in 2006 it was $624,000; in 2007 it was listed as $832,000; and in 2008, it was reported as $348,000.

Newspaper accounts report that the Portland Diocese has paid out $2.6 million to 86 victims from 1976 to 2002. Recently, $4.4 million was awarded to Steven Boyden by Justice Joseph Jabar in Kennebec County Superior Court. In January of last year, $4.2 million was awarded to plaintiff William Picher.

The Diocese lists “Insurance Claims Payable” under “Financial Information” in its annual report. This amount is always in the millions, but it is unclear if these charges are related to the “Cost of Sexual Abuse.” In the last two years, those amounts were $2,567,731 (2008) and $3,824,110 (2007).

The Diocese sent out a Bishop’s Appeal to raise funds to pay these claims, perhaps they used a similar approach to raise the money it contributed to Stand for Marriage Maine.

There is no evidence that the Diocese has ever given substantial sums to other ballot question campaigns or PACs in Maine prior to the $100,000 contribution on June 6th. Most organizations such as the Diocese budget all expenses one or two years in advance. The Diocese does not have hundreds of thousands of dollars sitting in their treasury. To make a donation, the Diocese would need to collect donations as part of a separate fund-raising appeal.

In a July 17, 2009 Sun Journal story, Marc Mutty, who is on leave from his work as Communications Director at the Portland Diocese, practically admitted that the Portland Diocese had raised new money for the campaign. He said parishioners should know the donated funds were not taken from the collection plate.

“The money is dedicated revenues that were provided by a donor for causes such as these and money from the collection basket or any of those types of things would never be used,” he said.
Mutty said he only had limited details regarding the origins of the donation.
“It’s my understanding the money was left to the Portland diocese for defending church dogma or policy, that sort of thing. It wasn’t specific to this particular issue. Our application to this issue was our choice, but it fell within the general parameters of the donor’s request,” he said.

This certainly does not correspond to the Diocesan Financial Council Statement of November 2008, which looked to, “…achieving openness and transparency in diocesan financial reporting.”
In Sunday’s Kennebec Journal, Marc Mutty, chairman of Stand for Marriage Maine's executive committee, said, referring to the criticism by Californians Against Hate. "We are frustrated at the fact that it's yet one more distraction."

Knights of Columbus
$50,000 to Stand for Marriage Maine

The Knights of Columbus is chartered as a fraternal benefit society headquartered in New Haven, CT. It is required to provide life insurance to its members. Founded in 1882, it has recently become the “political arm” of the Catholic Church. The Knights has supported constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage across the United States.

The Knights of Columbus is a nonprofit corporation, exempt under section 501(c)8 of the Internal Revenue Code. It is very difficult to evaluate its finances. What is unusual about their $50,000 contribution to Maine is that such a substantial amount would come from Washington, DC. Historically, contributions from the Knights come from either the national headquarters in Connecticut or from the state chapter where the election is taking place.

In last year’s California Prop 8 campaign the national Knights gave $1,400,000 and the California Knights gave $25,000. It would be very interesting to see why the Washington, DC Knights gave $50,000 to Stand for Marriage. Because of its size and minimal reporting requirements, the Washington, DC chapter would be a likely recipient of laundered funds. Then they could then turn around and give it to a campaign.

The Knights, as is the case with religious organizations has suffered from severe losses in its investments and has seen its membership decline. Massive contributions to various state anti same-sex marriage campaigns derived from existing treasury funds are inconceivable.

Focus on the Family
$31,000 to Stand for Marriage Maine

James Dobson’s Focus on the Family has been experiencing tough times lately, too. While still a huge power among the religious right in this county, it is not the force it once was. Dr. Dobson has been eclipsed by Rick Warren, Pastor of Saddleback Church and other younger leaders. Last year Focus let go 202 employees. It received much criticism for the $620,000 that it gave to qualify and fund Prop 8, as it was firing 20% of its staff.

Focus still reports $141 million in revenue for 2007. It had a net loss of $3 million that year, however. It has huge expenses to support its gigantic complex in Colorado Springs as well as
Dr. Dobson’s extravagant lifestyle.

It would be easy for James Dobson to reach out to some of his wealthy Board members and benefactors and ask them to give funds to Stand for Marriage Maine through Focus on the Family. Michigan’s Elsa Prince, who is on the Board of Focus, gave $450,000 to pass Prop 8 last year. Dr. Dobson has access to many donors who could donate directly rather than use money from the dwindling treasury.

Conclusion

Without question, there are irregularities in the financial disclosures of Stand for Marriage Maine that would warrant an immediate investigation into their funding sources. Unpaid obligations of $145,000 remain, as do many unanswered questions.

Another campaign finance report is not due until October 13, 2009. By this late date, just three weeks before this crucial election, it will be too late to see if this pattern of attempting to hide the true identity of the contributors to Stand for Marriage Maine will continue.

We respectfully request that our allegations be heard at your next regularly scheduled Commission meeting on Tuesday, September 8, 2009.

That would allow the Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices time to ensure an election that will enable Maine’s voters to learn the actual sources of funds contributed to Stand for Marriage Maine.

Thank you very much for your consideration of our request.

Best regards,

Fred Karger
Californians Against Hate
1278 Glenneyre, #20
Laguna Beach, CA 92651
619-592-2008

cc: Attorney General Janet Mills

Attachments: Appendices

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Mormon - NOM Cooperative in Iowa Election

2009-08-25T17:38:00.000-07:00

Des Moines Register

Anti-gay, Mormon-funded group spreading lies and fear in Iowa, group says

By Jason Clayworth • jclayworth@dmreg.com • August 24, 2009

One Iowa, the state’s largest civil rights organization for gays and lesbians, is speaking out about an out-of-state Mormon-funded group that’s spent at least $86,080 on a special House race to fight marriage equality for same-sex couples.

The National Organization for Marriage is a New Jersey-based group known for its multi-million investment to pass California’s Proposition 8.

The marriage organization last week filed an independent expenditure statement indicating it has spent $86,080 on radio and television ads that benefit Stephen Burgmeier, the Republican candidate for House District 90 in a Sept. 1 special election in southern Iowa.

Burgmeier is opposed to same sex marriage. His Democratic opponent, Curt Hanson, says he believes Iowans should be able to vote on a constitutional amendment to prohibit same sex marriages.

One Iowa executive director Carolyn Jenison issued a statement today noting the marriage organization’s efforts in Iowa.

“The Mormon Church and NOM have invested millions of dollars to spread lies and fear in California and now they have their sights set on rural Iowa,” Jenison said. “This raises the question: Has Burgmeier been bought and paid for by out of state religious extremists? If not, he should reject this divisive ad.”

She continued:

“NOM has a history of funneling money from the Mormon Church into anti-gay measures, while refusing to disclose the source of their funds. NOM should release the list of those contributing to the ads airing in Iowa.”

Sen. Pam Jochum, D-Dubuque, was also quoted in One Iowa’s press release:
“This is about out-of-state extremists attempting to buy an Iowa election, plain and simple,” Jochum said.

One Iowa has countered the ads with its own. See it here.

Calls made Monday and Tuesday to NOM, including one to its executive director Brian Brown, were not immediately returned.

Maine Coverage + 8 The Mormon Proposition

2009-08-18T00:39:00.000-07:00

Three Excellent Stories: Maine -- Investigation of NOM and Other Groups, AP Story - Mormon Church in Hot Water & Mike Tidmus on San Diego Kiss-In at Manchester Grand Hyatt?

Kennebec Journal Story by Matt Wickenheiser

BY MATT WICKENHEISER
Maine Sunday Telegram

Maine's same-sex marriage debate increasingly seems to be a coast-to-coast affair.
Earlier this summer, the campaign seeking to repeal Maine's new same-sex marriage law said it had retained Schubert Flint Public Affairs, the high-power firm that ran the successful effort to ban gay marriage in California.

Now it appears Sacramento, Calif.-based Schubert Flint may face some familiar foes.
This past week, Equality California, the San Francisco-based group that fought to maintain gay marriage in that state, said it planned to support similar efforts in Maine. During a conference call in which Equality California officials talked about trying to reinstate gay marriage there in 2010, they also pushed support for their Maine counterparts.

The attention, and several press releases from both supporters and opponents of gay marriage, demonstrate a growing focus on the Maine debate and the importance it will have on a national level this year.

Both sides - supporters and opponents of gay marriage in Maine -- have attracted dollars and expertise "from away."

"Equality is our mission, and we support our brothers and sisters throughout the country," Equality California Executive Director Geoff Kors said in a Friday interview. "Each time there are more people who are able to have the dignity and respect and rights that come with marriage, the better it is for everyone, and the better it is to restore marriage rights in California."

Kors said his group would contribute $25,000 to the "No on 1" campaign in Maine. Kors also said the group would encourage supporters to make matching contributions and volunteer time to help the campaign in Maine. And Equality California is evaluating what sort of staff assistance it could send to the East Coast, Kors said.

Also on Friday, the Washington Blade, a gay and lesbian publication, reported that the Washington, D.C.-based Human Rights Campaign had donated $50,000 to No on 1 this past week, raising the total contribution from that group to $75,000.

The group is committed to donating at least another $50,000 to Maine, and it has field staffers working in the state, the Blade reported.

The group spearheading the people's veto initiative, Stand for Marriage Maine, put out a release this past week, criticizing the California-based efforts.

"Stand for Marriage Maine's opposition has constructed a glass house, claiming their campaign is being orchestrated by Mainers, not special interest groups from away," the group said. "The Equality California announcement would seem to roll a boulder right through that glass house."
Mark Sullivan, spokesman for No on 1, said the campaign "welcomes the support we're getting from defenders of marriage equality." Sullivan noted that Stand for Marriage Maine had already received more than $200,000 from out-of-state groups, according to campaign finance reports filed last month.

Sullivan said Maine organizers had not yet spoken to their California counterparts about how efforts could match up.

"We'll be looking forward to meeting with them," said Sullivan.

The money that Stand for Marriage Maine has received from national groups, particularly the National Organization for Marriage, was the subject of yet another critical e-mail - this one from a California group supporting same-sex marriage.

On Thursday, Californians Against Hate, based in San Diego, put out a media statement complaining that while Stand for Marriage Maine had received large sums of money from those groups, it wasn't apparent who had donated money to those groups in the first place.
"We certainly don't take much of it very seriously," Marc Mutty, chairman of Stand for Marriage Maine's executive committee, said, referring to the criticism by Californians Against Hate. "We are frustrated at the fact that it's yet one more distraction."

Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate, sent a letter to the Maine Ethics Commission and the Attorney General's Office, raising allegations of money laundering.

Jonathan Wayne, executive director of the commission, said his staff is interpreting the letter as a request for an investigation. They have forwarded the letter to the Stand for Marriage political action committee, he said. The staff needs to ask Karger for more specific information and charges, said Wayne.

Campaign finance laws for candidates are fairly clear, said Wayne. Any money earmarked for a candidate from one party through an intermediary must be identified back to the source, he said. The laws for PAC reporting aren't as clear, said Wayne.

Kate Simmons, spokeswoman for the Attorney General's Office, said the office would aid the Ethics Commission in its work.

"We appreciate Wayne's responsibilities to the people of Maine, and we will cooperate with them to the extent we can," said Mutty. "We see all these accusations launched against us as very non-specific, just an attempt to further blur the issues." Mike Tidmus Blog -- Coverage of San Diego Kiss-In
Fred Karger in San Diego Saturday asking support for the Manchester Hotels Global Boycott and Mega Donor Terry Caster's A-1 Self Storage Boycott. Caster gave $693,000 to Pass Proposition 8!!!

AP Story by Jennifer Dobner

Mormon church becomes target in renewed gay marriage fight

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — The Mormon church's vigorous, well-heeled support for Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in California last year, has turned the Utah-based faith into a lightning rod for gay rights activism, including a nationwide "kiss-in" Saturday.

The event comes after gay couples here and in San Antonio and El Paso, Texas, were arrested, cited for trespassing or harassed by police for publicly kissing. In Utah, the July 9 trespassing incident occurred after a couple were observed by security guards on a downtown park-like plaza owned by the 13 million-member Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

FAITH & REASON: Kisses 'speak' for gays confronting church policies

The court case was dismissed, but the kiss sparked a community backlash and criticism of the church.

"I don't think that kiss would have turned out to be the kiss heard round the world if it were not for Proposition 8," said Ash Johnsdottir, organizer of the Salt Lake City Kiss-In.

Atali Staffler, a Brigham Young University graduate student from Geneva, Switzerland, said she joined the 200 or so people who filled a downtown amphitheater for the event because she has watched her gay father and many gay friends struggle to find their place.
The 31-year-old, who was raised Mormon but is not active in the church, said the church shouldn't be involved in Prop. 8.

"I encourage them to promote the values they believe in and to defend their religious principles in advertisements, but civil rights have nothing to do with religious principles," she said.
Twenty-two people, many of them strangers to one another, gathered under the scorching sun on Washington's National Mall to participate in the national smooch. They were gay and straight, couples and singles of all ages, with placards that read "Equal Opportunity Kisser" and "A Kiss is a Not a Crime."

"This is America. A kiss on the cheek is OK," said Ian Thomas, 26, of Leesburg, Va., who organized the Washington Kiss-In. "It's got to be OK. If not, we're in serious trouble."
About 50 people, mostly gay and lesbian couples, gathered at Piedmont Park in downtown Atlanta and kissed for about five minutes.

"You think that America is evolving into a gay-friendly nation," said Randal Smith, 42, "but what happened in Texas and Utah show us it's still a long way off."

National organizers say Saturday's broadly held gay rights demonstrations were not aimed specifically at the Mormon church. But observers say the church's heavy-handed intervention into California politics will linger and has left the faith's image tarnished.

"What I hear from my community and from straight progressive individuals is that they now see the church as a force for evil and as an enemy of fairness and equality," said Kate Kendell, executive director of the San Francisco-based National Center for Lesbian Rights. Kendell grew up Mormon in Utah. "To have the church's very deep and noble history telescoped down into this very nasty little image is as painful for me as for any faithful Mormon."

Troy Williams, who is gay and grew up Mormon, said ending the tension between gays and the church requires mutual acceptance and understanding.

"For both sides to peaceably coexist, we're all going to have to engage in some very deep soul searching," said Williams, a Salt Lake City-area activist and host of a liberal radio talk show.
Church insiders say Prop. 8 has bred dissent among members and left families divided. Some members have quit or stopped attending services, while others have appealed to leadership to stay out of the same-sex marriage fight.

But church spokeswoman Kim Farah said Friday that Mormon support for traditional marriage has nothing to do with public relations.

"It's too easy for those whose agenda is to change societal standards to claim there are great difficulties inside the Church because of its decision to support traditional marriage," Kim Farah said. "In reality the Church has received enormous support for its defense of marriage."
Mormonism teaches that homosexual sex is considered a sin, but gays are welcome in church and can maintain church callings and membership if they remain celibate.

The church has actively fought marriage equality legislation across the U.S. since the early 1990s and joined other faiths in asking Congress for a marriage amendment to the Constitution in 2006.

Last year at the urging of church leaders, Mormons donated tens of millions of dollars to the "Yes on 8" campaign and were among the most vigorous volunteers. The institutional church gave nearly $190,000 to the campaign — contributions now being investigated by California's Fair Political Practices Commission.

After the vote, many gay rights advocates turned their anger toward the church in protests and marches outside temples that singled out Mormons as the key culprits in restricting the rights of gay couples.

That constituted a setback for the faith, argued Jan Shipps, a professor of religious history and a Mormon expert from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis.

Mormonism, Shipps said, has struggled with its image since its western New York founding in 1830 for a host of reasons, including polygamy.

Leading up to Salt Lake City's 2002 Olympic Winter Games, the faith worked hard to craft a modern, mainstream image, touting its unique American history, culture and worldwide humanitarian work to thousands of reporters.

"This really undercut the Mormon image that had been so carefully nurtured during the Olympics," Shipps said.

Church representatives don't discuss public relations strategies or challenges publicly, but at a semiannual conference in April, church President Thomas S. Monson seemed to be clearly feeling a post-Prop. 8 sting.

In an era of "shifting moral footings," Monson said, "those who attempt to safeguard those footings are often ridiculed, picketed and persecuted."

That argument doesn't wash for Linda Stay, whose ancestors were early Mormon converts. Stay said she was doubly transformed by Prop. 8. She and her husband, Steve, finally quit the church — along with 18 other family members and a few close friends — and became gay right activists.
The St. George woman's family, which includes two gay children, will play a central role in a documentary film, "8: The Mormon Proposition" currently in production. Stay's son, Tyler Barrick, married his boyfriend in San Francisco on June 17, 2008, the first day gay marriage was legal in California.

Miami-area filmmaker Reed Cowan said the Stays' story is a painful representative of many Latter-day Saint families, including his own, that needed to be told.

"It used to be that I could defend my church and my heritage, but what they did here, they crossed the line and they made it very hard to defend their actions," said Cowan, whose family has cut him off since he began work on the film.

With the gay rights fight far from over, some believe Prop. 8 could continue to frustrate the church's image for years to come, much like polygamy — the church's own one-time alternative form of marriage — and a policy on keeping black men out of the priesthood, issues that have lingered years after the practices were abandoned.

"The church is certainly going to survive and thrive, there's no question about that," said the National Center for Lesbian Rights' Kendell, who is raising three kids in California with her partner of 16 years. "The issue is, what will be its image in the average American mindset."
To see the church characterized, because of its own actions, as one in a group of anti-gay religions and as a religion that forces members to choose faith over family is "a tragedy of generational proportion," she said. "And it seems to me, that it was entirely unnecessary."
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

This story appeared in publications across the US including: USA Today, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, MSNBC and Forbes Magazine

Money Laundering by NOM in Maine Election?

2009-08-13T08:43:00.001-07:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 13, 2009

Contact: Fred Karger 619-592-2008

Letter Sent to Maine Election Officials
Warning of Money Laundering by
National Organization for Marriage (NOM) & Others

LOS ANGELES, CA / AUGUSTA, ME – Californians Against Hate founder Fred Karger sent a letter today warning top Maine election officials of possible money laundering by opponents of same-sex marriage.

The organization trying to overturn Maine’s same-sex marriage law, Stand for Marriage PAC recently turned in 100,000 signatures to place the question on the November ballot. These gay marriage foes hope to repeal LD 1020 -- the law passed by the Legislature and signed by the Governor allowing same-sex marriage in Maine.

Of the $343,689.50 raised to pay the Brighton, Michigan based National Petition Management, Inc. to collect the signatures, only $400, or a mere .001 of that total came from individuals. The remaining $343,289.50 was given by various religious organizations and James Dobson’s Focus on the Family. The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) gave nearly half of that total, $160,000. The remainder came from Catholic organizations ($150,000) and James Dobson’s Focus on the Family ($31,000).“It sure looks like they are trying to hide the donors in their latest effort to strip away marriage equality,” said Fred Karger. “ There is no way these organizations like NOM and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland had all this money sitting in their treasuries (except for possibly Focus on the Family). They went out and raised it expressly for this campaign. It’s very expensive to hire these signature gathering firms to collect 100,000 signatures in a short period of time.”

Let the Laundering Begin

NOM is a Mormon Front Group

There is an ongoing investigation into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) by the California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC Case #08/735). The FPPC is looking into both the Church’s lack of reporting its non-monetary contributions to Prop 8, and also whether NOM was, in fact, established as a front group by the Salt Lake City based Mormon Church. The Mormon Church has used this tactic in several states beginning in Hawaii in 1996.

Warning Maine Officials

In a letter to Jonathan Wayne, Executive Director of the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Elections Practices (letter copy below), Karger warned of suspected money laundering by the major donors to Stand for Marriage PAC.

It begs the question; are they directing all contributions to their existing organizations, who in turn then give the money to Stand for Marriage PAC?,” Karger asked in today’s letter. “We are very familiar with how this coalition operates, and we want to warn the political leadership and the residents of Maine to beware.

The coalition has also hired the highly regarded Schubert, Flint Campaign Management firm of Sacramento, California.

Who are the Victims Here?

These major backers of Stand for Marriage PAC will do their best to play the poor victim. They like to say that their contributors are being targeted simply because they give money to “preserve marriage.” That’s what they did in California after running a very nasty campaign and spending $40 million to take away marriage equality from millions of Californians.

Let’s be clear. They are NOT the victims here. The Mormon Church and its coalition have qualified and passed Constitutional Amendments in 30 states to yank away civil rights from gay and lesbian Americans.

The Mormons began this fight in 1988. They have been destroying lives, intimidating people and demonizing an entire class to solidify their base and raise millions and millions of dollars.

After two decades of assaulting the LGBT Community, we are now fighting back with our talent, our numbers, our friends, our money and our purchasing power. They are not the victims in this equation, and even the best PR by all of their consultants cannot rewrite history.

Our hope is that as young people discover that they are LGB or T, they do not feel any less of a person because Maggie Gallagher (NOM $160,000 to the Maine campaign), Bishop Richard Malone (Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, ME $100,000 to the Maine campaign) Knights of Columbus (Catholic Church’s Political Arm $50,000 to the Maine campaign) or James Dobson (Focus on the Family $31,000 to the Maine campaign) gave so very much money to bully them and take away their rights.

Copy of Letter To Maine Election Officials

August 13, 2009

Mr. Jonathan Wayne
Executive Director
Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and
Elections Practices
135 State House Station
Augusta, Maine 04333

Re: Money Laundering -- Stand for Marriage PAC

Dear Mr. Wayne:

We have reviewed the very first finance report which was recently filed by Stand for Marriage PAC, the group trying to repeal Maine’s same-sex marriage law.

It appears that there are already questionable activities.

Stand for Marriage PAC reported raising $343,689.50 during the period April 1 to July 5, 2009. We found it very suspicious that of that total, only $400 was given by individuals. The balance of $343,289.50 was contributed by various religious organizations and James Dobson’s Focus on the Family. That means that individual contributions to repeal gay marriage in Maine are only .001% of the total raised.

Are the proponents trying to hide the identities of those contributing to their campaign? Are they directing all contributions to existing organizations, who then gave the money to Stand for Marriage PAC? This appears to be the case.

If this is true, would it not be considered money laundering?

We have been very active and have closely tracked all the money that was raised to pass Proposition 8 in California last year. Californians Against Hate was the first to uncover the vast involvement in the election by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church). Our extensive research revealed that the Mormon Church had its members in California and around the country give approximately 75% of the $40 million that was raised to pass Prop 8.

On November 13, 2008, just nine days after the election, we filled a complaint with, the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC), your counterpart in California. Our complaint alleged that the Mormon Church had spent a tremendous amount of money in non-monetary contributions that they never reported, which is required under California election law.

We submitted evidence supporting our claim that the Mormon Church ran out of state phone banks, produced 27 slick commercials (that ranged from 30 seconds to 8 minutes long) and put them on their elaborate web site Preserving Marraige.org for all to see. We also asked the Commission to investigate the Mormon Church for bussing people from Utah to California for precinct walking, sending out extensive direct mail and numerous other activities.

Eight days later, the FPPC announced that they were launching an unprecedented investigation into the Mormon Church (Case # 08/735) as a result of our complaint.

On March 19, 2009, we filed a supplemental complaint with the FPPC. We received hundreds of secret Mormon documents that show exactly how involved the Mormon Church has been throughout the country in fighting same-sex marriage. The documents reveal how the Church established front groups to wage their battles, and shield the Church from any negative publicity

We believe that the Mormon Church established the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) in May of 2007 for the express purpose of qualifying Proposition 8 for the California ballot. This was done in conjunction with leading Catholic organizations such as the Knights of Columbus, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and James Dobson’s Focus on the Family.

It is no coincidence that these are the exact same groups that are funding and leading the effort to repeal Maine’s recently passed same-sex marriage law.

We believe that only Focus on the Family had money in its treasury. The other groups raised money expressly for the campaign to hire the professional signature gathering firm to qualify the referendum.

They are trying to hide the true identities of those contributing to the campaign.

It certainly sounds like money laundering to us. We hope that your office will investigate the genuine sources of the funds contributed to Stand for Marriage PAC.

The Mormon Church appears to be using the National Organization for Marriage to fight same-sex marriage all over the Northeast.

They admitted as much in a Washington Post story on May 29, 2009. A spokeswoman in Salt Lake City declined to say whether the church is involved in debates going on in the Northeast except to say, “…that leaders remain intent on preserving the divine institution of marriage between man and woman. The faith holds that traditional marriage transcends this world and is necessary for the fullness of joy in the next life."

It sure sounds like the Mormon Church is involved to us.

On our web site Mormongate.com, we describe the formation of NOM. This was done at the very highest level of the Mormon Church – the President and the 12 Apostles.

You can see exactly how they operated in Hawaii in order to skirt state election laws there. They funneled money through Hawaii’s Future Today, which they established to fund that state’s campaign to ban same-sex marriage.

In the near future, we will be releasing other official Mormon documents that explain how this happened in other states.

If we can be of any assistance in your efforts to monitor Stand for Marriage PAC, please to not hesitate to call upon us.

Best regards,

Fred Karger
Founder
Californians Against Hate
www.CaliforniansAgainsthate.com
619-592-2008

cc: Attorney General Janet Mills

News Coverage From Around the World!!!

2009-08-08T14:01:00.000-07:00

CAH – News Coverage #24

New York Daily News

San Diego Union-Tribune

The LoHud Journal News

CBS Channel 8 San Diego

Huffington Post

GLT – Guest Commentary

The Advocate

Towleroad

Average Joel

San Diego Beat

GLT San Diego - Editorial

GLT San Diego – Guest Commentary

Salt Lake Tribune - Letter

Queerty

GLT – June 4th

The Women Rebel

Lavender Liberal

Gaytheist Agenda

Latter-day Chino

Gay Agenda

Queers United

Religion News Service

Lavender Newswire

Sonoma County DFA

Mashget

Instant Pride

Gay Agenda

Same Sex Marriage News

Queerty

A Couple of Things

Get Your News

Mash get

Sonoma County DFA

The Tidbits of My Life

The Gaythesist Agenda

On Top Magazine

San Diego Reader

Live Journal

Bay Area Reporter

Progressive Patriot

ICT Magazine

Huffington Post

Sonoma County DFA

Bilerico Project

Daily Koz

Sex Blog for Women

Road Runner

Lez Get Real

Mike Tidmus

On Top Magazine

HEDGEHOGS

Mike Tidmus

ICT Magazine

NOOSOOP

A Couple Things

Sonoma County DFA

Huffington Post

GLT July 16, 2008

Frontiers

GLT July 23, 2008

Cook & Schmid

San Francisco Bay Times

Metropolitan News-Enterprise

Pink News – United Kingdom

QX – Stockholm, Sweden

Concordia Discors

Global Manchester Hotels Boycott

2009-08-03T16:02:00.000-07:00

LGBT & UNITE HERE Leaders Announce
Global Manchester Hotels Boycott

SAN DIEGO, CA -- Five prominent leaders who have been boycotting San Diego developer and hotel owner Doug Manchester for one full year, held a news conference on Friday to announce plans to take the boycott of the Manchester Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Diego global for Year II of their highly successful boycott.

They unveiled three large posters in English, Spanish and Japanese representing the expansion of the Manchester Hotels Boycott to the world. Pointing to the enormous success of Year I, which by Manchester's own estimates has cost his Hyatt property $7 million alone; the group explained their plans to expand the boycott.

Photo by Mike Tidmus

"We will be asking the public to please not cross the line," stated Boycott organizer Fred Karger, founder of Californians Against Hate, while holding up the yellow caution tape (photo above) representing the theme of Year II. "We want everyone to really think long and hard before going in to Mr. Manchester's hotels. Don't support bigotry and discrimination by spending money at either Manchester Hotel only to have it used against us. Doug Manchester gave a whopping $125,000 early contribution to California's Proposition 8. Prop 8 ended marriage equality for millions of Californians when the voters narrowly passed the Constitutional Amendment last November.

Also speaking at the news conference was longtime LGBT activist and San Diego Gay Pride Grand Marshall, Cleve Jones, who discussed how the organizers were going to reach out to all international tour operators, travel planners and meeting planners. Brigette Browning, President of UNITE HERE Local 30, whose union has been so successful in encouraging over a dozen major conventions to cancel their meetings at the Manchester Hyatt, spoke about all the lost business due to the boycott. She explained that number represents over 100,000 room nights. Rick Jacobs, Founder and Chair of the Courage Campaign, representing over 700,000 members, asked Governor Schwarzenegger to "Fire Doug Manchester" from the board of the prestigious California Travel and Tourism Commission, because the passage of Prop 8 will cost the State of California $1 billion in lost revenue. Also speaking at the news conference was well known San Diego City Commissioner Nicole Murray- Ramirez, who discussed the Human Relations Commission's, which he chairs, unanimous support of the boycott.

Here are the three posters:

http://click.icptrack.com/icp/relay.php?r=-1&msgid=0&act=11111&c=302269&admin=0&destination=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.paypal.com%2Fcgi-bin%2Fwebscr%3Fcmd%3D_s-xclick%26hosted_button_id%3D1084701

It’s The Moment of Truth, Maggie.

2009-07-13T12:43:00.000-07:00

Will You Take a Lie Detector Test, Maggie Gallagher?

NOM President, Maggie Gallagher as she would appear strapped to a lie detector,
if she agrees to take a polygraph test.

We have made arrangements with the highly regarded New York City Polygraph Examiners, which has an office located very close to you in Westchester, for you to take a polygraph test. If you would prefer, they have a mobile polygraph service, and can have a paleographer administer the test right in your home.

Maggie, you claim that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) did not help establish, or give any money to your National Organization for Marriage (NOM), or to any of your other organizations or even to you personally. Let’s find out once and for all, Maggie.

Californians Against Hate will gladly pay for your lie detector test to determine the truth once and for all about whether or not the Mormon Church set up NOM as a front group, just like it has previously set up other front groups to oppose same-sex marriage around the country.

On our web site Mormongate.com, we have documentation that shows just how the Mormon Church established “ Hawaii’s Future Today” as a Mormon front group to fight same-sex marriage in that state. It hid the full extent of its involvement in fighting same-sex marriage in Hawaii until several months ago, when we received secret Mormon documents showing just how the Mormon Church, at the very highest levels, ran and funded that campaign.

As you are well aware, the California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) is in the middle of an investigation of the Mormon Church, including its involvement in setting up your National Organization for Marriage -- FPPC Case # 08/735.

In just two years since NOM was formed, you claim to have spent $6 million in your efforts to deny full equality to gay and lesbian Americans. Where is all that money coming from, Maggie? Who is producing all your slick commercials, paying for your polling, travel, robo calls, direct mail, PR consultants, lobbyists, Executive Director Brian Brown’s and your large salary and for all your other staff?

Why won’t you release your IRS form 990’s for 2007 and 2008 that we have repeatedly requested? This is required by federal law. Maggie, what are you hiding?

NOM funded the qualification of Proposition 8 for the California ballot to the tune of $2 million, and is now spending millions more in a failed effort to stop marriage equality in 6 Northeast states.

Maggie, You Have Lied Before.

Remember Your Bush Administration Scandal?

After 3 years, you finally were forced to tell the truth about the $41,500 you received from the George W. Bush Administration to promote its Marriage Programs and National Fatherhood Initiative. You lied about it for 3 years until the truth finally came out. You claimed that you "forgot about your contract," which ran from January through October 2002. According to USA Today, you were forced to apologize.

Your responsibilities included drafting a magazine article for a Health and Human Services (HHS) official, overseeing the initiative, writing brochures for the program and conducting a briefing for department officials.

Do you remember when CBS Nightly News reported about your scandal? Watch the coverage here: CBS News

In columns, television appearances and interviews with newspapers such as the Washington Post, you defended Bush's proposal for a constitutional amendment barring same-sex marriage. All the while, you were being paid by the Department of Heath and Human Services.
This forced President Bush to order his Cabinet secretaries not to hire columnists to promote administration policy.

Take a Lie Detector Test, Maggie!!!

We have repeatedly asked you to tell the truth about the millions of dollars in funding for your 2 year old National Organization for Marriage. You have refused.

Did the Mormon Church create and fund your National Organization for Marriage? Take the test!

Please Help Us Keep Up the Fight Against NOM & The Mormon Church.
Click on This Link Below to Contribute So That We Can Run More Ads!

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=1084701

2009-07-05T14:55:00.000-07:00

Where's the Money, Maggie?

Maggie Gallagher’s National Organization for Marriage (NOM) Refuses to Turn Over Its Federal Financial Records as Required by Law.

Californians Against Hate began requesting your 990s (IRS non-profit tax filings) over three months ago, Maggie. You have not responded as required by law. We visited your national office in Princeton, N.J. twice to view the Form 990s, and sent our requests there by certified mail.

Someone at that address signed the US Postal Service receipt on April 25, 2009 (see copy below). You then had 30 days to comply with our request, but you still have not sent us your federal tax flings for 2007 and 2008.

We have also been to your “office” in Manassas, VA, and no forms there either, Maggie. It looks to be the home of your Treasurer, Neil Corkery. The Corkerys are apparently traveling around the world, and again, the forms are not available for public inspection as required by federal law.

What are you hiding, Maggie? Tell Us the Truth!

Is it all the involvement by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) in creating and funding the National Organization for Marriage, Inc.? That is exactly what the California Fair Political Practices Commission is investigating (Case # 08/735) right now.

Since you have not complied with public disclosure laws for your 501(c)4 non-profit corporation for NOM, we have taken the liberty of preparing an invoice showing just how much you owe the United States Treasury as of today for refusing to release these documents.

INVOICE
June 24, 2009
TO:
Maggie Gallagher
President
National Organization for Marriage
20 Nassau Street, Suite 242Princeton, NJ 08542

Re: Fine for Nondisclosure of Federal 990 Records

National Organization for Marriage a 501(c) 4 Corporation has failed to file with the Internal Revenue Service and make its federal forms available to the public after repeated requests.

Fine shall be $20.00 per day up to a maximum of $10,000.00 for the period:

March 25 to June 24, 2009

92 days @ $20.00 per day = $1,840.00

Due and Payable to: Internal Revenue Service

$1,840.00
This is not an actual Internal Revenue Service Invoice

As you are probably aware, the IRS fine for noncompliance is $20.00 per day for every day that you do not turn over your records up to a total of $10,000. For the 92 days so far, you owe the United States Treasury $1,840. While that won’t put much of a dent in the national debt, it is what you owe the government so far in fines. Frankly, Maggie, we are tired of waiting, and are exploring other actions to force the release of your filings.

Is NOM Even a Legal Entity?

In another very interesting development, we received a letter from the IRS last week in response to the request that we filed with them on May 6, 2009 for your Form 990s. The IRS said that, “we have no record of any organization by the name (National Organization for Marriage, Inc.) or address ( 20 Nassau Street, Ste. 242, Princeton, N.J 08542). Now, can you explain that?? They do have a record of your Educational Fund, the 501(c)3, but that apparently was just established last year. NOM, Inc. was established in May 2007 to get Prop 8 on the ballot, so there should be 2 annual filings available on NOM, Inc.

Here’s the copy of the IRS letter:

Maggie, why don’t you do the right thing and release your 2007 and 2008 form 990’s? Just what is in there about your funding and expenditures that you don’t want people to see?

A recent Washington Post story had this to say about the Mormon Church’s involvement in the same-sex marriage battles in six Northeastern States.

Mormon officials have tried to stay out of the controversy that followed the California vote, when the church's prominent role in the marriage fight became clear. A spokeswoman in Salt Lake City declined to say whether the church is involved in debates going on in states such as New Jersey and New York, except to say that leaders remain intent on preserving the "divine institution" of marriage between man and woman. The faith holds that traditional marriage "transcends this world" and is necessary for "the fullness of joy in the next life."

Well, Maggie it’s not so divine for you to stonewall your financial records.

That Admission by the Mormon Church
Raises Many More Questions

Who is paying for your multi million dollar TV campaign? Who is funding your $500,000 New York State PAC? Your California PAC? Who is paying for all the direct mail robo-calls and millions of direct connect calls in New York alone? Where did you get the $6 million that you admit to spending as reported this week in your hometown newspaper, The Journal News:
LoHud.com ?

How much are you and your executive director Brian Brown getting paid? Is the Mormon Church paying you directly or through another one of your other organizations like the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy

Is the Mormon Church producing all of your slick new commercials? Your controversial and often maligned A Gathering Storm commercial that was made using actors pretending to be real people was chock full of Mormon actors, mostly from Arizona. Most of the bad actors on your audition tapes appear to be Mormon as well. We have that documented.

Just how much money is the Mormon Church spending now to fight same-sex marriage in at least 7 states? Mormon families spent close to $30 million in California to pass Proposition 8 last year. The Mormon Church has likely spent tens of millions of dollars directly throughout the country on all their efforts to stop gay marriage since they hired the world’s largest PR firm, Hill and Knowlton, in 1988. It even appears that the Mormon Church, through its Public Affairs Committee, was monitoring same-sex marriage activities and involved in Canada as well.

We know that the Mormon Church has not been truthful about all of its involvement in opposing same-sex marriage for 20 years. We have seen ample evidence of this in the Church documents that we received.

When we filed our complaint with the California Fair Political Practices Commission last November, Mormon Church officials first said they spent “zero dollars on Prop 8.” Then 3 months after the election, they finally admitted to have made $190,000 in non-monetary contributions. Nearly all of that was supposedly spent the week before the election.

They later changed their story again, saying that the $117,000 reported in Salt Lake City staff time ($96,000) and facilities’ usage ($20,500) was not actually spent just on election day as they had reported to the California Secretary of State. According to Church spokesman Scott Trotter, the staff time included work between August and November. Well, then shouldn’t there have been other expenditures in August or even July and September? Come on Maggie, tell the truth!

The Mormon Church announced its active participation to pass Proposition 8 in the now famous letter read from Thomas S. Monson, President of the Church. This rare act took place on June 29, 2008, and was read to every Mormon in the Western United States. President Monson called on all Mormons to give of “your time and your means to pass Proposition 8.”Well, it worked. As we now know, the Mormon Church took over every aspect of the Yes on 8 campaign, and was largely responsible for its passage.

Please, Maggie, tell America the truth for once about where your millions of dollars are coming from. We are a country of laws, and we have the right to know.

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NOM's Maggie Gallagher Probed

2009-06-22T01:14:00.000-07:00

June 22, 2009

Keith Eddings keddings@lohud.com

A national organization headed by an Ossining woman that has pledged to spend more than $1 million to defeat a gay marriage bill in New York is defending itself in California against allegations that it was organized by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to defeat similar bills nationwide.

The National Organization for Marriage said last week that it would spend $500,000 to help mount primary challenges against Republican state senators in New York who vote for a gay marriage bill proposed by Gov. David Paterson. It has passed the Assembly but stalled in the Senate, as Democrats and Republicans fight for control of that chamber.

The spending would come atop $600,000 the group says it has spent on media campaigns and telephone calls to sway senators in 25 Senate districts, including those represented by Sens. Vincent Leibell, R-Patterson, and Thomas Morahan, R-New City.

NOM says it has spent $6 million to block gay marriage in several states since it was organized in 2007, including $1.8 million to place an amendment on the ballot in California that repealed gay marriage there last year.

The campaign to repeal same-sex marriage in California was fueled in large part by the Mormon church. Critics in that state say the church began the effort by recruiting Maggie Gallagher of Ossining - who has forged a career writing about marriage for conservative think tanks - to establish NOM.

The California Fair Political Practices Commission is investigating complaints that NOM operates as a front for the Mormon church and that the church failed to report millions of dollars in nonmonetary contributions to the campaign.

The complaint was lodged by Los Angeles gay rights activist Fred Karger, who formed Californians Against Hate to protect gay marriage in the state.

"The church is the marionette, the puppeteer, of Maggie and Brian," Karger said, referring to Gallagher, who is NOM's president, and Brian Brown, its executive director. "The evidence is clear that the Mormon church is 100 percent behind the National Organization for Marriage and its funding."

Gallagher said there is no connection between NOM and the church except that a Mormon serves on NOM's board. She said she started NOM and recruited Brown to run it because conservative ministries, think tanks and charities that oppose gay marriage are not positioned to fight it on the ballot and in state capitols.

"I would not shy away from telling you if a group of Catholics and a group of Mormons founded NOM," Gallagher said. "It's not true. I founded NOM. I'd be happy to work with Mormons, but NOM was not started at the suggestion of Salt Lake. But I'd be OK with it if it was true."

Once before, Gallagher faced allegations of a cover-up about who funds her work for conservative causes. In 2005, she acknowledged receiving at least $21,500 from the Department of Health and Human Services to write brochures and other material promoting the Bush administration's marriage initiatives.

Gallagher also advocated for the Bush initiatives in a syndicated column she writes for Universal Press, but did not disclose the HHS payments. She said she earned the payments legitimately but conceded that she should have disclosed them in her column.

Karger has no smoking-gun evidence tying NOM to the Mormon church, but said the relationship would be exposed if the California Fair Political Practices Commission responds to his complaint by issuing subpoenas for church records. He said he believes the relationship exists because the Mormon campaign against gay marriage in California mimicked what he called its undercover campaign to overturn a court ruling allowing gay marriage in Hawaii in the 1990s.
On his Web site, www.californiansagainsthate.com, Karger posts documents revealing how Mormons created a group called Hawaii's Future Today in 1995 and covered up the group's roots in a church many Americans are uneasy about. The documents detail how the church recruited non-Mormons as figureheads for the effort, while installing a Mormon on the board, and dodged financial disclosure requirements about its spending.

"We have organized things so the Church contribution was used in an area of coalition activity that does not have to be reported," church Elder Loren Dunn said in a June 5, 1996, memo to a church committee overseeing the effort. He added that a campaign leader was avoiding reporters who were asking about church spending on the Hawaii marriage bill.

Kim Farah, a spokeswoman for the church in Salt Lake City, responded to a question about the authenticity of the memos by e-mailing this statement: "Mr. Karger is entitled to his opinion but not to his own version of the facts." She would not elaborate.

Farah said the church "did not establish the National Organization for Marriage." She did not respond to a question about whether the Mormon church has been active in the campaigns to defeat gay marriage in New England and New York.

In April, as NOM was launching its $600,000 media and phone campaign in New York, Karger launched his own low-budget media campaign in the state and New England in ads on news organizations' Web sites. The ads, called "The Mormons Are Coming!" and set to the tune of "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere," plays on New England's historic unease with the Mormon church. Several news organizations, including the (Albany) Times Union, rejected it.

"To attack, harass and intimidate any one religious faith and say they don't have a right to participate in the process I think is profoundly anti-American," said Brown, NOM's executive director. "A lot of what Fred is trying to do is to intimidate Mormons - especially - out of supporting marriage, and it's wrong."

"I've never questioned the right of the Mormon religion or any religion to be involved in the political process," Karger said. "All I've said is, if they are going to participate, they need to abide by the election laws. I believe there's a lot more there. I don't believe Brian or Maggie are telling the truth."

Two Words of Advice on How to Win Back Same-Sex Marriage -- Voter Registration!

2009-06-17T03:17:00.001-07:00

I spent three decades as a public affairs and political consultant. I spent a couple of hours at Los Angeles Gay Pride last Sunday.

Being heavily involved right now in our LGBT civil rights movement, it is important to observe what is going on out there. Several hundred thousand people attended the Sunday morning parade and the annual weekend festival. June is Gay Pride month, and there are literally dozens of cities in California that hold Pride weekends throughout June and all summer long.

Last year’s Pride was particularity interesting, because much to our surprise, gay marriage had been made legal just weeks earlier, and it was going to take affect days later. What an exciting and historic time that was. What a difference a year makes.

I remember last year that there was no one registering voters the entire weekend of L A Pride. Odd I thought, since one year ago we knew in advance that Proposition 8 was very likely going to be on the November 4th ballot.

Voter registration is an essential element in all major political campaigns. Practically every campaign and every political party has conducted voter registration drives almost going back as far as George Washington. It’s basic, nothing really new or innovative. The idea is, to register new voters who will vote with you in order to help your side get more votes than your opponents. Like I said, pretty basic.

This year I went into the Pride Festival to do a little test. I wanted to see what all was going on with voter registration.

I had assumed that our wonderful LGBT organizations (and they are incredible organizations) would have hundreds of people out registering LGBT voters and all our friends at LA Pride this year. I figured that they would be taking advantage of this mostly younger crowd, and get everyone at Gay Pride registered to vote. After all we very likely will be back on the ballot to repeal Prop 8 in less than 17 months.

As I went to my first LGBT political booth, I asked gently if there was a way to register to vote? A young bewildered volunteer said, “not really sure.” I visited the over 20 more LGBT political booths, out of over several hundred at the festival. Sadly, I could not find one voter registration card! Not even one!!!

During my wanderings, I finally met a very nice girl who had heard that the Stonewall Democrats booth had some voter registration forms. She marched me right over there, and I was thinking bingo, but alas, after some searching around they first said “we ran out,” then said, “sorry, we don’t have any.” Then the cute volunteer added, “good idea though.”

200,000 to 300,000 LGBT individuals and so many of our friends were in one place, who all agree that marriage equality should return to California. You do the math. Talk about a missed opportunity!!!

I’m pretty certain that at least half of the mostly younger crowd at Pride is not registered to vote yet. Once they do register, they will be voting for let's say 70 more years on many more LGBT issues and for candidates who support us. That’s a lot of Novembers and Junes. In California, all new voters have the option of checking a box to have an absentee ballot mailed to their home forever. Vote at home = very high turnout.

It’s simple. Elections are won by who gets the most votes. We narrowly lost last year. Let’s put on the biggest, most successful most fun voter registration program in California history. Let’s give it a catchy name like "Milk the Vote" or "Register for Equality." Then brand it, use our massive volunteer force that has been and continues to be organized, and let’s go get 600,000 new LGBT voters and our friends registered now. This new army should be everywhere the next 17 months where there is a gay event, rally, march, college campus and any place that there are more than 25 gay people assembled.

It’s a lot of work, but if all our organizations and volunteers get behind “Milk the Vote,” or whatever the name is, we can make up the 599,602 votes that we lost by and win next year’s election to repeal Prop 8. Let's make sure that California once again leads the way on equality.

I appeal to all our very effective LGBT organizations to work together and make voter registration the number one activity between now and next October 18th (last day to register for the November 2, 2010 election).

Hell, people can even register on line: http://www.sos.ca.gov/nvrc/fedform/ and then just print out the form and mail it in.

We lost by only 4% of the vote last year -- 599,602 votes out of the over 13.4 million cast on Prop 8. What a change from just 8 years earlier when we lost by 23%!

Please, make this the last Pride in California, or anywhere in the country for that matter, where we are not registering voters.

It is the smartest thing that we can be doing now and for our future.

2009-06-15T23:47:00.000-07:00

Meet your anti-gay adversaries
On the anniversary of Stonewall, remember we must still fight

By DANIELLE TRUSZKOVSKYJUN. 18, 2009

Although we are in another wonderful month of gay pride celebrations, it is important to remember that our community is in the midst of an active battle for equal civil rights. The National Organization for Marriage (NOM)—the group behind the nation-wide anti-gay movement—has recently expanded its efforts and ad campaigns to ensure that millions of gay Americans are denied the same basic rights as every other US citizen. Since we are fighting for our rights and the rights of our families, it makes sense that we should know as much as possible about our primary adversary.

On their website, NOM states they have a 501(c)(4) nonprofit status, which means that the group is a “Social Welfare Organization” without restrictions on lobbying expenditures. When I searched for the organization using Guidestar (the leading nonprofit research database), however, no such 501(c)(4) shows up. Instead the National Organization for MarriageInc shows up with a 501(c)(12) status which is for “Local Benevolent Life Insurance Associations, Mutual Irrigation and Telephone Companies, and Like Co.” It seems this organization is intentionally misrepresenting itself.

It is also suspicious that this group, which has a seemingly limitless supply of cash, is operating out of tiny one-room office (located at 20 Nassau Street, suite 242, in Princeton, NJ). I visited this office numerous times, but never found a single person working there.

Also strange is that this office was previously inhabited by a right-wing organization called the Witherspoon Institute, which according to the Opus Dei Awareness Network (ODAN) is an “Opus Dei-affiliated foundation.” Opus Dei is the secretive sect within the Catholic Church, with direct ties to the Vatican, that reportedly has billions of dollars in assets. They were made famous by the villain in “The Da Vinci Code,” who was a devout member of Opus Dei, albeit an uncharacteristically murderous one. It’s not surprising, however, that an Opus Dei “Numerary” is one of the founding members of NOM. ODAN states, “Numerary members pledge to remain celibate and generally live in Opus Dei houses. They commit their entire salaries to Opus Dei, submit incoming and outgoing mail to their directors, and practice various forms of corporal mortification, including use of the cilice, a spiked chain worn around the thigh, and use of the discipline, a knotted rope for whipping.”

NOM has more than one tie to a controversial religious sect. Another founding member of the group was Matthew Holland, who is a professor at Brigham Young University. His father is a member of the Quorum of 12 Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. This “Quorum” represents the governing body of the LDS church. The Mormon and Opus Dei connection comes together beautifully in NOM’s “Gathering Storm” ad campaign, and it appears that at least 3 of the “actors” in the commercial are Mormons and at least 1 is a member of Opus Dei. Although NOM portrays itself as a group of average Americans, the reality is quite different. (Most Americans do not whip themselves with knotted ropes or stab their own legs with spiked chains.) And since the Board of NOM has such close ties to religious organizations with billions of dollars in assets, it is only logical to question where NOM’s funding is coming from and if it being reported accurately.

On March 25, 2009 Californians Against Hate requested copies of NOM’s IRS 990 tax return forms. Federal law requires non-profits release this information within 30 days. It is nearly 90 days after the initial request and still NOM has failed to release their tax forms and are currently accruing IRS fines of $20 per day until their financials are released to the public. What are they trying to hide?Although NOM is continuing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on ad campaigns across the country, no one knows where this money is coming from. They are the only national organization working to deny gay Americans equal rights and their operating practices are suspect.

Considering the Board’s obvious ties to the Mormon Church and Opus Dei—is it possible that the only nationalized effort against gay civil rights is merely a front group for controversial religious organizations in an attempt to force their religious ideology on the American public?This June let’s remember that although we may have many differences within our own community, we are all fighting for a common goal: equal rights.

If members of the Mormon Church and Opus Dei can come together in a “marriage” of sorts in a collaborative effort to deny gay Americans equal rights, then certainly we as a community can work together to ensure that we win this fight for equality.

Opus Dei can come together in a “marriage” of sorts in a collaborative effort to deny gay Americans equal rights, then certainly we as a community can work together to ensure that we win this fight for equality.