After Bush endorsed the so-called Federal Marriage Amendment last week, the White House insisted that the president arrived at his decision after a lengthy and deliberative process. Scott McClellan said Bush “consult[ed] with constitutional scholars, theologians, religious leaders and others.” The decision was also prompted, Bush argued, by “local authorities” who were trying to “change the most fundamental institution of civilization.”
Apparently, like too many of the White House’s claims, none of this is true. As the Progress Report noted yesterday, the president told the amendment’s leading House sponsor in November that he would back the FMA, immediately after the Massachusetts court ruled and well before officials in San Francisco and New Mexico started issuing marriage licenses to gay couples.
As the Rocky Mountain News reported over the weekend, a top aide to Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.) said Bush assured the conservative lawmaker that he would back her proposed amendment three months before his official endorsement last week.
Guy Short, Musgrave’s chief of staff, said Musgrave discussed her Federal Marriage Amendment with the president during a Nov. 24 trip aboard Air Force One to Fort Carson, where Bush visited troops and met with survivors of military personnel killed in Iraq.
“She flew back to Colorado with him, and he indicated he would be supportive of the amendment and her language,” Short said.