Yup, Obama Has Always Supported Same-Sex Marriage, Says Axelrod

President Barack Obama was always more progressive on same-sex marriage than he let on, David Axelrod says. Why?

Political strategist David Axelrod reveals that even in 2008, as Barack Obama was running for president, the then-U.S. Senator from Illinois supported same-sex marriage, despite telling the nation – and Pastor Rick Warren – that he believed marriage is a religious institution.

“I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman,” Obama told Warren in August, 2008. “For me as a Christian, it is also a sacred union. God’s in the mix.” The audience applauded.

But in Axelrod’s new book, Believer: My Forty Years in Politics, he says Obama long ago had “evolved,” certainly before his first presidential run. Many know of Obama’s responses to a 1996 questionnaire, in which he announced support for marriage equality.

TIME reports today that Obama, on the campaign trail, told Axelrod, “I’m just not very good at bullshitting,” after telling a crowd he did not support same-sex marriage.

“Having prided himself on forthrightness, though, Obama never felt comfortable with his compromise and, no doubt, compromised position,” Axelrod writes. “He routinely stumbled over the question when it came up in debates or interviews.”

Axelrod makes clear the deception was his idea. 

“Axelrod also admits to counseling Obama to conceal that position for political reasons,” TIME’s Zeke Miller reports.

“Opposition to gay marriage was particularly strong in the black church, and as he ran for higher office, he grudgingly accepted the counsel of more pragmatic folks like me, and modified his position to support civil unions rather than marriage, which he would term a ‘sacred union,’ ” Axelrod writes.

On May 9, 2012, months before being re-elected, President Obama sat down with ABC News’ Robin Roberts to announce he had evolved.

“I’ve been going through an evolution on this issue. I’ve always been adamant that– gay and lesbian– Americans should be treated fairly and equally,” he told Roberts, adding that he had thought “civil unions would be sufficient.”

“I have to tell you that over the course of– several years, as I talk to friends and family and neighbors. When I think about– members of my own staff who are incredibly committed, in monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together. When I think about– those soldiers or airmen or marines or– sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf– and yet, feel constrained, even now that Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is gone, because– they’re not able to– commit themselves in a marriage.

“At a certain point, I’ve just concluded that– for me personally, it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that– I think same-sex couples should be able to get married,” the President said.

 

Official White House Photo by Pete Souza via Flickr