After an inquiry by The New Civil Rights Movement, a Republican U.S. Congressman has withdrawn from delivering a keynote address at a Christian Bible conference hosted by a far right wing pastor known for calling for the death of gay people.
Freshman Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) in August was scheduled to deliver a speech titled “The Bible: Equipping the Man of God for Politics and the Culture War,” at Pastor Kevin Swanson’s Bible Family Conference.
NCRM profiled Congressman Johnson on Tuesday in an article titled, “Congressman Tied to Anti-Gay Groups Scheduled to Speak at ‘Kill the Gays’ Pastor’s Conference.”
After an email conversation with Rep. Johnson’s office, his office says he has withdrawn from the conference. As of this writing his name no longer appears on the schedule for Swanson’s conference.
Johnson’s office initially told NCRM that “Congressman Johnson was invited to speak to a Christian conference in August. He was unaware of Mr. Swanson’s participation and of his previous comments. Once this was brought to the congressman’s attention, he immediately denounced those comments and withdrew his participation.”
When NCRM replied, noting there was no record of Rep. Johnson denouncing Swanson’s remarks, Johnson’s office responded: “The Congressman was asked by a friend not associated with Swanson or his organization to join a Bible conference in D.C. Once he learned of Swanson’s connection to the conference he immediately withdrew his participation.”
After NCRM’s article Rep. Johnson’s name was removed from the schedule at Swanson’s Bible Family Conference.
Johnson’s office also told NCRM: “Congressman Johnson believes and has publicly stated many times that all people are made in God’s image, and God calls us to love all and to treat every person with dignity and respect.”
But Congressman Johnson has a long history of working with anti-LGBT hate groups. Before being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives he was a senior attorney and the national media spokesman for the Alliance Defending Freedom, an anti-gay hate group.
He also was awarded the True Blue Award by another anti-LGBT hate group, Tony Perkins’ Family Research Council.
Rep. Johnson still appears to support the anti-LGBT movement. Last week he posted praise for his “good friend, law school classmate and former colleague, Kyle Duncan, on his confirmation today to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.”
LGBT civil rights group Lambda Legal calls Duncan “a lawyer who has built his career around pursuing extreme positions that target members of the LGBTQ community.”
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