Rick Perry: Evolution Is A Myth And Same-Sex Marriage Should Be Illegal
Unlike President Obama, Texas Republican Governor Rick Perry is definitely not evolving. Perry made major news last week when he claimed that he was okay with New York’s decision to legalize same-sex marriage because marriage is a states’ rights issue. That idea, even though many would agree, got Perry into major hot water with every major Christian hate group around, so Perry immediately spun it and appeased his anti-gay buddies by saying he was against same-sex marriage. Now, evidently, that wasn’t enough so Perry — whom many believe will be running for the Republican presidential nomination — today said not only does he not support same-sex marriage, he doesn’t even support evolution! — but he does support a constitutional amendment to make same-sex marriage illegal. No word yet on a constitutional amendment banning evolution.
On Friday, July 22, Perry said of same-sex marriage in the Empire State, “Our friends in New York six weeks ago passed a statute that said marriage can be between two people of the same sex. And you know what? That’s New York, and that’s their business, and that’s fine with me.”
The following day, über-homophobe Rick Santorum took the opportunity to bash the undeclared presidential candidate and number two in line, by saying, “So Gov Perry, if a state wanted to allow polygamy or if they chose to deny heterosexuals the right to marry, would that be OK too?,” via Twitter.
Then, on Wednesday, World Net Daily founder and America’s Birther-In-Chief, right wing extremist Joseph Farrah slammed Perry across space and time. In “Rick Perry fooled me,” Farrah wrote of all the glowing recommendations he had given Perry, “you can forget all that – and all the nice things I said and wrote about Rick Perry. I’m afraid I’ve wasted my time and your time. In fact, I was just dead wrong in all of my conclusions about the governor of Texas. I no longer want him to run and no longer believe he is a viable candidate. In fact, I will do all I can to warn the American people away from him.”
“Evidently I was fooled by Rick Perry.
“I freely admit it.
“I feel unclean for the nice things I have said about him to date.”
Dallas Voice reported,
“His comments were inartful and disappointing,†Gary Bauer, president of American Values, told Real Clear Politics. “The 10th Amendment and states’ rights is very important to conservatives, but it’s not our highest value. There are some things so fundamentally wrong that we have not left those things up to the states.â€
Oran Smith, president of an anti-gay group in the early primary state of South Carolina, told Real Clear Politics that Perry’s comments could mean he is also “slippery†on other issues (gee, ya think?). And our old friend Bob Van der Plaats, president of the Iowa Family Leader, said he hopes Perry’s comments were “more of an education issue … .†LOL.
Even Bryan Fischer, a spokesman for the American Family Association — the anti-gay hate group that is funding Perry’s day of prayer in Houston on Aug. 6 — told The Texas Independent that Perry “missed an opportunity here for him to stress the importance of natural marriage and the negative consequences for children when same-sex marriages are legitimized.â€
But Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic goes back to Perry’s original states’ rights, Tenth Amendment focus, and writes,
“How deeply does Perry believe in the 10th Amendment? As it turns out, not deeply enough for his advocacy on its “beauty” and wisdom to survive an interview with Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council. By its end, he is speaking out on behalf of the Federal Marriage Amendment, a proposal that would define marriage everywhere in the United States as being between one man and one woman, effectively overturning the actions of New York’s duly elected legislature, and preventing even citizen-backed ballot initiatives from legalizing gay marriage in the future.
In the interview, Perry and Perkins both try to make this sound as though it is the real states’ rights position:
TONY PERKINSÂ I think marriage and family policy is best dealt with at the state level. But the tenth amendment — and I am a strong supporter. I fought the federal government on a number of issues when they were trying to force us to do things. But when you look at what’s happening on marriage, the real fear is that states like New York will change the definition of marriage for Texas. At that point the states rights argument is lost.
GOV. PERRYÂ Right and that is the reason that the federal marriage amendment is being offered, it’s that small group of activist judges, and frankly a small handful, if you will, of states, and liberal special interests groups that intend on a redefinition of, if you will, marriage on the nation, for all of us, which I adamantly oppose. Indeed to not pass the federal marriage amendment would impinge on Texas, and other states not to have marriage forced upon us by these activist judges and special interest groups.Translation: We support the 10th amendment until the people of another state decide an issue in a way that affects us. As these men surely know, a state’s drinking age, gambling laws, agricultural policies, drug laws, and many other policies besides affect its neighbors. Should all those issues be federalized too?
So, now that all this is said and done, Perry, who is co-hosting and headlining a Christian-only possibly taxpayer-supported prayer rally next week, decided to make his stance as narrow as possible.
And Andrew Belonsky at Towleroad has this:
“Yes, sir, I would [support an amendment.] I am for the federal marriage amendment. And that’s about as sharp a point as I could put on it,” Perry told the news agency, just one day after he reiterated his opposition to same-sex marriage at a right wing gathering in Colorado.
Meanwhile, Perry also insisted that he thinks a creator, rather than the Big Bang, formed the universe.
“There are clear indications from our people who have amazing intellectual capability that this didn’t happen by accident and a creator put this in place.
“Now, what was his time frame and how did he create the earth that we know? I’m not going to tell you that I’ve got the answers to that.
“I believe that we were created by this all-powerful supreme being and how we got to today versus what we look like thousands of years ago, I think there’s enough holes in the theory of evolution to, you know, say there are some holes in that theory.”
Any questions?
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
