But Obama’s opposition to same-sex marriage was always mostly rhetorical, if it was ever sincere. (It contradicted the answer he gave a gay media outlet in 1996, which might have made him the only person in America to support gay marriage in 1996 but oppose it in early 2012.) He opposed the federal Defense of Marriage Act as early as 2008 and never supported any state-level Prop 8-style ballot initiatives.
Not so for Hillary Clinton. Her husband signed the Defense of Marriage Act into law in 1996. Most Democrats in both houses of Congress voted in favor. This legislation denied federal recognition of same-sex marriage and allowed states to enact laws like Prop 8: no same-sex marriage in their state or recognition of such unions in other states.
Hillary herself then defended this law for over a decade. Even when the press described her as “repudiating” it in 2007, she only favored repealing one section.
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