Anderson Cooper Calls Out Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi for Anti-Gay Policies
In a CNN interview, Cooper reminds Bondi of her role in Florida’s attacks on same-sex marriage as she attempts to sympathize with those affected by the mass killings in Orlando, Fla.In the days since the worst mass shooting in American history, many politicians have expressed support for the LGBT community. Critics, however, have been quick to point out the hypocrisy of those expressing sympathy who in fact have a policy history of oppressing LGBT rights.
Such hypocrisy was brought into sharp focus Tuesday in an interview conducted by CNN’s Anderson Cooper. The veteran journalist interviewed Pam Bondi, Florida’s attorney general since 2010. Bondi has a long history of opposing gay rights: When she ran for office in 2010, she vowed to oppose gay adoptions; and since being in office, she has “vigorously defended” Florida’s ban on gay marriage. In 2014 court documents, for example, she argued that recognizing the legal marriages of same-sex couples from other states would “impose significant harm” to Florida’s population.
Cooper, well aware of Bondi’s political record, did not shy from mentioning that her sympathies for the Orlando victims seem to contradict her actions as attorney general.
“I talked to a lot of gay and lesbian people yesterday who are not fans of yours, and they said that they thought you were being a hypocrite,” Cooper begins. He then brings up her court statement regarding “significant harm,” to which Bondi replies that she was simply trying to uphold the Constitution.
Cooper, however, isn’t having it. “I’m just wondering,” he asks at one point, “if it’s hypocritical to portray yourself as a champion of the gay community?”
Bondi has since stated that the CNN interview was badly edited and left out an entire segment that discussed donations to “legitimate funds” to aid victims of the shooting. She also called out Cooper for interviewing her “in front of a hospital when we could have been helping victims.” All the interview did, Bondi said, was “encourage anger and hate.”
Watch the full interview below:
—Posted by Emma Niles
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