What year does Marco Rubio think it is? The answer, if he’s engaging with reality, is 2016—the year after the Supreme Court made marriage equality the law across the United States—and yet the Republican establishment favorite had this bewildering exchange about marriage with Timothy Kierstead, a gay New Hampshire resident who was not interested in taking excuses:
Kierstead said he has been married for a “long time,” and he added to Rubio: “You want to say we don’t matter.”
“No, I just believe marriage is between one man and one woman,” said Rubio.
“But that’s your belief,” Kierstead shot back.
“I think that’s what the law should be. And if you disagree you should have the law changed by a legislature,” said Rubio. The man reminded Rubio that gay marriage is legal.
Rubio told him “I respect your view” and moved on.
Rubio has done a lot of whining about how the Supreme Court did a thing he disagreed with, so it seems implausible that he forgot what the law is. But if Rubio was trying to suggest that marriage equality is illegitimate because it was decided by the Supreme Court rather than the Congress, he struck out there, too, because New Hampshire’s legislature did pass the law, way back in 2009 (it went into effect in 2010).
And walking away when Kierstead reminded him what the law actually says … classy! Especially with the brush-off “I respect your view” line to the guy whose marriage Rubio just said he thinks should be illegal. No, Marco, I think Kierstead had it right at the beginning when he said, “you want to say we don’t matter.”