The President of anti-gay group ‘Texas Values’ lost his wife to another woman, just months before he became publicly anti-gay. Quite blatantly, it’s thought this might explain why he went from ‘socially conservative lobbyist’ to ‘homophobic firebrand’.
The man in question is Jonathan Saenz, a devout catholic and general bastion of the right-wing from Texas. He’s worked on abortion and ‘religious liberty’ cases as an attorney since 2005, but not until recently did he become one of the lone-star state’s most notorious and extreme anti-LGBT voices.
Saenz’s ex-wife, Corrine Morris Rodriguez Saenz was dating another woman named Ercilia Paredes when she filed for divorce back in 2011.
With Saenz as president, Texas Values have sought to challenge the legalization of same-sex marriage as well as the passage of LGBT-inclusive non-discrimination laws in the cities of Houston and San Antonio.
Saenz has come out with some classic Fox News style chat during his time as head of the anti-gay brigade too, he argued same-sex marriage will lead to polygamy and people marrying their stepchildren, and even suggested that gay activists want to put Christians in concentration camps.
The marrying-your-stepchild thing has been done before. As Jeremy Irons once argued that legalisation of same-sex marriage would lead to fathers and sons marrying, because it’s not incest and therefore not in breach of incest laws, as they can’t “breed” and thus inbreed, or something.
Incredibly, Saenz tried to get Morris jailed for not undergoing a psychological evaluation with the psychologist of his choosing, despite refusing to pay the psychologist’s fee of $2,500. He also tried to bar Corrine Saenz’s girlfriend from ever being in the presence of the children Jonathan and Corrine now share custody over.
It seems dramatic to work out your relationship issues by publicly discriminating against a whole demographic of people. What is clear though is those late night embraces between Corrine and Ercilia must seem all the sweeter, knowing there’s an ex-husband out there in absolute bits over the very notion of their right to be together.
