Tulsi Gabbard – Photo: Gage Skidmore; Chris Butler the leader of the Science of Identity Foundation – Photo: YouTube
Tulsi Gabbard has been under scrutiny ever since President Donald Trump first nominated her to be the next Director of National Intelligence.
Senators, including many Republicans, have expressed concerns about the then-congresswoman’s 2017 meeting with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad and her past adulation for Edward Snowden, a former NSA intelligence contractor who leaked classified information.
Democrats have also expressed concerns about past comments the Democrat-turned-Republican made appearing to justify Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Senators raised questions about those issues during hearings on January 30.
Meanwhile, the Daily Beast published a story that seems to contradict past comments from Gabbard regarding her spiritual “guru,” Chris Butler, founder of the Science of Identity Foundation, an offshoot of the Hare Krishna movement, which describes itself as Hindu.
The 43-year-old Gabbard has been a devout follower of Butler (who has taken the name Jagad Guru Siddhaswarupananda Paramahamsa, or “Jagad Guru”) since childhood, when her family joined his religious movement.
Gabbard, the first Hindu elected to Congress, described Butler as her “guru dev” in a 2015 video. Confronted with accusations that Butler was the leader of an abusive cult, Gabbard told the New Yorker in 2017 that she had “never heard him say anything hateful, or say anything mean about anybody.”
It’s that remark that the Daily Beast story attempts to poke holes in, alleging that Gabbard was being dishonest, or at least misleading, about her religious upbringing and beliefs.
According to the news outlet, attending or listening to recordings of Butler’s lectures is an integral part of the group’s devotion. As such, the piece contends, that because her family was deeply involved in the movement, she would have heard, or at least been exposed to, Butler’s lectures growing up.
According to the Daily Beast, it obtained a 30-minute audio recording of one of Butler’s lectures, in which the spiritual leader spewed anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and profanity, attacking gay rights in the workplace.
In the recording, made a few years before Gabbard ran for the Hawaii House of Representatives at age 21, Butler called homosexuality “abnormal,” “unhealthy and unnatural,” and compared it to having “sex with a fire hydrant.”
He also denounced secular society’s acceptance of homosexuality.
“If you have a day camp and a homosexual wants to come on and be the leader, he’s got an ‘I’m Gay and I’m Proud’ button on, you’re not allowed to express your spiritual convictions or values because there’s now a law, an economic field you’re not allowed to apply your spiritual values,” Butler lamented.
“You’re not allowed to consider [that] this person’s character has a flaw in it and I don’t want to hire them. He’s not able to control his desires or his senses, the guy’s a pervert – I don’t want him working for me. You should admonish such a person, educate such a person, let such a person know his lifestyle is wrong, it’s sinful.”
Butler’s rant accuses gay and lesbian people of promoting “faggotism” and “forcing you” to adopt their way of life. He lambasted laws protecting LGBTQ people from discrimination, shouting, “You have to go to court and be asked: ‘Are you prejudiced against fairies? Are you prejudiced against dykes? Are you prejudiced against people who have sex with fire hydrants?’
“You go, ‘Oh no, I think it’s perfectly normal, I promise.’ Whatever! If you say it’s quite abnormal for a man to have sex with another man, I think it’s sinful, I think it’s ugly, I think it’s unhealthy, I think it’s unnatural. Why? Is there a law against that? As a matter of fact there is!”
Gabbard’s father, Mike, a former Hawaii state senator, was one of the state’s leading voices opposing LGBTQ rights and same-sex marriage. In 1998, four years before running for office, Gabbard worked alongside her father to push for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. She campaigned on her advocacy for the amendment in her 2002 race for the state legislature.
Once elected, she opposed measures to equalize the benefits granted to same-sex couples in civil unions and married heterosexual couples, and balked at a proposed study to examine the needs of LGBTQ students.
After being elected to Congress in 2012, Gabbard’s views on gay rights appeared to evolve. She apologized for her past anti-gay advocacy, co-sponsored legislation to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, and amassed a largely pro-LGBTQ record for her first four terms.
In 2019, as she launched her campaign for president, she elaborated on her views, saying that her political evolution on the matter was informed by serving alongside LGBTQ service members in the Hawaii Army National Guard, both at home and abroad.
However, in 2020, she began to adopt more severe views on transgender rights, co-introducing a bill to ban trans athletes from female sporting events and define Title IX as only protecting individuals from instances of discrimination motivated by their assigned sex at birth.
Upon leaving Congress, she backed other anti-LGBTQ causes and legislation, including Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law.
It remains unclear whether Gabbard’s hostility towards segments of the LGBTQ community is motivated by her religious beliefs. But the Trump campaign previously told the Daily Beast that its reporting on Gabbard’s ties to Butler was “fomenting Hinduphobia” and “bigoted.” Similarly, a public relations firm hired by Butler’s group also pointed the news outlet to a statement deeming reporting on Butler as “Hinduphobia.”
An irate customer at a Florida Starbucks was arrested after throwing a tantrum over a Pride flag hanging on the wall.
Police say Tucker Alden Kemp, 31, of Clearwater, entered a Starbucks in St. Petersburg around 9:16 a.m. on October 22. Once inside, he took offense at a Pride flag and asked to speak with the manager, insisting it was offensive and should be replaced with an American flag.
When the manager refused, citing store policy, Kemp allegedly "decided to take matters into his own hands," according to an arrest affidavit obtained by The Smoking Gun.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace once cast herself as an LGBTQ-friendly Republican. She has since become one of Congress’s loudest opponents of transgender rights -- and is now echoing a familiar refrain used by opponents of same-sex marriage on social media.
"Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve," wrote Mace on X, repeating a long-used slogan that mocks same-sex relationships as “abnormal” and frames homosexuality as contrary to the Bible. The South Carolina congresswoman is currently running for governor.
A community note soon appeared under Mace’s post, pointing out that she voted twice for the Respect for Marriage Act -- once during its initial passage, and again when the House approved the Senate’s version. The 2022 law requires both federal and state governments to recognize same-sex marriages performed in states where they’re legal.
During the recent federal shutdown, the Trump administration changed the name on Rachel Levine's portrait at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, replacing her legal name with her pre-transition one.
Levine made history in 2021 as the first out transgender person confirmed by the U.S. Senate for a sub-cabinet role, serving nearly four years as Assistant Secretary of Health in the Biden administration and later becoming a four-star admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
Levine’s portrait hangs on the seventh floor of the Humphrey Building in Washington, D.C., alongside those of others who have led the U.S. Public Health Service. She has offered little commentary on the deadnaming, telling NPR it was an honor to serve as Assistant Secretary of Health. "I'm not going to comment on this type of petty action," she said.
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