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Don Kopp's Anti-Gay Campaigning

Please VOTE for candidates endorsed by Equality South Dakota PAC and encourage others to do the same. Here is another example of what is at stake.

An open-minded woman in District 35 opened her door last Saturday to Don Kopp, candidate for District 35 Senate. She felt compelled to share her conversation and subsequent email:

Don Kopp is running for SD State House District 35 as a republican. He was out canvassing in our neighborhood and stopped at my house. He asked if I was voting across the board democrat because I have an Obama for president sign in my yard. I told him that I vote based upon finding a person who will represent my beliefs best no matter what their party affiliation. He said I sounded more open-minded than most people he talks with...Mr. Kopp’s next statement was so incredibly unbelievable to me that I am still gobsmacked over it. With no precursor or lead-in he said, “I oppose gay marriage because if we let them get married then we will also have to make it legal for pedophiles to have sex with kids”. I asked how in the world he could even say such a thing and he countered that there are colleges in California that promote pedophile sex as acceptable and they even teach classes on how to do it. I asked him for proof of his remarks because I was having trouble being civil to him for any longer. He told me to go to his website and send him an email so that he could send me information proving his statements. I wrote to him that same day and received the reply I have forwarded to you at the bottom of this message. His website is donkopp.com.

Please help stop this man being sent...as a representative in my district. I want a sane representative who will serve the needs of all people, not some lunatic who is susceptible to right-wing extremist messages full of half truths and statements taken out of context. Feel free to contact me anytime and let me know if there is something I can do to help.

The email correspondance follows:

Mr. Kopp contacted Equality South Dakota Political Action Committee via our website on Sunday, November 2. We share with you his comments:

For your information I am not campaigning against homosexuals. I was asked about my position on same sex marriage which I am against, but so are most of my Republican peers. I am also against people living together without the benifit [sic] of marriage but that doesn't mean I dislike that person [sic]. The laws of our land have been established on Biblicl [sic] principals. The question I asked the "open-minded" lady was a simple one. If we don't base our moral principals on the Bible, who then makes up the rules? And if we have no moral foundation, we are destined to sink in our own quagmire. Biblical morality has governed our nation since its inception and have [sic] served us well and I choose to follow them [sic] as closly [sic] as possible.

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