A Mohave County Supervisor, and former Arizona state senator, is facing criticism after calling homosexuality “sinful” and claiming gay men die young despite a lack of evidence to back up the claim.

Ron Gould, who previously made headlines for a campaign ad in which he shot a copy of the Affordable Care Act, told The Kingman Daily Miner he believed gay men have a life expectancy of 42, most likely based on a Family Research Institute study from 1994. The anti-LGBTQ group claimed gay men live on average only to the age of 42, through a disgraced researcher’s wholly unscientific practice of reading obituaries in queer publications.

The paper asked Gould if he was saying he believed gay men die younger on average than their straight counterparts because of their sexual orientation, to which he replied, “That’s why they die.”

He didn’t stop there, either.

“We all have our sins, but we should try to suppress them. Alcohol is harmful, too, but we don’t see groups promoting alcoholism,” he added.

Mohave County Manager Mike Hendrix declined comment on Gould’s homophobic remarks, saying only, “All I can tell you is Mohave County does not discriminate in our employment or people who wish to do business with us.”

Gould has also taken heat for racist comments from a woman he appointed to a zoning and development board, LaJuana Gillette, who wrote on Facebook, “We must stop the minorities from coming here and trying to change us.”