Kim Davis with Mike Huckabee and Mat Staver, the head of the Liberty Counsel (Getty)

The lawyer who found fame representing Kim Davis has claimed that paedophiles are directly responsible for pushing transgender and LGB rights legislation.

Mat Staver is the leader of the Liberty Counsel – the hardline evangelical law firm that represented embattled clerk Kim Davis through her ‘won’t marry gays’ days.

A report recently found that Staver, who appeared countless times with Davis, has secretly been helping Republican lawmakers draft a wave of anti-LGBT legislation in at least 20 states.

The lawyer – whose wife-and-colleague recently pledged to bring a handgun to the bathroom to threaten transgender people with – directly equated LGBT rights with paedophilia this week, while speaking on his Faith and Freedom Show.



Speaking about transgender and LGB rights laws, he said: “The fact is we know sexual assaults occur, they are going to occur with or without these laws, there’s no question about that.

“People commit sexual assaults, they commit them in buildings, they commit them in restrooms… but what you have now done, knowing that sexual assaults occur, knowing that they occur in these places where women are trapped and they can’t get out, now what we’ve done, through these laws, is we’ve opened the door for every rapist and paedophile.”

“Frankly, when you look at some of the people behind the North Carolina law and some of these other laws, who are they?

“They have been identified, some of them that have been advocating this, as paedophiles. Some of this is being financed by those who are actively promoting paedophilia.”

Anita Staver, the group’s president and Mat Staver’s wife, threatened last month: “I’m taking a Glock .45 to the ladies room. It identifies as my bodyguard. #BoycottTarget”.

She added: “I want protection from the perverts who will use the law to gain access to women.”

Mr Staver recently insisted the gays and liberals were all to blame for his wave of anti-LGBT laws, claiming: “The Supreme Court in the 5-4 opinion on marriage in 2015 lit the house on fire.

“All we’re trying to do is control the fire at this point in time.”