Gay businessman who hosted Ted Cruz: 'I made a terrible mistake'

The two gay hoteliers who hosted an event for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz apologized on Sunday for what both called an error in judgment.

Ian Reisner, who co-hosted the “fireside chat,” apologized to the gay community and others in a Facebook post late Sunday for his “poor judgment.”


“I am shaken to my bones by the e-mails, texts, postings and phone calls of the past few days. I made a terrible mistake,” Reisner wrote in his apology post, first reported by The New York Times.

Mati Weiderpass, other businessman, said he shared in Reisner’s contrition in another Facebook post.

“Unfortunately, I cannot undo this. You taught me a painful but important lesson,” Weiderpass wrote. “The people that know me know the work that I have done over the last 20 years for the advancement of gay rights. Today, I came to realize that I might have nullified my past efforts and accomplishments in just one week.”

The apologies followed a significant backlash on social media against their businesses.

On Facebook, more than 8,700 accounts have joined a page calling for a boycott of their properties, including the OUT NYC hotel and Fire Island Pines property, and a prominent AIDS fundraising nonprofit announced last Friday that it was canceling a fundraiser scheduled for next month at 42West, one of the nightclubs that the two businessmen owned.

Reisner said that upon further review, he is “shocked and angry” to see Cruz’s positions on gay rights.

“I was ignorant, naive and much too quick in accepting a request to co-host a dinner with Cruz at my home without taking the time to completely understand all of his positions on gay rights,” he wrote.

Over the weekend, Cruz addressed media coverage during a summit hosted by the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition.

“The only explanation that makes sense to reporters is that anyone who supports traditional marriage,” he said, “must be somehow motivated by hatred for those who are homosexuals. It’s why this story seems so puzzling to the media.”