GOP strategist urges support of gay unions

DES MOINES, Iowa -- A national Republican strategist said in Iowa on Monday that Republicans should speak out in favor of same-sex marriage because the majority of Americans support it and it's consistent with conservative values.

In private meetings with GOP elected officials and operatives from across Iowa, Ken Mehlman, who was chairman of the Republican National Committee from 2005 to 2007 and managed George W. Bush's re-election campaign, has been urging the politicos to recognize the evolution in thinking and demographic shifts in Iowa and the nation.

"Republicans have an opportunity to both stand up for values that are core to our philosophy -- freedom, family values and the golden rule -- and to do the right thing politically by allowing adults who love one another to have access to civil marriage," Mehlman said in an interview with The Des Moines Register on Monday.

He spoke Monday evening at a public event at the Davis Brown law firm in Des Moines, Iowa. The crowd of about 40 included influential Republicans such as Eric Branstad, Steve Roberts, Stan Thompson, Christine and John Stineman and Eric Woolson.

Mehlman, who revealed he was gay in 2010, doesn't go as far as saying Republicans will lose future elections if they continue to crusade against same-sex marriage.

But it's indisputable that 53% of Americans support the freedom to marry for same-sex couples, he said.

Mehlman said he has been well received by a couple dozen senior-level Iowa Republicans. David Kochel, the top Iowa adviser for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, accompanied Mehlman to some of the meetings.

"People have been nice to my face," Mehlman, who is now a New York City businessman, said with a laugh.

But he declined to reveal who exactly he has met with since he arrived Sunday, noting "any issue in which people are evolving is always challenging for political leaders to deal with."

Mehlman has teamed up with two Iowa marriage equality groups, Iowa Republicans for Freedom and One Iowa, to expand the number of right-of-center Iowans promoting civil marriage.

It's a stance that runs contrary to the public statements most GOP officials make when they're campaigning in Iowa.

Since same-sex marriage was legalized by an April 2009 Iowa Supreme Court ruling, Republicans in the state Legislature have been trying to pass an amendment to the state constitution to ban same-sex marriage.

Such proposals have repeatedly died in the Democratic-led Iowa Senate -- to Iowans' applause.

About 4,500 same-sex couples have married in Iowa since the court ruling.

In February 2008, most Iowa adults -- 62% -- believed marriage should be only between a man and a woman, the Register's Iowa Poll showed.

In February 2012, just 36% of Iowans opposed the ruling that legalized same-sex marriage.

Kochel said Republicans need to recognize how the electorate feels about same-sex marriage "in order to move forward and field good candidates and win elections again."

Last fall, Kochel posted a yard sign in front of his Des Moines house to encourage a "yes" vote on retaining an Iowa justice who co-authored the marriage ruling. After the Nov. 6 election, he began to speak out publicly.

"If we're the party of freedom and liberty then we should be for personal freedom and individual liberty and that extends to marriage as far as I'm concerned," Kochel said Sunday on the WHO-TV politics show "The Insiders."

"You talk to younger people, they want to move past some of the old arguments we've been having on the culture wars," he said. "Frankly the culture wars are kind of over and Republicans largely lost."

Several Republicans ducked out the back door after a private reception with Mehlman on Monday evening.

At the public portion, in front of the TV cameras, Kochel said he's always been the guy in the back of the room helping candidates but he decided to step to the podium because the polling shows the GOP needs to be a more modern, inclusive party.

"I've had this position for a very long time, even longer than Barack Obama and Joe Biden," he said. "We're going to change a lot of attitudes. From one comes many."

Asked whether prominent Iowa Republicans such as U.S. Reps. Tom Latham and Steve King or U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley will shift their positions, Kochel said he's not sure.

"It'll probably take a little time for candidates to get there," he said, "but you also hear a lot of conversations off the record, people talking about how they'd like to move on past some of these old fights that we've been having and talk about new things."