California Governor Gavin Newsom joined other political leaders and LGBTQ+ advocates in San Francisco on Friday to promote the Freedom to Marry ballot initiative.
Although same-sex marriages have occurred in California over the past two decades, the state constitution still says gay couples cannot marry.
The ballot initiative would enshrine in the state constitution that all couples have the right to marry, regardless of gender or ethnicity, in addition to repealing 2008’s Proposition 8, which defined marriage as a union between one man and one woman.
At the event also attended by San Francisco Mayor London Breed and Senator Scott Wiener, Newsom said this is critical given current efforts to roll back LGBTQ+ rights across the country.
“It is a recognition of the urgency of this moment, and states are on the front lines of this fight for rights,” Newsom said. “And that is why it is imperative that states like us stand up and stand up for themselves at this critical time.”
The initiative was announced last February on a date that coincided with the 20th anniversary of when then-San Francisco Mayor Newsom performed California’s first same-sex weddings, setting off a legal battle to legalize same-sex marriage. More than 4,000 couples got married in just the first month.
