Republican Group
Invites Antigay Leader to Speak

A local chapter of a California conservative group has invited a controversial antigay leader to speak at an upcoming meeting. The Murrieta-Temecula Republican Assembly asked Scott Lively, whose work maintains that the Nazis were gay-friendly, to address its members in Riverside County.

The initial meeting, scheduled for April 3 at the Temeku Hills Golf Course and Country Club, was canceled by the venue on Tuesday after threats of demonstrations against Lively.

Assembly president Bob Kowell told the Press-Enterprise that the group still intends to host Lively, at a location to be determined, perhaps privately.

Lively, a former Temecula resident who now lives in Massachusetts, founded the antigay group Abiding Truth Ministries, which is listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. He is the coauthor of the book The Pink Swastika , which argues, against known historical facts, that gay people held privileged positions in the Third Reich.