A Tea Party Leader's Antigay Past

Gabriel Jose Carrera, a high-profile Tea Party leader in Florida, once ran against a gay Connecticut state representative on a virulently antigay platform, the Broward-Palm Beach New Timesreports.

Carerra, a Fort Lauderdale Tea Party leader, "ran a campaign based strictly on my sexual orientation," said Evelyn Mantilla, the former state representative whom Carrera challenged in 1998. "He had a van with loudspeakers that repeated all these tired messages, letting people know that I was gay, letting people know he thought I was going to bring it into the schools, that it was a sin, that I would recruit people, untrue stuff."

In defense of his antigay political rhetoric, Carerra told the New Times,"I made some comments indicating that [Mantilla] married her female campaign manager and is this the type of person you want to have in office," Carrera said. "The media jumped on it because they wanted her to win and they didn't want the evil right wing to win."

Read the article here.