Prop. 8 Hearing to Be Broadcast?

A court hearing next week over whether video of the 2010 Proposition 8 trial in San Francisco should be unsealed may itself be broadcast.

The Associated Press reports that U.S. district chief judge James Ware notified attorneys in the case that he would like to record Monday's proceedings on the matter. Lawyers representing backers of the antigay ballot initiative oppose the broadcast and have fought to keep sealed video of the trial, which includes testimony by leading LGBT scholars and a withering cross-examination of gay marriage opponent David Blankenhorn by attorney David Boies.

Judge Vaughn R. Walker, now retired, had recorded the trial, though the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that it could not be broadcast outside of federal district court viewing areas.

Prop. 8 backers have assailed Judge Walker's use of a three-minute video clip from the trial for a recent lecture and have demanded the recordings be turned over. They have also appealed Judge Ware's June ruling that Walker's opinion striking down the ballot measure cannot be vacated because he is gay. Gay jurists, Ware ruled, are "entitled to all the presumptions about impartiality and fairness as other judges."

Read the report here.