Gay Rights Groups presents NOM Exposed

HRC and the Courage Campaign have launched NOM Exposed. They are attacking NOM by exposing everything that make NOM... NOM.

The site looks great and they are just getting started. Here's some stuff from their site: Who's funding them?

NOM board members and its project, the Ruth Institute, have deep ties to the Mormon Church, including: Former president Maggie Gallagher sits on the board of the Marriage Law Foundation, a Utah-based legal group with ties to both Mormons and a shadowy campaign committee used in Utah’s 2004 marriage amendment fight. William Duncan and Monte Stewart, the founders of the Marriage Law Foundation, are both Mormon. In fact Stewart was formerly a Mormon stake president in Atlanta, Georgia.

Stewart and Duncan previously co-chaired Utahns for a Better Tomorrow (UBT), a committee that supported the 2004 Utah amendment to ban same-sex marriage. Substantial donations were funneled to UBT through a shadowy nonprofit named Marriage Education Initiatives that was formed just two weeks before the election. A complaint was filed with the Utah Attorney General alleging malfeasance, but nothing ever came of the investigation.

While famous Mormon writer Orson Scott Card currently sits on the NOM board, he replaced Matthew Holland, a Mormon with familial links to the Church’s hierarchy. As a founding NOM board member, Holland “hails from a family with strong connections to leadership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: His father is LDS Apostle and former BYU President Jeffrey Holland.” For his part, Card has advocated that homosexuality be criminalized.

An academic advisor to the Ruth Institute, a NOM project, Lynn Wardle, has been deeply involved with the Mormon Church’s strategy to defeat same-sex marriage wherever it arises since that strategy’s beginnings in mid-90’s Hawaii.

NOM was closely tied to the coalition that supported California’s Prop. 8 – a campaign that was significantly funded and powered by the Mormon Church. Financially, NOM received at least $60,000 in high-dollar donations from Mormons during that 2008 campaign, as well as $10,000 from Mormon politician – and aspiring presidential candidate – Mitt Romney for NOM’s efforts around Prop. 8. In fact, Mormonsfor8 found Mormons donated over half of ProtectMarriage’s (Prop. 8) campaign funds. Mormonsfor8.com identified $16,483,037.24 from Mormons donating over $1,000 each to ProtectMarriage.com, 51% of the total funds raised.

NOM was so closely identified with the Mormon Church that several newspapers throughout the 2008 Prop. 8 fight referred to NOM as a “Mormon group.” The Grand Rapids Press, The Sacramento Bee, and the Contra Costa Times all referred to NOM as a “Mormon group” or a “New Jersey-based Mormon group” during that volatile campaign.

They have more info that is very interesting. Please check it out, here

pic from JMG