The Values Voter Summit is an annual event that brings together some of the most extreme anti-LGBT voices and organizations with some of the mainstream conservative movement's most well-known political figures.
GLAAD is one of seven organizations signed onto an open letter published today asking Chairman Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee chair, to ask Republican officials to disassociate themselves from the groups behind the upcoming Values Voter Summit.
The letter, published today in the Washington Post and The Hill, begins by referencing Priebus' predecessor who called for party members to shun the Council of Conservative Citizens because of the group's "racist views."
Now, the letter asks for Priebus to shun the Summit because "these groups engage in repeated, groundless demonization of LGBT people--portraying them as sick, vile, incestuous, violent, perverted, and a danger to the nation."
The anti-LGBT Family Research Council, which hosts the Summit, has called the "It Gets Better" campaign--designed to encourage LGBT students-- "disgusting" and a "concerted effort" to "recruit" children into the LGBT "lifestyle." Several of the extreme statements of the staff of the Family Reserach Council, including Tony Perkins, Peter Sprigg, and Gary Baur have been featured in GLAAD's Commentator Accountability Project.
The letter cites other anti-LGBT organizations that are attending the summit, including the American Family Association and the Liberty Counsel.
The letter ends by asking, "Will you live up to your own words and tell the members of your party to shun groups that demean other people and deny them dignity? Wil the GOP condemn anti-LGBT bigotry as vigorously as it opposed racism 15 years ago?"
You can read the letter below:
