CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN SENATOR IN FIRESTORM OVER SEXUAL IDENTITY, DRUNK DRIVING ARREST
6 March 2010By Susan Ferriss
The Sacramento Bee
A prominent Republican state senator arrested on suspicion of drunken driving this week in Sacramento has taken a personal leave through Sunday from the upper house.
State Sen. Roy Ashburn of Bakersfield, a 14-year veteran of the Legislature, was arrested at about 2 a.m. Wednesday while driving his state-issued car near the state Capitol.
Ashburn later issued a written apology, but the arrest catapulted his personal life into a very public spotlight.
State Sen. Roy Ashburn, a divorced father,
has refused to discuss rumors he is gay.
A Sacramento TV station reported that unnamed sources saw Ashburn at a gay bar the night before the arrest, setting off a media frenzy that stretched from the blogosphere to late-night television talk shows.
Ashburn’s hometown paper, the Bakersfield Californian, printed excerpts from an unpublished interview he did last year in which the divorced father declined to address rumors he was gay.
“Why would that be anyone’s business?” he told a columnist. “I think there are certain subjects that are simply not relevant, and this is one of them.”
But in a world where activists have the ability to instantly hold politicians accountable for any inconsistency between their public actions and personal behavior, some say sexual orientation is entirely relevant.
West Sacramento Mayor Christopher Cabaldon, an openly gay Democrat, told The Bee and other media he had spotted Ashburn at other gay bars in Sacramento in recent months.
“I don’t think it’s a scandal for an elected official to be gay,” Cabaldon said. “But if you’re going to vote against every piece of hate-crimes legislation (to protect gays), that’s hypocritical.”
In the interview, Ashburn said he didn’t believe he had been a staunch anti-gay activist, insisting the way he had voted on social issues reflected his constituents’ views.
Ashburn, who is in his last year representing a bedrock conservative region, organized a Traditional Values Coalition rally in Bakersfield in 2005 to support a proposed constitutional amendment that year to prohibit gay marriage.
Ashburn also touted his support for Proposition 22, a gay-marriage ballot initiative, calling himself a co-sponsor at the 2000 measure.
Equality California, a gay rights group, gave Ashburn a “zero percent” for his 2009 voting record.
Ashburn voted against bills that included expanding California’s mental health services for gay youths and measures to protect gay prisoners from violence – which won some GOP votes – and creating a day to honor slain gay activist Harvey Milk.
An Ashburn aide said Friday the senator had no response to questions about his sexual orientation, adding that aides didn’t know if Ashburn would appear Monday for a Senate floor session.
State GOP activist Jon Fleischman, who runs the conservative Flash Report Web site, said Ashburn’s career in politics was already damaged because he angered GOP loyalists by voting for a tax increase last year.
“That puts you in a coffin,” Fleischman said. If Ashburn is gay, he said, “it’s like hammering nails into it.”
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