The Republicans Have A Presidential Candidate They're Trying To Keep In The Closet

Although we featured it the other day, I bet you haven't heard too many prominent Democratic politicians railing against Republican state legislator Gregory Sorg's bill to deny New Hampshire students the right to vote. Oddly, a lifelong movement conservative and GOP operative running for the Republican presidential nomination told students in New Hampshire he advocates a constitutional amendment to lower the voting age to 16. Meet Fred Karger (ignored by the GOP Establishment he once served, but profiled in yesterday Guardian).

There is no doubting Karger's Republican credentials. He has spent his life working for the party's cause as a top strategist. Like Karl Rove, he was a disciple of the controversial Republican tactician Lee Atwater. Indeed, Karger played a key role in publicising the "Willie Horton" adverts that destroyed the Democratic candidate Michael Dukakis in 1988. Horton was a jailed murderer let out on a Dukakis-backed weekend release programme in Massachusetts who committed armed robbery, assault and rape while at large. Karger toured the country with relatives of Horton's victims, dealing a fatal blow to Dukakis's image. He does not regret it for a moment. "No, not in the least," he said with a smile.

Some might say he was lucky to be excluded from speaking at the bedbug-infested CPAC shindig this past weekend, but Karger is serious about his run and is aghast that homophobes have the power to keep him out of the contention. He's gay-- openly so, unlike so many GOP closet cases from notorious queens like Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and David Dreier (R-CA) to deeply hidden frauds like Patrick McHenry (R-NC) and Trent Franks (R-AZ)... and he's pro-gay.

Karger is already at work in Iowa and New Hampshire, the key first states in the nomination process. He has visited Iowa five times and New Hampshire 11 times in the past year. He has had aired TV adverts (the only potential candidate to do so) and held town hall meetings, attracted volunteers and even hired staff.

He is bluntly honest about the fact that he is a virtual unknown. His campaign slogan adorning the T-shirts, badges and frisbees he gives out asks: "Fred who?" Yet it's a strategy that has earned him a wave of positive press coverage, including a profile in the Washington Post. Karger knows that winning the 2012 Republican nomination as a proud proclaimed gay man is a long shot. But getting in the televised candidate debates might not be. By the spring he will probably have a ground operation, a media presence, campaign funds in the bank, a staff and a headquarters. That will allow Karger to put gay rights, including gay marriage, on the table in a party that usually contents itself with bluntly dismissing them. To say the least, it will make interesting viewing and unsettle the big names. "I will take the gloves off if necessary," he said. He believes his campaign can raise $5m.

Since coming out several years ago, Karger has been a vocal campaigner for gay rights and a high-profile critic of organisations, especially the Mormon church, that oppose gay marriage.
Perhaps, then, it is no wonder the Republican establishment is trying its best to exclude him. Last week's meeting of the influential Conservative Political Action Committee in Washington did not invite Karger to speak, though Karger used the snub to generate media attention to his cause. "I cannot help but think that I have been excluded solely because I happen to be gay... I am not some two-headed monster. I want to squash the anti-gay rhetoric," he said.

During his trips to Iowa and New Hampshire, often speaking to gay student groups, Karger noticed that he was getting a lot of emails from young gay people saying his ambitions had helped their lives where they faced prejudice and bullying. Karger remembered feeling isolated when he was closeted for most of his life and does not want others to go through that experience. Having an openly gay man run for the presidency is vital, he believes, even if he fails.

He says the symbolism of paving the way is important, just like it has been with pioneering but ultimately unsuccessful women such as Hillary Clinton and black candidates like the Rev Jesse Jackson. Somewhere in America, Karger hopes, a young gay person will see his run and think: I can do that, too, one day. "I am doing this for younger people," says Karger. "I am fine now. I am happy in my skin. But when I was growing up it was hell. I don't want anyone to go through that. That is what motivates me to make my voice heard. No more Mr Nice Gay."

But not all gays are all that enthusiastic about Karger, once an active and vicious homophobe in the Republican hate machine, running as the reformed hay candidate inside the Party of Hatred and Bigotry.

After spending 27 years in opposition research (i.e. digging up dirt on your clients' opponents to destroy their campaigns), which included the presidential runs for Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984, and battling anti-smoking campaigns, Karger at last decided to go public with his internal conflict.

But he led a double life for decades: Savvy, straight-acting strategist at work, gay man who had long-term relationships and wrote checks to LGBT causes at home. "It was hell," Fred says. "I was so uncomfortable and so cautious... I would go to gay pride parades and always look for cameras, and hide in the background. I had a fit if my picture was taken."

These two lives didn't unite until a couple of years after he retired at age 53. He wanted to "give back" and do something "significant," so in 2006 he organized a local coalition to save a historic gay bar near his residence in Laguna Beach, Calif. In 2008 he formed the nonprofit Californians Against Hate to battle Proposition 8, the state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. He used his opposition-research skills to launch a boycott of San Diego hotelier Doug Manchester and shame the Mormon Church for funneling cash to advance Prop 8.

[...] For years, the opposition was his candidate's challenger or his client's economic foe. These days, his chosen nemesis is Brian Brown, executive director for the National Organization for Marriage, which is pushing for a repeal of New Hampshire's same-sex marriage bill now that the state house has a Republican supermajority.

...[L]ike Ken Mehlman, Fred spent much of his career-- and generated most of his earnings-- playing for anti-gay Republicans. But-- BUT!-- insists Fred, he was still helping out the gays. Anonymously. Donating to LGBT causes.

I'm not rushing out to change my party registration so I can vote for him in the GOP primary, especially since he has no answers on any issues facing the country... except about how much he likes gay marriage... and that he favors giving 16 year olds the right to vote and donated to Hillary Clinton.