Just now, the Montana House held its third and final vote on SB 107, a bill to repeal the state’s unconstitutional sodomy law. The final vote was 64–36, meaning there were still 36 lawmakers who believes that gay sex should remain criminal under law. As ThinkProgress reported Wednesday, the state’s only current openly LGBT lawmaker, Rep. Bryce Bennett (D) made an impassioned plea to remove the irrelevant but stigmatizing law while Republicans reiterated Biblical condemnations of homosexuality.
One other advocate for the repeal was Rep. Duane Ankney (R), who called the bill an “embarrassment” and talked about his desire to protect his lesbian daughter from such treatment:
ANKNEY: I raised five kids. The oldest is a daughter and I got four sons — three of them are veterans. And them four sons would give their last breath for my daughter to live her life in the way she chooses. To say she is any less of a person or she is a criminal for her lifestyle really upsets me. And for anybody that would feel that way upsets me. […]
I don’t think God thinks any less of my daughter than he does of any one of you in here. This bill is an embarrassment — the law is an embarrassment on the good people of Montana. It should go away and should go away as quietly as it can.
There are still three states who have laws that criminalize gay sex, and ten others that criminalize sexual acts such as oral and anal sex.