Same-Sex Opponent Now Backs Gay Marriage

(AP)  Mayor Jerry Sanders abruptly reversed his public opposition to marriage for same-sex partners and signed a City Council resolution supporting a challenge to California's gay marriage ban after revealing his adult daughter is a lesbian.

Sanders, who previously promised to veto the Council resolution, said Wednesday that he could no longer back the position he took during his election campaign two years ago, when he said he favored civil unions but not full marriage rights for homosexual couples.

The mayor, a Republican former police chief, fought back tears as he said he wanted his adult daughter, Lisa, and other gay people he knows to have their relationships protected equally under state laws.

"In the end, I could not look any of them in the face and tell them that their relationships - their very lives - were any less meaningful than the marriage that I share with my wife Rana," Sanders said.

Lisa Sanders was unavailable for comment, according to the mayor's spokesman, Fred Sainz. He said she had told her parents four years ago that she is a lesbian and is currently in a committed relationship, but her orientation wasn't public until her father's speech.

The mayor, who is up for re-election next year, acknowledged that many voters who supported his earlier stance may disagree with his shift, but said he had to do what he believed was right.

In 2000, 62 percent of San Diego voters endorsed a statewide measure to restrict marriage to a union between a man and woman.

The City Council voted Tuesday 5-3 in favor of joining other California cities to back a lawsuit pending before the California Supreme Court attempting to overturn the gay marriage ban.

By Karl Ritter