State Rep. Matt Krause
Fort Worth Republican Matt Krause was recently named the worst legislator in the state House on LGBT issues by Equality Texas.
Krause called last Thursday night after the deadline for the story, but we were able to connect Friday and discuss the ranking, as well as his views on some LGBT issues. Until now Krause, who’s worked for the anti-gay Liberty Counsel, was perhaps best known in the community for his representation of Dakota Ary, a Fort Worth student accused of harassing a gay teacher.
Krause attributes the ranking to his amendment to SB 215 that started out as HB 360 and would have allowed student groups to determine who to allow into clubs based on sexual orientation, race and gender.
“Their rankings are up to them. They use the criteria of the votes of the issue they want to , so I can’t really disagree with them. I think if you talk to anybody, you wouldn’t find that I’m hateful toward the LGBT community, that I have any type of disregard for them,” Krause said. “It’s nothing that I do out of animosity. It’s just what I feel is constitutionally sound, but I think there’s a lot of people, maybe with Equality Texas, that think I don’t like them or appreciate them for who they are. That’s not true. But if they want to give me the worst legislator ranking, that’s their prerogative and completely up to them.”
HB 360 was rewritten and a substitute made it out of committee, but the bill didn’t make it onto the floor. The amendment was then created to allow universities to not follow “all-comers” policies. Krause said he should have monitored the bill’s original language more closely because the intent was not to discriminate but to not force groups from admitting people who would undermine the club’s purposes.
“When the draft came back and it said, you know, race, gender and sexual orientation, we should have known right then that’s not the language we wanted to use,” Krause said. “It was never my intent for a political group to be able to discriminate against someone because of their sexual orientation or an athletic group being able to discriminate on the basis of race, something that had nothing to do with the actual club.”
He said the inspiration for the bill was the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court case Christian Legal Society v. Martinez where he agreed with the dissent. He said a Christian fraternity BYX (Brother Under Christ) at Texas State and the University of North Texas was in contact with his office about their almost not being allowed on campus because the pledge they made members sign.
“I think everybody saw that first draft and they saw that and it did have that discriminatory language in there and that’s what they keyed on,” Krause said, adding that he failed to explain that schools still would have had to follow their nondiscrimination policies. “It doesn’t touch nondiscrimination policies in place on college campuses and things like that, so I think that was the real crux behind it, the initial language and just the frustration and things from that draft kind of tainted everything going forward.”
Krause was also a co-author of Rep. Drew Springer’s HB 1568 that aimed to defund school districts that offer domestic partner benefits. He said the issue was similar to when he worked with El Paso citizens as a member of the Liberty Counsel when they challenged a measure to offer the benefits a few years ago. He said it violates state’s constitutional amendment.
“Right now in Texas we have a constitutional amendment that says we don’t recognize any relationship that’s not marriage between one man and one woman,” he said. “And so when we get into domestic partner benefits, if Texas wants to change its laws, then that’s all well and good and I then think that opens up that door. But until Texas changes its law, then I think it’s unlawful for municipalities, local government, state government to offer marriage-type benefits to relationships that aren’t recognized in Texas as marriage.”
When asked if he would support an effort to repeal the marriage amendment, he said he would not. He also said he doesn’t support civil unions.
“I think it’s sound public policy. I know a lot of people disagree with me, but I think having that traditional definition of marriage is a good thing, and so I wouldn’t seek to repeal that,” he said.
Krause did say he wanted to help in instances where someone’s property was in danger of not going to their partner or if they couldn’t see their partner in the hospital.
“That’s an area where I feel like we could definitely work together because I feel like if it’s your property or if you’re the person in the hospital on your deathbed, you should definitely be able to have anybody there that you want,” he said.
Asked about his stances on DP benefits and statewide LGBT job protections — which he’s also against because there’s “a lot of pitfalls and a lot of vague areas” with them — he says he doesn’t consider his viewpoints anti-gay.
“Now there’s issues we obviously disagree on and probably because of that people will never fully say, ‘OK, he’s fine,’ but I don’t feel like I’m anti-gay,” he said. “I don’t have any animosity or hatred or fear of people in same-sex relationships or of a different sexual orientation than I am, so I’m sure if I sponsor amendments like I have or sign onto bill’s like Rep. Springer’s we’ll all get labeled that, but I don’t think that’s a true reflection of necessarily who I am or what I feel.”
His bill and amendment have opened up dialogue with his LGBT constituents who contacted him about the measures. He said he treated them with respect even though he disagreed with them and hopes more of his LGBT constituents reach out to him.
“I am ready and willing and open to helping anybody in District 93 who needs help regardless of their sexual orientation and if there’s anybody out here that needs anything from our office, please don’t hesitate to contact our office,” Krause said.
