Nancy Pelosi on Supreme Court rulings

San Francisco married couple Bradford Wells and Anthony John Makk, who faced deportation to Australia, gave a special thank you to House minority leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco for intervening, and said today’s court rulings end 21 years of worry and fear. They also thanked Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Immigration Equality. “It’s a beautiful day,” Wells said, thanking the “ladies from California.”

Here’s Pelosi’s statement:

“Today, the Supreme Court bent the arc of history once again toward justice. The court placed itself on the right side of history by discarding Section 3 of the defenseless Defense of Marriage Act and by allowing marriage equality for all families in California. The highest court in the land reaffirmed the promise inscribed into its walls: ‘equal justice under law.’

“Soon, the federal government will no longer discriminate against any family legally married in the United States. California will join 12 other states and the District of Columbia in recognizing the fundamental rights of all families. Our country will move one step closer to securing equal protection for all of our citizens.

“Nearly 44 years to the day after the Stonewall Riots turned the nation’s attention to discrimination against LGBT Americans, the fight for equal rights took a giant step forward. Yet even with today’s victory at the Supreme Court, the struggle for marriage equality is not over. Whether in the courts or in state legislatures, we will not rest until men and women in every state are granted equal rights. We will keep working to ensure that justice is done for every American, no matter who they love.”

Carolyn Lochhead