Arnold Schwarzenegger waded deeper into the debate over same-sex marriages, directing the state attorney general to take immediate legal steps to stop San Francisco from granting marriage licenses to gay couples.
Schwarzenegger told a cheering crowd at the state GOP convention that “in San Francisco, the courts are dropping the ball.”
“It’s time for the city to stop traveling down this dangerous path of ignoring the rule of law. That’s my message to San Francisco,” he said Friday night.
Schwarzenegger’s directive to Attorney General Bill Lockyer was prompted in part by a judge’s decision not to impose a temporary restraining order that would have halted San Francisco’s weeklong parade of 3,175 same-sex weddings, said Rob Stutzman, Schwarzenegger’s communications director.
A spokeswoman for Lockyer told the Los Angeles Times that the attorney general’s office planned to seek a judgment soon declaring the city’s action a violation of state law, but said Schwarzenegger had no authority over the elected Democrat.
Peter Ragone, a spokesman for San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, scoffed at Schwarzenegger’s directive.
Amazing. California is in danger of becoming a Third World political system. Between the farcical recall procedure they just went through, a mayor openly flouting the law, the courts refusing to enforce the law, and the attorney general and a mayor simply ignoring executive orders, the state is in virtual anarchy.
