Pastor Brad Brandon has earned a place on GLAAD’s Commentator Accountability Project.
Who is Brad Brandon? Well, he’s the Director of Church Outreach for Minnesota for Marriage, the anti-LGBT activist organization pushing Minnesota’s anti-marriage equality constitutional amendment, which goes before voters on November 6. He’s also the pastor of Berean Bible Baptist Church in Hastings, Minnesota. He’s also someone who has a record of saying some extreme things about LGBT people.
Pastor Brandon’s latest offense occurred during a series Minnesota for Marriage events, in which he compared marriage equality supporters to Hitler. He sees the lack of support for the anti-marriage equality amendment as an assault on his religious freedom. His direct quote:
[Hitler] removed their voices in the public square and removed their control of their own businesses. So, he stopped Jewish people from speaking out in public and he silenced them.
Pastor Brandon presented this comparison at least three times before an audience member, who lost a significant portion of her family in the Holocaust, pointed out how outrageous and offensive his comparison was.
Minnesota for Marriage has apologized for the Holocaust analogy, but not for the sentiment behind it.
This is not Pastor Brandon’s first or only offence. He has a history of wild, anti-gay claims. It is this repeated pattern that has earned him a spot on the Commentator Accountability Project. Some of his other offences:
- Claims gay people are using Bob the Builder and Dora the Explorer to get kids to "sign a pledge online" to say that they are "for the homosexual agenda and the homosexual movement in this country" because "Satan knows that if he gets the kids he gets the future. Even Adolf Hitler knew that."
- Claims to have witnessed a "group of homosexuals" teaching students that "masturbation is okay" at Minnesota's State Capitol
And in this radio clip, one can hear Pastor Brandon give the highlights tour of his extreme statements. In one radio episode, Pastor Brandon compares being LGBT with alcoholism, adultery, and pedophilia. He attacks the religious freedom of another church body for considering ordaining gay and lesbian clergy. And he just after he calls cartoon characters LGBT activists, he invokes Hitler.
Yes, Pastor Brandon’s use of “Hitler” to talk about LGBT people is not new. This radio clip is from 2009.
Pastor Brandon often appears as the religious face of Minnesota for Marriage, and claims that his anti-gay activism “is not about people.” Here he is discussing with Kalley Yanta, Minnesota for Marriage spokesperson his love for LGBT people.
However, in his public statements, Pastor Brandon frequently compares being gay to being an alcoholic, an adulterer or a pedophile.
Even though Pastor Brad Brandon and Minnesota for Marriage would like to say that their activism are simply about marriage and not people, the evidence of animus toward LGBT people is mounting. Reporters who are covering the amendment need to be aware of the claims that Pastor Brandon makes to drum up support for the anti-marriage amendment in Minnesota.
Pastor Brandon has joined fellow Minnesotans Barb Anderson, Chuck Darrell, Bradlee Dean, John Helmberger, and Tom Prichard on the Commentator Accountability Project. View the entire Commentator Accountability Project at www.glaad.org/cap.