WASHINGTON — Even as the NAACP engages in a tense debate over the issue of same-sex marriage, the group’s leaders have begun reaching out more forcefully to gay-rights groups.
The outreach has been steered by former chairman Julian Bond and the group’s president, Benjamin Jealous. Both men are supporters of same-sex marriage rights, though the NAACP’s national board has taken no stance on the issue.
Jealous, who is helping to lead a march for jobs and justice in Washington next month, was to be in New York on Wednesday night to encourage members of the city’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center to attend the rally.
“The NAACP is opposed to discrimination in all its forms,” Jealous said in an e-mail, adding: “We recognize that many of our members are also members of the LGBT community, and just as the LGBT community counts on us to stand with it for basic civil rights protections, so we count on the LGBT community to stand with us in our unified struggle for the broader civil rights agenda.”
Other members of the NAACP have resisted supporting same-sex marriage and, more broadly, gay rights. The Washington Post
