Barney Frank: Anti-gay lawmakers in the closet have ‘no right to privacy’
The first openly gay congressman in US history has lambasted homophobic lawmakers who remain in the closet – and said they should be “exposed”.
Barney Frank, who served as a member of the US House of Representatives from Massachusetts from 1981 to 2013, weighed in on controversy surrounding Republican Aaron Schock.
Mr Schock – who has resigned from Congress ahead of an investigation over alleged financial irregularities – faced scrutiny last month when he breached regulations to bring his male “full-time personal photographer” on a trip.
Barney Frank raised the Republican’s record of anti-gay votes and comments, telling ABC: “When you are in public office and you vote opposite to the way you live your life, I don’t think you have privacy.
“Anyone who is gay and votes in an anti-gay fashion has, it seems to me, lost their right to privacy, because it’s been converted to a right to hypocrisy.”
Mr Frank also defended his previous jokes about Mr Schock’s homoerotic Instagram feed, saying earlier this week: “If [the rumours] are not true, he spent entirely too much time in the gym for a straight man.”
He told the network: “I don’t think it’s a terrible thing, and now that I’m not in public office, I feel free to make jokes.
“It’s a joke… making fun of gay men who obsess about being in the gym, and it did seem to me that it was an unusual thing.
“I don’t know many straight guys who spend that much time in the gym and pose with their shirts off all the time.”
