Franklin Graham threatens arena with legal action as they cancel yet another stop on his ‘hate speech’ tour
Hate preacher Franklin Graham. (Justin Sullivan/Getty)
US hate preacher Franklin Graham has reportedly threatened legal action against a Scottish venue after it cancelled one of his performances due to homophobia concerns.
The Trump-supporting preacher, who is known for praising Vladimir Putin’s anti-gay laws and blaming gay people for a “moral 9/11”, is set to visit the UK at the start of Pride Month in June as part of an eight-day evangelist tour.
So far three venues have cancelled his performances as a result of growing backlash led by LGBT+ activists. The latest to withdraw was Glasgow’s SEC Arena, which confirmed on January 29 it was cancelling due to “recent adverse publicity”.
It’s understood the arena’s administration also expressed fears about the event damaging the city’s reputation.
According to the Scotsman, Graham said he would still be coming to Glasgow and urged the SEC Arena to reconsider or find themselves in court.
He said there was “no question” that the council and venue bosses were “discriminating against Christians”, and the cancellation was “unfortunate because it’s based on heresy and false accusations by just a very small group of people”.
Franklin Graham, a man who has declared that gay people are “the enemy” of civilisation, insisted: “I don’t preach hate speech. We’re not coming to speak against anybody, everybody is invited to our meetings – we’re inclusive.
“Though this venue may be cancelled we have not pulled out of Glasgow – we’re coming. We do have options legally. We’ll certainly pursue those options. We would rather not do that. We don’t like having to do that.
“We would hope that the people of the SSE Hydro would reconsider because we do have a contract and we’ve done nothing or have said nothing that would cause them to breach that contract.
“We just need to pray that God will intervene and that we’ll be able to move forward.”
Graham also hit out at protesters who had campaigned against the event. “The other side talk about how tolerant they are and how inclusive they are, but they are the least tolerant, the least inclusive people in the UK,” he said.
PinkNews has requested comment from the four further venues that have yet to cancel Graham’s planned performances – Birmingham Arena, Utilita Arena in Newcastle, Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes and ICC Wales in Newport.
