The fallout from the anti-gay comments of Sen. Chris Buttars continues as Senate Republicans met behind closed doors for more than two hours Monday morning to air their concerns and share their feelings about the comments.
"Just about everyone in the caucus expressed his or her feelings relating to the issue, and I think it was a venting process," said Sen. Peter Knudson of Brigham City. "I think everyone came away feeling their position had been vented."
Buttars has been under fire for a week now, after he told a documentary filmmaker that gays pose the greatest internal threat to the country, lack morals, are demanding special rights and engage in disgusting sexual practices.
Senate leaders had hoped to put the issue behind them last week, after Senate President Michael Waddoups, R-Taylorsville, stripped Buttars of his chairmanship and membership on the Senate judiciary committee and the judicial confirmation committee.
"We all very much consider this a significant wrench thrown into the middle of an otherwise very productive session," said Senate Majority Leader Sheldon Killpack, R-Syracuse.
But Killpack said there were lingering emotions and members who felt they had viewpoints that hadn't been fully aired, and he takes the blame for not providing that opportunity.
"I think I can say that, to a person, everyone in our caucus supports traditional marriage," said Senate Assistant Majority Whip Greg Bell, R-Fruit Heights. "Many of us, however, feel the tenor, the examples, some of the phrasing that Senator Buttars used in his controversial comments were intolerate and immoderate. We disagree with the element of divisiveness and of controversy that he injected."
Senate Minority Leader Pat Jones, D-Salt Lake City, said her party still has concerns about how the issue was handled, which they have raised with Waddoups. They suggested specific steps they would like to see taken, but she would not say what those recommendations were until she heard back from him.
Waddoups said Democrats' views would be considered but noted they make up just eight of the Senate's 29 members.
Buttars, who has said he disagreed with the decision to punish him for his comments and refused to apologize for the statements, sat through the GOP caucus, in which members of the fractured body expressed their concerns about his comments and how the situation was handled.
"I would say the discussions were very candid and very direct and there was no question as to individuals, how they felt about this current situation, about how they felt about what we need to do going forward," Killpack said.
Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, said on a radio show he hosts Saturday that Buttars was not reprimanded for the content of his comments, but for violating an agreement with Senate leaders not to speak publicly on gay issues because he had become a "lightning rod" on those issues.
At a daylong, pre-session caucus, Buttars struck a deal with leaders to keep his mouth shut on gay issues, but it only lasted about a month before his interview with the filmmaker.
