House GOP Has Wasted $1.5M Defending DOMA

Ever since the President and the Department of Justice made their decision public that the so-called Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional in February 2011, the House Republicans, led by Speaker John Boehner have been paying superlawyer Paul Clement to defend the federal statute in federal court. The Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group of the U.S. House (BLAG) authorized $1.5 million to defend DOMA and today comes word they have basically spent $1,447,996.73 of that amount.

BLAG has not gotten much for spending  nearly $1.5 million of taxpayer funds to defend discrimination, because DOMA has been declared unconstitutional by 5 courts in at least 3 federal circuits (the 9th, 1st and 2nd) with the most prominent loss at the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Gill v. Office of Personnel Management (along with the companion case Massachusetts v DHHS) widely expected to be taken up by the United States Supreme Court in its current term.

The Democrats in the U.S. House, led by former Speaker Nancy Pelosi have vociferously opposed the legal actions by BLAG as well as the wasteful spending of federal taxpayers to defend a statute which has been declared unconstitutional by multiple federal judges, is opposed in court by the Attorney General of the United States and whose repeal has been endorsed by the President of the United States.

Hat/tip to Washington Blade.