Obama Is First Gay President, Says Newsweek

Time Magazine may have the “most controversial cover” title this week, but Newsweek isn’t too far behind. Newsweek called President Obama the United States’ first gay president this week in light of the president’s recent support of gay marriage.

Newsweek puts Obama under a rainbow halo on the new cover. (The CS Monitor notes that Obama is also on a rainbow themed cover of the New Yorker.)

But being the “first gay president” may not help (or hurt) the president come election season. Rep. Barney Frank, the first openly gay member of congress, said:

“If you were going to cast your vote based on a candidate’s position regarding same-sex marriage, you were already going to vote for Obama [or] Romney based on that. I literally don’t think anybody’s vote was changed by this one way or the other.”

The Inquisitr reported earlier this week that Obama’s stance on gay marriage may have a negative impact on his campaign. A recent Gallup poll showed that 26% of voters were less likely to vote for Obama due to his support of gay marriage. 60% said that it made no difference and 13% said that they were more likely to vote for him.

Obama’s support of gay marriage may not help him win an election, but according to the Newsweek story, it has comforted thousands of LGBT people around the country.

Andrew Sullivan, the openly gay writer who penned the Newsweek story, wrote on his blog last week.

“Let me simply say: I think of all the gay kids out there who now know they have their president on their side. I think of Maurice Sendak, who just died, whose decades-long relationship was never given the respect it deserved. I think of the centuries and decades in which gay people found it impossible to believe that marriage and inclusion in their own families was possible for them, so crushed were they by the weight of social and religious pressure. I think of all those in the plague years shut out of hospital rooms, thrown out of apartments, written out of wills, treated like human garbage because they loved another human being. I think of Frank Kameny. I think of the gay parents who now feel their president is behind their sacrifices and their love for their children.”

Do you think Obama is the “first gay president?” Does his stance on gay marriage change your opinion about him?