Same-sex marriage has been in the spotlight since President Barack Obama announced his support for it to ABC News last week. Majority Leader Sen. Loretta Weinberg, who has been a strong supporter of gay rights in New Jersey, says she is hopeful the state will allow same-sex marriage, either through a veto override or the governor having a change of heart. She spoke with NJ Today Managing Editor about marriage equality and equal pay legislation that would require women to receive the same salary as men for the same work.
Weinberg said she believes the Marriage Equality Bill will be able to survive a veto, though she also said she hoped Gov. Chris Christie would think about his position against same-sex marriage, talking to young people especially.
“The president who leads our nation arrived at the appropriate decision to announce his public support of marriage equality,” she said. “He is in the same place that the majority of our nation and I really believe the majority of our state is in support of marriage equality.”
Weinberg said she hopes the Senate will gain enough votes to override Christie’s veto, especially if legislators wait until after the primaries. “I think we’ve got time to post this override and I think we’re going to take advantage of that time. And when we do decide to post it for a vote, I think it will be because we think we have the requisite amount of votes to override a veto,” she said.
Weinberg said the bill is about equality, which Christie should think about. “For the governor of the state of New Jersey — a state that’s really essentially a blue state — I would hope that he might look up the word “evolve” in the dictionary and come along on some increased understanding of these issues and not kind of mock the word because it’s a really good word that all of us should be doing throughout our lives,” she said.
Weinberg also discussed equal pay legislation, which passed in the Assembly and was just introduced in the Senate. “Why should women on average be paid only 70 cents on the dollar for every dollar that a man earns?” she asked, pointing out unequal pay results in vastly different pensions and Social Security benefits. “This is very important to the women in the state of New Jersey based on longevity who like myself will live beyond the earning capacities of their husbands or partners. So I think it’s important and I’m looking forward to getting these bills signed and the governor kind of intimated that maybe he’d even support it. So we’ll see.”
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