Washington (AP) White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer on Thursday said the White House was not making any policy on same sex marriage, saying the administration was focused on the Affordable Care Act.
“We are still making a lot of decisions about what is the best way to get the ACA out there, but I think that the ACA is the number one priority of the administration and that we are making decisions on that as we go through the rollout,” Spicer said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“And so, I think what I can tell you is that we do not have a position on that, that is a decision for the president to make.”
He also declined to say whether the administration would seek to ban same-gender couples from marrying, a suggestion that was made by a member of President Donald Trump’s transition team.
Spicer’s remarks come a day after President Donald J. Trump signed into law a measure repealing the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which bans same-year same- and opposite-sex couples from wed.
The measure would make same- sex couples the legal parents of children born out of wedlock and bar them from receiving Social Security benefits or unemployment benefits.
The bill was designed to protect marriage between a man and a woman, but critics said it would have unintended consequences by creating a pathway for gay and lesbian couples to marry.
In his remarks, Spicer acknowledged the impact of DOMA on marriages, saying, “we’ve seen the damage that that has done to the lives of so many people.”
“That is the issue that we’re focused on.
And I think when you look at the facts, we’re very much focused on that issue, and the issue of DOMAs impact on marriages,” he added.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
