Here Is Mike Pence’s Questionable 2000 Proposal On HIV/AIDS Funding

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During his first successful run for Congress in 2000, now-Indiana Gov. Mike Pence wrote on his website in a section on LGBT issues that money from a program to help those with HIV/AIDS should go to organizations “which provide assistance to those seeking to change their sexual behavior.”

Pence is reportedly a finalist to be Donald Trump’s running mate.

Pence also wrote that he opposed same-sex marriage and extending minority protections to LGBT individuals. BuzzFeed News first tweeted about the section last year.

Here’s how the section read:

• Congress should oppose any effort to put gay and lesbian relationships on an equal legal status with heterosexual marriage.

• Congress should oppose any effort to recognize homosexual’s as a “discreet and insular minority” entitled to the protection of anti-discrimination laws similar to those extended to women and ethnic minorities.

• Congress should support the reauthorization of the Ryan White Care Act only after completion of an audit to ensure that federal dollars were no longer being given to organizations that celebrate and encourage the types of behaviors that facilitate the spreading of the HIV virus. Resources should be directed toward those institutions which provide assistance to those seeking to change their sexual behavior.

The Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program according to its federal page “works with cities, states and local community-based organizations to provide HIV care and treatment services to more than 512,000 each year, reaching approximately 52% of all those diagnosed with HIV in the United States.”

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