Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

New GOP boss says party accepts gays

Gays and lesbians have long criticized the Republican Party for excluding people whose lifestyles don't fit a rigid definition of "mainstream."

But Dan Burdish, a 45-year-old gay Las Vegan who will become executive director of the Nevada Republican Party Monday, said no one in the GOP has ever made him feel like an outsider.

"I have not had one problem with inclusion in the Republican Party," Burdish said. "There is a segment that wants to have nothing to do with gays, but I have not seen that."

Burdish is former president and a current member of the local branch of Log Cabin, an organization of gay Republicans.

In its three years of existence, Log Cabin members have been invited to all county and state GOP functions, Burdish said.

Burdish even supports presumptive GOP presidential nominee Bob Dole, who created a stir last fall when his campaign staff rejected a financial contribution from national Log Cabin Republicans. Dole later apologized to the gay community, though the organization continued to withhold its contribution.

Burdish predicts the group will contribute to the Kansas senator's campaign after his nomination at the GOP convention in August. Burdish also noted that Dole has signed a pledge not to discriminate against his congressional staff members on the basis of sexual orientation. The pact was sponsored by the Human Rights Campaign, a national gay and lesbian organization.

Burdish further criticized Candace Gingrich, the lesbian sister of GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., for accusing House Republicans in January of being "largely unfriendly to gays as far as equal protection and not being committed to fighting against AIDS."

"I think she's dead wrong," Burdish said. "As far as AIDS funding, it was not cut. In fact, it was increased."

The Republican-led Congress has also come under fire for not approving the proposed Employee Non-Discrimination Act, which covers sexual orientation. But Burdish said the bill has been debated for a half dozen years and wasn't passed under a Democratic-controlled Congress either.

Burdish, a partner in City View Partnership Inc., a general contractor, has lived in Las Vegas for 26 years. In 1994, he was a member of Campaign For Liberty, which helped defeat a statewide initiative to prevent gays and lesbians from obtaining minority status.

Burdish considers himself both right-wing and Christian but not a member of the so-called religious right. He concedes there is a "significant minority" of Republicans who feel threatened by gays.

But that did not stop fellow Republicans from electing him last year as treasurer of the Clark County GOP.

Nevada Party Chairman John Mason said he believes the Republican "tent" has always been open to gays.

"The faction that takes the most extreme moral position is about 15 to 18 percent of our party," Mason said. "If you looked at the numbers in the primary, that's the range of the Pat Buchanan vote."

He called Burdish the best person for the full-time, $40,000-a-year job to replace Charles Muth of Las Vegas, who will remain the state party's communications director.

"It wasn't an issue of whether he was gay," Mason said of Burdish. "Someone's sexual orientation or color of their skin is not what I look for in a Republican to determine if they're good for the job."

Muth said "a few squeaky wheels" may voice opposition to Burdish's selection, but that Burdish is a proven leader respected for his abilities.

"This just goes to show that contrary to what liberals and Democrats want people to believe, Republicans are open-minded and don't focus on the race or the sexual preference of a person," Muth said.

Burdish, who became involved in Republican politics during President Richard Nixon's re-election campaign in 1972, has served on both the county and state GOP central committees and on the state platform committee.

Burdish

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