Obama Reaches Out To Gay Community, Withholds Same-Sex Marriage Endorsement

President Barack Obama defended his administration’s record on gay rights during an appearance Thursday evening before LGBT Democratic donors in New York, but declined to explicitly endorse the right for same-sex couples to marry.

After being urged by several hecklers in the audience to address gay marriage, Obama noted that his administration is no longer defending the Constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, a law that blocks the federal government from requiring other states to recognize same sex couple’s marriages.

Emphasizing that “gay couples deserve the same legal rights as every other couple in this country,” Obama described the law as “wrong” and “unfair” and said that it should be repealed.

The President voiced support for state efforts to determine policy on marriages, including New York, whose state legislature is currently weighing a decision.

“New York is doing exactly what democracies are supposed to do,” Obama said. “There’s a debate;  there’s deliberation about what it means here in New York to treat people fairly in the eyes of the law.”

Listing off the advances his administration has made in the gay rights arena, and adding that many in the LGBT community doubted their efforts, Obama said that if the LGBT community supported his 2012 campaign, he would help them write “another chapter” in American progress.