Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson took the stage at a Ted Cruz rally in Iowa City on Sunday, calling marriage equality "evil," "wicked" and "sinful" before a cheering crowd.
According to the CNN Wire, Cruz enlisted Robertson to secure the evangelical vote in today's Iowa caucus. In a commercial endorsing Cruz, Robertson went duck hunting with the reality TV star and both donned black face paint. The pitch was essentially, he's one of us.
The patriarch of the A&E reality show who was briefly kicked off of it for racist and homophobic remarks hasn't shied from that kind of negative language on marriage equality. At Sunday's rally he said:
"Don't you understand that when a fellow like me looks at the landscape and sees the depravity, the perversion -- redefining marriage and telling us that marriage is not between a man and a woman? Come on Iowa! It's nonsense. It is evil. It's wicked. It's sinful and they want us to swallow it, you say. We have to run this bunch out of Washington, D.C. We have to rid the Earth of them."
Taking the stage after Robertson, Cruz did not directly address the comments, though Cruz is no stranger to homophobic rhetoric, having been named the "Phobie of the Year" in 2014 by The Advocate. He called Robertson "a joyful, cheerful, unapologetic voice of truth," according to CNN.
"What an extraordinary human being," Cruz reportedly said, "What a voice Phil has to speak out for the love of Jesus."
Watch Robertson in action:
