A Michigan state representative has announced his plans to introduce a resolution asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn marriage equality.
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Republican Rep. Josh Schriver announced on X, formerly Twitter, that he will be introducing the measure on Tuesday urging the court to reverse Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark 2015 ruling that guaranteed same-sex couples the right to marry, stating that it is supposedly "at odds with the sanctity of marriage, the Michigan Constitution, and principles upon which the country was established."
Schriver's resolution is nonbinding — meaning it carries no legal weight. It has 12 cosponsors in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, but it would not be able to pass the Democrat-controlled Senate or be signed by Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. Other states have introduced similar resolutions, but the Supreme Court has yet to agree to hear such a case again.
However, when the conservative Supreme Court majority created by Donald Trump overturned the national right to abortion in 2022, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in his concurring opinion at the time that the court should also revisit and overrule decisions that prevent state restrictions on contraception, marriage equality, sodomy, and other private consensual sex acts, calling the rulings "demonstrably erroneous."
Similar resolutions have been proposed in Republican state legislatures, such as Idaho, where the House of Representatives approved the measure. Northwestern LGBTQ+ advocacy group Pride Foundation's CEO, Katie Carter, previously told The Advocate that "the resolution, while non-binding, amounts to an amplified cultural attack against our community — and a foreshadowing of what’s to come for LGBTQ+ people across the United States."
Voters in Michigan did approve a constitutional amendment prohibiting marriages between same-sex couples in 2004, which was nullified by the 2015 Supreme Court ruling. If the Supreme Court were to overturn Obergefell, marriage equality would still be protected nationally by the Respect for Marriage Act, which passed in 2022 and was signed by President Joe Biden that December.
Schriver has previously spoken out against marriage equality, saying in December that the U.S. should “make gay marriage illegal again.” He claimed his stance was “not remotely controversial, nor extreme,” then called Obergefell a “perverted Supreme Court ruling,” asserting that “America 2124 doesn’t have to be as dysfunctional as America 2024.” The vast majority of Americans (over 69 percent) believe that same-sex couples should legally be allowed to marry, according to a 2024 survey from Gallup.
Schriver's introduction of the resolution comes in the midst of a racism scandal that's caused him to lose staff members as well as his committee assignment. Schriver posted online earlier this month a picture with a map of the world featuring Black people greatly outnumbering white people next to the phrase, "The great replacement!" The great replacement is a debunked white supremacist conspiracy theory that falsely asserts there is an ongoing effort to replace white people with minorities.
Whitmer denounced Schriver's proposal in a public statement on Instagram, stating that "we fought a long hard fight to win marriage equality, and we will always protect our family, our friends, and neighbors from hateful attacks."
"In Michigan, everyone has the freedom to marry who they love. It's not only the law of the land — it's a nonnegotiable," Whitmer said. "Right now, some extreme members of the Michigan Legislature are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn marriage equality. Here's my response to that: Hell no."
"No one should be fired from their job or evicted from their home because of who they love or who they are. This is personal for me just like so many Michiganders," continued the governor, whose daughter is a lesbian. "And I'm not gonna allow the people I love most in the world to have less rights than anyone else. That's just not how we do things in Michigan."
This article has been updated to include Whitmer's comments.
