Anti same-sex marriage campaigners falsely accuse Barack Obama of supporting their agenda

The Greater Than campaign, which seeks to overturn same-sex marriage in the US, has wrongly used a 2010 Barack Obama quote to suggest he supports its anti-LGBTQ+ agenda.

Greater Than misrepresents a statement made by the former US president during a speech given for Father’s Day, falsely implying that he agreed with their anti-gay campaign.

Obama, who was in office from 2009 to 2017, said in his speech: “We know that when fathers abandon their responsibilities, there’s harm done to those kids.”

Barack Obama has been a long-time ally of the LGBTQ+ community

Promoting responsible fatherhood rather than heterosexual parenting, he added: “We know that children who grow up without a father are more likely to live in poverty. They’re more likely to drop out of school. They’re more likely to wind up in prison. They’re more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol. They’re more likely to run away from home. They’re more likely to become teenage parents themselves.”

Drawing on his own childhood, where his father left the family when he was just two years old, Obama said: “I say all this as someone who grew up without a father in my own life…. And while I was lucky to have a wonderful mother and loving grandparents who poured everything they had into me and my sister, I still felt the weight of that absence. It’s something that leaves a hole in a child’s life that no government can fill.”

Obama has been a long-time ally of the LGBTQ+ community, publicly supporting same-sex marriage in 2012 and having previously advocated for its legalisation during his 1996 Illinois state Senate campaign.

“Children’s rights aren’t up for debate” – Greater Than campaign argues against same-sex marriage

The Greater Than campaign website features Obama’s picture alongside those of Charlie Kirk, Allie Beth Stuckey, and Seth Dillon – aside from Obama, all outspoken anti-LGBTQ+ political figures in the US – under the title:
“Children’s rights aren’t up for debate: be a voice that refuses to stay silent – stand up for kids.”

The campaign’s messaging frames LGBTQ+ parents as “putting adult desires over children’s needs” and describes same-sex parenting as a “destructive state-sanctioned gaslighting experiment on children.”

Katy Faust, founder of the 2026 campaign, has long promoted anti-gay rhetoric. By working with a coalition of around 47 right‑wing and religious groups, she aims to overturn the 2015 US Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalised same-sex marriage nationwide.

Faust said the group had come together after observing the “consequences” of same-sex marriages and child-rearing, which they argue should only occur between a man and a woman.

Attempts to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges have been denied in recent months

“Parenthood [is being] treated as replaceable, and children [are being] deprived of the unique love and guidance only a mother and father can provide,” she stated, using the comment to promote her campaign to overturn same-sex marriage.

Attempts to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges have been denied in recent months, after former Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis appealed to the US Supreme Court in August 2025.

In November, the Court rejected Davis’s appeal to overturn same-sex marriage, ruling that the legalisation of same-sex marriage remains in force nationwide.