Clarence Mason Weaver, who was recently named to an advisory board position in President Donald Trump’s campaign, is a right-wing commentator who believes that homosexuality is “evil” and an “abomination.” Weaver has said that people have “got to worry about homosexual training” in schools and questioned, “What is wrong with being homophobic.” He’s also said he has a problem with gay co-workers and would “not appear on a program with a homosexual host and pretend like that’s normal.”  

Media Matters reported on Monday that Weaver has frequently pushed misogynistic rhetoric, including saying that women aren’t equal to men and that they damaged society when they won the “‘right’ to leave the home and go to work”’; claiming that women who report sexual misconduct at work are the reason “why we don’t want to be around you in a business”; and stating that women should carry themselves as “handmaidens” and “be submissive.” 

The Trump campaign recently launched its “Black Voices for Trump” coalition, which aims to “encourage the black community to re-elect President Donald J. Trump by sharing experiences and successes of everyday people as a result of the Trump administration.” The campaign named Weaver to its advisory board; he attended the coalition launch in Georgia and wrote on Facebook that he got to “meet the President [and] shake his hand again.” He also met Lara Trump. 

Weaver is also an open anti-LGBTQ bigot. 

In November 2018, he posted a video complaining about an advertisement featuring a woman in a same-sex marriage. He related that he told his granddaughter that “homosexuality is a abomination. Not just a sin. It’s abomination.” He later criticized people who try to find “common ground” on the issue, saying, “How can you find common ground with evil and sin?”  

Weaver added that he “can work with homosexuals. I've worked with a lot of homosexuals. Worked with a lot of them. Political and social things. But I’m not going to stand there and pretend like that’s not a sin. Like you would not -- I would not pretend like I don’t sin. I would not pretend, I’m not going to try to fool God to make you feel comfortable.” He added: “I appear on programs all the time with homosexuals. I will not appear on a program with a homosexual host and pretend like that’s normal.” He expanded on a hypothetical meeting with a same-sex couple: 

Weaver also said that he’s homeschooled his kids in part because he wanted to “get them out” of an environment where “we got to worry about homosexual training.”  

In a May 2016 video, Weaver criticized President Barack Obama for purportedly having wanted “to destroy the boundaries between men and women. Every aspect of our lives we’re told that men should be soft. Homosexuality is all over TV. Soft men. In our dancing, in our music. Men are weak and women are strong.” 

In January, Weaver shared a Reuters story about India's army chief “drawing accusations of homophobia” after “saying gay sex would not be tolerated among soldiers, months after the country scrapped a colonial-era ban on same-sex relations.” On Twitter, Weaver wrote: “WHAT IS WRONG WITH BEING HOMOPHOBIC.” He also tweeted about a transgender contestant in the 2018 Miss Universe pageant: “This is not gender equality, it is gender delusion. You are a man. You don’t have a womb, you are a guy. It is not gender equality because you don’t equal a women. #StopPlaying.” 

The Trump administration has been hostile to the rights of LGBTQ individuals when it comes to policy positions and appointments, and Weaver's position on the coalition advisory board reinforces that trend in the Trump campaign.