Democrat Rep. Nick Rahall cosponsors doomed nationwide same-sex marriage ban

A congressman from West Virginia has become the first Democrat to cosponsor the Marriage Protection Amendment, BuzzFeed reported on Thursday.

Rep. Nick Rahall (D-WV) signed on as one of the 39 cosponsors of the proposed amendment to the U.S. constitution, which would prohibit same-sex marriage nationwide. The other 38 cosponsors are conservative Republicans.

“He apparently has a fondness for being on the wrong side of history,” a Human Rights Campaign spokesman told BuzzFeed.

The amendment needs to be approved by a two-thirds majority vote in both the House and Senate before being ratified by three-fourths of states. However, no one in the House of Representatives seems willing to even move the bill forward.

The proposed “Marriage Protection Amendment” to the U.S. Constitution would read, “Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.”