Washington D.C., Feb 6, 2012 / 17:18 pm
Professor Doug Kmiec, a Catholic supporter of Barack Obama in the 2008 election, has rebuked the president, saying he may withdraw his endorsement over the federal contraception coverage mandate.
“Where is the common good, sir, in not making room for the great Catholic traditions of education, health care, and meeting the needs of the least among us?” Kmiec asked the president in a letter he made public Feb. 6 through the website Catholic Online.
On the same day, the Washington, D.C. newspaper The Hill published excerpts of an e-mail from Kmiec saying he was “now unhappily without a candidate,” until he could “have an opportunity to speak with the president” about Health and Human Services' new rules on contraception coverage.
“This matter goes to the heart of who we are as a people,” Kmiec stated in his letter to the president, as he went on to ask why Obama would “put the cold calculus of politics above faith and freedom.”
The Pepperdine University professor, who served as U.S. ambassador to Malta from 2009 to 2011, suggested the president was forcing him to choose between “friendship” and his “duty to faith and country.”