“Do you really think you’re a champion of the gay community?” Cooper asked, observing that under Florida’s marriage ban, LGBTQ+ survivors of the shooting would not have been allowed to receive visits from their partners in the hospital. “I have never seen you talk about gays and lesbians and transgender people in a positive way until now,” Cooper added, wondering if Bondi’s new statements were “hypocritical.” Bondi responded by repeatedly insisting that she had merely followed the Florida state constitution, and that she had “never said I don’t like gay people.”
Although that interview ended in a curt handshake, Bondi swiftly pivoted to attack Cooper in other media appearances. In a radio interview on WOR, Bondi accused Cooper of “encourag[ing] anger and hate” by calling out her previous record. “There’s a time and place for everything, but yesterday wasn’t the time nor the place in front of a hospital when we could have been helping victims,” Bondi said. In response, Cooper fired back on CNN later that week to say Bondi was “either mistaken or not telling the truth” about the interview and her record.
“Ms. Bondi’s big complaint seems to be that I asked in the wake of a massacre of gay and lesbian citizens about her new statements about the gay community and about her old ones,” Cooper said at the time. “Ms. Bondi is championing efforts to help survivors, but the very right that allows gay spouses to bury their loved ones — that’s a right that wouldn’t exist if she had her way.”
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