A Republican candidate who is also a member of the Tea Party expressed support for stoning gay people to death, according to The Huffington Post.
Scott Esk, of Oklahoma, made the comments during a debate on Facebook last year. But he may soon get the chance to share some of his Biblical ideals with the state legislature, as he is slated to run for the state House of Representatives at the end of June.
Stoning homosexuals, the Republican said, was a practice sanctioned by God.
"That was done in the Old Testament under a law that came directly from God and in that time there it was totally just. It came directly from God," Esk told the Moore Daily, supporting what he wrote on Facebook. "I have no plans to reinstitute that in Oklahoma law. I do have some very huge moral misgivings about those kinds of sins."
However, Esk wrote on Facebook last summer that he never said he would introduce "legislation to put homosexuals to death," but he "didn't have a problem with it," The Huffington Post reported.
"I think we would totally be in the right to do it," Esk wrote. "That goes against some parts of libertarianism I realize, and I'm largely libertarian, but ignoring as a nation things that are worthy of death is very remiss."
Esk, who owns a window-washing business, also took a jab at those who get divorced, saying that divorce cases should be tried by a jury.
"I also don't buy into the notion that it's unfair to make somebody stay in a marriage he's unhappy with," wrote Esk, whose 15-year marriage ended in divorce, according to The Huffington Post.
Elections for the state House of Representatives will be held on June 24.
"I look forward to applying Biblical principles to Oklahoma law," Esk wrote on his website.
