Shawn Ashmore and Ellen Page speaking at the 2013 San Diego Comic Con International for X-Men: Days of Future Past at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, California. Photo: Gage Skidmore | FlickrCC.
At the Iowa State Fair, Canadian actress Ellen Page said to Ted Cruz “Can we ask you questions right now”? Cruz did not immediately answer her as he had just taken a big bite out of a pork chop wrapped in tin foil.
Page brought two others one of whom had a camera. She was wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses and then dove into her questions. The Texas senator and GOP presidential candidate gave his assent while still holding his pork chop.
Page, who is openly gay, asked a broad opening question about his views on the use of religious liberty to justify discrimination against the LGBT community. She then cited racial segregation and women’s suffrage movements as other examples of groups that suffered discrimination in the name of religious freedom.
Cruz responded, “If you actually look at the history in this country of defeating slavery, if you look at the history of defeating Jim Crow, leaders in the church played a critical role.” He invoked Martin Luther King’s letter from the Birmingham jail “where he calls upon the conscience of Christians to stand up.”
The two who are both Canadian-born spoke for over five minutes on the topic. Friday night Cruz is holding a rally in Des Moines meant to call “attention to the religious persecution of Christian business owners and employees who have been sanctioned by their government because of their religious beliefs.”
Along with the senator, the event will feature appearances by other religious freedom advocates, including an Iowa couple that refused to host a gay wedding at a venue they owned.
Page is in Iowa on a project for VICE Media, her publicist told ABC News, declining to provide details.
