that was al snyder back in 2011. the u.s. supreme court had just ruled the west borough baptist church had the right to free speech where the group protested outside of snyder s son s fr funeral. he was killed in iraq in 2506of. the signs carried outside the funeral, despicable. i won t read them aloud. al snide hear been keeping a secret for a while and he s here to share it with us now. al, what s the secret? the whole time i was going through this, i managed to keep from the media that while i was fighting this hate, gay hate group, that i myself was gay. why keep it a secret during the course of the multiyears of litigation? in the very beginning of the process, my partner and i made the decision that we would not share this, because we didn t
because i really wanted to get to this heartfelt story you broke. because it s about a father who was fighting not just one, but two battles at once. one being the right to keep his son s memory peaceful and taking the west boro baptist church to court. tell me about him. we all got to know al snyder, the father of matthew snyder. we lost matthew snyder in a one-car humvee accident in iraq in 2006. you know the rest of that story. westboro baptist showed up at the funeral in maryland with ugly visitrysigns and when they posted online about the way he raised his son. he and his wife raised his son. dad had enough filed a lawsuit and was successful at a trial court level, and then in an appellate battle went all the way to the supreme court of the united states. and brooke all the while, dad
in which his father was now comfortable. and it was just fine with him. and frequently, when he would write whether it was from an overseas deployment or during the course of basic training, he would be sure to say to dad, extend greetings to mr. walt. with whom al snyder had more than a decade-long relationship. i cannot wait to watch the interview. tomorrow. we re watching tomorrow morning 9:00 a.m. eastern here on cnn. true big heartfelt. michael, welcome to the cnn family. thank you so much for saying that. coming up next the power of a girl and her pen. meet our cnn hero next.
to talk about the most awkward man in the world mitt romney. mitt romney will talk about how president obama is politicizing killing osama bin laden. it was really his idea. although we have audio that proves otherwise. all right. all of that to come on it s a big tuesday show. in the meantime newsroom. good morning, jacki. good morning, stephanie. good morning, everyone. representative howard berman is going up against brad sherman and berman may have just gotten the best endorsement ever. i bring you betty white. here she is with hot in cleveland costar, in a new ad for howard berman. thanks to howard we have hundreds of more policeman patrolling the streets. and he very nice blue eyes. today is may day and the occupy movement protests are around underway. organizes have created more than 135 events nationwide. today s date is not without precedent may day is also international worker s day. occupy wall street reports that picket lines have formed at lax in los ange
mounting pressure to get out of afghanistan. talking at a significant success in afghanistan, president obama is expected to announce bringing home 5000 troops next month, another 5000 by year s end, 30,000, the entire surge in 2009, by the end of next year. we do not have unlimited resources and we have to make decisions about how to spend precious dollars. some lawmakers don t think that is enough. democrats and republicans said the president at saying that half of the troops now afghanistan need to come home this year $100 billion a year we are spending their can be used here. i believe it is time for us to rebuild america, not afghanistan. military commanders warned that the president that pulling out too fast could strengthen the anime. we withdrew from afghanistan and that taliban came eventually, followed by al qaeda, followed by attacks on the united states of america. it is not wise for the commander in chief to pull forces in the middle of the fight.